Thoughts on this Veteran's Day

     It has been a few years since I wrote about my dad's exploits during WWII.
 
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     He is and always will be my hero.  Another hero has arisen in the family.  My daughter will soon be a Lt. Colonel in the Air Force.  I am one proud dad for what she has done and for what she will do.

     I could easily write a tome defending the Air Force Academy and what it has given my youngest daughter.  But that is not why I'm writing this post. 

     My daughter went to a Catholic high school.  Her acceptance to the Air Force Academy was valued and supported by her classmates and the faculty at her school.  This is not the case at many public schools today.  A friend's son was accepted to West Point and he was told by a couple of his teachers that he should consider going to a real college and not waste his time at a service academy.

    When did our country change?  When a 16-year-old kid is being told that attending West Point is going to be bad for his future, then there is a dangerous disconnect in America, and entirely too many Americans have no idea what kind of burdens our military is bearing.

     In World War II, 11.2% of the nation served in four years.

     In Vietnam, 4.3% served in 12 years.

     Since 2001, only 0.45% of our population has served in the Global War on Terror.

     These are unbelievable statistics.

     Over time, fewer and fewer people have shouldered more and more of the burden and it is only getting worse. Our troops were sent to war in Iraq by a Congress consisting of 10% veterans with only one person having a child in the military.  Taxes did not increase to pay for the war. War bonds were not sold.  Gas was not regulated. In fact, the average citizen was asked "to sacrifice nothing," and has sacrificed nothing unless s/he has chosen to out of the goodness of their heart.

     The only people who have sacrificed are the veterans and their families.

     The volunteers. The people who swore an oath to defend this nation.  You stand there, deployment after deployment and fight on. You've lost relationships, spent years of your lives in extreme conditions, years apart from kids you'll never get back, and beaten your body in a way that even professional athletes don't understand.  Then you come home to a nation that doesn't understand.  It is not like the vitriol of the Vietnam Conflict, but there is an indifference from not understanding.

     They don't understand. . . suffering.  They don't understand. . . sacrifice.  They don't understand why you fight for them. They don't understand that bad people exist -- that there is evil in the world.  They look at you like you're a machine - like something is wrong with you. You are the misguided one - not them.

     When you get out, you sit in the college classrooms with political science teachers who discount your opinions on Iraq and Afghanistan because YOU WERE THERE!  You don't understand the macro issues they gathered from books because of your. . . bias.

     You watch TV shows where every vet has PTSD and a violent strain at that.

     Your Congress is debating your benefits, your retirement, and your pay, while they ask you -- to do more.  The President of the United at this year's Wreath Ceremony in Arlington says "we will take care of you" and then adds a "veiled threat" that finances are difficult.  What finances?

     But, the amazing thing about you is that. . . you all know this. You know your country will never pay back what you've given up. You know that the populace at large will never truly understand or appreciate what you have done for them.  Hell, you know that in some circles, you will be thought as less than normal for having worn the uniform. 

     But, you do it anyway.  You do what the greatest men and women of this country have done since 1775 - YOU SERVED. Just that decision alone makes you part of an elite group.

     "Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few." - Winston Churchill - August of 1940.

     Thank you to the 0.45% who have and continue to serve our Nation.   May God bless you and the United States of America.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYya4O9XD_M