Tip of the cap to The Loon, who sent this to me and I just saw it last night (mea culpa, mea culpa):

Before You Go Home

Quite the reminder of what we are losing, everyday.

In case I haven’t said this lately, let me say it now – go out and thank as many veterans as you can find. Doesn’t matter how old they are or how young they are. Tell them you appreciate their service to this country. Doesn’t matter if they claim they were forced into it, or if they served willingly and would do it again. Thank them for their service. I thank every veteran I run across. I usually get tears in return, if the veteran is older than I am. I’ll get a “It was my pleasure, sir!” out of the younger ones. If the veteran is a little stooped, and his baseball cap with the 1st MarDiv patch on it has World War Two battlegrounds listed next to it, I’ll learn some military history and some personal service history. If the names on the cap are oriental and difficult to pronounce, I’ll get clarification of the names, and why they are on his cap. Sometimes, from a Viet Nam vet, I’ll get five minutes of silence while his stare goes out to a thousand yards and he runs down his mental list of buddies he can’t see anywhere but in his mind… that’s when I sit quietly, and watch his face, and start to tear up for him, and for my cousin, who died with the epithet of “babykiller” still ringing in his ears, thirty years after he stepped off the freedom bird. Thank them all, because they did something not everyone is willing to do – put their beliefs and their lives fully behind the greatest nation in the world.

Thank you, Gawfer.
Thank you, Doug.
Thank you, Fred.
Thank you, Kris.
Thank you, Old Soldier.
Thank you, Greybeard.
Thank you, Gunny.
Thank you, GuyK.
Thank you, Akinoluna.
Thank you, dtodeen.
Thank you, Hans and Lewis.
Thank you, Fix4RSO.
Thank you, Mac.
Thank you, Stu.
Thank you, Eric.

Added 5-19-08
Thank you, Richard.
Thank you, Rogue.

And thank you to the ones I missed, whether because I couldn’t remember or since I was writing this so late at night I shouldn’t even be up…

To all the veterans out there: Thank You.

On this day, in 1943, US forces landed on Tarawa. In honor of that occasion, once again I refer you to this post:

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It was low tide. The young man stood on the outermost shelf of the reef that protected this island paradise, the crashing waves behind him, the coral cliffs that supported the flat top of the island more than a hundred yards away and thirty to forty feet high. The reef itself was only eight inches below the surface of the water; waves didn’t make it to this point because of the deep drop off at the end of the coral shelf. He had carefully made his way to this vantage point, gingerly stepping around the many sink holes that would be hidden from view in more turbulent water. His eyes scanned the many scars and cracks on the face of the cliff, knowing that each mark was man made-either with the picks and shovels of the defenders or the impact of high-explosive ordinance thrown from the invaders’ ships more than forty years in the past.

He searched and found the narrow slits at the tops of the cliffs, and followed them down twisted pathways to the narrow strips of dazzling white sand at the water’s edge. In his mind he replayed the words he had read – “…the landing craft ran aground on the reef… …as the ramps crashed down, we were sitting ducks for the Japanese guns in the cliffs… …I was the only one that made it to the beach from our LC… …they were dug in so deep we couldn’t get at them… …the water was red from the waves to the shore…” – and stood there, in the quiet summer sunshine, and listened to the ghosts of the Marines who had taken Tarawa.

He turned from the cliffs, and rejoined his fellow Marines as they regrouped at the base of one of the paths to the top. Pausing, they examined the shreds of leather that had been their boots before they stepped onto the knife-sharp coral shelf. The joking back and forth died down, replaced with the sobering realization of just what those young kids had faced in World War Two. Scrambling up the steep path, they found an opening into the warren of caves behind the cliff face. Moving from room to room, bent over double, they could see every inch of the defender’s territory from the base of the cliffs to the watery horizon. Idle kicking of the dust on the floor would turn up Japanese machine gun casings, bits of shrapnel, and the remains of cooking fires – signs of human occupation many years past.

Returning to the coveted airstrip, they boarded an older model cargo plane, ready to continue their flight back to the base on the island of Okinawa. The plane’s propellers strained against the wheel brakes as the engines were readied for the launch; assisted by an auxiliary jet engine, the plane leaped back into the clear blue sky over the Sea of Japan.
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Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

Ooh-Rah. Semper Fi. Happy Birthday to all my Devil Dogs out there in Blogland.

God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and get in on the Baby Pool!