My Story - 30 Years Ago

Robert asked in his post, what were you doing 30 years ago today?

30 years ago today, I was oh not so patiently waiting for my senior year in high school to come to an end...then it was off to Basic Training...at times it seems so long ago, but at other times it feels as it was only yesterday. Funny how the mind plays tricks on us like that, especially when the memory is of one to which we are so close.

I think of Robert and his family often and I hope everyone of them are doing well. If you live in his neck of the woods, I implore you to support Robert in his current endeavor to secure a spot in the Legislature, for Robert is the kind of man who will make a difference.

Robert’s story of Mike's birth sounds so familiar to me, as it is very similar to the flurry of activity that surrounded the birth of son#2 (S2). S2 was late, two-weeks late and although everything seemed fine, we just felt that we shouldn't be waiting any longer. On December 26, 1999 we finally went to the hospital in labor, and we had decided that we weren't leaving there without our child (we had made a decision to not learn the sex of the baby with both boys). Finally, the time came and our second son was on his way out...but something wasn't right. The umbilical cord had wrapped around his neck and with every push, it was choking him, to death. Labor it seems had become a fight for survival for our little one. After what seemed like hours, but was really only an hour at most, he was delivered, and placed on his mother’s chest, but still something was wrong. It was then that we saw the face on our mid-wife change from one of serious business to out-right fear.

Rub his chest…pinch his toes…nothing was working he just wasn't breathing enough... Then he was gone, ripped off her chest and out of her arms and out of the room. A quick hesitant look at each other and her eyes told me all I needed to know - go after them and don't come back without him!

We were lucky, the local hospital was a big one, and a year earlier they had opened up their own Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) and yes, as Robert noted they do say it - Nick U, across the hall from the Labor and Delivery Suites. Through the glass I saw him...tiny, with more tubes coming out of him than you could think possible. The delivery process and umbilical cord issue had caused him to instinctively try to gasp for breath, unfortunately he was still in amniotic fluid at the time and he swallowed a fair amount of fluid as well as meconium too - the pressure change caused his right lung to collapse.

Two-weeks later we were able to hold him for the first time; today he is a healthy 6th Grader and the Scribe for his Scout Troop.

Like Robert I am blessed by my children, they are my heroes for both of them have overcome so much and still every day they get up and do it all again. I don't know if I would have had the strength to do what they do but I suppose, as people tell me that they are just like me, that somewhere I have the strength that they do.

God bless you Robert, drive safely and give our hellos to Mike and to your Dad O, they are who they are, because of you just as you are who you are because of them. Hold onto your Memories and keep making more, for to forget debases us as humans and we have more value than that for our purpose comes from an authority higher than us all.

Never forget that even in the darkest of times we can find the path God wants us to follow if we believe in Romans 8-25 and follow the example of Isaiah and simply reply, "Send me."

[Ed Note: This is my story, ask my wife and the details may vary slightly, but I am a firm believe in remembering the story in the manner to which it benefits you the most. Besides I'm a historian by training I can't be expected to be so exact with the facts can I? lol)

Where Have All the MilBlogs Gone – Part 2

In response to my post yesterday there has been some reaction.

The Armorer believes that “[s]ome of it is fashion - blogging is old hat now, and has been impacted both by ubiquity (gone are our days of 10K+ visits) which lead to niche choices - just like the proliferation of cable channels reduced the no-other-choice artificial numbers of the big TV nets. Social media has changed dramatically, with Facebook and Twitter being much easier to use (and tailor who receives the data) than maintaining a blog.” But he also goes on to say that, “So, many of the more prominent voices... are negative. Even when they are also positive. DoD can't really impact those of us not drawing active duty pay. But they can act on the voices in the sandboxes.”

John Lilyea of This Ain’t Hell writes that “[t]his must be a recent phenomenon, because under the Bush years, it was encouraged.”

But I can’t say that it was encouraged under the Bush Administration because by 2006 the first Social Media policy was released by the Army. At the time Blackfive said in an interview with Fox News, “The regulation was either poorly written or intended to crack down on bloggers…”

And then in December 2009 MilBloggers around the globe went silent in support of MSG CJ Grisham after his command effectively told him to “shut up or get out” all because he dared challenge the local school board, because of actions taken against his daughter. In response to that, blogger blackout Army Live the official blog of the U.S. Army posted A Message to Milbloggers. Lindy Kyzer, Public Affairs Specialist, Online and Social Media Division, who single-handedly dragged the Department of the Army into the digital age of social media, wrote in that column, “As a huge fan of milblogs – personally and professionally – I do my best to keep up with issues in the milblogosphere. And to be honest, I have to say I wasn’t aware of huge issues among our bloggers. There has been at least one high profile case, but I haven’t been on the grapevine of information about widespread shut downs of military blogs. From my foxhole, I meet new commanders and leaders in our Army every day who openly embrace milblogging in the ranks. Gone are the days when LTG William Caldwell was one of the few champions of engaging the blogosphere. These days everyone from the Secretary of the Army to battalion and brigade commanders across the field aren’t just supportive of blogging – many of them are blogging themselves.

I absolutely admit that there are still areas, and leaders, where blogging in the ranks is not met with open arms. And most of the issues milbloggers have are with their local command, not a headquarters Army action item. We consider our left and right boundaries when it comes to social media engagement and blogging to be the Uniform Code of Justice and Operations Security.”

Her suggestions on how to avoid being targeted were simple but concerning:
1. Consider a pseudonym,
2. Little brother is watching,
3. Don’t get political
4. Don’t diss the boss.

In the comments Major Z wrote: “If the best that senior leadership can offer me for advice is ‘use a pseudonym’ then they are a LOT less than I desire as leaders. The leaders who taught me as a young officer were ones who explained that you should be honest in thought, word, and deed; loyal to the constitution and your oath; and have the integrity state your beliefs and opinions--even if they are unpopular. There was a time, place, and means for stating these opinions and beliefs, a right and wrong way. I don't personally blog about differences of opinion with my Military leaders. I have written about my differences with elected leaders. I thought that as a free citizen, that was my right. I have been punished for using harsh language, reprimanded for writing things that were taken grossly out of context. What opinion of my leadership should I hold when the best advice they can give me is ‘wear a mask, hide, and say whatever you want?’”

And that has brought us to the situation we find ourselves in today. Currently what few voices are out there are only posting DoD approved puff pieces, puff pieces that are providing anything but the honest truth about what is happening, because if the truth was getting out then LTC Daniel Davis wouldn’t have felt it necessary to post his essay, Truth lies and Afghanistan – How military leaders have let us down.

LTC Davis, spent last year in Afghanistan, visiting and talking with U.S. troops and their Afghan partners. His duties with the Army’s Rapid Equipping Force took him into every significant area where our soldiers engage the enemy and he has this to say about Afghanistan. “Over the course of 12 months, I covered more than 9,000 miles and talked, traveled and patrolled with troops in Kandahar, Kunar, Ghazni, Khost, Paktika, Kunduz, Balkh, Nangarhar and other provinces.

What I saw bore no resemblance to rosy official statements by U.S. military leaders about conditions on the ground.

Entering this deployment, I was sincerely hoping to learn that the claims were true: that conditions in Afghanistan were improving, that the local government and military were progressing toward self-sufficiency. I did not need to witness dramatic improvements to be reassured, but merely hoped to see evidence of positive trends, to see companies or battalions produce even minimal but sustainable progress.

Instead, I witnessed the absence of success on virtually every level.”

If this was the type of reporting that Army brass wanted to hinder with their rules on Social Media then LTC Davis’ career is probably over, which is precisely why we cannot have a policy that punished soldiers for simply pointing out the truth, no matter how many people don’t want to hear the truth. If leaders are afraid of the truth then they shouldn’t be leaders. No one wants hear from their subordinates that they are complete morons, and honestly those types of comments aren't my concern with this series. What I am concerend about are bloggers or soldiers who know that things aren't working and are being silenced. Leaders have to hear when their plans aren’t working! They have to hear it from those ordered to implement their plans that the plans are total failures and simply aren’t going to work, because the Afghan’s or Iraqi's or whomever, aren’t capable or are unwilling of following through!

The lack of blogs may be a result of more than one thing as The Armorer notes, and Facebook and Twitter may have filled the void, or even supplanted the blog from the soldier who found him or herself deployed in this war, but I can’t help but wonder if it isn’t by design. If LTC Davis’ opinion piece is any indication, I’m going to have to say yes, it is. As my buddy TRCNAK asked me last night in reference to the recent trends, what stories are not being told?

What stories indeed!

Where Have the MilBlogs Gone?

Do you wonder where all the blogs went that were being written by the soldiers on the frontlines? I do, I’ve been tracking these blogs for close to a decade now and for information on what is happening on the front lines you are pretty much now resigned to the major media outlets or the Department of Defense official reports, and the few blogs that are out there are primarily being written by civilians or contractors.

So what happened to the wide spread use of social media by the troops? The best I can tell is that they either went dark or completely private, meaning the blog owner has to approve you to view their posts, because Big Army has put the hammer down on anything that doesn’t reflect highly on the mission or the commanders.

CJ Grisham, a Master Sergeant currently serving in Afghanistan writes a blog called A Soldier’s Perspective. He is an outspoken blogger who doesn’t hold back when he sees someone doing the wrong thing, and has been in very public debates with local school districts as well as correspondents, but since late 2011 he hasn’t posted anything.

Major Zigenfuss, founder of Project ValOUR IT, and owner of the blog, From My Position…On the way!, who started blogging about his deployment to Iraq and then continued to blog after he was seriously wounded by an IED, is now deployed to Afghanistan, but his once vociferous blogging has also gone silent.

Milblogging.com, a site founded by JP Borda after his return from Afghanistan in 2004 catalogs Milblogs of every persuasion. He currently list over 3000 MilBlogs but a scant handful of them are being published from the frontlines, and on the list of recently updated blogs, none are being updated by soldiers on active duty, let alone deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan.

A few short years ago we had thousands of frontline bloggers telling us what was going on, telling their story both good and bad. Matthew Currier Burden founder and owner of the blog Blackfive even published a book called The Blog of War, highlighting their efforts. The Blog of War presented selections from some of the best of the military blogs, the purest account of the many voices of this war and offered a glimpse into the full range of military experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq, from the decision to enlist right through to homecoming. That book could not be written now.

Blogs such as this blog and the Mudville Gazette used to run daily updates and roundups of blog posts from the frontline but the Web Reconnaissance and From the Front series from The Thunder Run and The Dawn Patrol from the Mudville Gazette have done dark.

At the 2008 and 2009 MilBlog Conferences, Army staff participated and whole-heartedly supported the advent of blogging by soldier on the frontlines. Social media roundups spearheaded by Lindsay Kyzer for the DoD gave higher level commanders a depth of understanding of what was being said about the military by giving them an actual roundup of what was being said on blogs and broader-audience social media outlets. If the January 25, 2012 edition of the Social Media Review (SMR)[Click on the thumbnails to open each slide] is any indication, what was once a look at what is being said is now a 10-slide presentation on all the ways that blogging can be a violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ).

Are the days of service-members giving their open, honest, and usually gritty opinion gone? Based upon the dearth of active and open blogs on the internet right now, I’d have to say yes it is.

During my off the record interviews for this post I was told that soldiers are told that any time they talk to a reporter, they are free to give their opinion on anything, but that they should stay in their lane. Which basically means, don’t talk about something you don’t know anything about! Soldiers are regularly told that they can say whatever they want, as long as they make it clear it is their opinion, so if that is true, why can’t they write anything they want as long as it is their opinion?

Under the current rules highlighted in the SMR if a soldier posts on their Facebook page that they are not happy with the President’s policy on X they can be prosecuted under Article 88 of the UCMJ. Have a disagreement on Facebook or Twitter with a Senior NCO on policy and you can be counseled for violating the Social Media guidelines set forth in DTM 09-026. Get counseled one too many times and you can be separated from the Army under Article 600-235.

The Effect

So what is the effect of the lack of blogs by soldiers deployed on the frontlines? For some of us there is no effect, the lack of a third voice insulates us against the war because let’s face it no one really wants to know that after a decade of mentoring by the US, French, British, Germans and dozens of other militaries, the Afghan Army still can’t handle the most basic of logistical issues, and their soldiers still have no concept on the use toilet paper. No one really wants to know what our troopers go through on a daily basis, the hours of shear boredom they endure, or the days of extreme stress and fatigue they sustain on long patrols through the countryside, or the horrible conditions under which they have to live.

But we need their voices to be heard, they have a level of experience and expertise that is needed to temper the erroneous and sometime blatant falsehoods being spread by the enemy and the press. Right now a disembedded correspondent is on a mission to have the Red Crosses on the MEDEVAC Helicopters (Medical Evacuation) of the U.S. Army removed, so that they can be converted to armed CASEVAC helicopters (Casualty Evacuation). His belief is that because the MEDEVAC helicopters are not armed and fly with armed escorts that if we simply remove the Red Crosses we could arm them with weapons and they could fly on their own without escorts, thus shortening the time it takes them to get to those who urgently need them.

Right now he is the only person out there asking for this to happen, he has written to Congressmen and gotten Washington involved. His dispatches appear on dozens of high profile web sites around the world, and there is not one voice out there countering him and some of his absurd assumptions because the Army’s rules on Social Media use have blacked them out.

Why do we need their voices, because no one cares what Big Army says about the topic, no one has even seen Big Army’s response to his claims and how removing the Red Crosses and adding weapons effectively destroys their MEDEVAC capabilities. Frontline bloggers could effectively rebuke his short sighted beliefs, but instead every day he releases another letter “supporting his position”. What does this mean for you - nothing if you don’t have a dog in the fight, but what if you have a son or daughter deployed to Afghanistan, who heaven forbid gets hit by an IED and needs a MEDEVAC flight, a flight that arrives with ALL of the medical support equipment (defibrillator, IV pumps, O2, Monitoring Devices etc.) needed to keep them, and their buddy, alive until they can reach a forward hospital, but instead receives one of this correspondent’s new CASEVAC flights, that got there with a medic and his aid bag of bandages and an IV?

Then it becomes important, unfortunately it may be too late.

The Future

One of the questions I asked during my interviews was “why the change and what do you see as the future for Social Media use by soldiers?” The results aren’t promising. The current rules on the use of Social Media by soldiers are a complete reversal of the rules from just a few years ago.

Gone are the days when soldiers were encouraged to blog, good or bad and after reviewing the material, and the pattern exhibited by the Army, I can only guess that it is because as the war winds down and budgets are getting cut, commanders are looking once again at their own careers and not their soldiers.

What does this mean for soldiers, it means that they once again have to go underground and that if they want to blog, use twitter, or facebook they are going to do so under aliases, if they want to write anything at all.

So Long My Friend

“I’ll never go home again.”

The words hung in the air after he spoke.

“So true,” I replied, “at least not to this home.”

The finality of it all came in a brief flash, after a lifetime seeking the Zen like quality of being while not being, of being one with your surroundings and having the ability to release yourself from the draw of your belongings, it was only achieved by being thrust upon him.

Our belongings do not define us, but our belongings are a part of us, we collect them because they mean something to us. They remind us of someone, or someplace, or some time, and as cliché as it sounds, they are only things, and they can be lost and lost they were - consumed in the fire that left his home a smoldering pile of rubble.

No loss of life, only property, and still, it, for lack of a better word, sucks.

Recounting the days that followed I could hear in his voice the sense of loss as he described the monumental task of searching through the rubble for items that you knew just had to survive; surely not everything could have been lost, only with much reluctance to give up after hours of fruitless searching. In the end it is just easier to rip the band-aid off in a single tug, call the demo company and have it all trucked away, because it still mattered it hurt too much to sift through the pile of rubble that suddenly represented your life’s accomplishments. Death by a thousand paper-cuts, as each destroyed memory was found in the pile and each hopeful wish was dashed by the incredibly efficient effect of fire on the fabric of one’s life.

And still we learn.

This was the first time any of us have been on the other side. We are a group of sheepdogs, always doing for others, whether that is in some Emergency Room treating the next patient, or responding on the call for help. Hearing him talk of the scene as the local fire department responded and did their job, I could picture it exactly, but it was hearing him talk of the firefighters and their radio transmissions that really made me think. They were doing their job, handling inquiries from the media and still fighting the fire, but he was on the outside now, and despite being rational enough to understand that it wasn’t personal to them, it was very personal to him. Our gallows humor in that line of work, I think could be our undoing at times.

He says that he is going to be more vigilant to that family member standing at the end of the stretcher the next time he is working on a patient, because now he knows, that while it may be exciting for us, to be battling against death, it is far from an exciting time for that person, who is now very emotionally involved, and hyper sensitive to every little word. I hope I can do the same, for him and others.

Yet, the road goes ever on.

I am extremely lucky that I have a core group of friends that while we are apart geographically, we are never that far apart from each other. I am sure you know the kind of friend I’m talking about, you may go weeks, months or even years between conversations, but as soon as you see or hear from them you can pick right back up where you left off. And so it was yesterday, after 2 plus hours on the phone talking with him.

But that geographical distance is destined to get even further apart. It is as those with faith are wont to proclaim, when a door closes a window opens, and this window beckons to a move across country. When you are literally wearing everything you own, packing for that trip is the easiest one you’ll ever take.

Plans have been made for a final farewell before he sets off on that grand adventure, and then he will be gone, and hopefully he will find a place that he can once again call home.

Good luck my friend, you will always be welcome in my home, and I wouldn’t want anyone else to be by my side when the lead starts to fly.

Ciao!

Hugh and Dorothy

He was 91 and as spry as a 30 year old.

I noticed him right away, his WWII Vet ball cap wasn’t out of place, but his face was one that I never remembered seeing at a family reunion. His name is Hugh and my grandfather was his uncle. He was a man that looked like had a million stories to tell but today all he wanted to talk about was the picture of the beautiful woman he held in his hand.

Dorothy was her name and she had been his wife for 66 years.

Dorothy was from the wrong side of the tracks as Hugh liked to tell it, but Dorothy was from the right side of the tracks and it was Hugh who was from the north-side. But Dorothy loved Hugh and Hugh loved Dorothy and for 66 years they raised a family. But it almost wasn’t to be.

Hugh knew that he had to marry this girl so he sent her a ring, as he was preparing to ship out for Europe, hoping beyond hope that she would still be there for him when or more correctly if, he returned home.

Hugh joined the Army Air Corp and trained for duties as a waist gunner in a B-17. 8 missions out and back, 8 more to go, it was number 9 that almost made this story one that I would never know.

In those days the Army Air Corp was flying daylight missions over Germany in an effort to bomb the Nazi war machine into oblivion, and that ninth mission found Hugh and the rest of his crew over Germany. Their bombs released all they had to do was make it back to England, an FW-109 pilot had other ideas.

Flame and smoke from their right wing stretched back past the tail and the Pilot called over the intercom to Hugh, “How’s it look?”

“We better get the hell out of here!” was Hugh’s reply.

So one by one, out the hatch they went.

“I did two somersaults and then yanked on that rip cord” Hugh says, “Then I started looking around. One, two, three, four, five, six, and I make seven. Damn…where are the other 3?”

And then a thought came to him: “I wonder if I’ll ever get married?”
The snow was going up, as he was going down, and then on the ground it was over.
Captured and train ride to Nuremburg, and then a road march to Moosberg, not far from Dachau.

15 months in that camp, and at times the Army Air Corp sent them their love by dropping bombs on the camps. But the Luftwaffe took care of them and treated them respectably and at the end of the war he made it home.

Home to PA and of course home to Dorothy.

Dorothy died three weeks ago.

He looks back at the picture, and you can’t deny it, Dorothy is a beautiful woman. Then he whispers, “I really miss her and can’t wait to get to her.”

And I think to myself “Dorothy waited for you once; she’ll gladly wait for you again.”

He looks at me and I think he knows that too.

Then it’s off to make another track around the pavilion pushing the stroller that holds his great-grandson, six months old now, and as cute as his great-grandmother, and perched on the top of the handle is Dorothy’s picture.

Moon over Yusufiyah and Ghana

This post comes to us from long time friend of this blog, Mr. Robert Stokely. If you don't know Robert, then your life has an emmense hole in it that needs filled.

Robert is the father of Sgt Mike Stokely whom this blog has written about many times. Robert is with out a doubt the best father I've ever met, and I only hope that at some point in my life as I continue to grow I can be as wonderful a person as his children have become.

You all know how proud I am of my children, and today I want to show that pride about Abbey. I have talked before of the hardships she has weathered since Mike's death and her own near death injuries from a car wreck and then Lyme Disease followed by the sudden death of her 17 year old best friend and first boyfriend. She has weathered much to say the least. She just had a great break-out year nailing her first year of college in Honors courses for pre-med at the University of Georgia, scoring all A's except one 89 in Honors Chemistry where the highest grade was a 92 - the first B she ever made in her life. She came back second semester with 4.0 including Advanced Chemistry where she only needed a 68 on the Final to get an A. Now, at age 19, after her first rigorous year of college, rather than idling away the summer with fun, sun, and shopping, carefree and catered to, she spent a good deal of her own money and we pitched in to send her on a a "study abroad" trip to Ghana Africa where she is not studying, but working for free doing medical and nutrition service work for the kids and others in that country. While they did get in some fun time and sight seeing, the bulk of the trip has been traveling around in a 12 person van with 15 people crammed in that are on the team, with a ride to an from their assignements being two hours each way each day with an 8 or so hour shift in between, and 13 hour van rides other days.

Today, Abbey posted a blog referencing that her mom, who is an Post Partum OB nurse at a Northside Hospital, which delivers about 17,000 - 20,000 babies a year, calling it a "Spa". If you have time and can, read her blog today and then it will make you think. And she has other posts not quiet so heavy, some even very funny. From around these parts we have a saying "Tough as a Lighter Knot." A lighter knot is that part of certain pine trees that is hard as a rock, will eat a saw blade up and will not decay. It is also extremely rich flamable material, such that in days gone past it was a prime ingredient in gun powder, and the gathering of "fat lighter" stumps from cut down pine trees of that variety was big business. It has a rich pungent smell that is akin to Pine Sol disinfectant on steriods. No doubt, I am a very blessed dad for a son stood up for America and Iraq and endured hardship and rigors with a smile until the moment of his death; another son too son Wes thrust into manhood by his brother's death yet he manned up without a whimper; and now Abbey. And the Mike Stokely Foundation is there with her, having sent medical and school supplies for them to use and hand-out. Obviously, our small Foundation can not even scratch the need that is there, but maybe in the life of a few children, for a short period of time, a difference was made and it will be a bridge to a better day and way of life for them.

http://dearabbeyblog.blogspot.com/

Lighter knots are marshmallows compared to Abbey.

Robert Stokely
proud dad Mike, Wes and Abbey Stokely
Remembering with Honor SGT Mike Stokely
KIA 16 AUG 05 near Yusufiyah Iraq
USA E 108 CAV 48th BCT GAARNG

My hat is off to you Robert, you're the father I and everyone I know wants to be. What a role model.

Be Careful of Malware Attacks in Links to Usama bin Laden Death

The FBI today warns computer users to exercise caution when they receive e-mails that purport to show photos or videos of Usama bin Laden’s recent death. This content could be a virus that could damage your computer. This malicious software, or “malware,” can embed itself in computers and spread to users’ contact lists, thereby infecting the systems of associates, friends, and family members. These viruses are often programmed to steal your personally identifiable information.

Social networking sites are vehicles for spreading malware!

The most recent, known spam activity is on Facebook, where a spam message cloaked as “Sweet! FREE Subway To Celebrate Osama’s Death – 56 Left HURRY!” or “2 Southwest Plane Tickets for Free – 56 Left Hurry” was being circulated. It has a link inviting users to post the information to their wall in order to keep the scam strewn. A sender's account is hijacked and sends messages to everyone who is "connected" to the sender. When the receiver navigates to the message in the message, malware will try to load. "This example serves as a good reminder to all social networking site users that the message may not be from a friend, even if it is from a friend.

According to Kaspersky Lab, since people are most drawn into the images of Bin Laden’s dead body, two domains took the liberty to serve a fake anti-virus by the keyword “Osama Bin Laden body” on Google Image Spanish search. Another Spanish-language site photo shopped bin Laden’s dead body after he was shot, added by a seemingly legitimate news story and a video. When you click on the video to play, it prompts the viewer to update a VLC media player plug-in, which is actually an adware tool called “hotbar” but is disguised as “XvidSetup.exe, warns Zscaler in a blogpost.

As always, users are reminded to remain cautious when opening e-mails or clicking on links. Bottom line, if something looks too good to be true, uncommon, unlikely, or calls for immediate action then it's most likely an attack.

Should the Military Family be TIME's Person of The Year for 2011

Bloggin buddy CJ of A Soldier's Perspective sent this email from one of his readers with their reasoning, why the Military Family should be TIME's 2011 Person of the Year:

I'm writing to tell you about a grassroots effort to convince TIME Magazine to consider the military family as its 2011 Person of the Year. It's not supposed to be an honor and it's not designed to put military families on a pedestal - it's to recognize the indisputable impact they've had, and the resilience they've shown and continue to show, after a decade of dealing with their own effects of war and deployments.

Three key links:
Military Family - Time's Next Person of the Year? - explains how the military family fit's TIME's Person of the Year criteria.

I Have a Confession - explains why the movement and the upcoming letter-writing campaign are important.

March 4th is Mail Your Letter to TIME Day - explains the letter writing campaign (coming soon - March 4th [or, March forth! - it seemed appropriate]).

And this is just a fascinating and evocative pictorial timeline of the military family from 1917 - present day.

Word of mouth is essential for the letter writing campaign to work - and the letter writing campaign is the most important step for this effort if it's going to get off the ground. I'd be so grateful if you would take a look at the links and, if you agree with them, help spread the word to your readers. This is a fun campaign, but with a serious message.

Best to you, and thanks for your time.

Well, with that said, the ball is in your court.

Serving a Need or Just Being Sensational

Mike Yon has a Facebook page. Many of the Milbloggers that for years supported and reposted Mike's work, have been banned from that page, because of a war of words, that you can read more about here, here, here and here.

Today, I noticed that he posted a video of a soldier being filmed by a French news crew. In the video it appears that the soldier is pulling security and then takes a fateful step, stepping on a mine. The blast and the ensuing aftermath is caught on tape for all to see. The end result is that the Sergeant loses both legs. It's graphic, and it's horrible, but it is war, and as Mike says, this is the stuff our troops deal with on a daily basis.

But....

Was it necessary to repost the video on Facebook?

If Mike feels that American's aren’t really grasping the gravity of the situation, I honestly feel there are better ways of driving home the point without resorting to what can only be described as tabloid journalism.

Come on Mike, you can and have done better than this.

Finally a Politician that Tells the Truth!

Loosely related to a previous post from today here's Gov. Christie (NJ) talking about Public Sector Pay and Benefits.

As an aside there are a lot of politician's here in Maryland that should be listening to this guy...okay make that EVERY Politician in Maryland!

Budget Cuts the J-20 and the Joint Strike Fighter

My milblogging buddy McQ sent me an interesting email the other day in which he wrote:

I spent 28 years in the military, both active and reserves, and during that time we built a military second to none and with a technological edge that has kept us safe and deterred would be bad guys from wanting to test us.

That said, I also know that budget realities mean we have to cut spending - everywhere. And that includes Defense. My concern is we may be considering cutting capability, not just cost. That could be a critical mistake. [Emphasis mine]

An example of this potential mistake can be seen in these two stories at Defense Tech.

Defense Tech: J-20: The Threat We Think it Is? -

I just read an interesting piece from our friends at Aviation Week postulating that China’s J-20 stealth fighter might not be worth all the worry. Here are a some key reasons why:

A: The jet is being developed at a time when Western-made Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radars designed to track stealth jets are beginning to proliferate. The U.S. is upgrading its F-15s and most likely a bunch of its F-16s with these powerful radars that have more than twice the range/power of conventional radars and are also good at jamming enemy air defenses. The article also points out that the F-35 may be equipped with radars and sensors aimed at nixing stealth fighters.

B: Both Aviation Week and us here at DT have pointed out that the one of the keys to a modern stealth jet’s effectiveness are its weapons and sensor loads. The J-20 is a big airplane and may have the ability to carry some serious sensors along with the computers and datalinks to process and covertly share the information they collect. The jet’s size also means it could carry some serous weaponry in an internal weapons bay. But, fifth-generation avionics and weapon systems integration can take a long time to master. We don’t know how far along China is in this department.

(READ MORE)

Guest Op-Ed (John Wagner): J-20 Shows Need for JSF -

Recently DefenseTech ran a piece about the Chinese J-20 “stealth” fighter that points out it may be less troublesome than the initial hype suggested. I put “stealth” in scare quotes for just that reason; we have no idea whether this is a legitimate stealth aircraft or just some fancy sheet metal and paint. We have no clue if they have managed to engineer the sensors and electronic systems needed to fly it or to allow it to go up against our frontline birds.

But that really shouldn’t be giving us a warm fuzzy. If they had actually fielded an aircraft capable of even competing with the F-22 or F-35 it would be keeping everyone responsible for our security up at night. This was still a pretty decent scare and it certainly should remind some folks that the Chinese believe they have surpassed us in the world. Their actions show the truth of that as they build a blue water navy and a blue sky air force and do not recognize any U.S. right to dominate either of those.

(READ MORE)

While I'm not 100% sold on the Joint Strike Fighter, I agree wholeheartedly that we cannot cut our capabilities to defend ourselves from an aggressive nation. The US has repeatedly failed to learn it's lessons from history, now is not the time to simply cut spending to cut spending, especially if those cuts only save us money at the expense of our safety.

The Chinese are placing themselves economically and militarily in a position superior to the US, and someone on Capital Hill better start paying attention.

Advice Found in My Inbox

This was in my inbox this morning...thought I would share. There is some good advice in these words.

ONE: Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully.

TWO: Marry a man/woman you love to talk to. As you get older, their conversational skills will be as important as any other.

THREE: Don't believe all you hear, spend all you have or sleep all you want.

FOUR: When you say, 'I love you,' mean it.

FIVE: When you say, 'I'm sorry,' look the person in the eye.

SIX: Be engaged at least six months before you get married.

SEVEN: Believe in love at first sight.

EIGHT: Never laugh at anyone's dreams. People who don't have dreams don't have
much.

NINE: Love deeply and passionately. You might get hurt but it's the only way to live life completely.

TEN: In disagreements, fight fairly. No name calling.

ELEVEN: Don't judge people by their relatives.

TWELVE: Talk slowly but think quickly.

THIRTEEN: When someone asks you a question you don't want to answer, smile, and ask, ‘Why do you want to know?'

FOURTEEN: Remember that great love and great achievements involve great risk.

FIFTEEN: Say 'bless you' when you hear someone sneeze.

SIXTEEN: When you lose, don't lose the lesson.

SEVENTEEN: Remember the three R's: Respect for self; Respect for others; and Responsibility for all your actions.

EIGHTEEN: Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.

NINETEEN: When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.

TWENTY: Smile when picking up the phone. The caller will hear it in your voice

TWENTY-ONE: Spend some time alone.

A true friend is someone who reaches for your hand and touches your heart.

The End is Here, Not with a Bang, but with a Whimper

PARDON me for a few if I slip away from my typical method and indulge in some introspection.

Galrahn of Information Dissemination has a rather salient point to be made about the end of combat operations in Iraq, that being, that for the most part, there has been no generational impact upon the American people because of Iraq or Afghanistan theatres. Not surprisingly the meme coined by some Marine in theatre: “America isn’t at War, the Marine’s are at war, America is at the mall” was then and is now irrefutable true.

Perhaps this is why for the last several days I have felt as if I’ve been in a fog of sorts, Americans are still at the mall, and there is no celebration for our warriors who have risked all for us – 10 Thousand and more of them giving up their tomorrows for our today’s.

American deaths due to combat are on the rise, and while those deaths will be immensely powerful events for the families involved, America, as a country, is still unaffected. Only a small percentage of the American population has been directly affected by the war, either by their service, or the service of one of their loved ones. This is not an America where memorials will spring up in the town square because half of the male population of the town died in a single battle or conflict, and this is not an America where an entire generation of men will have been lost, as occurred in Europe after the Great War. No this is an America that is for the most part stuck in some egocentric funk.

The current generation of American’s have not been affected by war, in the way that past generations have and that is both a good and bad thing to have occurred. Galrahn writes of his daughter and the impact the last decade of war has had upon her thusly: “The nation has been at war for over 60% of her life, and the impact of the war on her life doesn't exist despite the fact that the explosion of technology, access to information, and variety in new communication capabilities represents the most influential cultural impact on her generation. Did 9/11 impact a generation? Absolutely, but the military actions that followed have not.”

I was 11 when the Vietnam War officially ended, and to me it seemed as if there had been a collective sigh of relief – from both sides of the aisle - as our warriors began coming home. And yet, like today, there have been no national ticket tape parades welcoming home our warriors, and unlike in 1976 there has been no national sense of relief, because for the most part, war has not affected many Americans. Like Galrahn’s daughter my son’s have been largely unaffected by war, even though it has been with us for 80% of my youngest son’s life. Oh yes, war has touched our bucolic community in the piedmont, by claiming some of our finest young men, and our little church has sent off four of its own on Active duty – one bravely enlisting in the Infantry upon his graduation from high school, and we as a community have been spared the trauma of generations past. As Galrahn so correctly points out, "Generation Kill" is a slogan, not an applicable stereotype.

Perhaps you are wondering at this point in the essay if I am advocating that the trauma and heartache of loss due to war should have been thrust upon a much larger segment of the society? Allow me to reassure you I am not. What I am advocating is that perhaps we as a nation should not have gone to the Mall when President Bush told us to and instead we should have gone to war as a nation.

When 9/11 occurred Americans were for one brief moment united in their direction. 9/11 was the proverbial 2x4 to the forehead so many of us needed to snap ourselves out of the egocentric world we had fallen into. The 80’s in all its pastel glory and the 90’s with its techno-advancements and social networking had removed the personal from the collective. That generation was the first true generation to be born in this country where there was no want. Everything and anything you could imagine was there for the taking, provided you could lose yourself in yourself and let go of the one thing that had guided our country for so long, our collective soul, our collective experience, our singular purpose that made us America.

Today far more people have slipped back into that pre-9/11 mentality, than those whom have slipped out of the focus on the self, and are now focusing on the needs of America. You cannot argue at any length that the US Military is filled with the latter and not the former, and for that we must be eternally grateful, however, the US Military is but a small fraction of our countries population and that small population cannot continue to provide for the rest of America.

America must once again step up and throw off the mantel of self and taken upon itself the cloak of destiny.

Yes, the dusty cloak of Manifest Destiny needs to be brought out from the back of the closet and put on once again. Oh! I can hear the cries from the politicos now, so take heed, I am not suggesting that we invade Canada or Mexico on the contrary I am suggesting that no nation has never prospered when it did not have some sense of a national purpose or destiny. I am suggesting that we as a nation have no single purpose anymore, and we need one - desperately.

America has lost its collective soul, its reason to be and become instead of a great melting pot, a buffet table of beliefs, ethnicities and cultures. We no longer identify as American’s but instead we are: African-American, Indian-American, Chinese-American, Japanese-American, Iranian-American and the list goes on. Our heritage is a great and wonderful thing, but in today’s society there is no room for anything other than the Id. In a culture of instant gratification significant social events such as 9/11 and subsequently Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom (we can’t even call them theatres in a World War anymore – but rather operations, as if we at some point we will all wake up in a recovery room made better by the worlds miracles) there is no room for a national zeitgeist.

The Greatest Generation was without a doubt united in their purpose, every industry and community mobilized and gave their blood, sweat and tears towards a common goal our current generation seems only united in the purpose of getting more for less, and shifting the cost onto some future generation. A nation cannot survive on a steady diet of Hollywood Starlets and their twittering escapades, or the misguided ravings of an environmental wacko who feels that the only solution is to force a network to change their programming to save the frogs.

The current direction of the country seems to be one in which the government can do pretty much anything it wants, as long as the American people are not inconvenienced or directed away from their breads and circuses. The American people must once again become engaged in the dealings and direction of our country. We must unite in a single purpose and we must no longer allow the government to prosecute its actions without our input and if need be intervention.

I agree whole heartedly with Galrahn: “[t]he government may be engaged, but the people are not.” Or more to the original point, the US military is at war, America is at the mall. We need to get out of the mall shed ourselves of our egocentric attachments and become engaged in all matters of our current war.

World War II, for the US was over in less than 5 years; our current World War has dragged on for nearly a decade. While our personal losses have been less, the accounting on the gains is still to be determined. Yes, Iraq has a new government but it is as one said: "[a] government if you can hold on to it." Afghanistan has a new government but it at times seems more of the same. However, if we as a nation had put ourselves on a war footing as we did during WWII, do any of you think that the war would have continued on for as long as it has? Can you honestly say that if we had deployed 16 million men and women in both theatres we could not have forced both AlQaeda and the Taliban out? Think of the effect on the home front if another 80 million Americans had retooled their industry to churn out weapons and vehicles. GM could have been churning out 1000s of Stryker vehicles a day to supply the need in Iraq. Foreign companies such as BAE could have expanded their production of Bradley Fighting Vehicles and the ubiquitous up armored hummer could have been produced in mass quantities by Ford or other manufacturers instead of starting as hillbilly armor in the maintenance shops of Baghdad.

Manifest Destiny could have saved American lives.

So the end of combat operations is upon us in Iraq, but for most Americans it is business as usual, there are no Rosy Riveters heading home, no long-shore men tired after 12 hours of loading cargo ships of men and material. The Greatest Generation of our generation is but a small subset and because of that there is no cause to celebrate. Is it no wonder that even with this momentous occasion upon us I feel a loathing developing once again in the country? Our news cycles are dominated by a hurricane named Earl and an environmental wacko named James, the talking heads continue to scream at each other, and large segments of the population continue to push the American Soul to the back burner instead of pulling it to the fore.

A common singular purpose over the last decade could have saved American, Iraqi and Afghani lives, instead we as a nation decided that it was safer to let someone else do the heavy lifting, and we went shopping. There is no simpler way to say it: Manifest Destiny could have saved American lives.

Win the War of Ideas: Build the Mosque and Defend It

Friend of this blog, Kat in MO sends this defense of our American Ideals and the proposed Cordoba Mosque.

As always your thoughts are welcome.

This We Will Defend!: One Mosque, One Battle In the War of Ideas
We are in a period of deep confusion, general malaise and loss of direction. We are faced with an issue that, in a very real way, leads to questions about who we are as a people and citizens of these United States. Today, we must decide whether we are a nation of freedom who lives up to our Constitution and our ideas or if we are to become something else. Something less.

The building of the Mosque two blocks from ground zero and the subsequent protesting and attempts to hold up or stop the building of this house of religion shoots right to the core of these issues. Where is our nation going if we fore swear one of the basic rights by which we were founded and for which millions of our citizens, past and in the present, have shed their blood and given their very lives to defend?

We were founded on basic principles that have defined us for over two centuries. We have fought wars between ourselves and with others to obtain and maintain these principles. Not only as principles by which we choose to live by, but rights that we believe all mankind is entitled to.

Our founders created an idea that flew in the very face of the only form of government known at that time: absolute and powerful monarchies who all claimed their right to govern came from God. They turned the claim of the divine rights of kings on its head when they wrote: We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are the rights to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness

To that end, they wrote a constitution that created a limited government, of, for and by the people. They signed a Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments, to protect us from the potential abuse of the government.

The first of these amendments states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

This amendment was not placed first for arbitrary reasons. Most school children have learned that the pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock to escape religious persecution. Most adults have forgotten that the more relaxed and less homogeneous establishment of religion and the exchange of philosophical ideas led to that singular idea and cornerstone of our nation: that men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.

The first right to freedom of religion was not only written to protect religious minorities from persecution, but, in fact, to protect this very simple idea that our rights were not handed to us from men or their governments, but from a Power above the earthly power men can create or take for themselves. A power that was unassailable and unchangeable. So, too, were the rights of men.

That is why this freedom must be protected. That is why it is imperative today, in this battle of ideas against tyranny and oppression, we defend that right even more.

It is understandable that the people of this nation, particularly the citizens of New York, would find the building of the mosque near ‘Ground Zero’ egregious. There is still, ten years later, a very strong belief that Islam as a religion inspired the men who attacked our nation on September 11, 2001 and took from us 3,000 innocent citizens. Even so many years later, the anger and pain still lingers.

It took from us our sense of security and our belief that conflicts over freedom and religion were relegated to far away places with names we could not pronounce and people we did not know. That these battles were not our own, but something for someone else to sort out. On that day, we were faced with a very different reality. A reality that we still wish to negate and ignore as much as possible. Even more so after ten long and bloody years of war.

We as a people may argue the question of Islam’s role for decades and never agree as to that truth. What we do know is that September 11, 2001 was an “attack on Freedom” as President Bush so succinctly described it, more so than most Americans understand even today. One of those freedoms that was and is still under attack, is the freedom of religion.

At the very core of the fundamentalist beliefs that inspired Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden and the men who carried out those attacks, is the idea that freedom of religion, the freedom to worship or not to worship as any man or woman sees fit, is the very essence and proof of the iniquitous nature of our nation.

In fact, the writings of Sayyid Qutb that informed the beliefs of these men insists that freedom and democracy as a whole, a belief system and government that leaves leadership and decisions up to men and women instead of direction from God alone (as interpreted by them), is the greatest and gravest of all sins. They sought to weaken and, if possible, destroy that freedom in a belief that the establishment of their tyrannical and oppressive ideas of religion and government would set the world and its people on the right and holy path. All those who will not follow should be destroyed.

Now we are faced with a battle that is at the very center of this war between the ideas of freedom and oppression. The question that we have to ask ourselves is whether that battle is won by holding the ground and preventing the mosque from being built in its proposed location as if defending it from “the enemy” or is that battle won by holding on to our ideas, that the building of the mosque is a protected right, that freedom in its every form is better and stronger than any tyranny proposed by Zawahiri and bin Laden or any of their adherents?

Are we, as they claim, hypocrites who pick and choose to whom these rights apply? That we would willing throw out our beliefs and oppress others whenever it was in our interests or simply our desire to obtain something we want?

It is my firm belief that we will lose this battle of ideas if we do not step aside, relinquish our fears and animosity, and allow this mosque to be built. That it is at this site where so many died, unknowing martyrs to the idea of freedom, that we must defend freedom in its every form, in its every idea, in every line of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and its amendments.

Most importantly, we must defend the rights of every citizen, of every race, of every creed and of every religion. We cannot give an inch. Not in fear, not in anger, not even in grief. We must be who we say we are, the defenders of freedom, or every drop of blood spilt from that day to this will be for nothing.

Let the mosque be built and let freedom ring from New York City to the remote villages of Waziristan, Pakistan, the plains of Afghanistan and every place where his tyrannical idea raises its head. Let it be known that it is we who believe in freedom that defends the right of every religion to worship as they see fit, where they see fit, when they see fit. Not some fanatic hiding behind his religious intolerance and inflicting his ideas on innocent people on the pain of death.

Let us plant our flag here. Write it in stone because we have already paid for it in blood. This we will defend!

Theo Needs Some Help

Theo of the acclaimed Theo's Park needs your help in answering a rather important question.

The World Needs More Men Like Him?

"The world needs more men like him."

A quote from British Ambassador to Lebanon, Frances Guy, stated at the passing of Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah. Who?

Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah had this to say about the bombing of the U.S. Marine Barracks as he gave an interview in 2002:

"I was not the one who launched the idea of so-called suicide bombings, but I have certainly argued in favor of them."

http://www.aolnews.com/opinion/article/opinion-the-praise-of-sheikh-mohammed-hussein-fadlallah-shows-a-silent-contempt-of-islam/19563457

Oh, did I mention that Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah was the spiritual head of Hezbollah, one of the world's most deadly terrorist organizations and the murderous puppet of Iran?

With this coming in the wake of the release of the Lockerbie Pan Am Bomber, one has reason to wonder what direction Britain is taking as a government and how much we can or should rely upon them in the future. One could start to wonder if maybe these two incidents are a hint that Britain has lost its ability to distinguish the line between terrorists and humanity, or whether we are looking at the early signs of a 21st century Islamic "diplomacy" that is akin to the default to Germany regarding Poland in the days leading up to WW II.

What are they thinking across the pond, or are they at all?

Robert Stokely
proud dad SGT Mike Stokely
KIA 16 AUG 05 near Yusufiyah Iraq
US Army, E 108 CAV 48th BCT GAARNG

Color Me Enraged - CJ

CJ of A Soldier's Perspective and You Served has an interesting missive on a recent Anti-Defamation League (ADL ) report about a suppossedly groing "rage" movement in America. Suprisingly they found nothing wrong with the rage leveled at the previous administration or even conservatives today.

Bush = Hitler was fine.

Obama is a Socialist...not so much.

Read on.

Color Me "Enraged"

By CJ at A Soldier's Perspective

In November 2009, the morons at the Anti-Defamation League released a report titled "Rage Grows In America: Anti-Government Conspiracies." The authors of the report have the audacity to suggest that a "climate of anti-government fervor and activism" was created "since the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States." Really?

I searched the ADL website forwards and backwards looking for a report talking about all the "anti-government fervor and activism" that was so prevalent during the Bush Administration. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any. None. Not one. It's not because there was no such thing as rage against Bush – it was everywhere! It was because the ADL is a leftwing extremist organization in and of itself.

The report cites "growing beliefs [that] threaten to create a large pool of people more susceptible to extreme anti-government conspiracy theories and even calls to resistance on the part of extremist groups and movements." Again, I couldn't find any mention anywhere in ADL's vast resources that mentions all the extremist groups that also advocated anti-government conspiracies (9-11 anyone?) and calls to resistance (IVAW/ANSWER/Code Pink).

READ MORE...

A Father’s Pride in His Late Son’s Service

By Army Maj. Gen. Kurt J. Stein
Special to American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, March 15, 2010 – While flying on United Airlines last week, I overheard a telephone conversation from a gentleman seated directly behind me. His words went something like this: "Although today was an extremely sad day for me - it was absolutely the happiest day of my life, and I am proud to be an American."

This gentleman went on to talk about a funeral he attended in South Carolina, and specifically gave great kudos to the U.S. Army for the professionalism displayed at this service. He went into great detail about the funeral service itself and how it was conducted. He went on to say that Jeremiah really enjoyed serving in the Army, and now, he clearly understood why.

My ears immediately perked up when I overhead him talk about the Army in such a positive way. He boasted about the general who presented the flags to him and his family, the sharp-looking soldiers of the salute battery, the sounds of taps, how the soldiers stood at attention for such a long period of time, how the military paid for his family to fly to South Carolina, the number of letters and calls he received from Jeremiah's command, how the Red Cross assisted, and so on. He could not say enough great things about our Army.

I quickly pulled a two-star card from my briefcase and wrote him a thank-you note for his kind words about our Army. He had no clue I was in the Army since I was in civilian clothes. Within seconds, he tapped me on the shoulder and with tears in his eyes proceeded to tell me the rest of the story.

The gentleman's name is Robert Wittman. He was flying with his entire family: wife, son, daughter, Mom, Dad, grandparents and friends. They were carrying home the cremated remains of his son, Sgt. Jeremiah T. Wittman of the 4th Infantry Division, who was killed in Afghanistan on Feb. 13.

Dad told me that Jeremiah already had two tours in Iraq and ultimately gave his life in Afghanistan. While in Iraq the first time, Jeremiah's vehicle was hit by an improvised explosive device, and several of his buddies were severely injured. He went on to say that his son truly loved the Army and did what he did from the heart.

His dad was a proud man. He did say that he often wondered why his son stayed in the Army after his initial attack in Iraq. Now that he saw the U.S. Army in action at the funeral, he said – as he had on the phone earlier -- that he now understands why.

Dad proudly held up the urn and boasted about how beautiful it was, and he continued to brag about the Army for all to hear. The folks around him listened with big ears and inspiration.

I must admit, although it really was a beautiful urn and a wonderful Army story - it brought a slight tear to my eye, as I, too, have a son —- a captain in the 82nd Airborne Division -- serving in Afghanistan, and this moment hit home.

Bottom line: Although the family was saddened by the loss of their son, they were all proud to be associated with the U.S. Army. I could see it in their eyes and hear it in their voices. Why? Simply because of the way they were treated by our Army family at the funeral. The 4th ID leadership and others involved did it up right and made a positive, lifetime-lasting impact with this family. Great job!

To top off a memorable flight, when the aircraft came to a halt the pilot announced, "Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention please. Among us today is a great American soldier named Sgt. Jeremiah Wittman, killed in action on 13 February. Our deepest sympathy, respect and sorrow go out to the Wittman family. We ask that you honor Sergeant Wittman -- our fallen hero -- the entire Wittman family and our armed forces by remaining seated and allowing the family to depart the aircraft first.”

At that moment, you could have heard a pin drop in the aircraft, but within seconds, everyone on the aircraft was clapping as the family departed on their way.

The family departed feeling special and honored. I sat there proud to be an American soldier.

(Army Maj. Gen. Kurt J. Stein is the commanding general of U.S. Army TACOM Life Cycle Management Command.)

H/T: The Armorer

WTF?

I think this person is just a little too angry to be driving around the beltway...

Hat Tip: Lt Col P at OPFOR

Washington DC / Government shut down by Snowmagedon - well, not totally - Robert Stokely

We have all heard about Snowmagedon and how Washington DC and our Federal Government was shut down here recently with the heavy snow. Even snow plows called back in.

Well, not exactly - check out these photos from Arlington and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers.

Even though there were no visitors, they did their job, for their job is not to entertain, but to show honor and respect to the Unknown Soldiers as an overall show of appreciation for the sacrifice of all fallen soldiers.

Robert Stokely