Thanksgiving Day – 2016

This will be my only post this week and it will be a repeat of my 2010 Thanksgiving Day post. I ask that you remember those who are serving in our military as you feast on Thanksgiving…

Normally, on Thanksgiving, I wish all who view my blog a joyous and somewhat fattening holiday; and make a reference to the “WKRP in Cincinnati” TV episode where the world discovers that domesticated turkeys can’t fly.

This year will be different. This year, as we American give thanks I ask that you consider the below speech, Lt. General Kelly, USMC, gave on Veteran’s Day. This was two days after he was notified that his son 2nd Lt. Robert Kelly had been killed in Afghanistan.

This year I give a special thanks to the brave Americans across the globe who are on watch defending our way of life. May God bless them all.

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General Kelly’s speech:

Nine years ago two of the four commercial aircraft took off from Boston,

Newark, and Washington. Took off fully loaded with men, women and

children-all innocent, and all soon to die. These aircraft were

targeted at the World Trade Towers in New York, the Pentagon, and likely

the Capitol in Washington, D.C.  Three found their mark. No American

alive old enough to remember will ever forget exactly where they were,

exactly what they were doing, and exactly who they were with at the

moment they watched the aircraft dive into the World Trade Towers on

what was, until then, a beautiful morning in New York City. Within the

hour 3,000 blameless human beings would be vaporized, incinerated, or

crushed in the most agonizing ways imaginable. The most wretched among

them-over 200-driven mad by heat, hopelessness, and utter desperation

leapt to their deaths from 1,000 feet above Lower Manhattan. We soon

learned hundreds more were murdered at the Pentagon, and in a

Pennsylvania farmer’s field.

Once the buildings had collapsed and the immensity of the attack began

to register most of us had no idea of what to do, or where to turn. As

a nation, we were scared like we had not been scared for generations.

Parents hugged their children to gain as much as to give comfort.

Strangers embraced in the streets stunned and crying on one another’s

shoulders seeking solace, as much as to give it. Instantaneously,

American patriotism soared not “as the last refuge” as our

national-cynical class would say, but in the darkest times Americans

seek refuge in family, and in country, remembering that strong men and

women have always stepped forward to protect the nation when the need

was dire-and it was so God awful dire that day-and remains so today.

There was, however, a small segment of America that made very different

choices that day…actions the rest of America stood in awe of on 9/11

and every day since. The first were our firefighters and police, their

ranks decimated that day as they ran towards-not away from-danger and

certain death. They were doing what they’d sworn to do- “protect and

serve” -and went to their graves having fulfilled their sacred oath.

Then there was your Armed Forces, and I know I am a little biased in my

opinion here, but the best of them are Marines. Most wearing the Eagle,

Globe and Anchor today joined the unbroken ranks of American heroes

after that fateful day not for money, or promises of bonuses or travel

to exotic liberty ports, but for one reason and one reason alone;

because of the terrible assault on our way of life by men they knew must

be killed and extremist ideology that must be destroyed. A plastic flag

in their car window was not their response to the murderous assault on

our country. No, their response was a commitment to protect the nation

swearing an oath to their God to do so, to their deaths. When future

generations ask why America is still free and the heyday of Al Qaeda and

their terrorist allies was counted in days rather than in centuries as

the extremists themselves predicted, our hometown heroes-soldiers,

sailors, airmen, Coast Guardsmen, and Marines-can say, “because of me

and people like me who risked all to protect millions who will never

know my name.”

As we sit here right now, we should not lose sight of the fact that

America is at risk in a way it has never been before. Our enemy fights

for an ideology based on an irrational hatred of who we are. Make no

mistake about that no matter what certain elements of the “chattering

class” relentlessly churn out. We did not start this fight, and it will

not end until the extremists understand that we as a people will never

lose our faith or our courage. If they persist, these terrorists and

extremists and the nations that provide them sanctuary, they must know

they will continue to be tracked down and captured or killed. America’s

civilian and military protectors both here at home and overseas have for

nearly nine years fought this enemy to a standstill and have never for a

second “wondered why.” They know, and are not afraid. Their struggle

is your struggle. They hold in disdain those who claim to support them

but not the cause that takes their innocence, their limbs, and even

their lives. As a democracy- “We the People” -and that by definition is

every one of us-sent them away from home and hearth to fight our

enemies. We are all responsible. I know it doesn’t apply to those of

us here tonight but if anyone thinks you can somehow thank them for

their service, and not support the cause for which they fight-America’s

survival-then they are lying to themselves and rationalizing away

something in their lives, but, more importantly, they are slighting our

warriors and mocking their commitment to the nation.

Since this generation’s “day of infamy” the American military has handed

our ruthless enemy defeat-after-defeat but it will go on for years, if

not decades, before this curse has been eradicated. We have done this

by unceasing pursuit day and night into whatever miserable lair Al

Qaeda, the Taliban, and their allies, might slither into to lay in wait

for future opportunities to strike a blow at freedom. America’s

warriors have never lost faith in their mission, or doubted the

correctness of their cause. They face dangers everyday that their

countrymen safe and comfortable this night cannot imagine. But this has

always been the case in all the wars our military have been sent to

fight. Not to build empires, or enslave peoples, but to free those held

in the grip of tyrants while at the same time protecting our nation, its

citizens, and our shared values. And, ladies and gentlemen, think about

this, the only territory we as a people have ever asked for from any

nation we have fought alongside, or against, since our founding, the

entire extent of our overseas empire, as a few hundred acres of land for

the 24 American cemeteries scattered around the globe. It is in these

cemeteries where 220,000 of our sons and daughters rest in glory for

eternity, or are memorialized forever because their earthly remains are

lost forever in the deepest depths of the oceans, or never recovered

from far flung and nameless battlefields. As a people, we can be proud

because billions across the planet today live free, and billions yet

unborn will also enjoy the same freedom and a chance at prosperity

because America sent its sons and daughters out to fight and die for

them, as much as for us.

Yes, we are at war, and are winning, but you wouldn’t know it because

successes go unreported, and only when something does go sufficiently or

is sufficiently controversial, it is highlighted by the media elite that

then sets up the “know it all” chattering class to offer their endless

criticism. These self-proclaimed experts always seem to know better-but

have never themselves been in the arena. We are at war and like it or

not, that is a fact. It is not Bush’s war, and it is not Obama’s war,

it is our war and we can’t run away from it. Even if we wanted to

surrender, there is no one to surrender to. Our enemy is savage, offers

absolutely no quarter, and has a single focus and that is either kill

every one of us here at home, or enslave us with a sick form of

extremism that serves no God or purpose that decent men and women could

ever grasp. St Louis is as much at risk as is New York and Washington,

D.C… Given the opportunity to do another 9/11, our merciless enemy

would do it today, tomorrow, and every day thereafter. If, and most in

the know predict that it is only a matter of time, he acquires nuclear,

chemical, or biological weapons, these extremists will use these weapons

of mass murder against us without a moment’s hesitation. These butchers

we fight killed more than 3,000 innocents on 9/11. As horrible as that

death toll was, consider for a moment that the monsters that organized

those strikes against New York and Washington, D.C. killed only 3,000

not because that was enough to make their sick and demented point, but

because he couldn’t figure out how to kill 30,000, or 300,000, or 30

million of us that terrible day. I don’t know why they hate us, and I

don’t care. We have a saying in the Marine Corps and that is “no better

friend, no worse enemy, than a U.S. Marine.” We always hope for the

first, friendship, but are certainly more than ready for the second. If

its death they want, its death they will get, and the Marines will

continue showing them the way to hell if that’s what will make them

happy.

Because our America hasn’t been successfully attacked since 9/11 many

forget because we want to forget…to move on. As Americans we all

dream and hope for peace, but we must be realistic and acknowledge that

hope is never an option or course of action when the stakes are so high.

Others are less realistic or less committed, or are working their own

agendas, and look for ways to blame past presidents or in some other way

to rationalize a way out of this war. The problem is our enemy is not

willing to let us go. Regardless of how much we wish this nightmare

would go away, our enemy will stay forever on the offensive until he

hurts us so badly we surrender, or we kill him first. To him, this is

not about our friendship with Israel, or about territory, resources,

jobs, or economic opportunity in the Middle East. No, it is about us as

a people. About our freedom to worship any God we please in any way we

want. It is about the worth of every man, and the worth of every woman,

and their equality in the eyes of God and the law; of how we live our

lives with our families, inside the privacy of our own homes. It’s

about the God-given rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of

happiness and “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by

their Creator with certain inalienable right.” As Americans we hold

these truths to be self-evident. He doesn’t. We love what we have; he

despises who we are. Our positions can never be reconciled. He cannot

be deterred…only defeated. Compromise is out of the question.

It is a fact that our country today is in a life and death struggle

against an evil enemy, but America as a whole is certainly not at war.

Not as a country. Not as a people. Today, only a tiny fraction-less

than a percent-shoulder the burden of fear and sacrifice, and they

shoulder it for the rest of us. Their sons and daughters who serve are

men and women of character who continue to believe in this country

enough to put life and limb on the line without qualification, and

without thought of personal gain, and they serve so that the sons and

daughters of the other 99% don’t have to. No big deal, though, as

Marines have always been “the first to fight” paying in full the bill

that comes with being free…for everyone else.

The comforting news for every American is that our men and women in

uniform, and every Marine, is as good today as any in our history. As

good as what their heroic, under-appreciated, and largely abandoned

fathers and uncles were in Vietnam, and their grandfathers were in Korea

and World War II. They have the same steel in their backs and have made

their own mark etching forever places like Ramadi, Fallujah, and

Baghdad, Iraq, and Helmand and Sagin, Afghanistan that are now part of

the legend and stand just as proudly alongside Belleau Wood, Iwo Jima,

Inchon, Hue City, Khe Sanh, and Ashau Valley, Vietnam. None of them

have every asked what their country could do for them, but always and

with their lives asked what they could do for America. While some might

think we have produced yet another generation of materialistic,

consumeristic and self-absorbed young people, those who serve today have

broken the mold and stepped out as real men, and real women, who are

already making their own way in life while protecting ours. They know

the real strength of a platoon, a battalion, or a country that is not

worshiping at the altar of diversity, but in a melting point that

stitches and strengthens by a sense of shared history, values, customs,

hopes and dreams all of which unifies a people making them stronger, as

opposed to an unruly gaggle of “hyphenated” or “multi-cultural

individuals.”

And what are they like in combat in this war? Like Marines have been

throughout our history. In my three tours in combat as an infantry

officer and commanding general, I never saw one of them hesitate, or do

anything other than lean into the fire and with no apparent fear of

death or injury take the fight to our enemies. As anyone who has ever

experienced combat knows, when it starts, when the explosions and

tracers are everywhere and the calls for the Corpsman are screamed from

the throats of men who know they are dying-when seconds seem like hours

and it all becomes slow motion and fast forward at the same time-and the

only rational act is to stop, get down, save yourself-they don’t. When

no one would call them coward for cowering behind a wall or in a hole,

slave to the most basic of all human instincts-survival-none of them do.

It doesn’t matter if it’s an IED, a suicide bomber, mortar attack,

sniper, fighting in the upstairs room of a house, or all of it at once;

they talk, swagger, and, most importantly, fight today in the same way

America’s Marines have since the Tun Tavern. They also know whose

shoulders they stand on, and they will never shame any Marine living or

dead.

We can also take comfort in the fact that these young Americans are not

born killers, but are good and decent young men and women who for going

on ten years have performed remarkable acts of bravery and selflessness

to a cause they have decided is bigger and more important than

themselves. Only a few months ago they were delivering your paper,

stocking shelves in the local grocery store, worshiping in church on

Sunday, or playing hockey on local ice. Like my own two sons who are

Marines and have fought in Iraq, and today in Sagin, Afghanistan, they

are also the same kids that drove their cars too fast for your liking,

and played the God-awful music of their generation too loud, but have no

doubt they are the finest of their generation. Like those who went

before them in uniform, we owe them everything. We owe them our safety.

We owe them our prosperity. We owe them our freedom. We owe them our

lives. Any one of them could have done something more self-serving with

their lives as the vast majority of their age group elected to do after

high school and college, but no, they chose to serve knowing full well a

brutal war was in their future. They did not avoid the basic and

cherished responsibility of a citizen-the defense of country-they

welcomed it. They are the very best this country produces, and have put

every one of us ahead of themselves. All are heroes for simply stepping

forward, and we as a people owe a debt we can never fully pay. Their

legacy will be of selfless valor, the country we live in, the way we

live our lives, and the freedoms the rest of their countrymen take for

granted.

Over 5,000 have died thus far in this war; 8,000 if you include the

innocents murdered on 9/11. They are overwhelmingly working class kids,

the children of cops and firefighters, city and factory workers, school

teachers and small business owners. With some exceptions they are from

families short on stock portfolios and futures, but long on love of

country and service to the nation. Just yesterday, too many were lost

and a knock on the door late last night brought their families to their

knees in a grief that will never-ever go away. Thousands more have

suffered wounds since it all started, but like anyone who loses life or

limb while serving others-including our firefighters and law enforcement

personnel who on 9/11 were the first casualties of this war-they are not

victims as they knew what they were about, and were doing what they

wanted to do. The chattering class and all those who doubt America’s

intentions, and resolve, endeavor to make them and their families out to

be victims, but they are wrong. We who have served and are serving

refuse their sympathy. Those of us who have lived in the dirt, sweat

and struggle of the arena are not victims and will have none of that.

Those with less of a sense of service to the nation never understand it

when men and women of character step forward to look danger and

adversity straight in the eye, refusing to blink, or give ground, even

to their own deaths. The protected can’t begin to understand the price

paid so they and their families can sleep safe and free at night. No,

they are not victims, but are warriors, your warriors, and warriors are

never victims regardless of how and where they fall. Death, or fear of

death, has no power over them. Their paths are paved by sacrifice,

sacrifices they gladly make…for you. They prove themselves everyday

on the field of battle…for you. They fight in every corner of the

globe…for you. They live to fight…for you, and they never rest

because there is always another battle to be won in the defense of

America.

I will leave you with a story about the kind of people they are…about

the quality of the steel in their backs…about the kind of dedication

they bring to our country while they serve in uniform and forever after

as veterans. Two years ago when I was the Commander of all U.S. and

Iraqi forces, in fact, the 22nd of April 2008, two Marine infantry

battalions, 1/9 “The Walking Dead,” and 2/8 were switching out in

Ramadi. One battalion in the closing days of their deployment going

home very soon, the other just starting its seven-month combat tour.

Two Marines, Corporal Jonathan Yale and Lance Corporal Jordan Haerter,

22 and 20 years old respectively, one from each battalion, were assuming

the watch together at the entrance gate of an outpost that contained a

makeshift barracks housing 50 Marines. The same broken down ramshackle

building was also home to 100 Iraqi police, also my men and our allies

in the fight against the terrorists in Ramadi, a city until recently the

most dangerous city on earth and owned by Al Qaeda. Yale was a dirt

poor mixed-race kid from Virginia with a wife and daughter, and a mother

and sister who lived with him and he supported as well. He did this on

a yearly salary of less than $23,000. Haerter, on the other hand, was a

middle class white kid from Long Island. They were from two completely

different worlds. Had they not joined the Marines they would never have

met each other, or understood that multiple America’s exist

simultaneously depending on one’s race, education level, economic

status, and where you might have been born. But they were Marines,

combat Marines, forged in the same crucible of Marine training, and

because of this bond they were brothers as close, or closer, than if

they were born of the same woman.

The mission orders they received from the sergeant squad leader I am

sure went something like: “Okay you two clowns, stand this post and let

no unauthorized personnel or vehicles pass.” “You clear?” I am also

sure Yale and Haerter then rolled their eyes and said in unison

something like: “Yes Sergeant,” with just enough attitude that made the

point without saying the words, “No kidding sweetheart, we know what

we’re doing.” They then relieved two other Marines on watch and took up

their post at the entry control point of Joint Security Station Nasser,

in the Sophia section of Ramadi, al Anbar, Iraq.

A few minutes later a large blue truck turned down the alley way-perhaps

60-70 yards in length-and sped its way through the serpentine of

concrete jersey walls. The truck stopped just short of where the two

were posted and detonated, killing them both catastrophically.

Twenty-four brick masonry houses were damaged or destroyed. A mosque

100 yards away collapsed. The truck’s engine came to rest two hundred

yards away knocking most of a house down before it stopped. Our

explosive experts reckoned the blast was made of 2,000 pounds of

explosives. Two died, and because these two young infantrymen didn’t

have it in their DNA to run from danger, they saved 150 of their Iraqi

and American brothers-in-arms.

When I read the situation report about the incident a few hours after it

happened I called the regimental commander for details as something

about this struck me as different. Marines dying or being seriously

wounded is commonplace in combat. We expect Marines regardless of rank

or MOS to stand their ground and do their duty, and even die in the

process, if that is what the mission takes. But this just seemed

different. The regimental commander had just returned from the site and

he agreed, but reported that there were no American witnesses to the

event-just Iraqi police. I figured if there was any chance of finding

out what actually happened and then to decorate the two Marines to

acknowledge their bravery, I’d have to do it as a combat award that

requires two eye-witnesses and we figured the bureaucrats back in

Washington would never buy Iraqi statements. If it had any chance at

all, it had to come under the signature of a general officer.

I traveled to Ramadi the next day and spoke individually to a half-dozen

Iraqi police all of whom told the same story. The blue truck turned

down into the alley and immediately sped up as it made its way through

the serpentine. They all said, “We knew immediately what was going on

as soon as the two Marines began firing.” The Iraqi police then related

that some of them also fired, and then to a man, ran for safety just

prior to the explosion. All survived. Many were injured…some

seriously. One of the Iraqis elaborated and with tears welling up said,

“They’d run like any normal man would to save his life.” “What he

didn’t know until then,” he said, “and what he learned that very

instant, was that Marines are not normal.” Choking past the emotion he

said, “Sir, in the name of God no sane man would have stood there and

done what they did.” “No sane man.” “They saved us all.”

What we didn’t know at the time, and only learned a couple of days later

after I wrote a summary and submitted both Yale and Haerter for

posthumous Navy Crosses, was that one of our security cameras, damaged

initially in the blast, recorded some of the suicide attack. It

happened exactly as the Iraqis had described it. It took exactly six

seconds from when the truck entered the alley until it detonated.

You can watch the last six seconds of their young lives. Putting myself

in their heads I supposed it took about a second for the two Marines to

separately come to the same conclusion about what was going on once the

truck came into their view at the far end of the alley. Exactly no time

to talk it over, or call the sergeant to ask what they should do. Only

enough time to take half an instant and think about what the sergeant

told them to do only a few minutes before: “…let no unauthorized

personnel or vehicles pass.” The two Marines had about five seconds

left to live.

It took maybe another two seconds for them to present their weapons,

take aim, and open up. By this time the truck was half-way through the

barriers and gaining speed the whole time. Here, the recording shows a

number of Iraqi police, some of whom had fired their AKs, now scattering

like the normal and rational men they were-some running right past the

Marines. They had three seconds left to live.

For about two seconds more, the recording shows the Marines’ weapons

firing non-stop…the truck’s windshield exploding into shards of glass

as their rounds take it apart and tore in to the body of the

son-of-a-bitch who is trying to get past them to kill their

brothers-American and Iraqi-bedded down in the barracks totally unaware

of the fact that their lives at that moment depended entirely on two

Marines standing their ground. If they had been aware, they would have

know they were safe…because two Marines stood between them and a

crazed suicide bomber. The recording shows the truck careening to a

stop immediately in front of the two Marines. In all of the

instantaneous violence Yale and Haerter never hesitated. By all reports

and by the recording, they never stepped back. They never even started

to step aside. They never even shifted their weight. With their feet

spread should width apart, they leaned into the danger, firing as fast

as they could work their weapons. They had only one second left to

live.

The truck explodes. The camera goes blank. Two young men go to their

God. Six seconds. Not enough time to think about their families, their

country, their flag, or about their lives or their deaths, but more than

enough time for two very brave young men to do their duty…into

eternity. That is the kind of people who are on watch all over the

world tonight-for you.

We Marines believe that God gave America the greatest gift he could

bestow to man while he lived on this earth-freedom. We also believe he

gave us another gift nearly as precious-our soldiers, sailors, airmen,

Coast Guardsmen, and Marines-to safeguard that gift and guarantee no

force on this earth can every steal it away. It has been my distinct

honor to have been with you here today. Rest assured our America, this

experiment in democracy started over two centuries ago, will forever

remain the “land of the free and home of the brave” so long as we never

run out of tough young Americans who are willing to look beyond their

own self-interest and comfortable lives, and go into the darkest and

most dangerous places on earth to hunt down, and kill, those who would

do us harm. God Bless America, and….SEMPER FIDELIS!

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