Veterans Day 2009
Veterans Day is a time to remind our nation to reflect on all of the people who served and sacrificed as members of the United States military and thank them for that service. From the battles of Lexington and Concord to the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, this nation has always had a strong core of people who were willing to serve, fight, and sometimes die for their country and that is truly honorable.
TSA has a strong core of Veterans who have come to TSA to continue to serve and protect their country- in a different capacity. Over 15,000 of our employees are Veterans and over 3,000 employees are serving in the military reserves. Many are currently deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq.
On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of 2009, the wounded of Fort Hood will remember their fallen friends, and wonder how a man wrapped in enough red flags to turn him into a bloody mummy was allowed to infiltrate their base. Those wounded and dead rely upon us to ask the questions their superiors in the chain of command cannot comfortably answer. Calling the injured and dead of Fort Hood “victims” perpetuates the blindness that compelled those men and women to face the enemy unarmed. They are casualties of war… and as far as I’m concerned, Sergeant Kimberly Munley, who took their cowardly attacker down, is a veteran today.
The terrorist enemy doesn’t have a formal chain of command that can sign an armistice, they don’t muster on clearly defined battlefields, and they’re quite happy to benefit from the efforts of deranged fanboys. If we don’t stand behind our professional soldiers, and give them the tools to do their jobs now, we will all become soldiers before this enemy is defeated.
Somewhere in the world tomorrow, an American soldier will ring in the eleventh hour of the eleventh day with gunfire. Another will arrive home after an honorable tour of duty, perhaps passing brothers and sisters in arms saying farewell to their families. A mother’s tears will fall on a letter from the far side of the world. Old veterans will spend a beautiful afternoon watching children play beneath the flag they raised at Anzio, Guadalcanal, Incheon, or Khe Sanh. Young veterans will put their lives on the line, to give the children of Iraq and Afghanistan a chance at a future free from murderous evil. A little girl will playfully salute a uniform she will one day grow up to wear. A pilot will land a machine that was impossible in his grandfather’s day on the heaving deck of an aircraft carrier. The USS New York will ride at anchor, close to the site of the fallen buildings whose bones became her steel.
The veterans of the United States military have always been there for us, in the desperate eleventh hour of our need.
Whether these dedicated men and women served in a kitchen or a foxhole – or were an expert with an M-16 or a Clarinet – their selfless service to our country is something to appreciate and recognize – today and every day.
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Written by: ikogsakanding [ 1505 Posts ] (Author Profile)
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