Posted on 03/13/2010 5:42:43 AM PST by MTank50
GI, maybe you shared your gum with that smiling kid and her friends irresistibly mangling English phrases on that street in Danang. They knew "GI soldiers" loved kids, and you didn't disappoint them. You probably didn't know it then, or even now, but because of you, she felt safe despite the explosions that rocked her childhood nights.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Tank,
Loved this and sent it to everyone in my address book, thank you for sharing.
I was too young to serve, but I was with you guys every day in spirit.
Thank you folks, for your exceptional bravery and character.
I, for one, will never forget your sacrifices...
That put a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye.
My home town librarian was an army nurse in WWII, covering European theatre. She told me once that when they set up their hospital tents, she would see all the orphaned children camp as close as possible to the American soldiers, perceived to be the safest spot in town. She said, “I never saw a child afraid of an American soldier”. During the unfavorable press coverage of the Vietnam war, I always used that former nurse’s witness as an anchor for the truth.
What a wonderful article. Thanks to all of you who served. Even if your home country did not appreciate it. The people in the country you did your tour in did and do. God Bless All of You!!
And this is how our ‘beloved’ leaders demwits are repaying them.
MILITARY & Retired MILITARY
Veterans’ G.I. Bill benefits MIA
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2464680/posts
TRI CARE FOR LIFE This from a google search:
http://economicspolitics.blogspot.com/2009/05/tricare-for-life-is-obama-trying-to.html
This option would help reduce the costs of TFL, as well as costs for Medicare, by introducing minimum out-of pocket requirements for beneficiaries. Under this option, TFL would not cover any of the first $525 of an enrollee’s cost-sharing liabilities for calendar year 2011 and would limit coverage to 50 percent of the next $4,725 in Medicare cost sharing that the beneficiary incurred. (Because all further cost sharing would be covered by TFL, enrollees could not pay more than $2,888 in cost sharing in that year.) http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9925/12-18-HealthOptions.pdf
Pushing Veterans Toward the Grave
http://www.christianpost.com/blogs/opinion/2009/08/pushing-veterans-toward-the-grave-31/
Outrage: Filipino Vets Waiting for the Big Payout
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourmoney/personalfinance/articles/outrage_filipino_vets_waiting_for_the_big_payout.html
“These veterans have been waiting for these benefits for a very long time—more than 60 years. Now that the money is there, there may not be enough,” Arcebal says.
Congress plans to block Tricare fee increases
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/military_tricarefees_blocked_100709w
http://www.navytimes.com/news/2009/10/military_tricarefees_blocked_100709w/
By Rick Maze - Staff writer, Oct 7, 2009
Tricare fee increases imposed last week by the Defense Department will be repealed by a provision of the compromise 2010 defense authorization bill unveiled Wednesday by House and Senate negotiators.
The fee increases were announced on Sept. 30 and took effect on Oct. 1, but the defense bill, HR 2647, includes a provision barring any fee increases until the start of fiscal 2011.
Retired Army Maj. Gen. Bill Matz, president of the National Association for Uniformed Services, said the announcement of fee increases was shocking considering that the Obama administration promised earlier this year to hold off on any new fee Tricare fee increases until fiscal 2011.
“President Obama and DoD assured NAUS and the entire military family earlier this year that there would rightly be no increases in any Tricare fees” in fiscal 2010, Matz said. “We took them at their word, and I can’t believe that a co-pay increase like this was allowed to go forward,” he added.
I truly believe that America redeemed the 20th Century, otherwise the most murderous century in human history.
See the articles listed below and add this one to it. Pick them up and pass them along.
Bill Would Restrict Veterans’ Health Care Options
http://www.vawatchdog.org/09/hcva09/hcva110609-1.htm
My dad was in Korea and every “Daddy, what did you do in the war?” question was *always* answered with stories of kids with chocolate covered faces.
His mom would send him huge boxes of candy which he, unbeknownst to her, would give to the Korean kids and my mom has a bunch of photos showing him surrounded by hordes of them, grinning and chocolate-smeared ear-to-ear.
That’s what I grew up thinking he did, as if there were a “position” in the army dedicated to that.
He never spoke of Korea, otherwise.
When I was much older, one of his brothers told me that my Dad drove an ordnance truck to the front lines every day.
He said not to ask Dad the question “Did you ever kill anyone?” so I never did.
"TWO QUOTES TO PONDER
"Life's tough......it's even tougher if you're stupid." -- John Wayne
"We live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you'll join with me as we try to change it." -- Barack Obama
Unfortunately, we are now beginning to understand what the second one means and what the first says about us as a nation!!!"
Likewise I remember reading in one of Ambrose’s many fine books, but I cannot remember which one, how in the summer of ‘45 there were three armies fighting in Europe, the Soviets, the Germans and the American/British. Of those three there was only one that did not rape and pillage the countryside and its people, the American/British army. Rape and murder was commonplace in both the German and Soviet army.
I read a book on the WW II GI (quite possibly Ambrose) that recounted what happened when some GI’s in Germany had to evacuate a village under their control. The evacuation order came down with VERY short notice : The GI’s only had time to tell the people to start moving , double time (I can’t recall but I’m guessing bombers were coming). Anyhow, one elderly German lady refused to go-she wanted to go back to her cottage and get her sweater. Much arguing ensued-till the GI just threw his hands up and let her go back under escort for her sweater. As the author put it (from memory as best as I can recall), “The mind boggles when imagining how an SS officer faced with that situation would have responded.”
My dad served in WWII (Navy) , Korea (Army) and Viet Nam (Air Force). 1941-1971. He told me once how he had shown photos of his family’s home in upstate New York and his fiancee’s home in North Dakota to a Korean lady that worked on base in some capacity. Seems in one of those states (probably ND but could have been either) had so severe a snow storm that year that the drifts piled high enough to let people walk up onto the roofs of their houses. The lady looked at the pictures, scoffed, and handed them back with the remark that there was no way those pictures could be real-they had to be Hollywood fakes-because “people couldn’t live in a place like that.” I don’t think he ever did convince her those photos were authentic. I thought of that story when the various UK and EU “pundits” opined that American soldiers couldn’t handle Afghanistan winters : Do they think we all live in Florida, California, or Texas?
LOL!
[I’d write more but I’m currently cleaning the floor because of the knee-deep sloppy mud from the FOUR FEET of freaking snow that just melted...and my root cellar is now an indoor “pool”]
;-D
Salamander
[slogging around in not-so-tropical Western MD]
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