Posted on 09/21/2007 1:14:03 PM PDT by BGHater
A Kansas military cemetery has run out of space after the burial of another casualty of the Iraq war, officials said on Thursday.
"We are full," said Alison Kohler, spokeswoman for the Fort Riley U.S. Army post, home of the 1st Infantry Division.
U.S. Sens. Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts, both Kansas Republicans, on Thursday sent a letter to William Tuerk, the under secretary for memorial affairs at the Department of Veterans Affairs, urging for full funding for a new cemetery for Fort Riley.
"While a new cemetery would not be completed in time to alleviate this situation immediately, it is vitally important," Roberts and Brownback, a Republican presidential candidate, said in their letter.
"We truly owe our military members a debt of gratitude and the least we can do is provide them with an honorable burial ground," the senators wrote.
Since the 2003 beginning of the war in Iraq, Fort Riley has lost 133 soldiers and airmen, though not all are buried in the Fort Riley cemetery. Sgt Joel Murray, who died September 4 in Iraq, took the last available plot, said Kohler.
Fort Riley can bury bodies on top of other bodies if family members want to share a plot, said Kohler.
The Fort Riley Cemetery has been only for those who die while on active duty or retire from a military career and their single spouses and qualified dependents.
http://www.cjonline.com/stories/070207/kan_181512347.shtml
This cemetery is over 150 years old. The press makes it sound like it is because of the Iraq war that it is full.
And, according to the article I linked from July there is a new cemetery in the planning stages that won’t be ready until next year.
It makes me angry to see a slant that blames the full cemetery on Iraq. I’m sure WWII filled up a great deal of space.
Good grief, it’s a good thing we aren’t fighting a war that has the usual casualties of above 50,000.
My father (former Navy guy in 1949) is buried there as well as my g.grandfather(Civil War Vet)!
I’m not implying that it’s the result of the WOT, but more so the Greatest Generation, and we have to prepare for their passing.
As you know, the loons will contend that it is because of Iraq.
And the passing of the WW-II generation probably filled it up way more than the war itself, except indirectly by creating many more career military, along with the ensuing Cold War.
Perhaps if FDR had known the veterans cemetary crisis we would face in the 90’s and 00’s he’d have thought twice about fighting Nazism and Japanese imperialism.
But no mention of the 1000 WWII vets who are passing each day.
Oh I never thought you were implying that. I just was pointing out that the press slanted it to imply that. That way they can blame the war for one more thing.
I live down the street from a National Cemetery and in the last five years it has filled up almost totally. Last I heard they were burying around 50 WWII vets a week.
That was the first phone call from the installation headquarters on what proved to be a very long day.
This smells so much like liberal MSM BS.
There are national cemeteries across the country, and I am sure more WWII vets are dying each day then are dying in Iraq per month. IF they are filling up, it has nothing to do with Iraq.
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