Posted on 11/27/2001 3:56:44 AM PST by rightwingextremist1776
A US flag, signed by the relatives and friends of victims of terrorist strikes that levelled the World Trade Centre in New York, will soon be flying high at a camp of Marines now in Afghanistan.
Traumatised by the worst terrorist attacks ever perpetrated on US soil, and carried away in a wave of patriotism, Americans have found a means of expression for their pain by flying the flags in the wake of the September 11 attacks that left around 4,300 dead and missing.
The star-spangled banner, which will be sent to Afghanistan on Thursday, was entrusted to the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit by officers of the New York Police Department, New York spokesman for the Marines, Captain Jaret Heil said.
"Some of their people that went down with the building were former Marines," Heil said of the police officers. "They wanted us to have it because the Marines Corps is the first one" into Afghanistan.
"They wanted this flag to be with the people that are paying back for September 11, and that's the Marines Corps," he said.
The US-led war on Afghanistan's Taliban militia was launched in response to their harbouring of Osama bin Laden, the suspected international terrorist believed to have carried out the attacks.
The names of 27 police officers lost in the wreckage of the World Trade Center were the first to be inscribed in black felt pen on the flag, which was tied to a rescue command post at Ground Zero, the site of the flattened twin towers.
As visits were slowly allowed at Ground Zero, the piece of material became an outlet for the grief and rage felt by victims' family members in response to the attacks.
Vincent Danz wrote of his brother, a former Marine dead in the attacks aged 38, "My brother is on the pile."
"For my sons ... they gave their lives doing what they loved - helped others," wrote the mother or father of Joseph Viagiano, a 34-year-old policeman, and John Viagiano, 36, a fire fighter at the scene on the day of the strikes. "God bless them and all their 'brothers.'"
Other messages are more aggressive.
Policeman Bill Dinkelacker wrote: "Those colours don't run! For all the victims of terrorists attacks: give them hell!"
Tom Whalen, another police officer, writes directly to Osama bin Laden. "Benny, may the last breath you take be spent looking at this flag."
The flag is going to a base set up at the weekend by Marines, near an airstrip at Kandahar, the only city in southern Afghanistan still controlled by the Taliban. WTC flag sent to Kandahar
"This flag is going to the guys on the ground. Eventually it's gonna come back: the NYPD wants this flag back, after they're done in Afghanistan," says Heil. "The NYPD want to set it up in some type of memorial."
Another flag sent from the ruins of the World Trade Centre has been flying at the stern of a US warship in the Arabian Gulf.
God, bless the United States Marine Corps and every other one of our wonderful service people!
§176. Respect for flag
(g) The flag should never have placed on it, or attached to it, any mark, insignia, letter, word, number, figure, or drawing of any kind.
You can check out the whole Code by clicking on the following website links:
No need to put on the flame suit, it is pretty clear that we should not be doing this.
As far as I'm concerned, that flag should fly over the airbase taken over by the Marines. It is the monument to those who died, as well as those who lived.
That flag is the Avatar of all of us, who cannot be there to fight.
Yeah, and the stem cells of the aborted fetuses? Well they're aborted already -- just use 'em.
It is highly unlikely that they will be given a proper burial in accordance to the rules of a moral society.
Nope, to a Marine it is UUUUUUHHHHH RRRRRAAAAHHHH!Just ask any Marine!
Methinks that anyone who would compare the symbol of the September 11 atrocities and the symbol of our nation, to
"fetal stem cell research" is a tad too anal retentive to be reasoned with.
If you feel the flag is "damaged" it should be burned. It does not provide an excuse to write on it.
Ok, it was a pretty poor analogy.
I love the graphics on this site.
It was a really p*ss poor analogy. While I agree with you that we should not be writing on flags, this flag is special.
This flag is not just a symbol. In a way, this flag is all of us.
If the US Marines don't mind, and will proudly fly this symbol of us while killing the murderous b*stards, I don't mind either.
No, that's not overkill. Shoving a pork loin down his throat first would be overkill.
This is the large flag that was flying atop the WTC. The rescue worker that found it tried numerous museums, including the Smithsonian, plus public agencies and no one wanted it. He was from San Diego so he contacted the air craft carrier Stennis that had just departed for Afghanistan and they were overjoyed to have it and it is now flying from the Stennis.
...You sure about that? Can we all take turns slapping him upside the head with it then?
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