[Chainmail]

I have no idea what experience our other military veterans have had and I certainly read their opinions with interest.

However, I have somewhat more experience than most - 27 years in uniform - so I have seen the depths that Democratic leadership has taken respect to our armed forces to. Like I said earlier, we went through a period where we had to wear civilian clothes to the Pentagon to avoid arousing unhappy reactions of our liberal betters.

A good military parade has several great benefits:

Showing the American people the state of readiness and fitness of our young service people. And showing everyone that they are like everyone else, not some faceless "military" as the Left would have you believe.

Training our different services in the logistics and issues in the mass movement of men and materiel - quite similar to what would be required if we had to move large units to the West coast, for instance if things brew up in North Korea.

Also an excellent recruiting tool to present our armed forces as a meritorious and even elite organization, unlike the image pushed by three generations of communist-leaning educators.

An excellent motivator for those in the "thin green line" to show our appreciation and admiration.

So - why do you have a problem with that?

[TexasGunLover]

So - why do you have a problem with that?

First, thank you for your service, genuinely. Something I've taught my children to do, and I have always done as it was instilled in my by father is to walk up to any service member and thank them in public.

I can appreciate your take on the parade. In my mind, my reaction is that I associate a military parade with the countries I've mentioned before. I also subscribe to the fact that sometimes, less is more. In other words, something that regularly demonstrates the superiority of American forces is that they don't have these shows of force. It's just my opinion and reaction. I haven't served and so don't have a horse in that race, but I've read both opinions on the thread.

For me, what makes our military great is that they don't perform these same shows of force, but bring victory. I also fully support celebration and parades of soldiers coming back from active duty.