The Veterans Day Thread

[UtahDan]

"We sleep safely at night because rough men stand ready to visit violence on those who would harm us." -Winston Churchill

As one who has never served in the military, I hold the service people render to our country in the armed forces in a fair amount of reverence. There are families everywhere today who are remembering a dad, a son, a brother, a husband, or in some cases a wife, daughter, mother or sister who will not join them at the Thanksgiving table in a few weeks because they died in a foreign land clutching a rifle or a radio. Some in the company of their comrades and others scared and alone.

Other families will sit at the table with a loved one who is a hollowed out shell because of the things they have seen and the things they have had to do. Some of these are missing arms or legs or most of their skin. Yet other families will remember a loved one who lost the battle once they returned because of the demons that accompanied him back. But many of us will be fortunate enough to have a Veteran with us in our homes, or our offices or our congregations. Some Veterans will be seen on the street or about town today proudly displaying the tokens of their service. No one has to agree with every foreign policy decision that has been made by our government, or even any of them, to recognize that these people hold a place of honor in our society.

If you get a chance today, let a Veteran know you are grateful for their service and sacrifice.

I also thought this might be a nice place to share memories or stories or just appreciation for Veterans we know.

[UtahDan]

I wish I knew the family history better, but the Veteran in my life was my maternal grandfather. I always remember the big tatoo on his forearm that you couldn't quite make out anymore that he got while he was in the Navy.

After Pearl Harbor was attacked, my grandfather and his father left for Hawaii. The clean up effort there was significant and the two of them participated in cleaning up the harbor, a huge amount of which involved retrieving the remains of the dead. I don't know if he had already enlisted at that point or whether that came later, but ultimately he did join the Navy.

From there he served on a frigate tender and ultimately on a submarine chaser, the USS SC-686 which later foundered in a storm near Okinawa and was lost (he was not stationed on it by then). It looked like this:




He was stationed aboard the sub chaser when Okinawa was invaded and was there when the Japanese surrendered. He reached the rank of Radioman, 3rd class. He has been gone now for more than 10 years. Thanks Grandpa.

[Pheidippides]

Great thread. I will share the story of my Grandfather, who passed on some 8 years ago. He was an uneducated man, but a smart one. He enlisted in the army from his farm in Idaho, earned several Sharpshooter badges, went over to Europe, and was promptly captured by the Germans. He spent several months in a concentration camp (actually, it may have been "just" a POW camp) where he was forced to do things like eat dead cats and rats just to survive. He and the rest of the prisoners were taken to a hill to be executed one day, and, as they were lined up facing the rifles, the Russians came in and saved them. He went back to the states, got well (it took some time) and then went to the Asian theater.

I knew only knew very vague details of this until he died, and old army veterans showed up to give him a 21 gun salute, and we found his old medals (among them, a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star).

It made me realize how many people there are out there who are heroes in keeping us free, but who come home and don't really talk about it, don't brag about it, and don't get the respect and recognition they deserve.

[myboynoah]

My father. He served in Korea and sports a Purple Heart license plate. A few years back he had tire trouble and was stopped by the road taking care of it. A nice guy stopped and helped him. After all was taken care of and the guy was leaving, he turned, pointed at the license plate and said, "Thank you for your service." Brought tears to my dad's eyes.

How many CUF veterans do we have? Obviously GNer. Any others?

Thank you all for your service.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Great thread, UD.

This photo got to me this morning:

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705343659/Obama-salutes-slain.html

[UtahDan]

Great thread, UD.

This photo got to me this morning:



http://www.deseretnews.com/article/7...tes-slain.html

This must be particularly moving for those of you who have children who of are military service age.

[byu71]

Great thread to start, thanks. My Dad served in WWII and continued in the Air Force Reserves. He got to the rank of Colonel. Really didn't talk about his combat experiences much.

Now that he is older, he talks about it more, but I am not so sure he remembers things quite exactly as they were. I know from an earlier discussion with him he met Patton and Patton ordered him to get an airfield cleared and ready. Now the story goes that he told Patton that way he wanted it done was wrong and got him to do it another way.

As one who never served, I have the deepest respect for those who have served and presently serve. Amongst Dad's personal effects, the one his 3 sons will have by far the biggest debate over, is his uniform he wore in WWII.

Again thanks for the reminder. I will call my Dad today and thank him for his service.

[beefytee]

In Flanders fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
— Lt.-Col. John McCrae (1872 - 1918)

[BoylenOver]

My grandfather is a former Marine who served during the Korean War (but never fought in the actual war); my father is a former Marine; and my brother graduated from boot camp last week.



I'm grateful for their service and unselfish desire to protect our great nation.

[Indy Coug]

Let me give a different perspective on Veteran's Day.

As most of you know, my family lived in Saudi Arabia for nearly 20 years. While a student at BYU, I would still fly out to Saudi for Christmas and for a few weeks in the summer. While visiting during the summer of 1990, Saddam invaded Kuwait, which was less than 200 miles from where we lived on the coast of the Persian Gulf.

The fear was that Saddam wouldn't just stop with Kuwait and that he would attempt to seize all the oil production facilities along the Saudi coastline. In the days to come, more and more Kuwaiti refugees poured into Saudi, telling horrific stories of what Saddam was doing in their country. Obviously, we were very concerned. What would happen to us and where we lived?

Scores of Westerners were scrambling to find any way out of the country. Fortunately, we had plane tickets scheduled a couple of weeks after the invasion (for my family's annual vacation to the US), so we had our out... as long as we could keep safe for those couple of weeks. It was a very tense time.

Thankfully, the American military arrived shortly thereafter and made sure that Saddam stopped at the border. They set up a large camp near where we lived. Our ward and other groups of Americans would visit regularly and provide food, recreation and entertainment for the troops as a show of our appreciation.

That Christmas, I flew back from BYU to home. We were lucky enough to host five Marines for Christmas Day. They hung out with us and had a real Christmas dinner (not some MRE), shot basketball in the backyard, played Nintendo, called home for as long as they wanted and so forth. It was the best Christmas our family ever had. For fun, we drove up the highway leading to Kuwait and passed an endless caravan of military personnel and machinery. We drove probably 50 miles and never saw an end to the caravan. It was truly astounding how much there was.

As the time of the Kuwait liberation neared, my family was distributed gas masks in the event that scuds were carrying biological weapons. Several times in the middle of the night, scuds landed within a few miles of our home. Air raid sirens would go off in the middle of the night and my family would scramble out of bed and get into my parents' walk-in closet, put on their gas masks and wait for the all clear to be given. We have a fist sized piece of a scud missle as a souvenir from a "near miss".

So as an American citizen whose family has been in some measure of harm's way, I am especially grateful for those that have served their country. Lee Greenwood's God Bless the USA was played on the local radio all the time and never has a song had more meaning to me and my family than that song did to our family at that time.

God Bless the USA.

[beefytee]

Great thread. I will share the story of my Grandfather, who passed on some 8 years ago. He was an uneducated man, but a smart one. He enlisted in the army from his farm in Idaho, earned several Sharpshooter badges, went over to Europe, and was promptly captured by the Germans. He spent several months in a concentration camp (actually, it may have been "just" a POW camp) where he was forced to do things like eat dead cats and rats just to survive. He and the rest of the prisoners were taken to a hill to be executed one day, and, as they were lined up facing the rifles, the Russians came in and saved them. He went back to the states, got well (it took some time) and then went to the Asian theater.

I knew only knew very vague details of this until he died, and old army veterans showed up to give him a 21 gun salute, and we found his old medals (among them, a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star).

It made me realize how many people there are out there who are heroes in keeping us free, but who come home and don't really talk about it, don't brag about it, and don't get the respect and recognition they deserve.

Was this WW1 or 2?

Based on my inference of your age, I would guess 2.

[Indy Coug]

I knew only knew very vague details of this until he died, and old army veterans showed up to give him a 21 gun salute, and we found his old medals (among them, a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star).

It made me realize how many people there are out there who are heroes in keeping us free, but who come home and don't really talk about it, don't brag about it, and don't get the respect and recognition they deserve.

My wife's grandfather served in the Pacific and never discussed his war experience to his family. I didn't know this beforehand, so during a visit I just asked a few questions about places he had been to during the war and he suddenly started sharing some of his war experiences; things his family had never heard before. I'm not sure why he picked that time to share it and why it was me instead of his family, but it was an interesting experience.

[BoylenOver]

It made me realize how many people there are out there who are heroes in keeping us free, but who come home and don't really talk about it, don't brag about it, and don't get the respect and recognition they deserve.

This is part of the reason why my grandfather holds a deep resentment of Tom Brokaw's "Greatest Generation" designation. The people who fought for us in WWII don't consider themselves heroes; they felt like they did what they had to do, and no more or no less. They would rather live their normal lives and not recall or revisit those experiences.

[Goatnapper'96]

I knew only knew very vague details of this until he died, and old army veterans showed up to give him a 21 gun salute, and we found his old medals (among them, a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star).

It made me realize how many people there are out there who are heroes in keeping us free, but who come home and don't really talk about it, don't brag about it, and don't get the respect and recognition they deserve.

Getting a Bronze Star during WWII was a really, really big deal. Those types of medals were not given away as easily then as they are now.

[TripletDaddy]

My experience with Veteran's has been similar to some that have been expressed here.

My uncle was a WW2 vet. While fighting in France, Germany, and possibly Poland (can't remember), he was part of a large group of support that came in several days after the initial liberation of concentration camps. His war stories were usually pretty interesting, but he only mention the concentration camp experiences very infrequently. The first time he told us, he started crying. In fact, we all were crying.

I was around jr high age at that time and his stories are what turned me towards a fascination of all things WW2...truthfully, even down to the WW2 video games.

I get the feeling that my uncle was a "plain jane" of sorts. He had no stories of great heroism beyond the call of duty. I am not aware of any special awards he received. And I don't recall him telling us of harrowing dogfights with the Luftwaffe, or hand-to-hand combat with the SS, or anything of that nature. In fact, if I am not mistaken, he may have even spent some of his time in the Army working as a cook. But he WAS there. And he served. He was ready. And he was a kid.

Perhaps the most mind boggling thing about our veterans is how young they were when they entered into service with a willingness to give their own life. I can only hope to one day be so selfless in the name of country and fellow man.

Props to all our Veterans and especially to our CUF veterans (including Simi Valley's finest!). Thank you to everyone for protecting me and my family.