May 27, 2013, - 2:17 pm
Memorial Day 2013: Remembering Our Heroes Who Made the Ultimate Sacrifice; But Enemies Fought Overseas Now Win on US Soil
I try to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice in service to America–giving their lives so that we would and will continue to be free–every single day, on this site and in the work I do outside of it. We need to remember those who gave their lives for America every single day, not just on one day of the year.
U.S. Army Sgt. Chris Moore @ the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (Photo by H. Darr Beiser/USA Today)
Michigan Natl Guard Staff Sgt. Duane Dreasky is Buried in Arlington Natl. Cemetery
But I have mixed emotions on this Memorial Day 2013. That’s because, yesterday, an experience I had brought starkly into my mind the contrasts and ironies involved in remembering those who died overseas (and on U.S. soil) in service to our country and to keep us free, while our enemies flourish on U.S. soil and nearly make their deaths ones that were in vain. Every day, young Americans–mostly men, and most of them so young, they are really almost kids–continue to die in Afghanistan, as they also died in Iraq, for no apparent reason, other than to pretend we are fighting to change the prevailing Islamic dynamic overseas. And at the same time they are fighting and dying over there, that prevailing Islamic dynamic takes over here on U.S. soil, so that future generations like those young boys who died will become future generations like the victims of Fort Hood and Lee Rigby on the streets of London, as we do nothing while extremists continue to invade and use the laws and freedoms our soldiers died for to take all of those freedoms away in the long term in the name of Islam.
Yesterday, at the gym while running on the treadmill, I was thinking:
Our soldiers died so I can and others here can do mindless, selfish things like work out at this gym and do it without wearing a burka or getting beheaded. And no one here is thinking about that. They’re thinking about Memorial Day sales and picnics and a day off. We are a lucky, but spoiled country. We don’t appreciate what we have, what our soldiers fought and died for, and it will come back to hurt us. They didn’t die for us to pay ten bucks and waste time watching garbage like “The Hangover Part III” and mindlessness like “Fast and Furious 6.” But that’s what America’s young generations are thinking about and spending their time and parents’ dollars on, NOT what this solemn weekend is supposed to be about. Heck, the solemnity doesn’t exist in Ameria, anymore, among younger generations and their parents who taught them it wasn’t important.
Then, on the way home, I stopped at a dollar store to buy some white vinegar (I pour some in the wash when I do laundry). In front of me in line to pay was a woman in a niqab–the Muslim full ninja outfit for women, so that this woman’s nose and chin won’t turn some out-of-control Muslim men into sudden rapists and so that those men don’t have to exercise an iota of control that we, here in Western civilization, expect modern men to exercise. And I see more and more and more of these women in niqabs in my neighborhood every single year. That’s because while our men our dying over there–have died over there in the thousands and maimed and lost limbs in the tens of thousands–and while our men over the centuries gave their lives, whether it was fighting the Nazis and Japanese or fighting each other to keep the Union together or fighting the British in the name of our independence, now it seems we have forgotten that sacrifice on a daily basis, as we do nothing to fight the future loss of all of that with the daily encroachment and spread of extremist Islam across American soil, from shore to shore.
After the women in the niqab left the dollar store, and as I was paying for my vinegar, I shared my internal vim and vinegar to the Black store clerk, a middle aged man who “Amened!” and shook in agreement with what I was saying. I said,
G-d, this makes me so angry. We’re about to memorialize our guys who died over there for them, and who decades earlier died elsewhere for us, and this woman and her full-face-veiled crap are spreading here for wildfire. And they died for that? So, that in future generations, her brand of cult will take over and erase all the gains those soldiers made for us in blood, giving their lives, getting blown up . . . all so that in future generations it will amount to nothing?! It can’t be.
Graves of Some of Our Fallen Heroes at Arlington National Cemetery
So, if you are remembering the ultimate sacrifice these men made, whether it was at Lexington or Chelsea Creek, at Antietam or Gettysburg, on the beach at Normandy or at Iwo Jima, at Da Nang or the streets of Baghdad or Kabul, ask yourself: what are you doing to make sure that those deaths were not in vain? Are you doing anything to stop the cancerous Islamic threat and slow down its metastasis? If not, then your Memorial Day remembrance is just hollow and empty. You must do more. You must educate ignorant, naive, and/or politically correct friends and family. You must make sure that the deaths of our soldiers overseas and on U.S. soil over the centuries continues to mean something, that it wasn’t just in vain a few generations later because we were content and happy to just go to the gym, the dollar store, and the crappy movies, and to just get on with our lives. That’s not good enough. We must do more.
Or their lives–the lives that meant so much, that mean so much to the continuation of freedom and America as we know it–will in a couple of hundred years or so, will have been lost for nothing, or just a brief respite of Western civilization overtaken by those who hack soldiers to death on the streets of London, those who blow up Boston marathons, those who hijack planes and fly then into buildings or try to blow them up with their underwear or shoes.
Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
The lives of our fallen American heroes meant something. They mean something. They gave everything for us. The least we can do is give something so that their sacrificed lives still mean something in a couple hundred years, a few generations from now.
It means fighting immigration amnesty for tens of thousands of these women in full ninjas and their husbands, who are here illegally. They don’t deserve a path to citizenship after their people–their fellow co-religionists–blew up the men we remember today and took their lives. It means fighting against their infringement on our First Amendment rights and fighting to keep our Second Amendment rights solid and uninfringed by gun control, so that we can ensure that those First Amendment rights are protected. It means activism and talking ’til your blue in the face. It means not silently standing by as a women goes into your dollar store with everything but her pupils covered in the United States of America.
You must do something–anything–to continue to make the sacrifices of those we remember today, a sacrifice whose end goal still endures in America’s future.
More from former Navy SEAL Leif Babin:
In 2006, my SEAL Task Unit deployed to Ramadi, Iraq. Among the rubble-pile buildings, bomb craters and burned-out hulks of vehicles, we experienced firsthand the harsh realities of war. We fought alongside the U.S. Army’s Ready First Brigade of the First Armored Division to take Ramadi back from a brutal and determined insurgency.
Combat is hard. It is alarmingly violent, ear-shattering, dirty, exhausting and ugly. It is marked by chaos and confusion and self-doubt. But combat also highlights the determination and sacrifice—and courage—of those who persevere. Through such times, an unbreakable bond is formed with brothers-in-arms.
Those bonds were tested greatly as our task unit suffered the first SEAL casualties of the Iraq War: Marc Lee and Mike Monsoor. Later, Ryan Job died of wounds received in combat. These men were three of the most talented and capable SEALs I have known. They were also loyal friends. Their loss is deeply personal to their families and to their SEAL teammates. As Marc’s and Ryan’s platoon commander, I bear the crushing burden of responsibility. I will forever wish that I could somehow take their place.
As a result, Memorial Day is deeply personal—to me, as it is to any veteran, to any military family. It is a time of mixed emotion: solemn reflection and mourning, honor and admiration for those who made the ultimate sacrifice in the service of their country.
Navy SEAL Leif Babin Let’s remember on Memorial Day—and every other day, for that matter—that America did not become a nation without a fight. Last week, I found myself in Washington, D.C., admiring a bronze statue of George Washington. The statue shows him as a general, astride a horse, sword drawn at the ready. This was Washington as a true American leader, inspiring those around him by showing that he too was willing to risk death for the cause of victory. The statue brought to mind the thousands of soldiers who marched with him into battle against the British, facing seemingly impossible odds.
It was not the Declaration of Independence that gave us freedom but the Continental Army. America was born from conflict, delivered by soldiers willing to pay with their blood the tremendous cost of freedom.
The dead did not wish to be martyred. They no doubt longed to return to their homes and families. But they believed in the “glorious cause,” something far greater than themselves. Despite knowing the dangers before them, they followed Gen. Washington into the fray even when victory seemed hopeless and the cause all but lost.
In America today, there are those who believe that under no circumstances is war the answer. Violence only begets more violence, we’re told. The unstated message: Nothing is worth fighting and dying for. History disagrees.
Knowing firsthand the hardships of combat gives me all the more reason to admire and stand in awe of those who marched with Washington and gave their lives for the United States of America. Most will never be depicted in bronze, but their sacrifices matter. The legions of American warriors since then who sacrificed their lives have not done so eagerly, nor have they done so blindly. They acted willingly because they believed in a great nation that is worth fighting and dying for.
Memorial Day is a living monument to them, a recognition of freedom’s cost. May we never take those sacrifices for granted.
AMEN.
Yes, America was born of conflict and war. Because our freedom and independence were worth fighting for. Worth killing for. Worth giving our lives for. But let’s make sure that the things–the freedoms and the country–those lives were given for continue to live on.
Today, will we just bend over, instead, as we lose our country, because we don’t want to offend anyone? Because we don’t want to stand up for what is right?
They gave their lives for what is right? We can at least give our voice and our energy for it. Otherwise, our nation will be lost. And that’s the real lesson of Memorial Day.
Graves of American Soldiers Who Gave Their Lives in WWII @ Normandy
Tags: American holidays, American national holidays, Leif Babin, Memorial Day, Memorial Day 2013, national holiday
It means ensuring our government doesn’t treat Islamic terrorists with more respect than it treats those who gave their lives for our country – often like crap.
If we want Memorial Day to mean something, let’s stop kow-towing to Islam. Let’s make the day worthy of all those who fought to keep America strong and free.
Its high time we put our American family first. The sacrifices of our ancestors should never be forgotten!
NormanF on May 27, 2013 at 2:29 pm