Veterans Day Speech


	Speech by Katherine Schmidt-Jenerette at the Veterans Day Memorial Service, North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. November 11, 1998. VETERANS DAY 1998 Yesterday's Veterans, Today's Military and Tomorrow's Challenges Good Morning - It's good to see you all out on a beautiful day like this...It's a great day to be an American...it's a great day to be a veteran...and I feel privileged and proud to be a part of this group who has done so much for so many. I know lot of you very well and it's great to see you ... just an update on me ... I'm still teaching American History at Brunswick Community College ... I'm still writing my book about my experiences in the Persian Gulf War with the 3d Armored Division ... and one of these days I'll finish it ... and finally, I'm still having children - I'm up to three now. I'd like to take a few moments to talk about why we are here today - I want to talk about the theme of Yesterday's Veterans, Today's Military and Tomorrow's Challenges. Today, we gather to salute our Nations Veterans - on this 80th Anniversary of the 11th hour, of the 11th day, of the 11th month of the great war that was supposed to "end all wars." Since that war ended in 1918, there have been many, many wars. But, once they are done and the shooting stops, how quickly the nation forgets those who sacrificed, and those who died... YESTERDAYS VETERANS Years ago someone once told me, "Every day's a bonus." It really is. And no one knows that better than a veteran, his family or his children...I feel like every day is a blessing...especially if I think back over the years that have flown by so quickly and I remember my friends who didn't come home like I came home - who won't see this day like I will see this day - who won't be remembered unless we remember...I feel like every day is a blessing... It's strange, I always seem to get Veterans Day and Memorial day mixed together in my head; one day is for the dead and the other is for the living... I had an uncle whose name is on the Vietnam Wall who will forever be 21-years old. I had a friend in my unit who I rode into the desert with back in '91 who made the supreme sacrifice in a minefield far away from home in Iraq...and then there is us standing here today - all of us - the lucky ones who came home and are here today. We remember our battalions, our companies, our ships, our bombers, our tanks. We remember our patrols, our deployments, our battles, our homecoming. We remember our friends, our crews, our units - the mess halls, guard duty - we remember their voices - their shouting - their laughing - their tears. We, the ones that have served this nation, have these images and sounds and feelings burned into our minds, hearts and souls...and sometimes we we look back and wonder...WHAT WAS IT ALL FOR? Does anyone today even care? TODAY'S MILITARY While I don't want to be critical during this day of remembrance, as a veteran of war and a historian I recognize the danger to our nation if our military is not prepared to go to war and to fight and to win! In WAR winning is EVERYTHING ...there is no place for second place in WAR. To those who think that we don't need a strong, well-equipped, and a well-trained fighting force; they are wrong! Those who think there is no danger are wrong... History has taught us many lessons - those nations who do not prepare for war in times of peace will pay in the blood of their sons and daughters in time of war. Please excuse me if I am not being politically correct... Today's military is in big trouble - the equipment is in need of parts and replacement; the bases are falling apart; the organization is without a clear mission; the soldiers, sailors, and airmen are not trained and ready, and the moral and spirit of our Armed Forces is nearly dead! Make no mistake - our most precious asset; the people who serve in our armed forces, are getting out in droves. We can't keep pilots to fly our fighters, we can't attract quality people to lead or to follow. Why? The easy answer is money, but what our forces need will take more than dollars to fix. There is a crisis of spirit that runs deep... Just the other day, I read how the services were cautioning their officers and men and women not to be critical of the Commander In Chief...the very soldiers who served in Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, Sudan, and Bosnia and paid in blood for this Nation's rights of free speech have been denied - those same rights to protect the 'reputation' of a person who when called to do his duty simply 'chickened-out.' It is ironic that we have drill sergeants in jail, pilots court martialled, and officers forced-out for behavior that pales in comparison. Where is the leadership? Where is the outrage? Where is the sense of moral injustice? Where is our leadership? There is a crisis of spirit in today's Armed Forces. We as a nation have seemed to have lost our direction. While the economy is good, our military is slowly shrinking. While the economy is good, veterans are on welfare, veterans are denied medical care, and veterans are forgotten. TOMORROW'S CHALLENGE We must wake up the nation. We must push through this time. We must remind our youth of today what price was paid and what the term... DUTY - HONOR - COUNTRY means... I remember part of a saying that we GI's used to see written in strange ways around the outpost of freedom: We are the unwilling, led by the unqualified ,doing the impossible, for the ungrateful. We must change this thinking...we must protect our nation, as much today as we did years ago. Our service to this nation is not over. We have much to do before the final roll call...we have much much to pass on. There is a important paragraph written many years ago by John Stewart Mill: War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. This saying is true today...but you and I must sound the wake-up call to a new generation of Americans that Freedom is not Free! We have to make it happen...and each generation has to make it happen...Spread the word and pass the torch of freedom... Keep up the fight...the nation still needs your voices... Thank-you, to all of you and your families. Those of us who are free today are free only because of what you have done ... and this we must not forget! God Bless You, and God Bless These United States of America.