American Sacrifice
Our way of life was gained at a great price

Hats off to Kentucky employers who are sacrificing with the absence of employees deployed to active military service. Employers must “make do” and guarantee jobs upon their return. One employer has also supplemented military salaries so families of those deployed will not suffer extreme financial hardship.

The reality of sacrifice is familiar to previous generations of Americans and many in contemporary America. A recent letter to the editor from a war opponent suggested that those who support the war to liberate Iraq prove it by joining the military to fight. In truth, many of them have already done that, many more than once…in the 1991 Gulf War, in Kosovo, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Korea and World War II. These people need no lessons on sacrifice.

War is always a terrible thing. However, it is sometimes the only alternative to the dreadful consequences of appeasement; to wit, the Nazi practices and ambitions of the 1940s. America’s leaders and a decisive majority of her citizens believe that the war in Iraq is one that must be fought, after 12 years of futile UN negotiations and terrorist attacks on America.

America’s liberty has never been free and preserving it is costly. Historian Stephen Ambrose’s book, “Band of Brothers,” relates verbatim World War II letters back home from E Company of the 101st Airborne Division. One wrote, “…stop worrying about me…. No war can be won without young men dying. Those things which are precious are saved only by sacrifice.”

The 9-11 terrorist attacks changed American thinking about preserving national security. Possibilities of further danger and destruction reintroduced the reality of sacrifice. While most Americans willingly sacrifice for their country in one way or another, no sacrifice equals that experienced by those at the battlefront. Those who serve in harm’s way need their story told. They need united support from the nation they struggle to secure from terrorism. Each one is a volunteer. Not one is forced into service to defend this great nation.

A note to subscribers of “moral equivalence” among nations: You will not see American soldiers gloating over dead Iraqi soldiers. You see them rescuing children and treating wounds of enemy combatants. You see a nation going out of its way to strike only military targets. You do not see them position artillery and tanks in civilian areas. You do not see them dress in civilian outfits, using women and children as human shields.

Moral equivalency indeed! Those in the Middle East who danced in the streets at news of the World Trade Center tragedy graphically demonstrated stark distinctions between civilization and barbarism – between decency and evil.

What happened to America’s tradition that politics should stop at the water’s edge? During the Cuban missile crisis, President Kennedy received united support from former President Eisenhower and political opponent Richard M. Nixon. Not anymore. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle and former presidents Carter and Clinton, while offering neither strategic alternatives nor respectable political dissent, took cheap partisan shots in bitterly attacking President George W. Bush as American forces massed along the Kuwaiti border.

Recently, some Kentuckians were sickened at reports that Asbury Seminary administrators removed American flags from its cafeteria because “God’s people do not wave flags as the sign of conquest.” Do they confuse “conquest” with liberty? While 45 nations are represented in that student body, including Iraq, why are these students here if they find America’s symbol offensive?

It cannot be said better than the words of Father Denis Edward O’Brien, USMC chaplain: “It is the Soldier, not the poet, who gave us Freedom of Speech. It is the Soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the Freedom to Demonstrate. It is the Soldier who salutes the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag. It is the Soldier whose bravery and sacrifice made it possible for the protestor to burn the flag.”

And let us add, to remove the flag from a school cafeteria.

Pat Freibert is a former Kentucky state representative from Lexington
editorial@lanereport.com

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