Open Letter To Our Military

I am pleased to be able to write to you to tell you that each of you holds a place in my heart. How does anybody truly convey the depth of appreciation for what you are asked to do for the wellbeing of the USA. You place your physical wellbeing at risk changing the pattern of your lives while leaving all that is familiar including your families, friends and future plans. Greater love of country is impossible to find. I have great confidence that you will succeed at whatever task is at hand. I saw an article in USA Today some months ago that mentioned three Iraqi brothers who were blogging from Baghdad. I checked out their blog http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/
and I finally felt I was getting views of what was happening in Iraq that was not being told by the media. I followed the links they posted to other Iraqi bloggers and links to Military blogs. I was hooked! As my son says on his webpage, "Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day; teach that person to use the Internet and they won't bother you for weeks". He laughs at me now because I spend so much time reading the blogs from the Military, the Iraqis and about politics.
My blog has been dominated by my thoughts on the political situation for many months.
It really started with the New Hampshire Democratic primary elections. As the months progressed with caucuses and primaries, I watched the televised debates and what I saw did not make me happy. We are at war, our military are in harms way because of
bold leadership by President Bush after our nation was brutally attacked on 9/11.
The Democratic debates quickly were a contest about who could bash President Bush most effectively. I have always been an independent who cast a vote for the person I thought would do the best job. The Democratic bashing has turned me into a Republican until such time as Democrats return to a more central position
I lived through WWII and so happy on VE day because my brother had enlisted in the Navy and at 10 I was naive enough to think this would mean he did not have to go.
In that and subsequent conflicts we did not have the internet so snail mail was the only way we could communicate. Cousins who were in the military during WWII had their mail censored and I recall reading them with lots of blacked our blanks. This is so much better in that military can instant message their loved ones and people like me can write my thoughts for anyone who may be interested to read. I lived through Korea with military that were at that time in my age group. Then came Vietnam
with the constant barrage of so many battles,so many losses of our brave troops. In WWII demoralizing messages were radioed to our troops in Europe and in the Pacific by Tokyo Rose. These were Germans and Japanese broadcasting propaganda about what the girlfriends or wives were doing while they were at war, how they were losing,how nobody at home cared about them. Anything to try to break their spirit. Then we came to Vietnam. Now the ones trying to demoralize our troops were homegrown. Jane Fonda went to North Vietnam to protest US presence. She reviewed our POWs in the hands of the North Vietnamese. She shook hands with our troops. At least one POW slipped her a note which she promptly turned over to the Vietcong. Back in the US, she was soon joined by John Kerry in their endless plotting against our presence in Vietnam. That was their right, we have freedoms fought for and protected by our military over the years. However, John Kerry testified before the senate claiming our military were murdering, raping, torturing, killing babies etc. The people he claimed told him these things have been discredited. This is why the Vietnam Vets were so badly treated when they came home.
All of this occurred while our military were still in action. You can read more accurate accounts of this written by vets at www.swiftvet.com and wintersoldier.com
I cannot vote for John Kerry. If you are a Kerry supporter, you will not like my blog. If you are undecided or plan to vote for President Bush, you may find my thoughts of interest. Whatever you think, I urge you to vote your conscience.
Now we have M. Moore and his propaganda movie, politicians who seem to want us to be defeated so they can prove their point that this war is wrong. Do not believe, even if God forbid Kerry wins, that we are not supporting you. I think enough of us feel the war was right both in Afghanistan and in Iraq to free the millions of innocent people who have lived so long under the suppression of the Taliban and Saddam. As a woman, I cannot imagine not being able to leave my home without a male relative, being stoned because my ankle showed beneath my dress, not being allowed to go to school and pursue my profession as a nurse and nurse educator. It is Taliban types who want to take over the Muslim world and then the entire world. The Iaqis have
issued a decree that women from birth to age 40 are to have a male relative accompany them in order to get a passport. Many Iraqis are trying hard to develop a democracy and they value freedom so greatly.Read the site I mention in my previous blog to read some of the good news from Iraq.
Please remember that you are in my thoughts and in my prayers. May God's angels watch over you. You are honored and loved by this senior citizen in North Carolina.