Mitch Lewis

Pictured above is the memorial tablet one sees as one enters Soldier Memorial Chapel on Camp Walker in Daegu (or Taegu), Korea. It may look like just another memorial plaque, but here on this land U.S. forces made a real difference for the 50 million people now living in the Republic of Korea (ROK). If someone asks if the use or threat of armed force ever does any good, one need look no further than the Korean peninsula.

After the U.S. liberated Korea from a half-century of Japanese occupation at the end of World War II, the Soviet Union made a land-grab to gobble up as much territory as it could in the Pacific. Soviet forces entered the northern half of Korea and effectively divided the nation at the 38th parallel. Stalin trained and equipped the army of his hand-picked dictator - Kim Il Sung - to dominate the region. Unsurprisingly, in June 1950 the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK) invaded the unprepared and virtually unarmed republic to its south.

Were it not for the combined efforts of the armed forces of the Republic of Korea, the United States and the fifteen other nations of the United Nations Command that defended against North Korean (and later Chinese) aggression, South Koreans would be living in the same state of starvation and virtual slavery that North Koreans endure today. See, for example, here and here. The Republic of Korea has the tenth largest economy in the world, rising literally from the ashes of its post-war world. Its citizens today enjoy true freedom of expression and political association.

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For me, Memorial Day changed forever in 2003. It's one thing to remember the hundreds of thousands who died fighting our nation's battles; it's another to remember the men and women with whom you personally went to war, some of whom never came home.

This monument at Fort Stewart remembers eight members of the Third Infantry Division Artillery who died in the first few weeks of what is now a five-year operation. Over 4000 have followed them in death, but these eight mean something extra special to me. The Division Artillery no longer exists as an organization, but these men whom I accompanied to war will forever be in my mind. May God continue to comfort and strengthen their families and the families of all the fallen.

So today I remember:
SFC Randall Rehn
SGT Todd J. Robbins
SPC Donald S. Oaks, Jr.
SPC Daniel J. Cunningham
PVT Devon D. Jones
CPT Tristan Aitken
1LT Jeffrey J. Kaylor

This holiday is no longer about some unknown "them"; it's personal now. And, as a consequence, I now also feel a very personal connection to all who bravely stood in the line of battle and gave the last full measure of devotion on our behalf.

Marne Thunder
Rock of the Marne

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