A Generation Forgotten
When the powers that be decide that missiles need to start flying or projectiles need to be flung at the newest “enemy”, regardless of who or what they are, they need to think back and remember.
Remember what they did to the last generation of Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines.
The ones who are now retiring and have been for the last 10 years or so.
The ones that had more combat stripes on their uniforms than they ever did service stripes.
Service Stripes are awarded one for every 3 years of service. Combat Stripes are awarded one for every 6 months of service in a combat zone. I’ve personally seen so many lower enlisted Soldiers with 4 or more combat stripes and either one service stripe or no service stripe at all.
If they make it to retirement, to the slightly older, “blue ID card” years, the scars they carry…the thick, nasty, ropy kinds of scars that aren’t always, or even usually, visible. That’s a long, hard road to march for 20+ years.
The things that trigger their nightmares, if they even need triggers. The triggers are insignificant things that most of us pay no attention to. Trash, the sound of a low-flying plane or helicopter, a firecracker…especially the mortars, a car backfiring, a news report, or something as innocuous as a smell or a spoken phrase.
The vast majority of this country has forgotten that generation who, time and again, spent months and years in deserts and mountains where they began life as a teenager and grew to become an old man in a young man’s body.
22. Every veteran from this forgotten generation knows the meaning of that number. It’s the average number of us, every day, who lose the battle with the demons that haunt them. The average number of us who take their own lives every single day.
Now, we have begun the same type of operation, in the same part of the world, literally smack in between the last ones, in the midst of the same cultures that caused the untold amount of grief…and pain…and trauma, all over again. Still no plan, still the same flimsy, easily torn away reasoning, still no clear goals, still no exit strategy.
Are we ok with creating another generation of service members whose experiences will also be forgotten in a few years?
Because the last generation is still paying their price.
They will pay it, physically, mentally, emotionally, every day for the remainder of their lives.
All so we can be the biggest bully on the block.
Again.
We never learn the lessons that innocent kids pay for. With their lives. In one way or another, with their lives.
❤️🕊️
Watch, and ask yourself, are we ready for this again?