A Veterans Day Message By A Veteran, For Veterans.

I want to start off by saying Happy Veterans Day, and from the bottom of my heart, Thank You! I am forever grateful for my fellow 3274th USAH Soldiers and my Marine Corps crew from 2ndMarDiv., 7th Comm. Bn., I MLG, RCT-2, and the 24th MEU. I chose the following quotes because I think they, better than any other quotes, sum up what we do and why we do it. Political Policy and Public Opinion will always change. Civilian support will always come and go, but we, and our actions, will always remain. Our bonds will always endure. Even as I write this I think about arguments and disagreements some of us have had with each other. Some of those disagreements and wrongs still linger, but for a brief point in time, we stood side by side and did great things together and for each other. And, these things changed us forever, and they'll always play a part in our lives. That's something I take pride in, and would do all over again without question.

"We who have seen war, will never stop seeing it. In the silence of the night, we will always hear the screams. So this is our story, for we were soldiers once, and young. Some had families waiting. For others, their only family would be the men they bled beside. There were no bands, no flags, no Honor Guards to welcome them home. They went to war because their country ordered them to. But in the end, they fought not for their country or their flag, they fought for each other. "

-Joseph L. Galloway, "We Were Soldiers, Once And Young."

"A man fires a rifle, and he goes to war. And afterwards he comes home and sees that whatever else he may do with his life - build a house, love a woman, change his son's diaper - he will always remain a jarhead. And all the jarheads killing and dying, they will always be me. We are still in the desert."

-Anthony Swofford, "Jarhead"

As for the video, I did not in any way post this as a protest against the war, and I'm not condoning any of the actions in the video or saying that I or anyone I know took part in anything like what's depicted. I decided to use it as a way of saying that being over there changes you and tests you in ways that civilians don't and never will understand. It also makes you question right and wrong, and we all realize that hardly anything there is black and white. Shades of grey abound in so many situations. Civilians back home are in no place to judge or criticize us when they haven't walked in our shoes. Regardless of how I may feel about the legality of one war and the direction of another, WE WENT BECAUSE OUR COUNTRY ASKED US TO, AND WITH YOU ALL BY MY SIDE, I WOULD DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN! HAPPY VETERANS DAY MY BROTHERS AND SISTERS!

Hero of War by Rise Against: