"Support and Defend"

“I, (American citizen), do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.”

The above oath is taken at the time any man or woman enters the armed services of the United States of America; I took this oath along with many others. I took this oath very seriously; it is a commitment to give everything asked of you in the defense our country, America, land of the free and home of the brave.

Way back then, we had the draft and some of my fellow “oath-takers” weren’t too eager about taking this step forward; I understand their point of view, nobody likes to be forced to do something they don’t want to do; especially if you might get killed for doing it!

Sometime after that, those young men reported to different forts across America for Basic Combat Training, in preparation for their next assignment; some went to Artillery School, some went to Clerk Typist School, some went to Military Police School and some went to Infantry School.

I went to Infantry School at Fort McClellan, Alabama and I earned the title Combat Infantryman, commonly known as “grunts”.

About 80% of those who graduated from Infantry School were destined for a land with a “tropical climate”;  the rest went to places like Germany, Korea, Japan or some stateside duty.

Those young men in the “80%” didn’t have a choice of duty assignment, they just “saddled up” and went where they were told, and some never came home from that “tropical paradise” giving their last breath to the protection of the people of the United States of America. Most of those boys go unremembered most of the year, along with young boys (and women) from WWI, WWII, Korea, Desert Storm, and our current entanglements.

A couple of times a year we, as a nation, spend a little time thinking about what has been given to maintain the freedoms which some of us treat so casually. We even have elected officials who treat these freedoms as something which may be changed or even disposed of at the pleasure of following a “social agenda’ or “political philosophy”; most of them don’t understand the price that has been paid for those rights.

Monday we celebrate “Memorial Day” in America, a day off of work, a day to cook-out and celebrate the coming summer, but most of all, it should be a day to honor all those who gave everything to keep America a free nation; for those who died, who vowed to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States” at all cost.

As voters, we have our own way of giving our nation an act of service; it is done in the voting booth every two years. This is our chance to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States”.

We may not be on a bloody battlefield as shells and bullets fly toward our heads, but we are in a battle, a battle for those things all those young people died for; don’t let them down.

Enjoy “Memorial Day”, remember the price!