Who Will Remember?

Today is the 71st anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. "A date which will live in infamy." Readers (2) who said that? What day of the week did the attack occur? What time of the day (I will give you an hour on either side.) Who committed the attack, with what, and what was destroyed? Were any civilians killed? Now for something a little more vague, where (or on what) was the greatest concentration of deaths? What still lies on the bottom?

I knew these answers as a child, a son of a World War I veteran and a Navy man, these were the bits of knowledge you did not forget. To bring it closer to the current time, will the decendants of parents living on September 11, 2001 be able to answer the who, what, when, how questions of that dark day? America has not  been attacked very often. This year is the anniversay of the War of 1812 or as it was called then Mr. Madison's War, and some call our Second War of Independence. The British Army burned the Captial; when you visit the White House, the scars of bullet hits are still on Portico. The scar's of America's involvement in so many conficts, lie here in the US, and far fields in Europe, in rusting hulks in lagoons of the Pacific, a frozen pennisula, the jungles of Asia, and in the blowing sand of distant deserts. Each of these scars is a mark of our nations leadership. Right or wrong history will judge, but in every event it is our citizens, that 1% who answer the call, and it is about them, it is for them we must keep the memory of these events.

Sadly, those who feel differently carry more influence, curriculum changes, apologists grow in numbers, while others tend the graves, stand watch at the tombs, and the participants of the conflict are called home to be with their fallen comrades. I avoided Vietnam by a few numbers in the lottery, my friends who went said I did not miss anything anyway, but I call myself a patriot from a long line of patriots. From the French and Indian War to a current generation who served in Iraq and family still serving I am blessed to be in the embrace of those who answered the call. Patriot is not a dirty word, for a true one will stand against what is wrong, as well as stand with what is right. It is the difference that must be judged later.

For now though the few remaining who were there that fateful day and all those who followed should be held in our memory and as we live and work in our communities recognize those who serve now, support them and their families and never forget their service.