Uncommon Valor Was A Common Virtue

A friend mentioned the name Ira Hayes this morning and I looked up the lyrics to the Johnny Cash song that I knew so well. I went on to read the stories of the battles at Iwo Jima and how Hayes and the others in that famous photograph fared.

Three of the six men in that photograph were dead within 21 days in the fighting that continued on that tiny island. One was hit by a mortar, another friendly fire and the third by a sniper. The other three were taken back to the states to promote the bond sales that funded the war. They were "wined and speeched and honored" and all three tried to tell the world that they were nothing but lucky... the heroes were buried in long rows of graves in the black sand of Iwo. Ira was heard muttering "my buddies, my buddies..." before he died, drunk, in an irrigation ditch on a reservation at the age of 32.

I'm embarassed to be part of a generation that is full of self promotion, where complaining is considered courageous and "victim-hood is a virtue." If you doubt that we've softened, imagine the reaction to losing 25,000 American soldiers in a month of fighting for 7.5 square miles of black ash and sand. There's no value left in being part of something bigger than our individual selves. There's no value left in serving the greater good.

I'm not a Marine and so I cannot and will not presume to salute those men who've fought and died for my freedom but I will mention their names with reverence.

Mike Strank of Pennsylvania
Harlon Block of Texas
Franklin Sousley of Ohio
Rene Gagnon of New Hampshire
John Bradley of Wisconsin
Ira Hayes of Arizona

May I live a life worthy of the freedom their lives bought for me.