Comments

Tom,

Prayers sent up in memory of those that have gone before us. May we be thankful for those who blazed a trail for us and remember those who made such great sacrifices that we might continue to travel that path today.

And to you, my friend, a safe trip and a wonderful Memorial Day.

Posted by Dan Gunter at May 23, 2009 4:06 PM

We are most grateful to for veterans during this weekend of rememberance. My beloved father was a Korean War veteran. Thank you for the mention. A lot happened there that he never spoke of, a lot that he could not whisper and wished to forget.

When my father died many years later, after being away from our family most of my life, my mother was given the flag that draped his casket. I can still see her clutching it with tears in her eyes. She loved him and knew some of his stories.

May God bless our veterans and their family on this special day that we remember their service to our great country.

May God continue to bless America and may we bless the world through our example and service.

Safe travels, TP. Thank you for your service.

Posted by Judith Ellis at May 23, 2009 4:40 PM

i am korean.
we are thank you..

Posted by Sangseng at May 23, 2009 8:34 PM

My greatest respect for the men and women, as well as the corresponding veterans, wearing uniform of the United States. My heart goes out to their family members, loved ones, and friends.

Posted by Andres Agostini (Andy) at May 23, 2009 10:27 PM

TP - Is that you in the photo? It's really cool: the likened "Bridge over the River Kwai" upon which the three Navy Seabees stood--one receiving important information via telecommunications, another alert and thoughtful (who might this be?), and the other standing guard. Is that a stooping wise native old man in white or an enemy combatant? I guess the former. But I suppose some enemies were hard to tell by what I have read in the past about that war in particular. What a time that must have been.

In honor of our veterans, I thought I'd do a little research on the role of Navy Seabees. WOW!!! What great work they do!

Below are excerpts from Wikipedia:

Korean War

The Korean War saw a call-up of more than 10,000 men. The expansion of the Seabees came from the Naval Reserve Seabee program where individuals volunteered for active duty. The Seabees landed at Incheon with the assault troops. They fought enormous tides as well as enemy fire and provided causeways within hours of the initial landings. Their action here and at other landings emphasized the role of the Seabees and there was no Seabee demobilization when the truce was declared.

During the Korean War the Navy realized they needed a naval air station in this region. Cubi Point in the Philippines was selected and civilian contractors were initially selected for the project. After seeing the forbidding Zambales Mountains and the maze of jungle they claimed it could not be done.

The Navy then turned to the Seabees. The first Seabees to arrive were MCB-3 on October 2, 1951; followed by MCB-5 on November 5, 1951. Over the next five years MCB-2, -7, -9, -11 and-13 were also deployed to Cubi Point.

Seabees cut a mountain in half to make way for a nearly two-mile long runway. Cubi Point turned out to be one of the largest earthmoving projects in the world, equivalent to the construction of the Panama Canal. The $100 million facility was commissioned on July 25, 1956 and comprised an air station and an adjacent pier that was capable of docking the Navy's largest carriers.

Following Korea, the Seabees embarked on a new mission. From providing much needed assistance in the wake of a devastating earthquake in Greece in 1953 to providing construction work and training to underdeveloped countries, the Seabees became "The Navy's Goodwill Ambassadors." Seabees built or improved many roads, orphanages and public utilities in many remote parts of the world.

Vietnam War

Naval Mobile Construction Battalion One (NMCB-1), 2006Seabees were deployed to Vietnam throughout the conflict beginning in small numbers in June 1954 and extending to November 1972. By 1962 they began building camps for Special Forces. In June 1965, Construction Mechanic 3rd Class Marvin G. Shields, part of Seabee Team 1104, was actively engaged at the Battle of Dong Xoai and was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions there. Shields remains the only Seabee ever to be awarded the Medal of Honor. These "Civic Action Teams" continued into the Vietnam War where Seabees, often fending off enemy forces alongside their Marine and Army counterparts, also built schools and infrastructure and provided health care service. Beginning in 1965 full Seabee battalions (MCBs) and Naval Construction Regiments (NCRs) along with other unit types were deployed throughout Vietnam. Seabees from the Naval Reserve provided individual personnel early on to augment regular units such as battalions and regiments.

In Vietnam the Seabees supported the Marines and built a staggering number of aircraft support facilities, roads, and bridges; they also paved roads that provided access to farms and markets, supplied fresh water to countless numbers of Vietnamese through hundreds of Seabee-dug wells, provided medical treatment to thousands of villagers, and built schools, hospitals, utilities systems, roads and other community facilities. Seabees also worked with, and taught construction skills to the Vietnamese people.

After Vietnam, the Seabees built and repaired Navy bases in Puerto Rico, Japan, Guam, Greece, Sicily, and Spain. Their civic action projects focused on the Trust Territories of the Pacific.

In 1971, the Seabees began their largest peacetime construction on Diego Garcia, a small atoll in the Indian Ocean. This project took 11 years and cost $200 million. The complex accommodates the Navy's largest ships and the biggest military cargo jets. This base proved invaluable when Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990 and Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm were launched.

Posted by Judith Ellis at May 24, 2009 8:36 AM

Memorial Day thoughts in pictures, words, and music...

I do not want to get into pro- or anti-war arguments or rhetoric. This Memorial Day weekend, I am thinking about those who paid such a dear price for the freedom we enjoy today. Let us for a little while put all our gripes about the economy, business, and politics aside this Memorial Day and simply remember those who truly HAVE been on the REAL front-lines -- where the cost was much higher than just losing a customer or a bad business day.

Let us be thankful for the ones who made it home, remember those who did not, and pray for those who are so selflessly serving our country today.

I suggest that if any of us knows a Veteran or the surviving family of one, or perhaps someone who's loved one is currently overseas serving our country, we at least pick up the phone and call one of them and say "Thank you."

A particular song comes to my mind in thinking about these things, and if you will all indulge me, I wish to share links to a couple of versions of it with you all.

The first is an acapella version which someone added a photo slide show to accompany: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8ljcPBbMt0&feature=related

The second is a video of Crosby, Stills, and Nash performing it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3Rezvr5TQA

Let us hear the words. Feel their pain. Pay our respects. Some debts can never be repaid.

Posted by Dan Gunter at May 24, 2009 9:49 AM

I just finished reading the Science "Fiction" posts (after 2 days) and enjoyed some of the comments.

Tom----thanks for your service and the service of many service men and women that frequent the blog.

I met with a man from the Air Force today, young in years but very educated in books and wisdom. I think of our snipers that picked off three pirates to set an American Captain free several weeks back.

We have some of the proudest, most dignified Americans in our military; I wish some of "IT" would rub off on American businesses.

Thank you for your service...safe travels.

Posted by Scott Peters at May 24, 2009 9:12 PM

This is the use of memory:
For liberation-not less of love but expanding
Of love beyond desire, and so liberation
From the future as well as the past. Thus, love of country
Begins as attachment to our own field of action
And comes to find that action of little importance
Though never indifferent. History may be servitude,
History may be freedom. See, now they vanish,
The face and places, with self which, as it could, loved them,
To become renewed, transfigured in another pattern.

--T.S. Eliot, "Little Gidding"

May we never forget the sacrifices of our veterans. On this day of rememberance do something kind for them or their families, as the "love of country begins as attachment to our own field of action."

Posted by Judith Ellis at May 25, 2009 5:15 AM