Never Forget Why We Are At War

I received this via email yesterday. While researching it, I found that it was initially sent in 2006, so some of you may have seen it before. It is worth seeing again:

The USS New York was built with 24 tons of scrap steel from the World Trade Center .

It is the fifth in a new class of warship - designed for missions that include special operations against terrorists. It will carry a crew of 360 sailors and 700 combat-ready Marines to be delivered ashore by helicopters and assault craft.

Steel from the World Trade Center was melted down in a foundry in Amite , LA to cast the ship's bow section. When it was poured into the molds on Sept. 9, 2003 , "those big rough steelworkers treated it with total reverence," recalled Navy Capt. Kevin Wensing, who was there. "It was a spiritual moment for everybody there."

Junior Chavers, foundry operations manager, said that when the trade center steel first arrived, he touched it with his hand and the "hair on my neck stood up." "It had a big meaning to it for all of us," he said. "They knocked us down. They can't keep us down. We're going to be back."

The ship's motto? "Never Forget"

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Al Qaeda and the other terrorists will try to attack us again as they did on 9-11. We must fight them wherever they are and we can never become complacent.

These killers want to turn the entire world into a brutal fundamentalist Islamic empire. Their unforgiving world would repress women, attack minorities and impose brutal religious punishments on perceived offenders.

When Presidential candidate John Edwards denied that there was a Global War on Terror, I couldn't believe that someone in his position could be so foolish. If we left Iraq tomorrow, the Islamic fascists would continue to attack innocent peace-loving people all over the world.

That sounds like a world war to me.

SFC Chuck Grist
www.AmericanRanger.blogspot.com

A New American Hero

During my 2004 tour in Iraq, the Marines fought hard in Fallujah and other areas in western Iraq. We worked with some of these Marines and, in fact, a Marine officer signed out an M79 grenade launcher to me for use on our convoy missions in Baghdad as we protected our general.

On April 14, 2004, Marine Corporal Jason L. Dunham of Scio, New York, was leading a patrol near the Syrian border when he became engaged in a confrontation with an insurgent. During the struggle, Dunham threw himself on an enemy grenade to protect his comrades. The resulting explosion resulted in wounds which were ultimately fatal.

Yesterday, President Bush awarded a posthumous Medal of Honor to Dunham’s parents in Washington, D.C. Corporal Dunham is an example of the professional young warriors that are fighting for their country in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere throughout the world. Americans are fortunate to have men like Dunham standing between them and those who would hurt them.

SFC Chuck Grist