With Honor

New Medal of Honor Museum honors selfless service to country, comrades.
By Jack Jacobs
Military analyst
MSNBC
Updated: 9:02 p.m. PT May 20, 2007.

This Wednesday, May 23, Brian Williams will host NBC’s "Nightly News" from Charleston, South Carolina, and moored nearby is the USS Yorktown, a World War II aircraft carrier. Brian is a member of the Board of Directors of the Medal of Honor Foundation, and the occasion is the grand opening of the new Medal of Honor Museum aboard the Yorktown.

The Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military award, was the brainchild of Abraham Lincoln, who sought to recognize exceptional bravery during the Civil War. At the time, the only battlefield distinction was the Purple Heart, awarded in those days for meritorious service, not as it is today, for wounds received in combat.

Since then, about 3,500 Medals of Honor have been awarded. In more recent times, since World War I, most have been posthumous, and there has been no living recipient for any conflict since Vietnam. Today, there are only 110 living recipients, and many of them will be on the Yorktown on Wednesday for the grand opening of the Medal of Honor Museum in South Carolina.

Among them are the oldest living recipient, John Finn, who will be 98 this July and was decorated for action on Pearl Harbor Day. He enlisted in the Navy in 1926 and can transfix the most jaded audience with first-person descriptions of life in America before World War I and tales of his participation in American naval operations in China a decade before the Second World War.

The museum is the principal repository for artifacts relating to the Medal of Honor, but the real thrust of the place is not just the display of things but also the perpetuation of the concept of selfless service to country and comrades. There is an emotion generated there that can be duplicated nowhere else, and one reason is the actions of people. Try these:
Jack Lucas
Jack Lucas was a bit bigger than other kids his age and spent some time at a military prep school. So, when World War II began, he successfully lied about his age and enlisted in the Marines Corps when he was 13 years old. He was so good in boot camp that he was made an instructor, at 14. Not content to serve in the States while his buddies were in combat, he got himself aboard a ship bound for the South Pacific. Landing on Iwo Jima, Lucas saved his fellow Marines by throwing himself on two hand grenades. He miraculously survived devastating injuries, and when he received the Medal [of Honor] from President Harry Truman, Lucas was the youngest recipient since the Civil War.

George Sakato
In danger of being sent to an internment camp like other Japanese-American families, George Sakato moved to Arizona and tried to enlist after Pearl Harbor, but he was rejected as an undesirable alien. In 1943, the government wised up and allowed Sakato and thousands of other patriotic Americans of Japanese descent to fight, and he became a member of the legendary 442nd Regimental Combat Team. In eastern France, in difficult, mountainous terrain, he singlehandedly attacked a German strong point and then, only a 22-year-old private, led his squad through ferocious enemy fire to capture dozens of German soldiers.

Jim Stockdale
After being shot down and injured over North Vietnam, Jim Stockdale was a prisoner for eight long years, and for three of those years he was in solitary confinement. By any standard, the treatment he received was criminal and inhumane: beaten, tortured, strangled until he was nearly asphyxiated. He was brought to the brink of death and resuscitated, time and time again, year after year.

But he never gave any more than his name, rank and service number.

He had told his fellow prisoners that they were honor-bound to resist, and he led by example. Rather than let himself be used by the North Vietnamese in a propaganda film, Stockdale beat his own face to a bloody pulp and cut himself with a dull razor so that he could not be presented on film.

They threw him in solitary again, and he feared that he would ultimately break under the torture and cooperate. So he shattered the window of his cell and slit his wrists with the glass. He was found before he bled to death, but the torture stopped because the guards realized that Stockdale would rather die with honor than serve their purposes.

Clarence Sasser
In 1967, Clarence Sasser was a medic in the Mekong River delta of Vietnam. Under continuous and intense enemy fire, and without regard to his own safety, he crawled from soldier to soldier to aid the injured. He ignored his own many painful shrapnel and bullet wounds to save others and did not cease his assistance until loss of blood made him incapable of continuing.

The behavior of these gallant people was extraordinary, but the basic underpinnings of it are not. American service members are imbued with a code that transcends background, race and every other demographic distinction: don’t surrender if you can fight, never cooperate with your captors, accomplish the mission at all cost, love your comrades.

And so it’s not surprising that every recipient of the Medal of Honor will tell you that he wears it not for himself but for those who can’t: all the men and women who sacrificed so that we can live in freedom. It’s something worth remembering each time we have a chance to help our neighbors and instead turn the other way.

Senator proposes Korean flag swap with US warship

Source: CNN, April 19, 2007.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A senator sees it as a fair trade: a Korean battle flag captured in the 19th century for the USS Pueblo, taken in 1968.

Republican Sen. Wayne Allard reintroduced a resolution Wednesday demanding that North Korea return the Pueblo, and he sent a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice suggesting she look into his proposed exchange.

"Since the USS Pueblo bears the name of the town of Pueblo, Colorado, many in our state want to see the vessel returned to its proper home," Allard wrote. "North Korea continues to hint at the possible return of the captured U.S. Navy ship, and I ask that you take action at this opportune time."

The Pueblo is the only active-duty U.S. warship in the hands of a foreign power. It was taken Jan. 23, 1968, after being sent defenseless on an intelligence-gathering mission off the North Korean coast.

Allard said Colorado veterans of the Korean and Vietnam wars suggested exchanging the flag. It was captured from Korean Gen. Uh Je-yeon in an 1871 battle after American ships attempting to open Korea to trade invaded Kanghwa Island, outside Seoul. The flag is on display at the U.S. Naval Academy in Maryland.

The Pueblo "belongs to the United States Navy, and we should pursue all possible options to return her to a rightful resting place," Allard said.

Navy records show the Pueblo was in international waters when it was captured, although the North Koreans insist it was inside the Korean coastal zone. One person was killed in an explosion during the attack, and 10 of the 82 surviving crewmen were wounded. All 82 were held 11 months before being sent to South Korea on Christmas Eve.

The North Koreans display the ship as a trophy and a monument to the rocky relationship between the two nations.

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Democratic presidential candidate, and other U.S. officials were given a tour of the Pueblo during a visit this month to collect the remains of American servicemen killed in the Korean War. (His reaction)

They were told that North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Il, had decreed that the ship should be used for "an anti-American education."

Members of President George W. Bush's administration who accompanied Richardson on his trip did not board the ship with Richardson and nongovernmental members of his entourage.

Libyan, Eritrean observers on Sudan-Chad border

Just one minute! Are they crazy?! Ugh!

Source: CNN.
April 12, 2007.

KHARTOUM, Sudan (Reuters) -- Libyan and Eritrean military and security observers have been deployed at the border between Sudan and Chad, scene of recent clashes, a Libyan mediator said on Thursday.

"We agreed on positive steps and the presence of military and security observers on the border from Libya and Eritrea, and from Chad and Sudan, and right now some of them are there on the border," Ali Triki, Libya's envoy on Chad and Sudan, told a news conference.

He did not say when the observers were deployed or how many had been sent there.

"I believe the confidence between both countries will return to normality, and if they respect agreements then we will not even need observers," said Triki, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's top adviser on African issues.

Gadhafi has taken the lead in trying to broker peace between Chad and Sudan, which have traded threats and accusations since a clash on Monday when Sudan said 17 of its soldiers were killed.

Chad denied any deliberate assault on its eastern neighbor, but said its forces had clashed with Sudanese troops after crossing the border to pursue Sudanese-backed rebels it said were launching raids.

That incident marked a sharp flare-up of tension between the two oil-producing central African countries, which have seen their ties become increasingly marred by violence spilling over from the conflict in Sudan's Darfur region.

Both Sudan and Chad are resisting international efforts to deploy U.N. peacekeeping forces.

A late February summit hosted by Gadhafi to keep the peace between Chad and Sudan agreed "observation mechanisms" along the Darfur frontier.

Sudan has witnessed a flurry of diplomatic activity aimed at easing tensions with Chad, including a visit by South African President Thabo Mbeki.

The No. 2 U.S. State Department official, John Negroponte, is due to arrive in Sudan on Thursday and then head to Libya and Chad to press for solutions to the Darfur crisis.

Negroponte is expected to deliver a tough message from Washington on Darfur. Sudanese officials have said international pressure on Darfur will only deepen the humanitarian crisis.

Report: Asia upgrading military

Source: CNN.

April 10, 2007

WASHINGTON (AP) -- While China has been modernizing its military in recent years, Japan, South Korea and Russia -- all neighbors and potential rivals -- have been pushing ahead with upgrades of their own, according to a report released Tuesday.

But Taiwan's military spending has actually been decreasing, reflected in the government's failure to appropriate funds to buy $18 billion in U.S. arms authorized by President George W. Bush for sale in 2001, the report said.

The report, titled "U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, A Responsible Course," was sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations, an independent private-research group based in New York.

The study said Japan has significantly upgraded capabilities over 15 years, even though it spends less than 1 percent of its gross national product on defense.

It has deployed the Aegis radar system and accompanying missile systems for its navy and advanced fighter aircraft armed with advanced air-to-air missiles for its air force, the report said.

"Japan is working in partnership with the United States to develop theater missile defenses, primarily oriented against the North Korean threat, but with obvious application in the event of any conflict with China," it added.

South Korea, the report said, has also undertaken a major modernization drive, replacing antiquated fighter aircraft, frigates, tanks, and artillery pieces with advanced systems, many of them purchased from the United States or developed in partnership with U.S. defense industries.

"South Korean forces enjoy a high level of interoperability with U.S. forces, proven again during South Korea's deployment of more than 3,000 troops to Iraq," it said.

The report noted that Russia is simultaneously China's largest supplier of advanced military hardware and also a potential great power rival.

Thanks to strong oil revenues, Moscow seems poised to begin a significant force modernization drive, the report said, pointing out that Russia's official defense budget has nearly quadrupled from $8.1 billion in 2001 to more than $31 billion in 2006.

While Russia may not complete an eight-year $190 billion military modernization plan announced in February, its growing capabilities "will complicate China's defense planning and force posture as its keeps a wary eye on its 4,300-kilometer border with Russia."

As for Taiwan, the study said that the island is not standing still even though it has not followed through on projected purchases from the United States. It said Taiwan is pursuing a $3 billion purchase of 60 new F-16 fighter aircraft to offset the retirement of aging F-5 fighters.

"But funding for this purchase has not yet been appropriated, and the United States is urging Taiwan to resolve at least some of the outstanding arms procurement issues before making any new requests," the report said.

Pace Won’t Apologize for Gay Remark, Aides Say

Source: New York Times.

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: March 13, 2007
Filed at 1:51 p.m. ET.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon's top general expressed regret Tuesday that he called homosexuality immoral, a remark that drew a harsh condemnation from members of Congress and gay advocacy groups.

In a newspaper interview Monday, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had likened homosexual acts to adultery and said the military should not condone it by allowing gays to serve openly in the armed forces.

In a statement Tuesday, he said he should have focused more in the interview on the Defense Department policy about gays -- and ''less on my personal moral views.''

He did not offer an apology, something that had been demanded by gay rights groups.

''General Pace's comments are outrageous, insensitive and disrespectful to the 65,000 lesbian and gay troops now serving in our armed forces,'' the advocacy group Servicemembers Legal Defense Network said in a statement on its Web site.

The group, which has represented some of the thousands dismissed from the military for their sexual orientation, demanded an apology.

Pace's senior staff members said earlier that the general was expressing his personal opinion and did not intend to apologize. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to speak on the record.

Rep. Martin Meehan, who has introduced legislation to repeal the current policy, criticized Pace's comments.

''General Pace's statements aren't in line with either the majority of the public or the military,'' said the Massachusetts Democrat. ''He needs to recognize that support for overturning (the policy) is strong and growing'' and that the military is ''turning away good troops to enforce a costly policy of discrimination.''

In an interview Monday with the Chicago Tribune, Pace was asked about the ''don't ask, don't tell'' policy that allows gays and lesbians to serve if they keep their sexual orientation private and don't engage in homosexual acts.

Pace said he supports the policy, which became law in 1994 and prohibits commanders from asking about a person's sexual orientation.

''I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts,'' Pace said in the audio recording of the interview posted on the Tribune's Web site. ''I do not believe that the armed forces of the United States are well served by a saying through our policies that it's OK to be immoral in any way.''

Pace, a native of Brooklyn, N.Y., and a 1967 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, said he based his views on his upbringing.

''As an individual, I would not want (acceptance of gay behavior) to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else's wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not. We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior,'' he said, according to the audio and a transcript released by his staff.

The newspaper said Pace did not address concerns raised by a 2005 government audit that showed some 10,000 troops, including more than 50 specialists in Arabic, have been discharged because of the policy.

Louis Vizcaino, spokesman for the gay rights group Human Rights Campaign, said Pace's comments were ''insulting and offensive to the men and women ... who are serving in the military honorably.''

''Right now there are men and women that are in the battle lines, that are in the trenches, they're serving their country,'' Vizcaino said. ''Their sexual orientation has nothing to do with their capability to serve in the U.S. military.''

''Don't ask, don't tell'' was passed by Congress in 1993 after a firestorm of debate in which advocates argued that allowing homosexuals to serve openly would hurt troop morale and recruitment and undermine the cohesion of combat units.

John Shalikashvili, the retired Army general who was Joint Chiefs chairman when the policy was adopted, said in January that he has changed his mind on the issue since meeting with gay servicemen.

''These conversations showed me just how much the military has changed, and that gays and lesbians can be accepted by their peers,'' Shalikashvili wrote in a newspaper opinion piece.