Thank You Veterans!

**Honky Tonk** · November-11-20, 11:21 AM

For stepping up to the plate! You're what made this Country great!

**Richard** · November-11-20, 01:26 PM

Thanks it is appreciated.

My friend passed last month,a few months shy of his 106th birthday,at 18 he was on a landing craft during the invasion of Italy when a mortar hit the landing craft,he was the sole survivor out of 23 that lost their lives in a split second,he carried the wounds with him until his passing.

It gives a whole new perspective on life when you go through knowing at any given second you will be gone and by the grace of god or pure luck you survive it.But to some extent you never really do.

But at the end of the day it is about preserving a way of life for future generations so they can enjoy the same privileges that others sacrificed so we can,for me it was a long time ago but I would do it again without a second thought.

Granted a 20 mile march would preferably have a lot of breaks in between and crawling through a jungle from air conditioned hut to air conditioned hut even better but would definitely think twice about jumping out of a perfectly good aircraft.

Thats the thing about being young and having more balls then common sense and contrary to the movies one does spend a good amount of time being scared shitless,but it’s all good in the end if one can walk away.

**SammyS** · November-11-20, 01:38 PM

I recently lost a WWII veteran friend. One of the best guys I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing.

**rickbak** · November-11-20, 01:56 PM

I enlisted, but I've always thought the draft from 1940 to 1974 had one major benefit: it brought together guys from all walks of life and all parts of the country and you learned to get along. At times I was practically a minority in the Marines----lots of blacks, Hispanics, guys from Guam and the Virgin Islands. My best buddy was from some reservation in the Southwest. Don't know whatever happened to him [[you try googling Bill Black after 45 years) but where ever you are, Semper Fi pal.

Anyway, I've always thought some kind of mandatory national service, be it the military or Peace Corps or AmeriCorps for 6-24 months, would be a way of bridging a lot of the cultural, religious, and racial divides that are just killing this country. But that will never happen.

**Ray1936** · November-11-20, 03:43 PM

I have direct ancestors who were in the Revolutionary War; War of 1812; Civil War; WW I and WW II, and Vietnam. Somehow our family missed Korea.

**rickbak** · November-11-20, 04:52 PM

For many years I attended weddings, funeral breakfasts, etc. at the Lyskawa VFW hall in Dearborn Hts. Wasn't until my grandmother's funeral that someone mentioned over a plate of kielbasa that, "Oh yeah, this post is named after Granny's nephew." In other words, my mother's cousin. Turned out 32-yr-old John Lyskawa, a single guy living with his parents [[like most unmarried Polacks did back then), was drafted in 1944, sent to France after D-Day, and was blown to pieces by an .88mm shell during the fighting in Normandy. He rests in the American cemetery there, far away from his old stomping grounds around Michigan and Martin. A few weeks ago, while assembling one of those Snapfish albums, I came across a photo of a bunch of us doing the polka at our daughter's wedding at Lyskawa hall---with a large framed portrait of Pvt. Lyskawa looking down from the wall. It was the first time I'd really looked at the pic and it produced an odd feeling. Who today would know of the otherwise unremarkable John Lyskawa if he hadn't been drafted off the street corner and sent off to get killed in France?

**Henry Whalley** · November-12-20, 12:14 PM

Originally Posted by Honky Tonk

For stepping up to the plate!

Ditto! Veterans are not "suckers and losers".

**Cincinnati_Kid** · November-13-20, 12:20 AM

Originally Posted by Henry Whalley

Ditto! Veterans are not "suckers and losers".

So glad we won't hear that nonsense from the next POTUS.

**Gistok** · November-15-20, 03:51 AM

Rickbak, I've been to Arlington National Cemetery, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on the Mall in DC... but somehow nothing quite prepares you for visiting the cemeteries of the beaches of Normandy. I went to Omaha Beach with my German cousin in 1982, and the overwhelming emotions it brings out are beyond description...