Happy Veteran’s Day

American heroes

From the Saint Crispin’s Day speech of Shakespeare’s Henry V:

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

To all who served before me, to those with whom I served, and to those who serve today — thank you. Of all of my life’s accomplishments and achievements, I am most proud of having been a Soldier.

Heinlein wrote: “The noblest fate that a man can endure is to place his own mortal body between his loved home and the war’s desolation.”

My mother’s brother, Herbert Williamson — a Captain in the US Army and a damned-fine American — died two years after coming home from Vietnam. His Zippo lighter had these words — rumored to have been written by an unknown Marine during the siege of Khe Sanh — engraved on it:

For those who have fought for it, freedom has a taste the protected will never know.

Indeed.