Let’s Make This Veterans Day Different

The author's father (R). Biba Kayewich

In my younger days, veterans were everywhere.

Harvey Smith, the local grocer who would later become mayor of our small Carolina town for 34 years, served in Europe during World War II. Henry Shore, father of my good friend Dickie, also fought there, and Jim McNeely, the redheaded, lively minister of Boonville Methodist Church, had flown as a navigator aboard a bomber over Germany. Other men I knew less well had also done their duty. In my boyhood, all these veterans were in their mid to late 30s, working, married, and raising families.

In my teen years, one of my Scout leaders told us about parachuting into Normandy during the D-Day invasion. My physics professor at Guilford College, Dr. E. Garness Purdom, was a lieutenant commander in the Navy during the war and played a pioneering role in the development of sonar. At Wake Forest University, Dr. Merrill Berthrong once mentioned in our postgrad philosophy of history seminar that he had served as a fighter pilot over Germany. When one of my classmates pressed him for details, he paused, then said, “Get me drunk enough someday, and I’ll tell you.”

My father was one of these men who had fought our country’s war against fascism. Uncle Sam called Dad into the Army at age 18, and he spent his time overseas as an infantryman and squad leader fighting with the 88th Division, the “Blue Devils,” against the Germans in Northern Italy. In one of the stories he told us kids, he and others were searching some houses for Germans when Dad opened a basement door. His platoon leader said, “I’ll handle it, Sergeant,” started down the stairwell, and lost his foot to an explosive device concealed beneath one of the steps.

These are only some of the soldiers, all of them now dead, whom I’ll remember this Veterans Day.

Men From Nam

From July 1969 to January 1971, I attended the U.S. Military Academy. We spent the summer of 1970 training at nearby Camp Buckner, where our instructors were veterans of the ongoing fighting in Vietnam. We thought we would soon be seeing those jungles and rice paddies ourselves, so you’d better believe we listened carefully to these men, mostly enlisted personnel, as they taught us how to fight “Charlie,” that enemy who could pop out of nowhere and blow you away.

During that summer, I was also fortunate enough to meet Capt. Paul Bucha two months after he was awarded the Medal of Honor for heroism in an engagement near Phuoc Vinh. When one of my classmates asked him what he had done to win the medal, Captain Bucha just shook his head, smiled, and said, “I’m a lover, not a fighter.” Right there, I thought to myself, was the brand of modesty I wanted to make my own.

The American Bicentennial found me one evening in a Boston bar where friends gathered and where I would soon meet my future wife. Egged on by a mutual acquaintance, a big man with a wicked sense of humor named Buddy told me the story of the night he and his fellow Marines were ambushed while on patrol. A Vietnamese soldier charged out of the dusk with his bayonet leveled at Buddy. The much taller Buddy recoiled, raised his leg, took the bayonet in his knee, gun-butted the guy to the ground, and escaped death.

“Why didn’t he just shoot you?” I asked.

Buddy said, “I’m thinking he wanted to stick an American.”

How Best to Honor Our Veterans

There’s a reason for this recitation of the names of men I knew who loved and served their country.

According to Pew Research Center’s surveys and government data, 40 years ago, about 18 percent of Americans were military veterans; today that number stands at 6 percent. In 1975, 81 percent of U.S. senators had once worn the uniform, while in 1967, about 75 percent of our representatives in the House had served in the armed forces. Today, only 17 percent of senators and 18 percent of representatives list military service as a part of their résumés.

In short, the veterans who helped shape my pride and love of country are dwindling.

Consequently, it’s up to the rest of us to take up the slack.

This Veterans Day, let’s honor the men and women who have served or are currently serving with a renewed intent to learn more about our nation’s history. Even better, let’s pay homage to their service by reviving our love affair with America.

As any good parent knows, what we most love, we most fiercely defend. Patriotism asks the same of us.

Someday, somehow, some enemy of our nation is going to try to stick America as that enemy soldier tried to stick Buddy. When that happens, we the people must be mentally and spiritually prepared to defend and protect the country that President Abraham Lincoln once called “the last best hope of earth.”