Deepest Thanks to All Our Veterans This Veterans Day!

On this Veteran's Day, I respectfully offer this short blog of thanks to all veterans who have served in the U.S. armed forces.  It's because of their collective dedication, commitment, honor and sacrifice that America continues to be the "...land of the free and home of the brave."

I was pleasantly surprised to learn today that our company will observe a two-minute moment of silence this morning, because the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month marks the signing of the armistice, on November 11th, 1918 to signal the end of World War One which was the genesis of this day of remembrance.

At 11:00am on 11^th November 1918 the guns of the Western Front fell silent after more than four years of continuous warfare, and today our organization will take two minutes of silence to honor the memory of the men and women who fought, fell and may not have lived to move forward.

While two minutes of reflection might not seem like much, I'm humbled by the thought that our veterans did not and  do not ask for much in exchange for their sacrifice. It reminds me of a scripture that reads, "Greater love has no one than this, that one would lay his/her life down for his/her friends." (John 15:13)

I would respectfully suggest that our veterans have demonstrated the greatest form of love - by laying down their lives for complete strangers like you and me.  I would encourage you to view the video link below that's posted on the web site of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

http://www1.va.gov/opa/vetsday/

Our War Dead Deserve Better

Image via Wikipedia

With the start of the summer vacation season and the FIFA World Cup, it’s possible that you may have missed a shocking story that came to light recently.

A series of investigations have revealed that as many as 200 grave sites at Arlington National Cemetery are mismarked or unmarked after a review of nearly a third of the sections that presumably contain remains of soldiers.

The full Washington Post story by reporter Christian Davenport can be accessed at this link http://tinyurl.com/2eytf6y

The majority of the impacted remains are those of veterans who served from World War I through the Vietnam War. One example of the military mix-up cited in the story found that the remains of a Tennessee woman’s sister who served in the Air Force were buried directly above the remains of another veteran.