tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-182445782024-03-13T21:33:00.660-04:00The 23rd of October<center><b>This is a Blog to remember the men and their families who fought in the Beirut War 1982 through 1984. We dedicate this blog to our Friends, Brothers, Fathers, and Sons who went to keep the peace in Lebanon and fought the War on Terrorism in 1982.This Blog will speak out against all Terrorism .
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<i>(the comments,posts, and opinions expressed on this Blog do not represent the BVA or any of it's BOD or Officers or Members)</i>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.comBlogger106125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-39267491616090540282011-12-09T07:19:00.000-05:002011-12-09T07:19:05.616-05:00Jacksonville perfect place for museum honoring Marines<h3 class="nrcTxt_headline">Jacksonville perfect place for museum honoring Marines</h3><div class="nrcBlk_pubdate" id="nrcBlk_Pubdate"> Monday, December 5, 2011 <div id="nrcBlk_Update"> (Updated 3:00 am) </div></div><div class="nrcBlk_byline " id="nrcBlk_Byline"> </div><span></span> <span class="nrcTxt_content"><div class=""><strong>By MADISON TAYLOR</strong></div><div class="nrcAd nrcAd_300x250" id="nrcAd_Middle2"> <div class="nrcTxt_label"> | </div><a href="" id="nrcAnc_Middle2_Jump" name="nrcAnc_Middle2_Jump"></a> </div><div class="">I first heard about it in the late-1990s when a group of grizzled retired Marine Corps sergeants major and colonels hatched an idea. They wanted to put a Marine Corps museum in Jacksonville, home to the largest Marine Corps base on the East Coast.<br />
<br />
There was a lot of common sense behind that notion. This is usually the case when sergeants major, lieutenant colonels and colonels are involved. They’re smart, they’re leaders and they’re usually hardened by experiences most could never comprehend. Not much scares them.<br />
<br />
They shoot straight, too. And I’m not talking about rifles, at least not right now.<br />
<br />
So this assortment of retired Leathernecks, who made their homes in Onslow County because after a life in the Marine Corps it’s sometimes hard to go back to a completely civilian world, decided it would be a good idea to honor the “Few and the Proud” in such a logical, albeit mosquito- and alligator-infested site near Camp Lejeune.<br />
<br />
The history, they believed, was already there for the taking — and displaying. A sample of history I found in the Jacksonville Daily News:<br />
<br />
l It’s not commonly known that Marines trained at Camp Lejeune were dispatched on Marine Air Group-26 helicopters to fish astronaut Alan Shepherd out of the ocean after his first manned space flight. They later did the same for astronaut Gus Grissom. And Cherry Point was an alternate landing site for the space shuttle program — though one never landed there.<br />
<br />
l New River Air Station’s helicopter squadron was featured on a stamp by the Haitian government after a humanitarian mission following Hurricane Hazel in 1954. This is the only time that Marine Corps helicopters have been featured on a postage stamp, foreign or domestic.<br />
<br />
l Camp Lejeune contained the only boot camp and schools for black Marines during World War II. It was the site of the Corps’ only war dog training school, and the location of the Corps’ boot camp, officer candidate school and specialized schools for the women Marines of World War II.<br />
<br />
l The 1st Marine Division trained at Camp Lejeune during World War II, along with elements of the 3rd, 4th and 6th Marine Divisions. But Camp Lejeune also trained the U.S. Army’s 1st and 9th Infantry Divisions in amphibious warfare. These were the divisions that would spearhead the landings in North Africa, Sicily and Normandy.<br />
<br />
Despite all that history, the money for what organizers wanted to call Marine Corps Museum of the Carolinas didn’t follow. A ton of other things fell through, too. A plan for a private-public civic center that would’ve included space for the proposed museum vanished in the thin mist of political and economic realities. <br />
<br />
Then a movement began for a national museum of the Marine Corps that is now in Quantico, Va. The effort took donations and wind from the more regional approach in North Carolina.<br />
<br />
So as time passed and I moved to Burlington, I forgot about the dwindling hopes for the Marine Corps Museum of the Carolinas. I figured it was a good idea that simply didn’t pan out. It happens. It’s a miracle so many bad ideas thrive when so many good ones are out there struggling for purchase.<br />
<br />
Then I saw a recent Associated Press story. It seems the dream of a North Carolina-based museum hasn’t gone belly up after all. The concept for what is now being called Museum of the Marine has been rejuvenated with a proposal to raise money nationally and tell the story of Marines in North and South Carolina. It will document the history of the amphibious training for which the Corps has become famous and include the connection Marine Corps installations have to the civilian communities in which they reside.<br />
<br />
To those who don’t know, it’s a pretty strong bond.<br />
<br />
Fittingly, the museum is set to go on property leased to the museum by the military for $1 a year, right beside memorials to the 241 service members killed in the Beirut bombing in 1983 (a joint military-civilian project) and those who fought and died in Vietnam. There is also a piece of the World Trade Center there marking the 9/11 terrorist attacks.<br />
<br />
So while the museum has new life, bucks are still needed. It will be privately funded and has around $8 million in hand. The goal is $28 million. A national corporate sponsor would certainly help.<br />
<br />
I hope they find one. It’s too good an idea to simply die.<br />
<em><br />
Madison Taylor is editor of the Burlington Times-News. To learn more about the Museum of the Marine go online to </em><a href="http://www.museumofthemarine.org/"><em>www.museumofthemarine.org</em></a></div></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-35453975020324032592011-09-03T00:20:00.000-04:002011-09-03T00:20:28.515-04:0024th Mau 1983 Glenn Dolphin Great Book a Must read!<div id="HeaderNew"> <br />
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<tr> <td><div class="pagetitle" id="printTitle"><div class="pagedate">Story Submitted: Oct 15, 2007 </div><h1>Marine Looks Back at Peacekeeping Mission in Beirut</h1></div><table cellpadding="6" cellspacing="0"> <tbody>
<tr> <td class="author" valign="baseline"><a href="http://www.quantico.usmc.mil/sentry/Archives.aspx?1=0&2=0&3=0&author=Robert%20B.%20Loring" title="Robert B. Loring"><img align="absmiddle" alt="Author" border="0" src="http://www.quantico.usmc.mil/sentry/Author/Uploads/Poll/person01.jpg" /></a> By: <a href="http://www.quantico.usmc.mil/sentry/Archives.aspx?1=0&2=0&3=0&author=Robert%20B.%20Loring" id="printAuthor" title="Robert B. Loring">Robert B. Loring</a> </td> <td align="right"></td> </tr>
</tbody></table><div class="news-photo-main" style="width: 244;"><div class="sidebar"><div class="photouts"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=18244578" title="Enlarge Photo">Enlarge Photo</a> </div><img alt="24 MAU: 1983: A Marine Looks Back at the Peacekeeping Mission to Beirut, Lebanon; Author: Glenn E. Dolphin; Publisher: PublishAmerica (February 20, 2006); Paperback: 272 Pages; ISBN-10: 1413785018" border="1" src="http://www.quantico.usmc.mil/sentry/pre.aspx?img=633280414355000000000264_071011_QSBR_24-MAU_1983_1_LRez.jpg&w=232&h=300&path=E:%5CQuan_Web%5Csentry%5CAuthor%5CUploads%5CPhotos%5C" style="border: #999 1px solid;" /> <br />
<div class="photosubtext">24 MAU: 1983: A Marine Looks Back at the Peacekeeping Mission to Beirut, Lebanon; Author: Glenn E. Dolphin; Publisher: PublishAmerica (February 20, 2006); Paperback: 272 Pages; ISBN-10: 1413785018 </div><div class="sidebarcontent"><div class="sidebarbox"><div class="bookmark"><br />
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</div></div></div></div><div class="storyText" id="printText"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">Most of America joined the Global War on Terrorism on Sept. 11, 2001—9/11. On that dastardly day the Twin Towers came crumbling down with mushrooms of fire and dust, the Pentagon was hit, and citizens on United Airlines Flight 93 rose up against onboard terrorists. However, Marines everywhere already had grasped this alarming state of affairs with Middle Eastern terrorists some years before.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">In Glenn Dolphin’s book, “24 MAU 1983: A Marine Looks Back at the Peacekeeping Mission to Beirut, Lebanon,” he describes what happened on Oct. 23, 1983 when 241 Marines and sailors of the 24th Marine Amphibious Unit perished in a flash while on a “peacekeeping” mission in Beirut, Lebanon. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">Dolphin was a Marine first lieutenant with the headquarters communications section of the 24th MAU. The MAU’s ground combat element was Battalion Landing Team, 1st Battalion, Eighth Marine Regiment. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">The 24th MAU embarked on May 11, 1983, for its cruel date with peacemaking on Middle Eastern shores. First Lt Dolphin and his headquarters’ Marines sailed in USS Iwo Jima (LPH-2). The 2,000 Marines of the MAU relieved a grateful 22nd MAU in late May. Their mission was to work with British, French and Italian peacekeepers to calm elements of the violent Lebanese civil war, keep the Beirut International Airport open and provide a presence.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">Due to random mortar and rocket attacks, most of the personnel of 1/8 were moved into the strongest building in the Marine compound, the BLT headquarters building. First Lt. Joe Boccia, 1/8’s communications officer, noted, “It was built like Fort Knox.” The Marines housed in their new barracks were envied by MAU headquarters elements quartered in a less secure building nearby.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">On Oct. 23 the unthinkable happened. A suicide bomber slipped by guard posts, overran wire and other obstacles, and drove his 5-ton yellow Mercedes truck into the BLT’s lobby. The detonation resulted in an enormous ball of fire. The author states, “The force of the blast arched the building upward into an inverted ‘V.’ The BLT then collapsed like a house of cards.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">The aftermath of the attack is graphically described in the book. Pandemonium followed as surviving Marines shook off the dust in the horrific realization of what had transpired. And then they quickly leaped to the ghastly task of digging out the few survivors.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">Who was responsible for this attack against the peacekeeping forces? Dolphin fast-forwards to inform the reader that “on May 30, 2003, U.S. District Court <a href="http://www.quantico.usmc.mil/display.aspx?Section=SJA" title="Smart Link">Judge</a> Royce C. Lamberth found in favor of the survivors and the family members, ruling Iran responsible for the attack. The court finds that beyond question Hezbollah and its agents received massive material and technical support from the Iranian Government.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">Glenn Dolphin, currently an agent in the Aiken, S.C., FBI office, has provided an insightful view into the personal lives of many of the Marines impacted by this attack. “24 MAU 1983” is a stunning account of America’s early experience serving in the thankless role of worldwide peacekeepers. It clearly characterizes the predicament our military faces while attempting to make “politically correct” war in quarreling countries throughout the world. It’s a first-rate volume written by a gifted writer and well-versed student of American geopolitics.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;">On this, the 24th anniversary of the Beirut tragedy, let us dedicate ourselves to the memory of the fallen 24th MAU warriors. These men will never be forgotten by Glenn Dolphin, the surviving members of the 24th MAU, or in the glorious annals of our beloved Corps.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: large;"><i>Editor’s note: This review was originally published in the ‘‘Leatherneck” magazine and is used here with permission.</i></span></div></div></td> </tr>
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</tbody></table></div></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-78836274388072523102011-08-17T23:30:00.000-04:002011-08-17T23:30:11.498-04:00David Frum: Hezbollah thumbs its nose at Hariri murder indictment<br />
<div class="npDateline"> <span class="npByline"><a href="http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/author/dfrumnp/" rel="author" title="View all posts by David Frum">David Frum</a> </span> <span title="2011-08-17T13:39:39-0400">Aug 17, 2011 – 1:39 PM ET</span> <span> | <strong>Last Updated: Aug 17, 2011 1:57 PM ET</strong></span></div><div class="npDateline"><br />
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</div><div class="npDateline"><span><strong> </strong></span> </div><div class="npBlock npPostContent"> <div class="npImgLeft"><div class="npPosRel" style="width: 222px;"><img alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-47926" height="400" src="http://nationalpostcomment.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/nasrallah.jpg?w=222&h=300" title="Hassan Nasrallah" width="296" /><div class="npPhotoTxt npTxtPlain npTxtLeft"><div class="npGroup"><div class="npPhotoCredit"> <i>AFP PHOTO/PATRICK BAZ </i></div><div class="npPhotoCaption"><i>Nasrallah, the smiling terrorist</i></div><div class="npPhotoCaption"><br />
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</div></div></div></div></div>The indictment for the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri was handed down June 30, but only published today.<br />
The tribunal delivered indictments on June 30 against four men that Hezbollah has acknowledged as members of the organization. Nearly no one here expected the warrants to be served or the men to be arrested, and Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, almost taunted officials who might think of trying to detain them.<span id="more-47920"></span><br />
“No Lebanese government will be able to carry out any arrests, whether in 30 days, 60 days, 1 year, 2 years, 30 years or even 300 years,” he said in July.<br />
He called it a trial in absentia, whose verdict “has already been reached.”<br />
The most prominent of the four members is Moustapha Badreddine, a brother-in-law of Imad Moughnieh, a shadowy Hezbollah commander killed in 2007 and blamed for some of the group’s most spectacular acts of violence. Among them was the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marines barracks in Beirut, which killed 241 American service members.<br />
First thoughts:<br />
1) The Assad family got a pass. Few in Lebanon believe that Hezbollah would have carried out this crime without approval in Damascus.<br />
2) I remember when governments in Europe and North America hesitated to act against Hezbollah on grounds that terrorism represented only a portion of its activities; it also supposedly carried on important social welfare work. The indictment drives home the point: political murder is the essence of Hezbollah.<br />
3) As the New York Times reports, nobody in Lebanon expects the UN indictment to mean very much. Let’s recall this expectation of international futility the next time somebody urges Israel to rely on international forces to protect its borders and its people.<br />
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</span><span class="npTxtAlt npTxtCap"></span> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-18762310373285875682011-08-15T23:14:00.002-04:002011-08-17T23:39:47.890-04:00The Men who gave their lives in Beirut, Scream out to all Americans!!The Tenth Anniversary of 9/11 is right around the corner. Almost 3,000 of our fellow citizens were murdered by the terrorists from the Arab World. Since 1983, (maybe before, who knows?) and the truck bombing of the BLT Headquarters of my Brother Marines, Arab terrorists have conspired to kill American Citizens, Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines. During the remembrance that will be held, speeches will be made, passion will be felt, and images will be flashed around the Country.<br />
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As Veterans of the Beirut War, it is commonly known, that this terrorism started with the the murderous, cowardly attack on our Brothers.<br />
<br />
At the 10th anniversary of the attack on the BLT Headquarters, I felt the same emotion as the next of kin at the 9/11 will feel this year.<br />
<br />
My sympathy and my hope is that the years, and the love of God will heal their hearts. We share the same pain, the suffering, and the frustration of the justice that seems to be denied. In the end, God decides the justice, but as humans we show our anger towards a world that often forgets the injustice done. In our pain, we are hurt more by the country for which we fought to protect, forgetting our friends, our brothers, our fathers, our husbands, and our servicemen who gave their lives in the pursuit of freedom and most of all peace.<br />
<br />
Suffering and pain carries on through almost 30 years now. Men relive these days in Lebanon on a daily basis, and the forgetfullness of a Nation brings more hurt and anguish.<br />
<br />
So, as we Americans gather this September 11 to remember those innocent Men and Women who died in this act of War, and we remember the utmost bravery of Firemen, Policemen, and everyday people who perished doing what they knew was right, let us not forget the Men of our Armed Forces who also gave their lives to protect our freedom and preserve the peace that every human being desperately wants.<br />
<br />
Remember the Beirut Heroes this September, along with all the other heroes from then to now. But most of all, keep sight of the real enemy. Don't be fooled by slick politicians, who play to the needs of Nations who killed our young men and women. Keep our historic identity of a Nation made from a <b><span class="st"><i>Judeo</i>-<i>Christian</i></span></b> idea. An group of men who were flawed, but still through their flawed human nature; planned and put forward the idea that One Nation Under God, indivisible, with justice for all, would stand the test of time.<br />
<br />
Thanks for listening, and May the grace of God continue to be with you.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi01eDerj-6ISdn35BGVZUECQe8AG9SAwoMzGuL3WOmO0tHyVgm51L0RykaH5T5K3nRkhU9dTIgkE-y5BoiMwVUQk3MhIqKSEmFd9fTEUziora1TXCJ4leyB8hVKjSkE8cQrTox/s1600/wreathlaying.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi01eDerj-6ISdn35BGVZUECQe8AG9SAwoMzGuL3WOmO0tHyVgm51L0RykaH5T5K3nRkhU9dTIgkE-y5BoiMwVUQk3MhIqKSEmFd9fTEUziora1TXCJ4leyB8hVKjSkE8cQrTox/s320/wreathlaying.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>CC<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-63419151095052600802011-08-15T22:18:00.000-04:002011-08-15T22:18:00.209-04:00Hezbollah Indicted <br />
<i><u>Old Article, maybe some of you know this already, but just so it's reinforced in your brain, that even now the World Court has more indictments against Hezbollah. The real question is "When will the U.S. wake up and join the rest of the world?" </u></i><br />
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BEIRUT -- In a country with a history of scores left unsettled, Hezbollah is in a strong position to ride out an indictment accusing a high-ranking member of one of the most dramatic political assassinations in the Middle East.<br />
The Shiite militant group has spent the past year laying the groundwork for thwarting any move to implement the all-but-inevitable indictment in the 2005 murder of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. It has warned to "cut off the hand" of anyone who tries to arrest its members and repeatedly cast doubt on the tribunal's investigation.<br />
The work appears to have paid off.<br />
Since the Netherlands-based court released the indictments Thursday, there has been no real sign that Lebanese authorities are willing to arrest the four suspects, including Hezbollah militant Mustafa Badreddine. To do so, they would have to directly confront the Iran- and Syria-backed militant group that is firmly in control of the Lebanese state.<br />
Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah planned a speech Saturday to address the indictment.<br />
The most prominent of the four people named in the indictment is <b>Badreddine, who appears to have a storied history of militancy. He is suspected of building the powerful bomb that blew up the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983, killing 241 Americans, mostly Marines, according to a federal law enforcement official and a book "Jawbreaker," by Gary Berntsen, a former official who ran the Hezbollah task force at the CIA.</b><br />
<b> He also is the brother-in-law of the late Hezbollah military commander Imad Mughniyeh and is suspected of involvement in the 1983 bombings of the U.S. and French embassies in Kuwait that killed five people.</b><br />
Hezbollah has always had serious muscle, boasting a guerrilla force that is better armed and stronger than the national army.<br />
But the group has amassed unprecedented political clout in the government, having toppled the previous administration in January when then-Prime Minister Saad Hariri -- the slain man's son -- refused to renounce the tribunal investigating his father's death.<br />
The new premier, Najib Mikati, was Hezbollah's pick for the post. He issued a vague promise Thursday that Lebanon would respect international resolutions as long as they did not threaten the civil peace.<br />
The ambiguous wording leaves ample room to brush aside the arrest warrants if street battles are looming. The Cabinet is packed with Hezbollah allies, so there is little enthusiasm within the current leadership to press forward with the case.<br />
And the indictments do indeed threaten to ignite fresh violence in Lebanon. In the six years since Hariri's death, the investigation has sharpened the country's sectarian divisions -- Rafik Hariri was one of Lebanon's most powerful Sunni leaders, while Hezbollah is a Shiite group. It has also heightened other intractable debates, including the question of the role of Hezbollah -- and its vast arsenal, which opponents want dismantled.<br />
Walid Jumblatt, a Hezbollah ally and leader of the tiny Druse sect, warned Friday that the indictments could lead to new civil strife in Lebanon and painted the case as a matter of justice versus stability.<br />
"As much as justice is important for the martyrs and the wounded, so too civil peace and stability is the hoped-for future," said Jumblatt, whose own father was a victim of a political assassination in Lebanon and who was once an ardent supporter of the tribunal before switching alliances. "Civil peace is more important than anything else."<br />
He pointed to widespread fears that the case could further divide the country, which has been recovering from decades of bloodshed, including a 15-year civil war that ended in 1990 and more recent sectarian battles.<br />
The younger Hariri and his allies, now relegated to the opposition, and the international court will likely push for action against the four. But there is little they can do to force the government to do so.<br />
Lebanese authorities have until the end of July to serve the indictments on suspects or execute arrest warrants. If they fail, the court's recourse is to publish the indictment. Details in the indictment about the investigation into the killing -- so far kept under wraps -- might in theory prove embarrassing to Hezbollah, but the group is unlikely to be severely hurt by them.<br />
While Jumblatt appeared to be offering a stark choice -- either turn a blind eye to a dastardly crime, or run the risk of chaos -- Hezbollah's leader has taken another tack.<br />
Nasrallah has worked tirelessly to convince the Lebanese that the tribunal is not fit to deliver justice. For more than a year, he has gone on a media offensive against the tribunal, taking nearly every opportunity to call it biased, politicized and a tool of archenemy Israel.<br />
He also said early on that he knew Hezbollah would be accused of the crime, a pre-emptive strike that dampened the impact of Thursday's indictment and bolstered his credentials as the man in charge in Lebanon.<br />
(This article was written by Elizabeth A. Kennedy, Associated Press chief of bureau for Syria and Lebanon).<br />
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<div class="contentRow"><a href="" name="commentsDiv"></a> <div class="moduleOneColorOne moduleOne" id="storyComments"><div class="contentInsert"> <div class="rightColumn"> </div></div></div></div><div id="rightColumn"> </div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-17352385685850238952011-05-02T22:58:00.000-04:002011-05-02T22:58:08.533-04:00Ok, we have seen the coverage of the World's Most Wanted Terriorist, shot dead in his Pakistani compund. The talking heads are all a buzz, with words like, "When you kill any Americans we will hunt you down and take your life!" Other comments are, "You can run but you can't hide!" My favorite so far is by Mr. Sean Hannity a fox news commentator, he said "We will find you, you can go to the ends of the earth but we will find you, No longer can you get away with killing Americans!"<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_2009.jpg/503px-Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_2009.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_2009.jpg/503px-Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad_2009.jpg" width="268" /></a></div>I have a question for Mr. Hannity, a short one, that maybe he and the other newscasters gloating as they should over Osama Bin Laden's death, where is our killer or killers? This guy has been on the run since 1983 when he killed 241 of my brother Marines, Sailor, and Soldiers. Currently this person resides somewhere near Teheran Iran. He is the President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He had been tried along with his government by US Courts for the bombing of the BLT Headquarters in Beirut Lebanon on October 23 1983.. Is seal team six available? just wondering.<br />
<br />
I find the news that Osama Bin Laden is dead a great joy for the military and the President. But one thing that really gives me pause, is to think that after almost 28 years, no one has been brought to Justice for my friends all 241 of them. Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton, Bush 2 and now President Obama, have all failed to bring the killer to justice. At least if we got him alive we could release him later, like the Scots did for the Pan Am 103 <i>Lockerbie</i><i> Bomber</i>.<br />
<br />
.President Obama, there are still grieving families from the 1983 BLT Headquarters Bombing, and families of the Embassy bombing that same year, can these Fathers, Mothers, Sisiters, Daughters, and Sons acheive some measure of justice? The same justice you spoke about last night. I mean, he is not hard to find. He is the President of Iran, I think intel can get a bead on him.<br />
<br />
Thanks go out from the BVA to those men and women on the front lines preparing the way for the operation that took place last night. Great Job my Brothers and Semper Fi !!<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-39696672853046140022010-12-28T20:12:00.000-05:002010-12-28T20:12:13.396-05:00Iran Immune From Bomb Victims' Collection Effort<h5>Iran Immune From Bomb Victims' Collection Effort</h5><div id="C1R1_Byline"><div class="byline">By TIM HULL<br />
<script src="http://w.sharethis.com/button/sharethis.js#publisher=42240697-4801-421a-9d96-cac79aed84c4&type=website&post_services=facebook%2Cdigg%2Cdelicious%2Cybuzz%2Ctwitter%2Cstumbleupon%2Creddit%2Ctechnorati%2Cmixx%2Cblogger%2Ctypepad%2Cwordpress%2Cgoogle_bmarks%2Cwindows_live%2Cmyspace%2Cfark%2Cbus_exchange%2Cpropeller%2Cnewsvine%2Clinkedin" type="text/javascript">
</script><span id="sharethis_0"><a class="stbutton stico_default" href="javascript:void(0)" st_page="home" title="ShareThis via email, AIM, social bookmarking and networking sites, etc."><span class="stbuttontext" st_page="home">ShareThis</span></a></span></div></div><div id="C1R1"><div class="summary"> (CN) - Relatives of U.S. soldiers killed in the 1983 Marine barracks bombing in Beirut can't collect portions of their $2.6 billion judgment against Iran from French shipping companies that owe Iran money for oil and the use of its ports, the 9th Circuit ruled Friday.<br />
The federal appeals court in San Francisco held that Iran's rights to the port payments are immune under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), because the debts are "located" in France, not the United States.<br />
The 1983 suicide bombing killed 241 U.S. soldiers and injured many more. Survivors and relatives of those killed in the bombing sued Iran in 2001 for its role in the attack. <br />
After a federal judge ruled that Iran had bankrolled and planned the bombing with Hezbollah, the nearly 1,000 plaintiffs won a multibillion-dollar default judgment in 2007. <br />
Unable to collect from Iran, which failed to answer the complaint or appear at the trial, the families asked a federal judge in California to assign them Iran's rights to payment from the French shipping firm CMA CGM and others. CMA CGM allegedly owed Iran money for its frequent use of Iranian ports and oil, according to the shipping routes on the company's website.<br />
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White rejected the motion, saying FSIA only allowed the plaintiffs to collect on Iranian property in the United States, but not in other countries.<br />
On appeal, the plaintiffs argued that if the principle of foreign sovereign immunity applied, it should have been raised earlier by Iran, not at trial by Judge White.<br />
The 9th Circuit disagreed.<br />
"This case turns on the question of whether immunity from execution is an affirmative defense that must be raised by a foreign state," Judge Betty Fletcher wrote for the three-judge panel. <br />
She said the judge's decision to raise the issue, even though Iran never did, "is appropriate and serves the dual goals of the FSIA: affording American plaintiffs with a means for bringing suit against foreign states and ensuring that their disputes will not be resolved based on political considerations, and also demonstrating a proper respect for foreign states and sparing them the inconvenience of litigation."<br />
Fletcher added that, under the FSIA's narrow exceptions to immunity for countries that support terrorism, Iran's right to payment from the shipping companies "is assignable only if that right is located in the United States."<br />
"CMA CGM is a French corporation, therefore the debt obligation it owes to Iran is located in France," she wrote. "Iran's rights to payment from CMA CGM are not 'property in the United States' and are immune from execution."<br />
Dissenting Judge Norman Randy Smith said the courts were wrong to grant Iran immunity, because immunity is an "affirmative defense." <br />
"As such, it must be affirmatively pleaded by the defendant," he wrote</div></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-76876727985162087612010-10-21T23:15:00.002-04:002010-10-21T23:15:40.997-04:00<a href="http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php" name="fb_share" type="button_count">Share</a><script src="http://static.ak.fbcdn.net/connect.php/js/FB.Share" type="text/javascript">
</script><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-20803174772209596592010-08-10T22:00:00.000-04:002010-08-10T22:00:20.253-04:00Memorial Day Record Turnout for Beirut Vets!!Record Turnout! Beirut Vets, Families Well Represented at National Memorial Day Parade<br />
Photo: JulieWard<br />
By Bill Kibler<br />
Twenty-Five! That’s how many people made the trip to be part of the Beirut entry in the National Memorial Day Parade in Washing- ton, D.C. May 31, 2010.<br />
This record number in- cluded: Major Bob Jordan and his wife, Evi from Ft. Meade, MD; Randy and Julie Ward and their 3 children from Orlando, FL; Jimmy and Janet Young and their 2 children from Baltimore, MD; Wayne and Kathy Hodges, their daughter and grandson in tow with the “Beirut Bug” who drove up the night before from Roanoke, VA; Les and Linda Kameck from Cuba, NY; Anthony “Boots” Leboutiller from SC; Ceasar Valdez from Washington, DC; and weekend organizer Bill Kibler from Washington, DC. Lastly we had 1st Sgt Willie Medley (Beirut Veteran) and 4 of his JROTC Marine Cadets from Mount Vernon High School.<br />
The weekend started at 5pm and never seemed to slow down. We had things planned the entire time. We started out Friday night walking from the hotel to 8th and I, Marine Barracks Washington for the evening<br />
sunset parade, stopping at the Hawk and Dove for dinner. What appeared as a looming rainstorm gathered full force and started raining at the be- ginning of the evening parade and didn’t let up until about 10 min. be- fore the end of the parade. The show went on as planned. Everyone made it back to the hotel soaked but en- joyed the night out.<br />
The next morning we walked to the US Capitol for a reserved tour of the place. Packed but orderly, we managed to make our way thru the halls of the US Capitol. Afterwards we all went to the Air and Space and at 1 p.m. went to Arlington National Cemetery to visit Section 59 where Beirut KIAs are buried. We placed Marine Corps and Navy flags by their headstones and paid our re- spects and then went to the Tomb of the Unknown and the JFK flame. Following our trip to Arlington we had dinner at a fancy restaurant in China Town.<br />
Sunday featured a trip to the Quantico Museum of the Marine Corps, followed by a stop at the Iwo Jima Memorial in Arlington, VA.<br />
Thanks to Ceasar Valdez who got thru security early enough and saved us front row seats at the PBS Con- cert on the west lawn of the U.S. Capitol while the Wards took an eve- ning bus tour of Washington, stop- ping at all the national monuments.<br />
We later reconvened at the hotel lobby cocktail lounge area and that’s when Randy Ward’s jaw dropped onto the table when he spot- ted a gentlemen sitting at the next table over from us wearing a Con- gressional Medal of Honor. We fi- nally found the right time and made conversation with him. Hershel “Woody” Williams received his CMH from his service from the bat- tle of Iwo Jima!! Coins were ex- changed!<br />
Monday finally arrived and after 3 days of on-the-go walking we were ready for more. Braving the 94 degrees in the shade, we made it down to the parade staging area where we assembled and waited for our cue to begin the parade. Thanks to Randy and Julie Ward, who do- nated the embroidered service and USA flags, we had our first ever BVA Joint-Service Color guard (including Les Kameck’s Lebanon flag), complete with armed sentries posted on either end from the JROTC Marine Cadets. The crowd gave us a standing ovation as we turned the corner onto Constitution Avenue as the master of ceremonies read our script, the Joint Chiefs of Staff standing to salute our color guard as we went by. We made it ... the entire 12 blocks with no heat ex- haustion and listening to the ap- plause the entire parade route. We are already planning for next year... will you be included?<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-17726508951924685542010-08-09T14:13:00.000-04:002010-08-09T14:13:45.000-04:00<div class="articleLayout"> <h1 id="TitleNewsStory"> <span> Beirut veterans, fallen honored with memorial stamp </span></h1><div class="byline"><span> 8/6/2010 <strong>By Pfc. Christofer P. Baines , Headquarters Marine Corps </strong></span></div><div> <span class="pageContent-dateline" style="display: block;"></span> <div class="hidden"> </div><span class="pageContent" style="padding-top: 0pt;"><div id="ctl00_PlaceHolderMain_EditModeControls_ctl03__ControlWrapper_RichHtmlField" style="display: inline;"> ARLINGTON, Va. — To honor the American service members who died during the Lebanese Civil War, veterans and Gold Star family members lobbied the United States Postal Service and Citizen Stamp Advisory Committee to issue a Beirut commemorative postage stamp for more than 20 years. The stamp initiative started in 1986 when a group of Gold Star family members visited the nation’s capitol. When petitioning the United States Postal Service and Citizen Stamp Advisory Committee failed to yield results after 24 years, Beirut veterans tried third party vendor zazzle.com. This led to the creation of <a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_1679473756"></a><a href="http://beirutstamp.com/">Beirut Stamp</a><br />
“I felt relieved that we made a breakthrough,” said Beirut veteran Leslie Kameck. “I’d love to see more stamps and I already plan on getting more.” <br />
Since its July 15 release, more than 50 stamp sheets have been sold. Additionally, 90 cents from the sale of each sheet goes toward the Gold Star Mothers National Memorial Foundation.<br />
"Not only are the purchases supporting the morale of the Beirut veterans and the families of the fallen, they also financially help Gold Star Mothers," said Bill Kibler, one of the Beirut veterans who headed the stamp initiative.<br />
Gold Star Mothers National Memorial Foundation Chairwoman Judith Young said the organization’s efforts are aimed at continuing a tradition that has affected thousands of mothers throughout history. <br />
<span> </span>“Our goal is to recognize an ongoing tradition and over 600,000 gold star mothers,” Young said. “Last year we raised $18,000 and hope to do better next year.”<br />
At approximately 6:22 a.m., on Oct. 23, 1983, a blast catalyzed by six tons of explosives tore through the Marine Corps Headquarters building in Beirut, Lebanon. The blast, equivalent to the force of 20,000 lbs. of TNT, destroyed the barracks and killed 241 service members, 220 of which were Marines, along with 18 sailors and three soldiers.<br />
Kibler said the Marine presence in Lebanon was one of good will. As part of a multi-national peacekeeping force, the Marines worked to quell the violence and halt atrocities. This is the validation behind the phrase “they came in peace,” which is inscribed on the Beirut War Memorial and the six commemorative stamps.<br />
“To have this stamp out there recognizes their sacrifice so they may hold their heads up high, if they aren’t already,” Kibler said.</div></span> </div></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-9007835740085256782010-08-04T08:01:00.001-04:002010-08-04T08:01:42.065-04:00<h2><span>New Marine Corps facility dedicated in Newport</span></h2> <span style="font-size:-1;"><b> <h5><span>01:00 AM EDT on Tuesday, August 3, 2010</span></h5></b></span> <span style="font-size:-1;"><b><span>By Richard Salit<br /><br />Journal Staff Writer</span></b></span> <span> <p>NEWPORT — Naval Station Newport, further expanding its role as a national center for military education, dedicated a new Marine Corps facility Monday in memory of the 1983 Beirut bombing that killed 241 service members, including 9 from Rhode Island. </p><p>The building, which underwent a $6.1-million renovation, will house the Marine Corps Aviation Logistics School, with a faculty of 35 and a student enrollment of 200. The school relocated from Athens, Ga. </p><p>The dedication ceremony, which preceded a ribbon-cutting for Beirut Memorial Hall, included the unveiling of a plaque that paid tribute to those killed when suicide bombers attacked the barracks of a multinational force during Lebanon’s civil war. </p><p>Relatives of the Rhode Island victims attended the unveiling. Families of Marines killed in other conflicts also were present, including relatives of Marine Lance Cpl. Holly A. Charrette, formerly of Cranston, who was killed in Iraq in 2005. </p><p>Sen. <a href="http://www.projo.com/blcS.sc?search=Jack+Reed&cat=all" target="_blank">Jack Reed</a> was one of the guest speakers. </p></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-70582353991450198702010-08-02T08:01:00.001-04:002010-08-02T08:28:00.333-04:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTn-XJW_lq3sBoIuMYyK1vCEU-gUQI294wNCRJRBKr3cIRsjHeGkjKIBn3uOp0jWW2chqknDMggRMCbg03WDfY5a6Iz-NgzxPDZ-iWMUlMABGVVAJHIFUdI-iRGBQ49vsJSCo4/s1600/stamp_statue_TCIP.png"><img style="float: left; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 231px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTn-XJW_lq3sBoIuMYyK1vCEU-gUQI294wNCRJRBKr3cIRsjHeGkjKIBn3uOp0jWW2chqknDMggRMCbg03WDfY5a6Iz-NgzxPDZ-iWMUlMABGVVAJHIFUdI-iRGBQ49vsJSCo4/s400/stamp_statue_TCIP.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5500788226355479058" border="0" /></a><br /><div><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:85%;" > <div> <h1>Beirut stamp becomes a reality – without USPS</h1></div> <div><span style="font-size:130%;"><a href="mailto:hhodge@freedomenc.com" target="_blank">HOPE HODGE</a></span></div></span></div> <div><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:85%;" ><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;font-size:78%;" ><span style=";font-family:Tahoma;font-size:78%;" > <p><span style="font-size:130%;"><a href="http://www.jdnews.com/news/stamp-80457-beirut-years.html" target="_blank">http://www.jdnews.com/news/<wbr>stamp-80457-beirut-years.html</a></span></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size:130%;"><a href="http://www.jdnews.com/news/stamp-80457-beirut-years.html" target="_blank"><br /></a></span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">After 24 years and numerous rejections, members of the Beirut Veterans Stamp Initiative have decided to move forward with a commemorative stamp design — with or without the approval of the U.S. Postal Service.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">In February, the USPS Citizen’s Stamp Advisory Committee declined for the third time a proposal memorializing the 241 peacekeeping Marines and sailors from Camp Lejeune’s 24th Marine Amphibious Unit who died in a terrorist attack in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Marine veteran Bill Kibler, who served in Beirut and manages the Stamp Initiative website, decided Beirut veterans and their family members couldn’t afford to wait any longer.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">“We’d have to wait until 2012 to reapply with the postal service,” he said. “I was going over the postal service page and came across third party vendors. I thought, ‘Well, gee, what’s that about?’”</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">After working with Defense Department administrators to find a useable image of Onslow County’s Beirut Memorial, he worked with the company to create six designs for postage and other items, including a close-up image of the statue of the Marine peacekeeper in front of the memorial and an image of the epitaph, “They Came in Peace,” etched into the memorial wall.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">It’s not happening the way Kibler and the other members of the Stamp Initiative imagined it would, but Kibler said it is a victory nonetheless for the movement.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">“Are these official U.S. postage stamps? Of course they are,” Kibler said. “The one thing is, you cannot buy them at the Post Office; you have to purchase them online.”</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">And, he said, these stamps have an advantage in one key way: Proceeds from sale of the stamps will be donated to the Gold Star Mothers National Monument Foundation.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Judith Young, chairwoman of the foundation and a Gold Star mother who lost a son in the Beirut bombing, said she would welcome the assistance with funding the monument, as well as the tribute to the troops lost in Beirut.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">“It’s good that we’re going to get it out there anyway, and it would benefit the monument,” she said. “If it comes down to it and this is the only way we will get out the stamp, then this is the only way; but we will keep trying.”</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Though 2012 is far off yet, Kibler said they would try once more then to have the stamp approved by USPS.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">A spokesman for the postal service said in February that the Beirut memorial stamp had been turned down because a North Carolina-based monument did not have national scope and appeal.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">[image#2, align=left, size=medium]</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Among Beirut veterans and family members, though, Kibler said, the Zazzle design, which was published to the site on Thursday, has already been a hit.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">“My hits started doubling as soon as I announced I had the website up and running,” he said. “Looking over the reports this morning, I’ve sold 25 sheets of stamps.”</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">A commemorative stamp may seem a small token, but Kibler said its meaning is significant for those affected by the Beirut tragedy.</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">“It means we can breathe again,” he said. “Somebody’s taken the time to recognize us, which is the whole point of the Beirut stamp.”</span></p> <p style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Representatives of <a href="http://zazzle.com/" target="_blank">zazzle.com</a> did not immediately return requests for comment. To purchase stamps, visit <a href="http://zazzle.com/" target="_blank">zazzle.com</a>.</span></p></span></span></span></div> <div style="font-family:georgia;"><span style="font-size:100%;"> </span></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-21104776992310909462010-03-17T21:51:00.004-04:002010-03-17T21:56:58.481-04:00Need Volunteers for Memorial Day March in Washington D.C. !!All interested contact Bill Kibler... WKibler@apa.org<div><br /></div><div>..for Help walking with BVA Banner!!!!</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-1441717593204883552010-02-04T22:14:00.000-05:002010-02-04T22:15:01.454-05:00Does anyone out there Care??????Beirut Vets denied again!!!<h1 class="marginMidSide">Beirut Memorial stamp bypassed again</h1> <div class="subhead marginMidSide"> </div> <div class="articledate marginMidSide">February 03, 2010 1:30 AM</div> <div id="v_player"> </div> <div class="byline marginMidSide"> <a href="mailto:hhodge@freedomenc.com">HOPE HODGE</a> </div> <!-- Video goes here --> <div class="newstext marginMidSide"> <p>A citizen petition to mint a postage stamp depicting Jacksonville’s Beirut Memorial has once again been declined, according to United States Postal Service officials. But the stamp’s advocates are not ready to give up yet.</p> <p>Beirut veterans and family members have been working for more than two decades to get approval for a stamp memorializing the 241 peacekeepers who perished in the 1983 Beirut terrorist attacks, most of whom were based in Jacksonville. In that time, they have received three rejections. In October, many of them were encouraged when, at a meeting of the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee, the stamp proposal was tabled until January for evaluation, rather than dismissed.</p> <p>But on Monday, a spokesman for USPS, Mark Saunders, said in a statement, “the proposal was rejected because the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee didn’t believe the Memorial in North Carolina was as national in scope as other National Memorials that have been recently featured on stamps.”</p> <p>Examples of memorials of national importance included Washington D.C.’s World War II and Korean War Memorials, built by the federal government and managed by the National Park Service. Saunders said that votes taken by the 13-member committee are taken behind closed doors, and tallies are not released.</p> <p>A leader of the stamp initiative and Web master of beirutstamp.com, Bill Kibler, said he could understand the committee’s reasoning in part, as other memorials to the Beirut bombings exist, including one erected in Philadelphia in 1985. But, he said, Jacksonville’s memorial has come to be understood as the official one, as people from across the country visit it on the anniversary of the tragedy to pay tribute.</p> <p>“If this memorial were sitting in Washington, we’d get a stamp in a heartbeat,” Kibler said. “Because this memorial sits near Camp Lejeune, they think we’re on a regional level, and we need to be on a national level.”</p> <p>There are 12 major criteria that now guide stamp selection, restricting subject matter to American or America-related themes, barring a living person from being featured on a stamp, and limiting content to themes only of widespread appeal and significance, among other criteria.</p> <p>To brainstorm creative ways to re-present the petition, Kibler said he has been in touch with one of the rulebreakers: George Mendonsa, best known as the sailor kissing a nurse in Times Square in the world-famous photograph taken on V-J Day, as one of two living people pictured on a stamp.</p> <p>Other members of the stamp initiative plan to collect more congressional signatures (in 2009, they collected 16) and attract more public attention to the effort, including the possibility of pursuing celebrity endorsement.</p> <p>A member of the group, Wayne Hodges, a former Marine who was on duty in the U.S. Embassy in Beirut at the time of the bombing, said a commemorative stamp would be a sign of acknowledgement from the U.S. government about the significance of Beirut, and would be a token of honor for veterans and survivor families. That, he said, should speak to the committee.</p> <p>“When they say it’s not national enough, what is more national than the United States Marine Corps?” he said.</p> <p>Hodges said he will see the petition through to its success, which he is “90 percent sure” will come about eventually.</p> <p>“Somewhere out there is the key and we’ve just got to find it. And we’re gonna find it,” Hodges said.</p> <p>Contact Hope Hodge at 910-219-8453 or hhodge@freedomenc.com.</p> </div> <input id="realstory" value="Beirut Memorial stamp bypassed again" type="hidden"><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-37121593269731833142009-11-15T12:37:00.001-05:002009-11-15T12:42:09.909-05:00Beirut Stamp not Dead?HOPE HODGE<br /><br />Jacksonville Daily News Jacksonville North Carolina <!-- Video goes here --> <div class="newstext marginMidSide"> <p>Sometimes, fitting tributes can come in small packages.</p> <p>Monday, a group of veterans and family members learned that their fight to get a stamp honoring the victims of the 1983 Beirut bombing is not over yet. Some members of the Beirut Stamp Initiative have been working for more than two decades to get approval for a stamp memorializing the 241 peacekeepers who perished in the attack, most of whom were based in Jacksonville.</p> <p>In that time, they have written letters to three U.S. presidents, mailed petitions containing an estimated 75,000 to 100,000 signatures, and received three rejections from the U.S. Postal Service.</p> <p>This year’s application, the group’s final effort, includes endorsements from Beirut Veterans of America, American Gold Star Mothers, Inc., 16 members of U.S. Congress and former commandant of the Marine Corps retired Gen. Michael W. Hagee.</p> <p>The Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee, a group of 12 scholars and public figures whose members include former second lady Joan Mondale and Harvard academic Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr., convened this weekend and were slated to deliver a decision about the Beirut memorial stamp.</p> <p>But rather than denying the petition a fourth time, the committee chose to defer a decision until January, citing a lack of sufficient information about the memorial.</p> <p>Bill Kibler, an Arlington, Va., resident and veteran who was in Beirut with the 24th Marine Amphibious Unit several months prior to the bombing, said he was pleased that the committee had not denied the group’s request again.</p> <p>“It’s a really positive sign for now,” he said.</p> <p>A Web master for the Beirut Stamp Initiative, Kibler said he had worked to come up with a new idea this year to avoid another rejection. In the past, he said, the committee had denied requests based on its policy of not creating stamps to commemorate tragedies.</p> <p>The latest application is for a stamp based on Jacksonville’s Beirut Memorial, a wall bearing the names of those who died, guarded by a bronze statue of a “The Peacekeeper” standing sentinel. Since the USPS minted a stamp dedicated to the Vietnam Memorial in 2000, the group hopes that this approach will clear the way to approval for them.</p> <p>Judy Young of Burlington County, N.J., a Gold Star mother who lost her son, Sgt. Jeffrey Young, in the Beirut tragedy and co-founded the initiative about 24 years ago, said that finally getting a stamp would be a small but fitting tribute to the work and heroism of those like her son.</p> <p>“It’s not only kind of a victory for the Beirut families to be recognized, it’s kind of a victory winning out over the post office committee,” she said.</p> <p>The victory would come after years of slights and indignation, as the group has watched characters like Bart Simpson receive tribute in a stamp while their requests are denied.</p> <p>Kibler said a stamp would show that honoring the veterans of Beirut is as vital as paying tribute to those of better-known tragedies.</p> <p>“It will finally mean a little more sense of closure, that the government’s finally stepping up to acknowledge what happened 26 years ago,” Kibler said.</p> <p>But now the work of this group is over for a few months.</p> <p>“All we can do now is sit and wait,” Kibler said.</p> <p>Officials with USPS stamp services did not immediately respond to requests for comment about the Beirut stamp.</p> <p> </p> <p>Contact Hope Hodge at 910-219-8453 or at hhodge@freedomenc.com.</p> </div> <input id="realstory" value="Big tribute, small package" type="hidden"><br /><!-- googleoff: index --><div class="fi_wide"><br /><div class="fi_wide_bottom "><!-- --></div> <script language="JavaScript1.1">OAS_RICH('x01');</script><!-- start of ad tag --><script type="text/javascript" src="http://ad.doubleclick.net/adj/cnd.fenc.jacksonvilledailynews/news/local;s1=news;s2=local;pos=1;dcode=cnd;pcode=fenc;kw=;ref=;test=;fci=ad;dcopt=ist;tile=7;sz=1x1;ord=3392662278210639.5?"></script><!-- Casale Media 2008 (C) --> <!-- Ad Format: Pop Under --> <!-- Domain(s): freedom.com --> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://as.casalemedia.com/s?s=95655&u=freedom.com&f=1&id=604558869.1128026"></script><input style="width: 0px; top: 0px; position: absolute; visibility: hidden;" id="oV6" onchange="fV8(fV1,5,true)"><div style="display: inline;" id="oV10"><embed style="position: absolute; top: 0px;" swliveconnect="true" src="http://as.casalemedia.com/cmp2.swf" width="1" height="1"></embed></div> <!-- Casale Media 2008 (C) --><!-- end of ad tag --> <script language="JavaScript1.1">OAS_RICH('x02');</script> </div> <!-- End Footer --> <script type="text/javascript"> //check to see if there is brightcove content, if so, turn parent div on if (document.getElementById("bc230videobox")) { var articlevideo = document.getElementById("articlevideo"); articlevideo.style.display = 'block'; } </script> <!-- End Wrapper --> <!-- cached: 09:36:09 11/15/09 --> <!-- accessLevel: 0 --> <script type="text/javascript">var tcdacmd="dt";</script><script src="http://an.tacoda.net/an/15136/slf.js" type="text/javascript"></script><script src="http://an.tacoda.net/an/cda1.js" language="JavaScript"></script> <!-- UCGv2 group layout--><form target="frame_0" method="get" action="http://sitelife.jdnews.com/ver1.0/Direct/Process" id="f0" name="f0"><input value="{"UniqueId":0,"Requests":[{"ArticleKey":{"Key":"Articlejdn69614"}}]}" name="jsonRequest" type="hidden"><input value="sitelife.jdnews.com" name="sid" type="hidden"></form><div style="position: absolute; top: 0pt; margin-left: -10000px;"><iframe id="frame_0" name="frame_0">&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;</iframe></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-54799071866527169312009-11-14T19:46:00.002-05:002009-11-14T19:56:17.269-05:00Where does this end? Endless Pain for Victims of Iran<div id="container"> <div id="containerBorder"> <div id="header"> <div id="headL"> <div id="mastHead"> <span onclick="choose(this);" id="searchLocal" class="searchOn"><span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">This has to be the most devastating news we have seen in over 26 years, The murderous President of Iran, are being given a huge advantage by the Obama Presidential Administration. I am outraged as I'm sure you are also, by this lack of compassion for our Brother's Family and next of Kin. No negotiation with terrorists. No dialogue with terrorists. We are in a War and have been so since 1983. The United States must open its eyes to the horror of Terrorism. Will we ever learn? Or must we face grieving widows and family members again and again. </span></span><br /></span></div></div></div><div id="content" class="article"><div id="Col1"><!--google_ad_section_start--> <div id="articleText"> <div id="article"> <div class="hideMe"><!-- <headline>Adding insult to infamy</headline> <source>Boston Globe</source> <teasetext>On Veterans Day, Christine Devlin stood in the cold in Westwood for the unveiling of a new memorial to local soldiers lost overseas, including her son Michael, one of the 241 servicemen killed in the bombing of the US Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983.</teasetext> <byline>Bryan Bender</byline> <date>November 14, 2009</date> --></div> <div id="articleHeader"> <div id="headTools"> <a href="http://www.boston.com/news/globe/"><img src="http://cache.boston.com/bonzai-fba/File-Based_Image_Resource/from_provider_globe.gif" alt="The Boston Globe" title="The Boston Globe" class="providerlogo" align="right" border="0" height="20" width="105" /> <input name="logotype" value="Globe Story" type="hidden"></a> <h1>Adding insult to infamy</h1> <h2>26 years after attack on Marine barracks in Beirut, families stymied again in bid for restitution</h2> <div id="articleBodyTop"> <table id="articleBodyImageV" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr> <td class="imageVPad"><img src="http://cache.boston.com/resize/bonzai-fba/Globe_Photo/2009/11/13/1258171170_5617/300h.jpg" title="Christine Devlin displayed a photo of her son Michael, who was killed in a 1983 terrorist bombing in Beirut. Below, US Marines pulled survivors from the rubble." alt="Christine Devlin displayed a photo of her son Michael, who was killed in a 1983 terrorist bombing in Beirut. Below, US Marines pulled survivors from the rubble." border="0" height="300" width="268" /></td> <td>Christine Devlin displayed a photo of her son Michael, who was killed in a 1983 terrorist bombing in Beirut. Below, US Marines pulled survivors from the rubble. (John Tlumacki/ Globe Staff)</td> </tr></tbody></table> </div> <div class="utility"> <span id="byline"> By <a href="http://search.boston.com/local/Search.do?s.sm.query=Bryan+Bender&camp=localsearch:on:byline:art">Bryan Bender</a> </span> <span id="dateline"> Globe Staff <span class="listPipe">/</span> November 14, 2009 </span> <!-- Email to a Friend , this is a hidden form revealed via click listener --> <script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="http://cache.boston.com/universal/js/bcom_etaf_scripts.js"></script> <!-- e-mail widget --> <div id="bdc_emailWidget" class="hide"> <div id="bdc_EMTOF_form" class="innerContainer"> <img id="pointer_top" src="http://cache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/etaf/pointer_top.gif" alt="" /><!-- end tools --> </div></div></div><!-- End utility --> </div><!-- End headTools --> </div><!-- End articleHeader --> <div id="articleGraphs"> <div id="page1"><div class="firstGraph"><p>On Veterans Day, Christine Devlin stood in the cold in Westwood for the unveiling of a new memorial to local soldiers lost overseas, including her son Michael, one of the 241 servicemen killed in the bombing of the US Marine barracks in Lebanon in 1983.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><div style="display: block;" id="articleEmbed"><div class="embed" id="relatedContent"><div class="relatedBox" style="padding-bottom: 4px;"><table id="commentInviteBox" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr><td rowspan="1" style="width: auto;"><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></div> </div></div><p>Devlin is among 30 Massachusetts relatives of victims of the Beirut attack who have been fighting for more than a decade to get compensation for what many consider the first major terrorist attack against the United States. After a federal judge ruled in 2007 that Iran was liable for $2.65 billion in damages to be shared by 150 families seeking restitution, they believed they were on the cusp of victory.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>But now, the Obama administration is going to court to try to block payments from Iranian assets that the families’ lawyers want seized, contending that it would jeopardize sensitive negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program and establish a potentially damaging precedent.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>In a little-noticed filing in federal court, the Justice Department is arguing that giving the money to the victims “can have significant, detrimental impact on our foreign relations, as well as the reciprocal treatment of the United States and its extensive overseas property holdings.’’</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>The Obama administration’s position is a blow to those like Devlin, who is still waiting for some measure of justice for her son, who was 21 when Hezbollah terrorists rammed a suicide truck bomb into the peacekeepers’ headquarters.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>“It is offensive that our government - the government that [the Marines] were fighting for, who sent them there - are against us collecting from Iran,’’ Devlin said in an interview this week. “I felt justice was going to be served, but so far it hasn’t.’’</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>“We can’t go on with our lives,’’ said Marlys Lemnah, 62, of St. Albans, Vt., whose husband, Richard, a Marine sergeant nearing his 20-year retirement, was killed in Beirut. “It’s not about the money. We need something tangible: responsibility and accountability. We will fight until we have no more fight left.’’</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>The lawsuit, specialists say, also demonstrates the enormous difficulty for terrorism victims in general to collect damages. Despite a host of court rulings in its favor and legislation passed by Congress to make it possible to sue foreign governments that sponsor terrorism, the executive branch has long resisted such payments, arguing that seizing the assets of another country could restrict the president’s ability to conduct diplomacy. There are also significant legal disagreements over what kind of assets can be seized.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>“Two branches are supporting [the families’] position and the executive branch is directly trying to undermine them,’’ said David J. Strachman, a Providence lawyer who has represented numerous families in terrorism cases involving Iran, but is not involved in this case.</p></div> </div> <div id="page2"><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>Even the courts have grown frustrated. Royce C. Lamberth, chief judge of the US District Court in Washington who ruled in favor of the Beirut families, wrote in a Sept. 30 opinion that “these case have consumed substantial judicial resources while achieving few tangible results for the victims.’’</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>Over the years, Iran, which since 1984 has been designated a state sponsor of terrorism by the US government, has been found liable for nearly $10 billion in damages for attacks on Americans attributed to the Lebanese Hezbollah and Palestinian terror groups including Hamas and Islamic Jihad that the United States says are financed and trained by Iran.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>But in only a few cases have any Iranian funds been seized as compensation for the victims or their families - most notably from Iranian funds held by the US government before the two countries severed diplomatic relations in 1979.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>Lawyers representing the Beirut families first went to court seeking damages in 2001, after Congress passed a law giving US courts jurisdiction over such lawsuits against nations that sponsor international terrorism.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>Building the case took four years of depositions from victims’ relatives, US government officials, and even a former Hezbollah member, amounting to 30,000 pages of testimony, according to Thomas F. Fay, one of the lawyers representing the families.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>The families’ first victory came in 2003 when the US District Court in Washington found that Iran’s Ministry of Information and Security helped plan and facilitate the Oct. 23, 1983, attack. Then, two years ago, the same court ruled the Iranian government was liable for the $2.65 billion in damages.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>The families’ legal advisers and the Obama administration - like the Bush administration before it - disagree on how many Iranian assets could be legally seized in the case.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>The Treasury Department estimates there is only $45 million in seizable Iranian assets in the United States and has argued in court that some of the property that the families’ lawyers have sought is outside the United States and cannot be legally seized.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>“The total amount of judgments against terrorist states for exceeds the assets of debtor states known to exist within the jurisdiction of US courts,’’ an analysis published by the Congressional Research Service, which advises lawmakers, concluded last year.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>But Fay maintains that he has identified as much as $2 billion worth of seizable Iranian assets, including securities held in a vault in New York that he said a senior US official has testified under oath is owned by Iran. Another source of funds he previously identified is an office tower in Manhattan, estimated to be worth $1 billion, that was among properties seized Thursday by federal prosecutors who assert they are owned by a foundation that is a front for the Iranian government.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>“It is clear from the seizures of Iranian assets in New York and elsewhere that the government of Iran does indeed have significant tangible financial holdings in the United States,’’ Fay said yesterday.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>Still, a deeper disagreement revolves around the possible consequences of seizing the assets of a foreign state and handing them over to victims of terrorism.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>Fay and other lawyers who have represented terrorism victims assert that doing so would strengthen the government’s leverage with nations like Iran because there would be a clear price to pay for supporting terrorism.</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p>The Justice Department declined to comment further on the administration’s position, but as the congressional analysis stated, “The issue has pitted the compensation of victims of terrorism against US foreign policy goals and some business interests.’’</p></div><div class="articlePluckHidden"><p><em>Bryan Bender can be reached at <a href="mailto:bender@globe.com">bender@globe.com</a> </em><img class="storyend" src="http://cache.boston.com/bonzai-fba/File-Based_Image_Resource/dingbat_story_end_icon.gif" alt="" border="0" height="8" width="6" /></p></div> <div class="copyright">© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.</div> </div> </div><br /></div></div></div></div></div></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-26699967634898931132009-10-23T06:55:00.004-04:002010-10-21T23:27:28.460-04:00Friday October 23 2009<script src="http://static.ak.fbcdn.net/connect.php/js/FB.Share" type="text/javascript">
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The names on the wall were read. Each Panel of the names of the young men who died between 1982 and 1984, are lifted up. Some names pronounced with a southern drawl, some names with a Midwestern accent, and some names read silently in the hearts of those who held their candles closely. Families of some of the slain men, read the panel that their son was listed on. Veterans read some names on the panels where their Brothers were. All the names, all the faces, every life remembered, cherished, and respected.<br />
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You see, on every October 23rd a candlelight service is held at the Beirut memorial in Jacksonville North Carolina. It starts promptly at 6 Am and ends at 6:23. That is for a reason. On the quiet Sunday Morning in Beirut Lebanon, on the 23rd of October 1983, a Homicidal Bomber drove his truck loaded with explosives into the Headquarters of the Marines in Beirut. It was the largest non-nuclear explosion we have known. That day 241 Marines were killed in their sleep and while on duty. During the entire Beirut War more than 270 Marines were Killed.<br />
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On that October morning in Beirut, the world took little notice of the whirlwind that would follow this massive blast. Yes, the deaths of the Marines, Sailors, and Soldiers, would be mourned terribly, but the World did not realize the War on terrorism had begun. There was no official "Day of Infamy" speech by the President, there was no act of Congress, but be assured that the Radical Islamic forces at work today, point to that day as their crowning glory, their "Pearl Harbor" without the retribution.<br />
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Since that day we have slept here in the United States, preferring to bargain with the oil dictators then to avenge our young peacekeepers sacrifices. We were jarred awake on 9/11, but only for a short time, until again our greed and complacency settled over us again. Today, we try again to negotiate with the ones who murdered our young men. Today the ringleader of the killings is welcomed into our Country to speak at the UN in New York. Today, that Country has nuclear weapons, and yet we still seek to negotiate, to placate. There was a time when we should have retaliated, but now, our enemy ,Radical Islam, is at our doorstep, ringing our doorbell, banging on our door, we look through our peephole and see the Monster of Radical Islam, but we just pretend he is not there and will go away.<br />
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The names are read. Each panel completed. The candles are extinguished. I blow out my candle. I noticed my tears are falling again, as they always do on this day, they hit my wrist one after another. We mourn for our Sons, our Husbands, Our Nephews, our Brother in Laws, our Brothers in Arms. We know they did a noble act. They kept the peace, and were murdered for it.<br />
For now, we remember them as young men, full of the vision and fullness of life. <br />
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The Sun is coming up now in Jacksonville North Carolina. Another day for the people of America filled with all the daily joys and problems we all face. Take a minute out today, just a minute, 60 seconds, and remember the sacrifice of those men, the men who gave their lives for our freedom to live free. The War on Terrorism began 26 years ago today. The Beirut Veterans of America have a motto it reads... "The First Duty is To Remember". Let us remember and never forget.<br />
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"Blessed are the peacemakers, For they shall be called sons of God"<br />
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Matthew 5:9<br />
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Semper Fidelis !<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-21008587556451794722009-10-16T16:54:00.001-04:002009-10-23T06:55:03.231-04:00Well, what now? For over 26 years there has been such a deafening silence from Washington regarding our Beirut Marine,Navy,and Army Brothers. No stamp. No payment of the huge judgment against Iran. No appearance of any administration; Republican or Democrat, at our Annual Ceremony to honor our brave fallen comrades. Our pleadings fall on deaf ears in Washington and around the Country. Beirut? what are you talking about? What happened over there?<br /><br />Just as our schools no longer teach the values and disciplines of our founding Fathers, the first battle against terrorism has been largely forgotten। Tucked away deep in the archives of the nations newspapers are a few two paragraph stories about the Beirut War and the men who fought over there. <span></span><br /><br />Recently our President, Barrack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. This is disturbing. The entire operation in Beirut Lebanon from 1982 until 1984 was to keep the Peace. We lost many fine young men doing just that. Doesn't that rise to the standards for the Peace Prize? Each and every one of the next of kin of all the brave young men who gave their lives for Peace in Lebanon should have a share in the "Peace Prize".<br /><br />As I type these words on this screen, I am well aware that will never happen. The powers that be will never recognize these brave men who took an impossible mission and made it work. These men, who one of them a Marine, stood on top of an Israeli Tank and leveled his .45 at the Israeli tank commander, and told him "You will stop here and go no further". One Marine, against a Tank ,protecting the people who would later spit at him, and murder his fellow Marines, Sailors, and Soldiers in their sleep on a quiet Sunday Morning in October.<br /><br />I come back to my first question, what now? How do we proceed? Well, we are Marines and we will never falter and never fail. We will proceed with our Navy and Army Brothers and continue to push for the justice that we are seeking.<br /><br />The Beirut Veterans of America have a simple motto, "The First Duty is to Remember". On October 23rd this year we will as we have all these many years. This year in Jacksonville North Carolina the candles will be lit at 0600 on October 23rd, and the names on the wall will be read in solemn tone. The Remembrance will never end. The Peacekeepers are on the wall, their sacrifice understood and justified by their comrades who still live.<br /><br />Semper Fidelis my Brothers.<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-394930900443829252009-05-27T19:25:00.004-04:002009-05-27T19:36:09.331-04:00Memories of Mike : A family remembers its fallen son<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.nwanews.com/images/stories/20090525/bcdr_Pc0010300.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 624px; height: 416px;" src="http://www.nwanews.com/images/stories/20090525/bcdr_Pc0010300.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Benton County Daily Record<br />Memories of Mike : A family remembers its fallen son<br /><br />By Jessica Weekley Staff Writer jessicaw@nwanews.com<br /><br />Posted on Monday, May 25, 2009<br /><br /><br /><br />Siloam Sunday photograph by Gary Burton Ron Evans, left, commander of Siloam Springs American Legion Post 29, and Bennett Howell, World War II veteran and former POW, place a flag on the grave of David "Mike" Randolph at Oak Hill Cemetery on Saturday. Randolph was one of 241 U.S. Marines killed Oct. 23, 1983, by a suicide bomber in Beirut, Lebanon. The Legion will hold its annual Memorial Day service at 11 a.m. Monday at the Community Building in Siloam Springs.<br /><br />Long before David Michael Randolph wore military-issue camouflage fatigues with his lips set in a grim line, he wore a pair of slick blue running shorts and Nike tennis shoes.<br /><br />Before he took up a weapon and pledged his life to the United States Constitution, he was a knobby kneed little boy monkeying with his four younger siblings in California.<br /><br />He loved to fish, stretch his well muscled legs during a long run and hoist his youngest brother into the air balanced on the balls of his feet.<br /><br />In the early Sunday morning hours of Oct. 23, 1983, he was resting on a cot in U.S. Marines barracks at Beirut (Lebanon) International Airport .<br /><br />After barreling through barbed wire and past bellowing security officers, a yellow truck hauling more than 12,000 pounds of dynamite crashed through the wall nearest Randolph.<br /><br />It took less than a second for the five-ton Mercedes-Benz to detonate.<br /><br />"I don't know how many total Marines were there that day, but he was one of the 243 that died," said Randolph's father and namesake, David Randolph. "What they told me was that my son was in the corner on his cot where he slept. The building collapsed in such a way that a sergeant, whose bed was across the room, survived without a mark on him."<br /><br />The blasts led to the withdrawal of the International Peacekeeping Force from Lebanon, where troops from the United States and France had been stationed since the withdrawal of the Palestine Liberation Organization after the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon.<br /><br />David and his wife, Virginia, were told their son was the closest person<br /><br />to the truck when it exploded. Today, from their home in West Siloam Springs, Okla., the couple easily remember the day, more than 25 years ago, when news came pouring out of the television and radio that the airport turned-Marine barracks where their son was stationed had been devastatingly bombed.<br /><br />"There were guys on the second and third floor, and it blew them right out of the windows. Some of them survived," David said. "Others were thrown off the roof. Even some of them made it out of there alive."<br /><br />Randolph, known to family and friends as "Mike," didn't survive the blast.<br /><br />Three weeks prior to his death, on Oct. 1, he had celebrated his 19th birthday thousands of miles away from his family. He had no way of knowing the letters he wrote would be delivered to his parents weeks after he died.<br /><br />"His letters kept coming, even after," David said. "It's not easy to read a letter after the fact."<br /><br />For three months following the bombing, the military listed Mike as missing.<br /><br />Just days before Christmas, the Randolph family met some unwelcome visitors at their front door. David had spent weeks calling military officials with inquiries of Mike's status but had been given little information.<br /><br />However unwanted the knocks were, the visitors dressed in military uniforms were expected. <br /><br /><br />"Months went by, and finally they came to the house one night," David said. "There were five of them. They said, 'We've identified your son.' Of course, I knew it wasn't good if it took that long."<br /><br />It wasn't until the final day of the year in 1983 that his family was able to hold a memorial service in his honor.<br /><br />Mike and another Marine were the last to be identified at a forensics lab in Hawaii. In a flag-draped steel coffin, Mike's remains arrived on a plane in Tulsa, Okla., the last week of December.<br /><br />"It was just before Christmas, and we decided to wait until after to have a service - for the kids, for everybody." David said. "God, it was cold that day. We were told it was the coldest winter they had had here in a hundred years."<br /><br />The Randolphs, natives of California, had lived on Franklin Street in Siloam Springs for less than six months before the death of their eldest son.<br /><br />Without Mike, who had enlisted in the Marines at 17 years old, the blended family moved to the area from El Centro, Calif., in July 1983 to be near Virginia's family. Within one day of finding a place to live, David had been hired by Allen Canning Co. as a truck driver.<br /><br />"So many people ... complete strangers came out, cooked food, donated," Virginia said. "It was amazing. I don't think if we'd still been in California we would've had so much support. I really don't."<br /><br />More than 1,000 people, including military officials, state represen tatives, two busloads of Marines, area residents and family attended the memorial service.<br />Posthumously, Mike was promoted to lance corporal.<br /><br />A 21-gun salute and the solemn sound of taps heralded the end of the service at the Oak Hill Cemetery.<br /><br />"I think it was the hardest thing that we ever did, signing those papers to let him go into the Marines," Virginia said. "If he wanted it bad enough to graduate early at 16, and worked that hard for it, what else could we do?"<br /><br />Soon after boot camp at Camp Pendleton, Calif., Mike visited his family in Oregon, where they had moved for a brief period before coming to Arkansas.<br /><br />Mike never made it to see the family's new home in Siloam Springs before he was shipped to Beirut from Camp Lejeune, N.C.<br /><br />"After all of this happened, in 1985 or so, the base where he was stationed in Maryland asked if they could name a building after him," David said. "Now, when you walk in the front door, in front of the memorial, there's this picture of him. They said as long as that building was there, his picture would be, too."<br /><br />Standing next to the highest ranking enlisted Marine in the United States, David was invited to cut the ribbon during the dedication ceremony.<br /><br />"With four kids at home, I was short on money then, but when I told my boss what they were doing with the building, he said he thought we might be able to work something out," he said. "I took a load up there and went over to the building. Right after it all happened, I took a week off from work, but after that I went back, I couldn't just sit around. They paid me just like I had been there."<br /><br />Today, a gleaming Purple Heart and other decorations of honor hang on the wall of the Randolphs' home.<br /><br />Despite the pride the family has for Mike's service to his country, accompanied by the constant reminder of framed photos hanging on walls, Mike is remembered for much more than the time he spent in the Marines and his tragic death.<br /><br />He loved cross-country track, was idolized by his two younger brothers and two younger sisters and would eat anything placed in front of him. His hazel eyes changed colors depending on the shirt that he wore, Virginia noted.<br /><br />On family fishing trips to the All American Canal in California, Mike would often pull large fish out of the water.<br /><br />He was popular in high school and had the time of his life with a friend when he went to Greece on a brief furlough from the military.<br /><br />Today, the Randolphs have six grandchildren and four great grandchildren. They live a quiet, content life in West Siloam Springs.<br /><br />But they have never forgotten Mike or the sacrifice that he made on Oct. 23, 1983.<br /><br />"My consolation is that he was a good kid," David said. "I'm a firm believer that when it's your time to go, you're going. I wished it had been longer, but he was here as long as he was supposed to be."<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-86214623638024053482009-05-26T11:04:00.003-04:002010-10-21T23:18:01.376-04:00He Planted the Trees and has never forgotten<a href="http://images.ocregister.com/newsimages/2009/05/24/b78510284z120090524161408000gfvi0rbd1_lg.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://images.ocregister.com/newsimages/2009/05/24/b78510284z120090524161408000gfvi0rbd1_lg.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; float: left; height: 325px; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; width: 488px;" /></a><br />
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Sunday, May 24, 2009<br />
Era ends for a Memorial Day veteran<br />
Harold 'Bud' Hohl has been the driving force behind decades of ceremonies in Costa Mesa.<br />
By SAM MILLER<br />
<br />
<br />
The Orange County Register<br />
Comments | Recommend<br />
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There's a picture that Bud Hohl likes to show off, of a flagpole in a Costa Mesa cemetery. The expanse of empty land behind it stretches to Tustin.<br />
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In 1954, when the photo was taken, Harbor Rest Memorial Park asked the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3536 to dedicate the flagpole. Hohl, then a 34-year-old Marine pilot, agreed. One of Orange County's longest stage careers was born.<br />
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For five and a half decades, Hohl has been the organizer and MC of Post 3536's annual Memorial Day ceremony. But now, with his health failing, Hohl has stepped down and today's ceremony will be the first he's sitting out since 1978, when he attended a friend's funeral.<br />
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"I was told to keep my mouth shut," joked Hohl, 89. "This is the first year I really haven't said something."<br />
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He'll be succeeded by Jack Hammett, a former Costa Mesa mayor who spent 22 years in the Navy.<br />
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"It's an attitude that all military men accept," Hammett said. "We all learn and accept stepping back and letting the young person take over once you've done your duty. Very well done, thank you, next."<br />
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Harold 'Bud' Hohl was mining hard rock in Arizona and caring for his widowed mother before he enlisted in 1942. He joined the Marines as a pilot, thinking that he might be stationed with his brother, also a Marine. (He wasn't.)<br />
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During World War II, he flew with the squadron known as the Death Rattlers, shooting down Japanese kamikaze pilots before they could attack the ring of American ships that surrounded the islands of Okinawa. The Death Rattlers were the most decorated squadron of the war, developing sophisticated analytical methods to shoot down 124 Japanese planes. Hohl – known by his fellow pilots as "Loophole" – shot down one of them on his first day.<br />
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Over the next 22 years, he spent 7,000 hours flying for the Marines. He flew supplies in the Korean War, and shuttled generals to their golf games during peacetime. He was stationed at El Toro for much of the 1950s, and Orange County became his home.<br />
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Whenever somebody asked the local VFW for something, Hohl stepped up.<br />
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"He is a person that did everything himself, because he couldn't get anybody else to help him," said Ted Marinos, who has volunteered alongside Hohl for 50 years. "You know how volunteers are."<br />
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"Semper Fi," Hohl's son, Bud Jr., explains.<br />
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Hohl chuckles. "Yeah, Semper Fi. It was the Marine Corps way of doing things you're asked. I believed in the Marine Corps. And I believed in the VFW. So whatever came along, I took an active role in it. If somebody wanted it done, all they had to do was yell out, 'Hey Loop!'"<br />
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He built a replica of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier for one Memorial Day ceremony. He built a replica of the Iwo Jima flag raising out of lava rocks. He planted trees in memory of the Marines killed by a terrorist blast in Beirut.<br />
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He'd love to still be leading the ceremony. "I'm down to a point where I just have a hard time finding the words," he said. He speaks with long pauses and his eyes closed, and a breathing tube in his nose.<br />
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He has dreamed for more than a decade of a large eagle monument in the cemetery. A few years ago, he found the right eagle in an antique store in Spokane, Wash. – a brass-colored statue, 6 feet tall, salvaged from the front of an Argentine bank. The monument is ready for installation once he gets the right text to have printed on its sides. He expects to dedicate it this year.<br />
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"That's his ace in the hole, before he leaves his country," Marinos says.<br />
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The Costa Mesa Memorial Day ceremony is at 11 a.m. Monday at Harbor Lawn-Mt. Olive Memorial Park, 1625 Gisler Ave.<br />
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Contact the writer: 714-796-7884 or sammiller@ocregister.com<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-70224097885697012432009-05-25T20:38:00.001-04:002009-05-25T20:40:15.811-04:00Marine honors the memory of the fallenBear Cieri/Daily News correspondent<br />Bellingham Memorial Day Parade Grand Marshal Stephen Russell.<br /><br />By Michelle Laczkoski/Daily News staff<br />GHS<br />Posted May 16, 2009 @ 11:50 PM<br />BELLINGHAM —<br /><br />To Stephen Russell, Memorial Day marks a day to stop, reflect and give due respect to the heroes who have served America.<br /><br />Russell is one of those heroes.<br /><br />The grand marshal of today's Memorial Day parade, Russell will pay tribute to all servicemen, especially his 241 brothers who died beside him in Beirut on a peacekeeping force in 1983.<br /><br />Russell, who is now a retired Marine, survived a harrowing attack on Oct. 23, 1983, when two truck bombs struck separate buildings in Beirut, where American troops were housed. Of 241 Americans killed, 220 were Marines.<br /><br />Russell was among the 60 Americans injured in the blasts. Just three weeks before he was set to return home, Russell was taken by medical helicopter from Lebanon with a cracked pelvis, broken femur and hand.<br /><br />"I shouldn't be alive," Russell, 53, said last week from his kitchen table. "They said I wouldn't walk again. But I was determined to stay."<br /><br />Just one year later, Russell returned to full duty.<br /><br />"I fought it, I wanted to continue serving," he said.<br /><br />Russell, a Bellingham native, promised his wife he would retire from the Marines and secure a comfortable life for his family.<br /><br />"I loved every second of it except for that one second," he said, referring to the barracks bombing in Beirut.<br /><br />Following his recovery at Camp Lejeune, N.C., Russell went onto Camp Geiger's School of Infantry. Later, he worked as a drill instructor on Parris Island in South Carolina.<br /><br />Eventually Russell's injuries from Beirut "caught up" to him.<br /><br />"I couldn't compete with my peers," he said.<br /><br />The Marine Corps placed Russell on temporary disability. He retired from the Corps in 1994.<br /><br />Settling back into civilian life with his wife and two children wasn't easy. It remains a struggle.<br /><br />"I still feel sore, aches and pains," he said. "I toss and turn all night."<br /><br />Jim Hastings, chairman of the Memorial and Veterans Day Committee, said the committee unanimously chose Russell to lead the annual parade.<br /><br />"We wanted to pay honor to Marines who lost their lives in Beirut," Hastings said. "Having someone like that right in our town, he was an obvious choice."<br /><br />Though Memorial Day "brings back bad memories," a humble Russell said it is vital to pay tribute to the nation's fallen.<br /><br />"That's what my loyalty is all about, those guys, all 241, the dead," he said.<br /><br />The parade will feature town officials, police, firefighters, bagpipes and several local high school bands.<br /><br />Following the procession from the high school to the town common, there will be a ceremony with several speakers at the gazebo.<br /><br />Russell will also speak and honor those who have given the ultimate sacrifice.<br /><br />"Many gave all, some gave a little and too many gave everything," he said.<br /><br />Many have forgotten the attack in Beirut, but the terrorist attack is fresh in Russell's mind.<br /><br />"Everyday, it's here," he said, pointing to his head. "People say, 'Let it go.' I have no desire to let it go. I was a part of it."<br /><br />Michelle Laczkoski can be reached at mlaczkos@cnc.com or 508-634-7556.<div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-81210593286711280842009-04-12T21:05:00.001-04:002009-04-12T21:08:27.720-04:00John Rice Hudson USN Beirut Navy Hero<meta equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"><meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 12"><meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 12"><link rel="File-List" href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5CHP_Owner%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><link rel="themeData" href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5CHP_Owner%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_themedata.thmx"><link rel="colorSchemeMapping" 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mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style> <![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">By Damon Cline
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<br /> <!--[endif]--></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">John Rice Hudson, by all accounts, had a promising future.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The 1981 graduate of the Medical College of Georgia School of Medicine had a beautiful wife, a healthy newborn son and dreams of opening a family medical practice in middle Georgia. The 28-year-old Naval lieutenant and physician was well-liked for his easygoing personality and his peers admired his ability to excel at seemingly any task, be it surgery, making music or overhauling a car engine.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">But his future was cut short on Oct. 23, 1983, when he and 240 other military personnel stationed in Beirut, Lebanon, were killed when a suicide bomber drove an explosive-laden truck into the U.S. Marines' barracks.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The attack – the deadliest single assault on U.S. servicemen since World War II – was largely forgotten by the public until 9-11 brought it back into the American conscience.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">In the minds of Dr. Hudson’s family, however, it never faded from memory.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“For 99 percent of Americans, terrorism started on Sept. 11, 2001,” said Dr. Hudson’s son, Will, who was 8 months old when his father died. “For my mom and me, terrorism started on Oct. 23, 1983.”
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<br /> <!--[endif]--></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">AN EXTRAORDINARY PERSONALITY
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<br /> <!--[endif]--></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Dr. Hudson was the eldest of Samuel and Losie Hudson’s three children. The family moved often during his father’s 23-year career in the U.S. Army, where he was a decorated veteran of the Korea and Vietnam wars.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The family eventually settled in Fayette County near Atlanta, where Dr. Hudson met David Anders, a fellow trombone player in the elementary school band. The two remained best friends through high school and were inseparable as roommates at the University of Georgia and MCG, which Dr. Hudson paid for through a Navy scholarship that required him to enlist after medical school. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Dr. Anders, who now practices internal medicine in Fayette County, said Dr. Hudson had an extraordinary personality.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“He enjoyed life to the fullest and wanted everyone to come along for the ride,” he said. “When you get together with people and talk about John, even 25 years later, you can’t get two or three minutes before somebody has a big belly laugh over something he did.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">His antics, including wearing a gorilla suit to the student center and strolling into his anatomy finals playing his trombone, tested the patience of administrators but provided comic relief to his stressed-out classmates.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“His friends have told me he was the guy who made everyone loosen up and enjoy themselves,” Will said.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Those who knew him cited an almost childlike innocence.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“John had a real dry sense of humor, but he was a very caring person” said Dr. Bob Parrish, former MCG chief of pediatric surgery and founding member of Code 99, a band Dr. Hudson played with for two years.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Dr. Hudson was a sophomore in 1979 when he met his future wife, Lisa, at an Augusta night spot. He had gone to pick up an amplifier he loaned to a friend but ended up staying once he saw the 23-year-old registered nurse from Milledgeville, Ga. He called her the next day and the two hit if off immediately.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“He was so unpretentious,” Lisa recalled. “He was probably the smartest man I've ever known, but he was so unpretentious about it.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The two discussed marriage, but Dr. Hudson initially wanted to put off a wedding date until after completing his military commitment.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“He made up his mind he was going to complete medical school and pay back his time to the Navy before he settled down,” Lisa said. “But I interrupted that process.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The two were married on Sept. 13, 1980, with Dr. Anders as best man.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I lost a good roommate,” Dr. Anders said. “But she got a good one.”
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<br /> <!--[endif]--></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">SEMPER FIDELIS</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Dr. Hudson enlisted in the Navy, which provides health care services to the U.S. Marine Corps, after completing the first year of his residency at MCG. The newlyweds moved to Camp Lejeune in Jacksonville, N.C., where Will was born on Feb. 15, 1983.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Having grown up an Army brat, Dr. Hudson was comfortable with military service. However, he was far from the average recruit.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Will recalled one particular story relayed to him by his father's commanding officer, Lt. Col. Larry Gerlach, whose injuries during the barracks bombing made him a paraplegic.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“My dad would drive the officers crazy because he wouldn't put his boots on,” Will said. “He told them, 'These boots are putting blisters on my feet. If I was seeing a patient who had blisters like these, I would tell him to stop wearing these boots.' My dad was a doctor first and foremost.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Dr. Hudson's service was uneventful until then-President Ronald Reagan ordered the 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment to participate in a multinational peacekeeping mission in Lebanon, which was in the midst of a civil war.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">He left for Beirut on April 9, 1983. The Marines set up their headquarters at the Beirut International Airport and were initially successful at preventing attacks from militant factions operating in the country.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">However, as the year wore on, it became clear to Dr. Hudson that militants were becoming increasingly confrontational.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“Rockets and artillery are coming into our area but we don’t shoot back because we’re not supposed to be in a war, but we are in a war,” he said in a taped message to his wife on Sept. 5. “We’re in a combat war zone.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">‘THINGS ARE SO DIFFERENT HERE’
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<br /> <!--[endif]--></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Randy Gaddo was a 30-year-old staff sergeant and combat correspondent when he served in Beirut, which many of the 1,200 Marines referred to as “The Root.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">He said Dr. Hudson was well-known around the compound.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“Everybody knew who the battalion surgeon was,” said Mr. Gaddo, who now lives in Peachtree City, Ga. “All the medical people were considered very special people, but he was the only qualified doc on shore. The other guys were called docs, but they were really medical techs.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Most of Dr. Hudson’s skills went unused early in the deployment. On one recording he said he was unable to practice “99 percent of the knowledge” he learned in medical school. Even depression was rare among the troops.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“They like being Marines and they like the job they have to do,” he said. “They motivate themselves. I’m really impressed with them.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">However, Dr. Hudson became concerned about his fellow troops – and his own wellbeing – as the skirmishes intensified. Marines no longer came to his basement clinic with sore throats and earaches; they now had bullet and shrapnel wounds. In an Aug. 31, 1983 postcard to Dr. Anders, he said he was worried about “coming home in a box or altered state,” and that “things are so different here, more than anything you could ever imagine.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">And he continued to express his dismay at the rules of engagement. Weapons were constantly pointed at the Marines, but they were prohibited from actively engaging the enemy unless fired upon. Dr. Hudson wrote about the futility to Sen. Sam Nunn, then chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">In one of Dr. Hudson’s last communications, a tape sent to a freelance reporter in Atlanta, he referred to the troops as “sitting pigeons.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“We actually can watch them build a bunker by day, see them put ammunition into the bunker, and you know what’s going on,” he said on the tape. “They can kill, maim, seriously injure Marines and sailors, and then – once they’ve shot – you have the option of shooting back.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Dr. Hudson reunited with his wife and 6-month-old son in Greece while on leave from the base from Aug. 20-28. It was the last time they would see him.
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<br /> <!--[endif]--></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">SHATTERING THE SILENCE
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<br /> <!--[endif]--></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The Root was peaceful during early dawn on Oct. 23, 1983. The cacophony of distant artillery fire had fallen silent.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">At around 6 a.m. Staff Sgt. Gaddo had stepped outside his bunker to enjoy the morning sun before walking to the barracks, where he planned to develop eight rolls of film in a makeshift photo lab on the second floor.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I started walking over there – it was less than a minute’s walk, maybe a couple hundred yards – then I just stopped,” he said. “It was just such a beautiful morning, very quiet. I just thought it was too good of a morning to go inside, so I turned around and went back to get a cup of coffee.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The decision saved his life.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">At approximately 6:20 a.m., a truck packed with explosives accelerated through the compound’s gate, barreling past two sentry posts and another gate before crashing into the lobby of the barracks. The Marines, under strict rules of engagement, barely had time to load and shoulder their weapons before the suicide bomber detonated explosives equivalent to six tons of TNT.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I heard a couple of shots go off, then I felt the heat of the blast,” Mr. Gaddo said. “The shock wave threw me back like a rag doll. I thought we had been hit by an artillery shell.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Those not killed by the blast were crushed when the four-story, reinforced-concrete building collapsed into a heap of rubble.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Seven time zones to the west, the sun had set on suburban Atlanta. Earlier that day, Dr. Anders proposed to his girlfriend, Kenya, in Stone Mountain, Ga. He had alluded to the pending engagement in letters to Dr. Hudson, and had asked his childhood friend to be best man at the wedding.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">He went to sleep that night unaware his friend was already dead.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I was getting into bed shortly after midnight and my sister mentioned something about a bombing in Beirut,” Dr. Anders recalled. “I was just hoping that it wasn’t going to be too much work for John – that he didn’t have to do too much triage. Later we learned it was much worse, that the whole compound had been attacked.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Recovering the bodies took several days. Dr. Hudson was found on day two, inside his sleeping bag.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Ms. Hudson feared her husband was dead the moment she saw news footage of the destruction. Those fears were confirmed by a visit from two Naval officers.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“They came up to the door, just like they do in the movies,” she recalled.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Her husband’s body was returned to the United States two weeks later and buried at her family’s dairy farm south of Milledgeville, an area where he hoped to one day build a home and practice medicine.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The U.S. government ruled in 2003 that the attack was carried out by the militant Islamic group Hezbollah with backing from the Iranian government.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Military analysts say the attack was America’s first brush with “fourth-generation warfare,” in which ideologically motivated insurgents use guerrilla tactics and civilian populations to create tactical dilemmas for an enemy. The insurgents’ strategy is to achieve victory not through superior military strength, but by convincing the enemy’s political leaders that victory is either unachievable or not worth the human toll.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">President Reagan withdrew the troops less than five months after the attack.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“We pulled out, so in a way, it showed them their tactics worked,” said Mr. Gaddo, currently the national president of the Beirut Veterans Association. “It was really a modern-day watershed event. We’ve seen identical elements in the wars after 9-11.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Will met Mr. Nunn for the first time at a charity event in Atlanta last year. To his surprise, the former senator remembered the letter his father wrote 25 years ago.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“He said, ‘That letter will haunt me for the rest of my life,’” Will recalled. “He said, ‘Your dad was exactly right. He knew exactly what was going on.’ ”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">AFTERMATH</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">A scholarship fund was started in Dr. Hudson’s name shortly after his death, and in 1987, the clinic at the U.S. Naval Supply School in Athens was renamed in his honor.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The building’s plaque rekindled memories in Dr. Sam Richwine, a 1977 MCG graduate who completed his surgical internship and residency at MCG.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“It finally rang a bell that John Hudson had been an intern of mine when I was a general surgery chief there,” said Dr. Richwine, a plastic surgeon in Gainesville, Ga.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">The Athens native hopes the memorial remains after the 58-acre Naval School property is transferred to the University System of Georgia in 2011 for use as an MCG-UGA medical campus. (Damon: Is there any question? If so, STET.)</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I think it would be great if we were somehow able to keep that name somewhere on campus,” he said, “not only to honor John as an MCG grad, but also the gift of his life to the country.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Ms. Hudson never remarried.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I’ve never had another best friend like him,” she said. “I miss my friend more than I miss my husband.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">She and Will moved from Milledgeville to Augusta, where she worked as a nurse until completing MCG’s psychiatric nursing program in 1995. The training allowed her to open a counseling practice for women with anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder. Setting her own schedule gave her the flexibility to attend Will’s sporting events and other school functions.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“He's the reason I'm alive, that's the truth,” she said. “Every day that I got up after that was because I had him to take care of. He was my motivation to move on.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Will, who married in June, recently started a professional recruitment firm, Complete Recruiting Solutions LLC in Atlanta. He also has political aspirations, which stem directly from the loss of his father.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I think some of our leaders make decisions without really thinking about the impact they may have,” he said. “When you know what it feels like when those decisions go bad, it makes you think a little more carefully and thoughtfully.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">Several of Dr. Hudson’s friends stay in touch with his widow and son, including classmate Dr. Allan Panter, a Gainesville, Ga., resident who practices emergency medicine.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">He said Dr. Hudson would be proud of his son.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I can’t say enough about Lisa’s parenting,” said Dr. Panter, who dropped in to visit Will at Furman University whenever he was passing through. “Will is well-rounded; he seems to be a complete package.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">For Dr. Panter, spending time with Will is almost like spending time with the young man’s father. Almost.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;">“I don’t think you’re ever going to meet anybody like John Hudson,” he said. “If you ever meet someone like him in your lifetime, you’re fortunate.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-84331403779381173522008-12-16T15:48:00.003-05:002008-12-16T15:52:46.047-05:00Merry Christmas to all, and to all a Good Night<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTPg6pJu9ECHQapTeIbi-lu2jQ_pnOUGICFif4AMIycZM7jqO42A-fKtseCEcDGomx-8KWv0dVHceW2HZBInPINvQ77WXUHiQBDuhZTgSyxXu4slUNLFjejdYqiDCHS5CiJl3a/"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 356px; height: 360px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTPg6pJu9ECHQapTeIbi-lu2jQ_pnOUGICFif4AMIycZM7jqO42A-fKtseCEcDGomx-8KWv0dVHceW2HZBInPINvQ77WXUHiQBDuhZTgSyxXu4slUNLFjejdYqiDCHS5CiJl3a/" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><h2><br /></h2><h2><br /></h2><h2>CHRISTMAS IN <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">BEIRUT</st1:place></st1:city></h2> <h4>Journal Entries from the Battlefield</h4> <p><b>BY <a href="mailto:elaborde@mcmediallc.com">Brian G. Lukas</a></b></p> <p><i>Editor’s note: The name <st1:city st="on">Beirut</st1:city> became a one-word symbol for the war torn <st1:place st="on">Middle East</st1:place> of the late 1970s. Civil war had erupted in <st1:country-region st="on">Lebanon</st1:country-region> in 1975, the result of clashes between Christian and Muslim groups, including members of the Druse religious sect and the <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Palestine</st1:place></st1:city> Liberation Organization, and had escalated over several years. In 1982, Israeli troops invaded <st1:country-region st="on">Lebanon</st1:country-region>; the two countries had already fought south of <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. As well, <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">Syria</st1:place></st1:country-region> had occupied the country since 1976. In 1983, the United Nations dispatched a multinational peace-keeping force, including <st1:country-region st="on">U.S.</st1:country-region> Marines, to <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. The Marines left Beirut within a year because of terrorist attacks; on Oct. 23,1983, a truck loaded with explosives crashed into the 24th Marine Amphibious Unit Headquarters compound, killing 241 Marines.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p><i>“The Marines in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city> seem to have gotten lost in the history books . . . they had a difficult mission,” says TV photographer Brian Lukas. He, along with news anchorwoman Angela Hill and editorialist Phil Johnson, all of WWL-TV/Channel 4, traveled to <st1:city st="on">Beirut</st1:city> in late 1983 to cover <st1:state st="on"><st1:place st="on">Louisiana</st1:place></st1:state> Marines stationed there at Christmastime. Lukas kept journal entries of his tense times there, excerpted here.</i></p> <p>Christmas 1983 was just a few weeks away. I would travel to <st1:city st="on">Beirut</st1:city> with Angela Hill and Phil Johnson to film and edit stories on local Marines from the <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">New Orleans</st1:place></st1:city> area. It was a time before portable satellite uplinks and the Internet, so we carried videotaped messages from the Marines’ families back in the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">United States</st1:place></st1:country-region>. Our ambitious itinerary also included production of a documentary about this war-torn area. But as fighting between the various factions escalated, that idea was abandoned. Armed militias set up roadblocks in various sections of <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. The Islamic Jihad decided to add another element to its arsenal of terror and brutality: kidnapping Westerners. </p> <p>•If there is hell on earth, it is here in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. At the same time that I arrived in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>, the French Embassy was hit by a car bomb, with 20 people killed. Later that night, a French military base was blasted by a bomb-laden truck. Ten French soldiers were killed, and 23 were hurt. The explosion lit up the whole area. Terror – it is sheer terror. I can see it on the faces of the residents who walk cautiously on the streets. Here in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>, teenagers carry assault rifles, mainly M-16s. On the streets, women cradle their children tightly in their arms, begging any Westerners for help. The city smells like death. There is a stench of rotting corpses and smoldering trash strewn about from buildings destroyed by the fighting in the streets. To realize the inhumanity of war, you have to look deep in the faces of the civilian population. Then, if you dare, look deep into their eyes. There you will find the horror of war absorbed deep within the soul. I look into many eyes here in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. </p> <p>•In the eyes of the young Marines, I can see the uneasy and uncomfortable situation they are in. The U.S. Marines’ position at the <st1:place st="on"><st1:placename st="on">Beirut</st1:placename> <st1:placename st="on">International</st1:placename> <st1:placetype st="on">Airport</st1:placetype></st1:place> keeps them under daily sniper and artillery attack. I remember when I was in <st1:city st="on">Washington</st1:city>, <st1:state st="on">D.C.</st1:state>, for a White House press function when many of these same Marines from the 22nd Marine Amphibious Unit invaded <st1:country-region st="on">Grenada</st1:country-region>, a tiny island in the <st1:place st="on">Caribbean</st1:place>. Now I am here in hell with them. The Marines, politically, are not invaders but are so-called “welcome guests,” strategically placed in <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">Lebanon</st1:place></st1:country-region> on a peace-keeping mission with the French and Italians as part of a multinational force. Our Marine contact is Capt. Dennis Brooks, the Marine public-information officer on the base, always “spring-loaded to say yes.” He remarked that the various militias near the Marine positions use their tanks like small arms fire: They quickly maneuver the tanks in firing position, release a shell and maneuver back quickly, then repeat the operation. Maximum destruction, I thought to myself. Total destruction was evident when we passed the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps – hundreds, perhaps thousands of Palestinians were killed here: men, women, and children. Our driver remarked, solemnly, that they were executed. The refugee camps are leveled, nothing remains, and where the victims of this civil war sought relief from the terror of war, only the bare reddish-brown earth remains visible from the nearby dusty road. Their graves are not even marked. It is as if they were never born. </p> <p>•At night there is no time to dream; the evenings are fitful with the sounds of rifle fire. My bed is level with the window. Crazy, I thought, there are snipers on the roofs – one shot through the window and that’s it. I tried to sleep on the floor, but there is no sleep at night. The sounds of sniper fire and the thud of muffled mortar and artillery rounds are trying to find any “peace-keeper’s” position near the Avenue de Paris, the long, winding road facing the <st1:place st="on">Mediterranean Sea</st1:place>. </p> <p>•At one time <st1:city st="on">Beirut</st1:city> played the <st1:city st="on">Paris</st1:city> of the <st1:place st="on">Middle East</st1:place>; now it plays a sorrowful tune of despair. My hotel in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city> is owned by the Nassai family, Palestinian owners of the Commodore Hotel. The Commodore Hotel is on the Muslim side of <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. On the Christian side, the owner of the Alexandre failed to pay protection money to the thugs and every conceivable terrorist seeking consideration for the hotel’s existence. As a result, somebody exploded a huge car bomb in its parking lot, destroying the hotel. I couldn’t help but notice the line of cars ringing the Commodore Hotel here in Muslim West <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. Sometimes the cars were two or three deep. I quickly learned that these vehicles were buffers to prevent any car-bomb attacks on the Commodore. The ring of vehicles and payoffs couldn’t stop the instruments of distant destruction. My hotel room in the Commodore is on the fourth floor, room 405. I could not enter the room without noticing the shift in the door and several large cracks running down the length of the wall. A little later that day, I learned that room 405, my room, had been hit by a rocket-propelled grenade just two weeks earlier. </p> <p>•There is no sanctuary in this city. It’s a sad place and a sad time. <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city> is a city defined by fear, a city bisected by the green line – Christians in the East, Muslims in the West. This is a noisy, depressing, dangerous and disconcerting place to work. I tried not to sleep last night. It’s been several nights since I’ve had any sleep. The last thing I wanted was to be asleep when a car bomb went off and then to be buried under the rubble of concrete and steel from the top five floors. I often fall asleep at the dinner table. Veteran journalists from Europe and the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">U.S.</st1:place></st1:country-region> networks in the hotel remark that this is one of the scariest wars they’ve covered. There is no “commuting” to this war; death and destruction are all around us. </p> <p>Blackened pockmarks of war are carved into the façade of every building. The city is gravely wounded. And now a new threat is employed by the terrorists: They are kidnapping journalists and teachers at the <st1:placename st="on">American</st1:placename> <st1:placetype st="on">University</st1:placetype> in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. A note was posted on the front bulletin board as we left the hotel. It was a warning from the Islamic Jihad. In very simple words, the note said that all Westerners must leave <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city> or “we will make the ground under your feet move.” It was a direct threat to destroy the hotel where the Western press reported the war. This is the same group that claimed responsibility for bombing the U.S. Marine base here in <st1:city st="on">Beirut</st1:city>, and the <st1:country-region st="on">U.S.</st1:country-region> embassies in <st1:city st="on">Beirut</st1:city> and <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">Kuwait</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</p> <p>•The war is escalating now. (A few months later, the Commodore Hotel would be completely destroyed by shelling and car bombs.) The American Embassy was heavily damaged by another car-bomb attack. Forty people were injured, and eight were killed in the suicide attack. The front of the embassy building, facing the seashore, is covered in what appears to be a seven-story green shroud. It hides the embassy’s exposed interior from probing eyes or people that pass through the zigzagged row of 55-gallon metal drums filled with dirt. The metal drums are defenses against another suicide attack. Marines are positioned throughout the building. Another contingent of Marines is stationed just across the street from the embassy. An American flag blew quietly in the wind next to a Marine guard watching the pedestrian movement in front of the embassy. The image of the American flag and the Marine standing with the sun setting on the <st1:place st="on">Mediterranean Sea</st1:place> gave the drab gray seashore kind of a splendid appearance. In a melancholy way I felt a strong connection with home. The obvious presence of the American flag waving in the warm breeze made me feel very thankful that I live in and would return to the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">United States</st1:place></st1:country-region> shortly. And if there is ever an image of the Marines in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city> that will be forever stamped on my mind, it is that one single Marine and the American flag rippling in the wind next to him. </p> <p>•On the corniche, in front of the American Embassy, the Marines are routinely targeted by snipers. It becomes very nerve-racking that at any time death may come by a sniper. As I filmed the area I noticed a small bunker with several Marines standing guard. One of them was Cpl. Brad Pellegrin from <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Slidell</st1:place></st1:city>. It is the Christmas season, and he is making the best of a very bad situation by lining his bunker with makeshift ornaments. I forgot that we were nearing Christmas.</p> <p>We were carrying messages from Cpl. Pellegrin’s family to give to him. It was a videotaped message to him from his wife, mother and child. As we showed the message to him I noticed an interesting effect on the other Marines . . . they gathered closer together to hear the family’s greeting to Brad. Closer the Marines came when Brad’s son said, “Daddy, I love you and miss you.” We played the videotape again and again. That’s when I realized that Brad’s family was now family to all the Marines that gathered to watch his videotape in front of the destroyed American Embassy. His family was their family; his son was their son or daughter. The Marines had a Christmas family now . . . and it was amazing to witness a little bit of loneliness disappear as they looked on. Christmas is family . . . even in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. </p> <p>•The makeshift Christmas ornaments lining the bunkers in front of the destroyed <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">U.S.</st1:place></st1:country-region> embassy were a welcome relief. It was a simple reminder of the hope that peace existed. Off in the distance, on the Mediterranean Sea, the sunset cast a shadow on the battleship <st1:state st="on"><st1:place st="on"><i>New Jersey</i></st1:place></st1:state>. The broad, flickering light from her was the firepower from her massive guns unleashed on the Druse militias, who rocketed the Marine base at the <st1:placename st="on">International</st1:placename> <st1:placetype st="on">Airport</st1:placetype> on <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>’s southern edge. We would find out that a Marine was severely wounded; later he died. </p> <p>•Overnight, hooded Shiite Muslims and their Druse allies drove Lebanese army units from most of their checkpoints on the Muslim West <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city> commercial thoroughfares and residential neighborhoods. I woke up to a very loud mechanical clanking just outside my hotel. The sounds of Lebanese military tanks rolling pass the hotel window quickly eliminated the little rest I hoped to get. </p> <p>•Reports indicate at least 90 people killed last night and more than 300 wounded in the fighting; in just two days more than 160 people were killed, mostly civilians caught in the cross-fire. It’s a sickness – hatred is a cancer destroying everything here. </p> <p>•At the Marine base this morning I could see the visible impact of the shelling by the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">U.S.</st1:place></st1:country-region> 6th Fleet on the mountain range surrounding the base. Huge billows of smoke rose as the shells hit their targets. Cpls. Herbert McKnight and Greg Nelson, both from the <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">New Orleans</st1:place></st1:city> area, said the Marine base was shelled by rockets overnight. Herbert was stationed in a sandbag bunker on the rooftop of the base. This bunker, accessible only by a ladder, is the highest point on the Marine base. It also appears to be a very vulnerable position, an obvious target for a sniper. Cpl. Nelson, from <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Slidell</st1:place></st1:city>, manned a .50-caliber machine gun overlooking the Kalda mountain range near the rear of the base. Cpl. Brian Campbell, only 19 years old and from <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Lafayette</st1:place></st1:city>, was quickly unloading supplies from a helicopter. The copters didn’t stay long . . . they couldn’t – mortars usually found their targets. Brian, Greg and Herbert, these young Marines, were reminders that wars are fought by the very young, often placed in horrific circumstances and forced to grow up quickly. Several times I asked them to move their helmet up so I could see their eyes while filming. “Son, can you move your helmet up just a little?” I said. I would later say, “Marine, would you push your helmet back just a little?” Eighteen, 19 years old . . . here in hell, when others of their age are probably wrapping Christmas presents and acting goofy back home. </p> <p>But on the Marine base at the <st1:place st="on"><st1:placename st="on">Beirut</st1:placename> <st1:placename st="on">International</st1:placename> <st1:placetype st="on">Airport</st1:placetype></st1:place>, the one focal point no one can pass without some reflection of what happened months earlier is the huge crater. That crater once housed the Marines in a four story building. Every time I moved past it, I thought of the young men like Greg, Brian and Herbert, and then I said a small prayer for the families of the 241 Marines that died here. </p> <p>•The Marine base alarm is sounding. The Druse militias are firing mortars now. In a few seconds, we must make the decision to stay on the Marine base during the shelling and miss our satellite deadline or leave and walk into the chaos and madness of the streets. We decide to leave. A condition-1 alert has been initiated . . . there are incoming mortar rounds in the distance, and the front gate will be locked shortly. The Marine base is the target.</p> <p>We had to leave quickly. But as I left the Marine base I noticed a small memorial in front of the former Marine barracks. Despite the imminent danger, I couldn’t help but stop, notice and film the small bouquet of light blue flowers ringed around a Marine-issued camouflage hat. Above the flowers was a small, white sign facing east, toward the city of <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>. The small sign simply described the Marines’ mission in <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Beirut</st1:place></st1:city>: To the “24th MAU, they came in peace.” </p> <p>It’s a dangerous world out there. •</p><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-37857538426118450222008-11-22T16:31:00.000-05:002008-11-22T16:32:34.985-05:00Beirut Vet's daughter receives Gift<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(60, 71, 11); font-family: Verdana; font-size: 10px; "><p class="storyheadline" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 700; text-align: left; vertical-align: top; ">PEOPLE PROFILE: Kira Kremer receives Freedom Alliance Scholarship</p><span class="storycredit" style="text-align: left; vertical-align: top; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: 700; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">By Bill Wolcott<br /><a href="mailto:wolcottb@gnnewspaper.com" style="color: rgb(0, 51, 102); text-decoration: none; ">E-mail Bill</a></span><br /><span>Lockport Union-Sun & Journal</span><br /><p style="font-family: verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); vertical-align: top; "><span>Kira Kremer, 21, a 2005 graduate of Lockport High School, is getting help with tuition to the SUNY Upstate Medical University with a scholarship from the Freedom Alliance Scholarship.<br /><br />The scholarships are for children of U.S. service members who have been killed or permanently disabled in an operational mission. Her dad, Daniel Kremer, was wounded in 1983 while serving as a Marine in Beruit, Lebanon.<br /><br />“I don’t remember much,” Kremer said of the Sept. 6, 1983, shelling. “They sent me out to do reconnaissance at the south end of the runway at the airport. They opened up with everything. It blew me 30 yards. I was blind, deaf and bleeding.”<br /><br />The artillery round landed about 4 or 5 feet from the Marine sergeant. He was told that shell left an umbrella signature and it was too close to kill him.<br /><br />“I just got real damn lucky,” he said.<br /><br />Who did it? “Nobody wanted us there,” Dan Kremer said. “They’ve been fighting there 2,000 years and seemed to focus attentions on us.”<br /><br />On Oct. 23, 1983, two truck bombs struck barracks in Beirut that housed U.S. and French military forces. The bombs killed hundreds of servicemen, the majority of whom were U.S. Marines.<br /><br />Kremer, who could not be evacuated after the Sept. 6 incident, was there, at the barracks. He had just gotten off a guard duty shift.<br /><br />He was awarded the Purple Heart, the Marine Corps Expeditionary Medal, the National Defense Service Medal and the Good Conduct Medal.<br /><br />Kremer got out of the Marines at 21, but later enlisted in the National Guard during the first Gulf War. He has worked at several manufacturing jobs.<br /><br />Two years ago, Kremer was classified 100 percent permanently disabled as a result of service-connected injuries in Beruit. He has post traumatic stress disorder.<br /><br />“At 43, I’m retired,” he said. “It’s sobering.”<br /><br />Kira receives $6,000 a year through the Freedom Alliance Scholarship. The fund has now awarded $2.5 million to the children of military heroes.<br /><br />“It really helps me reflect on my dad’s service,” she said. “It makes me really proud. I didn’t understand before. It brings us together. I can be proud of him and he can be proud of me ... The important lessons my father learned while in the Marine Corps have been instilled in me through his parenting, and I believe that I am a much stronger well-rounded person because of it."<br /><br />Kira is an active member of her school and community while pursuing a degree in physical therapy. She volunteers at the Syracuse VA Hospital, plays for the school Rugby Club and is a member of the honor society.<br /><br />“We are proud to grant this scholarship to such an impressive student as Kira Kremer,” said Freedom Alliance President Tom Kilgannon. “The purpose of this scholarship is to help alleviate the financial burdens of college tuition and also to honor the service of our military heroes through the achievements of their sons and daughters."<br /><br />Kira attended the SUNY school of Environmental Science and Forestry and is working toward a doctorate in physical therapy. “I want to help people,” Kira said. “The doctor-client time will be good for me.”<br /><br />Daniel, who has had a series of mini-strokes, is now retired. He praises the Freedom Alliance. “It’s so personal with them,” he said. “It was wonderful support.”<br /><br />Last year, the family was taken to the Army-Navy game in D.C., given the VIP treatment and met Oliver L. North, who founded Freedom Alliance in 1990. <br /><br />Ashley, an older sister, attends medical school in Erie, Pa. Their brother, Daniel, is a senior at Lockport High School.</span></p></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18244578.post-48427290836068099572008-11-05T17:43:00.000-05:002008-11-05T17:44:14.399-05:00USS San Antonio honor our Heroes<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: verdana; font-size: 12px; "><b>San Antonio Sailors, Marines Honor Beirut Bombing Victims</b> <br />Story Number: NNS081028-03 <br />Release Date: 10/28/2008 6:28:00 AM <br /><br />By Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class (SW) Brian Goodwin, Iwo Jima Expeditionary Public Affairs Center<br />USS SAN ANTONIO, At Sea (NNS) -- Marines and Sailors gathered on the flight deck of the amphibious transport dock ship USS San Antonio (LPD 17) Oct. 23 to honor their comrades killed during the Beirut bombing 25 years ago. <br /><br />On Oct. 23, 1983, two truck bombs struck buildings housing U.S. military forces in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 241 Marines, Sailors and Soldiers. <br /><br />"The Beirut bombing was an event that has stuck with me since I was 16 years old," said Marine Lt. Col. John Giltz, Combat Logistics Battalion 26 commanding officer. "The weight, tragedy and inspiration have been with me for 25 years now, and to be a part of today's ceremony and remember those who went before us is a moment I'll never forget." <br /><br />Giltz addressed his Marines during the ceremony. <br /><br />"We are not invulnerable," said Giltz. "You are all just like them -- young, full of life, had goals and aspirations. Their lives were taken in an instant, and so we dedicate ourselves to training and remember what it is to be a Marine." <br /><br />San Antonio's commanding officer, Cmdr. Kurt Kastner, stated the importance of the event. <br /><br />"Our first duty is to remember," said Kastner. "That is the motto and mission of Beirut's Veteran Association, established in 1992. The second is to perpetuate the memory of those 241 Sailors, Soldiers and Marines that gave their lives for their country." <br /><br />Kastner's words touched his Sailors. <br /><br />"The speeches made about the Beirut bombing were very motivational in not letting me forget why we are out here and what we are doing," said Hospital Corpsman 2nd Class (SW) Joseph Nayock. <br /><br />Several of the junior Marines were responsible for putting the ceremony together. <br /><br />"The Marines that lost their lives in that tragedy were all part of an amphibious unit, and I thought it would be good for us to honor their service on an amphibious ship," said Cpl. Christopher Hrbek. "We as Marines and Sailors hold a lot of tradition in what we stand for, and to carry on those traditions is to remember those who have made sacrifices." <br /><br />Senior leadership was proud of how the junior Marines set up the ceremony. <br /><br />"Many of these types of events are usually handled by staff, COs or officers, but today it was all corporals and sergeants, the backbone of leadership," said Gunnery Sgt. Benjamin McKinney. "It was a very touching ceremony, and I was moved on how the non-commissioned officers did it today." <br /><br />San Antonio is deployed to the U.S. 5th Fleet Area of Operations to conduct Maritime Security Operations (MSO). MSO help develop security in the maritime environment. From security arises stability that results in global economic prosperity. MSO complement the counterterrorism and security efforts of regional nations and seek to disrupt violent extremists' use of the maritime environment as a venue for attack or to transport personnel, weapons or other material. <br /></span><div class="blogger-post-footer">www.beirutveterans.org</div>23rd of Octoberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13112359131744040201noreply@blogger.com0