Forgotten War, Forgotten Future

Today, when five civilians die in a military skirmish abroad, the media go amok. I guess they never heard of the Korean War. Over 500,000 children died. As horrid as that number is, many children were saved by our American soldiers. Recently, Dr. George Drake of Bellingham, Washington told the story of the love that saved these tiny victims of the war.

GIs rescued more than 10,000 of these children. The soldiers made an orphanage from ammo boxes and gave them a chance to survive. Drake erected the Korean Children’s Memorial Pavilion in his hometown. In September will travel to Korea to see the dedication of a companion memorial on Korean soil, along the border with North Korea and dedicated to the half million children who died in what many dub “The Forgotten War”.

“You don’t have to be taught to pick up the crying child… help the injured child…. find food for the hungry child… or shelter for the homeless child. That comes with being American.”

You might want to consider this when you see Islamic terrorists use women and children as human shields as our brave military men and women fight to loose the average Afghani from the Taliban’s grip. Say what you want, there is a mindset within the American that puts honor first and protects innocents.

Many critics of current policies claim that if today’s rules of engagement had been in place in WWII and Pacific Theater WWII, Allied victory would have been impossible. A non-uniformed enemy that so easily sacrifices its women and children challenges reason and logic, but it is real nonetheless.

Take a moment and reflect on the honor of our men and women. Then, ask yourself if you want them hampered by unreasonable restraints. Collateral damage in a war is a given. It is an undeniable truth. Media of the past knew that. They didn’t leak critical information to the enemy. In contrast, they would print misleading information to confuse the enemy.

Along with Ernie Pyle, Edward R. Morrow’s radio broadcasts from England captivated American audiences nightly. “This is London…” Who of us can ever forget that compelling introduction? And what would he think of current network news?

I firmly believe that Morrow would be aghast at what passes for journalism today. He knew the value of honest reporting and wanted television news to distance itself from the pressures of the marketplace. This attitude summarily ended his career with CBS News. Just ponder this Morrow quote:

October 15, 1958, in a speech before the Radio and Television News Directors Association in Chicago, Murrow blasted TV’s emphasis on entertainment and commercialism at the expense of public interest in his ‘wires and lights’ speech:
“During the daily peak viewing periods, television in the main insulates us from the realities of the world in which we live. If this state of affairs continues, we may alter an advertising slogan to read: Look now, pay later.

It seems that this attitude not only infects the broadcast news world but also the highest echelons of our federal government. Pay later? What a dismal eulogy to our country. Public interest? More like unending, unfunded public debt. Think about it.

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