Bunny In The Foxhole

The following message was written by John Ubaldi, a U.S. Marine who served in both Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan) and Operation Iraqi Freedom (Iraq). Mr. Ubaldi is a member of the Board of Directors of the pro-troop organization, Move America Forward.

June 14th, America will celebrate Flag Day; and from the birth of this republic the flag has been the symbol of this nation. To the forces of tyranny this flag is the symbol that keeps them from enslaving mankind, to those seeking freedom it is that one image of salvation that brings liberty to a beaten people.

September 11th changed the lives of America, and world around us, forever altering our perceptions about the position we should play in world affairs. Viewing the images of destruction, my thoughts, and emotions reminded me of another time when a pervious generation in American history was forever altered by December 7th.

Deploying with the Marines to an arid, wind swept, and forsaken land of Afghanistan, I found myself standing in formation on the one-year anniversary of that tragic day, to commemorate the disaster that befell the nation. I listened to the speeches, but found myself viewing the American flag as it flapped in the wind swept breeze and thought of all those that had perished under its banner.

In the last century their lives have ended in places called Belleau Wood, the Argonne, Omaha Beach, Salerno, and half way around the world on Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Iwo Jima, Pork Chop Hill, The Chosin Reservoir, and hundreds of rice paddies and jungles in Vietnam.

In our lifetime they fell in the Persian Gulf, Somalia, the mountains of Afghanistan, Fallujah, Nasiriyah, Ramadi, and on the streets of Baghdad.

The American flag has become the symbol of this nation, a symbol of freedom, a place where freedom-loving people can look to for hope. The Sher family are one of these individuals hoping for a better life. Having spent years in a Nazi concentration camp, they immigrated to America; standing in a small apartment in New Orleans they recounted the difficult journey that brought them here. Holding in her arms there one month old son Mordecai, who was born in a Displaced Person's camp in Europe and who still clutched an American flag in his hands.

The young mother stated, "It is for him particularly that I am happy," said the sweet young mother. "That he should grow up in this great land which is America, grow up to be free that is what I thought of as our ship pulled in and saw welcoming me from the shore of your little Statue of Liberty."

Thinking back to my youth and the stories that my father always told me of his aunt, who passed away a few years ago, but always reminding me of her love and compassion that she showed his family after the death of both his parents. The one story that I am most fond of hearing, is how having never visited America or smelled its sweet breath of freedom, she always kept an American flag in her home, because she knows first hand what America brought to Italy and the world after the Second World War.

Witnessing first hand the vast arsenal that secured freedom from the brink of extinction, then built the economic resurrection of Europe, keeping the Soviet system of tyranny from enslaving the weakened countries of Western Europe enabling generations to enjoy freedom.

Weeks before the onset of World War I, President Woodrow Wilson stated, "My dream is that, as the years go on and the world knows more and more of America, it ...will turn to America for those moral inspirations which lie at the basis of all freedom...that America will come into the full light of the day when all shall know that she puts human rights above all other rights, and that her flag is the flag, not only of America, but of humanity."

Today, in that same spirit the American flag is flying proudly in Afghanistan and in Iraq, not over a conquered people, but to plant the seeds of liberty into a region that is void of freedom.

Interim Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi addressed a joint meeting of Congress on September 23, 2004 stated, "The overwhelming majority of Iraqis are grateful. They are grateful to be rid of Saddam Hussein and the torture and brutality he forced upon us, grateful for the chance to build a better future for our families, our country and our region. We Iraqis are grateful to you, America, for your leadership and your sacrifice for our liberation and our opportunity to start anew."

Viewing the image of the six Marines raising the flag on top of Mount Suribachi, you notice the hands of Marine Private First Class, Ira Hayes struggling to reach the American Flag as it begins to be raised on that pivotal battle, a battle that continues to this day, the symbol of freedoms precarious struggle in the hearts of man.

As President Kennedy stated in Berlin June 1963, "Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free."

As America is engaged on the War on terror the flag of this republic again is unfurled so all that wish to do us harm may see that the banner of liberty again is on the march to bring the light of liberty to freedom loving people everywhere!