From the time Pastor Jonas Clark watched from the Lexington, Massachusetts church yard as his men bravely took their first stand for freedom in America— “the shot that was heard around the world” — to the time General William Eaton and the U.S. Marines on the shores of Tripoli, where barbary pirates had put a price on head, to which he said, “Let them come and take it!”, the world can never forget.
From the day Francis Scott Key stood on a ship’s bow, casting a gaze at Freedom’s strength, the Stars and Stripes waving in the early Baltimore breeze, to World War I, Bella Woods, as French forces were retreating out of the woods under German fire, when a Marine captain said “RETREAT??? WE JUST GOT HERE!!!… and into the breach they went! the world can never forget.
Stopping next in World War 2 where the Japanese said that Iwo Jima would last for 1,000 years, yet American troops raised a flag on it in three days!
This generation not only defended liberty in face of totalitarian dictatorships, but they came home and build the greatest prosperity this nation has ever known.
To Korea, and the forces at the Chosin Reservoir surrounded by communist Chinese outnumbered 20-1, they survived, and then to Vietnam, fighting the spread of communism in a place called Khe Shan… 500 Americans stood on a hill and said you will NOT take us off of here. Outnumbered 30-1 North Vietnamese forces attacked them for 77 days and finally said, “Forget it, we can’t take them, you can have it, we are going home!”
One more account, one more recent from US Marine Corp Iraqi Freedom Veteran Nick PopaDitch: it was in a place called Al Coot… Marines were assaulted from the flank and we did what we did, what Americans do. We turned their ambush site into their kill zone; we turned in and attacked into their ambush… armored vehicles dropped ramps allowing marines to charge into the fire. Corporal Lebanon was one of those Marines.
It was a horrible fight with hand-to-hand combat. Small arms fire, grenades… on his way into the palm grove where the enemy was hidden, he was struck down by an AK-47 round just below the flak jacket in the lower abdomen region. A bad wound, but he was still alive.
He was medevac’d out onto the road. It was a horrible wound and he would not survive long. Those administering the first aid knew it, and more importantly Lebanon knew it.
We all talk about courage honor and commitment, but the real deal guy is the one who finds himself up against the wall, does he still believe it then? So, they looked down at Lebanon knowing he was going to die and they just wanted to make his life a little more comfortable on the way out the door. They asked him “Lebanon, is there anything we can do for you, just ask and we’ll do it.” Corporal Lebanon looked up with clarity, courage, honor and commitment and he said NO, I am right where I WANT TO BE!!!!
A quick glance at snapshots of the history of our brave men and women of the U.S. military whose gallantry and courage has been preserved in our memory for generations to come!
In President Ronald Reagan’s first inaugural address on Jan. 20, 1981, he said, “Directly in front of me, the monument to a monumental man, George Washington, father of our country. A man of humility who came to greatness reluctantly. He led America out of revolutionary victory into infant nationhood. Off to one side, the stately memorial to Thomas Jefferson. The Declaration of Independence flames with his eloquence. And then, beyond the Reflecting Pool, the dignified columns of the Lincoln Memorial. Whoever would understand in his heart the meaning of America will find it in the life of Abraham Lincoln.
Beyond those monuments to heroism is the Potomac River, and on the far shore the sloping hills of Arlington National Cemetery, with its row upon row of simple white markers bearing crosses or Stars of David. They add up to only a tiny fraction of the price that has been paid for our freedom…
Under one such marker lies a young man, Martin Treptow, who left his job in a small-town barbershop in 1917 to go to France with the famed Rainbow Division.
There, on the western front, he was killed trying to carry a message between battalions under heavy artillery fire.
We’re told that on his body was found a diary. On the flyleaf under the heading, “My Pledge,’’ he had written these words: ‘America must win this war. Therefore, I will work, I will save, I will sacrifice, I will endure, I will fight cheerfully and do my utmost, as if the issue of the whole struggle depended on me alone.’”
President Abraham Lincoln’s words from a windswept hill in Gettysburg Pennsylvania in the fall of 1863 inspire us yet today! — “The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.”
We will never forget!

Tim Throckmorton is the national director of Family Resource Council’s Community Impact Teams.