YOUR VOICE: Don't forget to thank a veteran

There’s a group of men and women who are not household names. They are American veterans.

Veterans blend in; they don’t stand out in a crowd. At one time however, they stood tall as they fought in the trenches, on the oceans and high in the skies. Because of these ordinary Americans, the rest of us live in freedom during peace and war.

Each Veterans Day, we’re asked to pause and remember all who fought for our country. Yet for many, “veterans” are faceless – a group to which some feel no connection. The majority of Americans do not serve in the Armed Forces and many may not know a living family member who did. As a veteran, it is surprising, humbling, and yet pleasing, when strangers say “thank you” even now, 36 years after my own service in Vietnam.

On April 19, 1967, I took off from the Takhli Air Base in Thailand in an F-105 “Wild Weasel” with Harry Johnson as my backseater.

We were set to destroy surface-to-air missile sites and ended up surrounded by a wagon-wheel formation of MiG-17 fighters. One of my wingmen was shot down and could not be rescued. We shot down two MiGs that day and survived. A few days later, however, we were shot down by a MiG and became POWs for six years.

Years of torture, loneliness, malnourishment and bad medicine were to follow. We’d spend the days tapping messages to one another between prison walls – sometimes a poem or a prayer – and longing for family and country back home. I relived the mission on which I was shot down over six years – what could I have done better?

I didn’t find the answer, but that experience taught me that even if we feel that we’ve failed, we can still persevere. When we take an oath or make a promise to ourselves, nothing will be gained if we don’t keep our word, or give up.

Medal of Honor recipients are said to represent the values of selflessness, courage, love of country and service. However, we are first to say that we simply responded to the call of duty and did our job the best we could. If we commit that same attitude in business, school and our personal lives, our kids and grandkids will enjoy the freedoms, rights and privileges to which we have been blessed.

When veterans hear “thank you,” it feels like our mission was accomplished. It helps remind me -- and surely other veterans – that even the most painful missions were worthwhile challenges. Every thank you on Veterans Day – be it from a grocery clerk or the presidential pulpit – is like the joy of a promise kept and a goal achieved.

This year, students at the University of Washington wrote their thanks in stone.

A small group of eight Congressional Medal of Honor recipients, who are alumni of the university, were memorialized by students as “heroic examples” for future generations.

The students didn’t personally know any of the veterans honored with the new memorial, yet they recognized something in their alumni which they say can be applied to everyone’s challenges. The monument, much like the Medal of Honor, exists to remind all Americans that extraordinary perseverance can come from the most ordinary among us.

We don’t win all of the battles that we fight, and today’s wars are still undefined. What we face together as a nation today will not be freedom’s last test. Yet, all service members still need support and a thank you – before, during and after the mission is accomplished.

Col. Leo Thorsness (retired, USAF), is a former Washington state senator and a recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor for heroic action in the Vietnam War, which included six years as a prisoner of war. Today, he is president of the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, a brotherhood of all who hold the nation’s highest military honor.