Congressional representatives listened to testimony of the Winter Soldiers, begun in 1971 by victims of the Vietnam War, who were soldiers. We honor the death of these 4,060 plus young people, but more we grieve the losses of those who suffered mental and physical abuse and who were left for dead while they are still living.

"War is hell," stated the President of the United States, who then was the Commander in Chief of the armed forces. Dwight David Eisenhower was completely against a military invasion of Vietnam. Unfortunately no one heeded his plea to resist the temptation to save lives and use diplomacy to counter the forces of oppression that exist everywhere. Democracy cannot be imported nor humane treatment of people. The dead whose names are read today in Pueblo contain the names of many soldiers and former civilians who gave their lives for their country while civilians. Many more soldiers abroad in Afghanistan and Iraq have given their lives with terrible consequences; they committed suicide.

Testimony after testimony before Congress indicated that the spiritual practices of the military was to establish a ruthless, dehumanizing perspective in the mind of the soldier. "The Rules of Engagement," established clear limits for intervening against the enemy, which was deliberately dismissed in practice. The impact of these decisions at the highest level of government insured that Iraqis would be brutally destroyed; most of the victims were children. The greatest sacrifice possible was the quality of life of people everywhere.

Service person after service person established the point that personnel from the occupation of Iraq came back here with no way to adjust. The service people established The Home Front Battle Buddies providing counseling and intervention for these vulnerable citizens whose lives and whose names are being read today. Do not permit their lives to end when they are discharged from the military and then are left dying on the streets. Geoffrey Mallard established this organization to counter the lack of treatment for returning service personnel and the impact of their training on their ability to survive at home in America.

The question begs that we call for a national day of mourning for our moral turpitude and the loss of innocent victims everywhere. As Julia Ward Howe said in 1870 shortly after the first Memorial Day for fallen victims of the Confederate and Northern sides, “We, the women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our children to be trained to injure theirs.” This came from the Mother’s Day Proclamation in 1870 after the end of the Civil War, for which Memorial Day was first designed to honor the children of the mothers who placed flowers on the graves of all of the dead on May 31, 1868.