Legacy of the Lives Lost

I did not know you before today,
had never even pondered your existence,
but who you are has come to make a profound impact on my life.
You were high above the ground,
looking out through cottony wisps at an azure sky,
eager to return home from business.
You were sitting at your desk at work,
logging onto your computer
as you had done a thousand times before.
You were with co-workers around the water cooler,
discussing the movie you had seen the night before,
and how your youngest was really enjoying school.
You were a policeman, or fireman, or emergency worker,
called to the scene of an unspeakable disaster.
You responded without hesitation,
with no thought of self or personal safety,
your extensive training
helping you to remain steadfast,
doing all that you could to help those in need.
You were a daughter, a son, a mother, a father,
a husband, a wife, a grandmother, a grandfather,
an uncle, an aunt, a niece, a nephew, 

a cousin, a friend.
You had hopes and dreams similar to mine,
had experienced fear, disappointment, anxiety.
Had learned and taught.
Had worked and played.
Had nurtured and loved.
Then, without warning, you were gone.
I did not know you before today,
but this will be your legacy.
I will never again pass a building, a home, an office,
oblivious to the fact
that there are real human beings inside.
I will never again walk by a stranger unseeing on the street,
without offering a smile,
and recognizing that this a person quite like me.
I will never again go by a police station or fire department,
without thinking that there are men and women
willing to put their lives on the line,
without question or hesitation,
for myself and those I care about.
I will never again look at a hospital
without feeling gratitude that there are those
who have the talent and dedication to devote their lives
to healing others.
I will never again pass a veteran selling poppies,
and drop in coins instead of bills.
I will never again hear on the news about a disaster,
anywhere in the world,
and think 'What a terrible shame',
without pausing to consider and grieve
for each individual life that was lost,
and each individual left to mourn.
I will never again hug or kiss my spouse or my child
automatically and habitually,
without my full thought, attention and gratitude.
I did not know you before today,
but this is your legacy.
And if you have touched even one life,
then you did not die in vain,
and your memory will live on forever.

Cathy A. Thomas

Here's an article that says it all...

We'll go forward from this moment
by Leonard Pitts Jr. of the Miami Herald

"It's my job to have something to say. They pay me to provide words that help make sense of that which troubles the American soul. But in this moment of airless shock when hot tears sting disbelieving eyes, the only thing I can find to say, the only words that seem to fit, must be addressed to the unknown author of this suffering.

"You monster. You beast. You unspeakable bastard.

"What lesson did you hope to teach us by your coward's attack on our World Trade Center, our Pentagon, us? What was it you hoped we would learn? Whatever it was, please know that you failed.

"Did you want us to respect your cause? You just damned your cause.

"Did you want to make us fear? You just steeled our resolve.

"Did you want to tear us apart? You just brought us together.

"Let me tell you about my people. We are a vast and quarrelsome family, a family rent by racial, social, political and class division, but a family nonetheless. We're frivolous, yes, capable of expending tremendous emotional energy on pop cultural minutiae -- a singer's revealing dress, a ball team's misfortune, a cartoon mouse. We're wealthy, too, spoiled by the ready availability of trinkets and material goods, and maybe because of that, we walk through life with a certain sense of blithe entitlement. We are fundamentally decent, though -- peace-loving and compassionate. We struggle to know the right thing and to do it. And we are, the overwhelming majority of us, people of faith, believers in a just and loving God.

"Some people -- you, perhaps -- think that any or all of this makes us weak. You're mistaken. We are not weak. Indeed, we are strong in ways that cannot be measured by arsenals.

"Yes, we're in pain now. We are in mourning and we are in shock. We're still grappling with the unreality of the awful thing you did, still working to make ourselves understand that this isn't a special effect from some Hollywood blockbuster, isn't the plot development from a Tom Clancy novel. Both in terms of the awful scope of their ambition and the probable final death toll, your attacks are likely to go down as the worst acts of terrorism in the history of the United States and, probably, the history of the world. You've bloodied us as we have never been bloodied before.

"But there's a gulf of difference between making us bloody and making us fall. This is the lesson Japan was taught to its bitter sorrow the last time anyone hit us this hard, the last time anyone brought us such abrupt and monumental pain. When roused, we are righteous in our outrage, terrible in our force. When provoked by this level of barbarism, we will bear any suffering, pay any cost, go to any length, in the pursuit of justice.

"I tell you this without fear of contradiction. I know my people, as you,  I  think, do not. What I know reassures me. It also causes me to tremble with  dread of the future.

"In the days to come, there will be recrimination and accusation, fingers pointing to determine whose failure allowed this to happen and what can be done to prevent it from happening again. There will be heightened security, misguided talk of revoking basic freedoms. We'll go forward from this moment sobered, chastened, sad.  But determined, too. Unimaginably determined.

"You see, the steel in us is not always readily apparent. That aspect of our character is seldom understood by people who don't know us well. On this day, the family's bickering is put on hold.

"As Americans we will weep, as Americans we will mourn, and as Americans, we will rise in defense of all that we cherish.

"So I ask again: What was it you hoped to teach us?  It occurs to me that maybe you just wanted us to know the depths of your hatred. If that's the case, consider the message received. And take this message in exchange:

"You don't know my people. You don't know what we're capable of. You don't know what you just started.

"But you're about to learn."

America WAKE UP!

Author U.S. Navy Capt. Ouimette is the XO of NAS, Pensacola.

This is a copy of a speech he gave on Feb. 19, 2003.

That's what we think we heard on the 11th of September 2001 and maybe it was, but I think it should have been "Get Out of Bed!" In fact, I think the alarm clock has been buzzing since 1979 and we have continued to hit the snooze button and roll over for a few more minutes of peaceful sleep since then.

It was a cool fall day in November 1979 in a country going through a religious and political upheaval when a group of Iranian students attacked and seized the American Embassy in Tehran. This seizure was an outright attack on American soil; it was an attack that held the world's most powerful country hostage and paralyzed a Presidency. The attack on this sovereign US embassy set the stage for the events to follow for the next 23 years.

America was still reeling from the aftermath of the Viet Nam experience and had a serious threat from the Soviet Union when then, President Carter, had to do something. He chose to conduct a clandestine raid in the desert. The ill-fated mission ended in ruin, but stood as a symbol of America's inability to deal with terrorism. America's military had been decimated and downsized / right sized since the end of the Viet Nam war. A poorly trained, poorly equipped and poorly organized military was called on to execute a complex mission that was doomed from the start.

Shortly after the Tehran experience, Americans began to be kidnapped and killed throughout the Middle East. America could do little to protect her citizens living and working abroad. The attacks against US soil continued. In April of 1983 a large vehicle packed with high explosives was driven into the US Embassy compound in Beirut. When it explodes, it kills 63 people. The alarm went off again and America hit the Snooze Button once more. Then just six short months later a large truck heavily laden down with over 2500 pounds of TNT smashed through the main gate of the US Marine Corps headquarters in Beirut. 241 US servicemen are killed. America mourns her dead and hit the Snooze Button once more. Two months later in December 1983, another truck loaded with explosives is driven into the US Embassy in Kuwait, and America continues her slumber. The following year, in September 1984, another van was driven into the gates of the US Embassy in Beirut and America slept.

Soon the terrorism spreads to Europe. In April 1985 a bomb explodes in a restaurant frequented by US soldiers in Madrid. Then in August a Volkswagen loaded with explosives is driven into the main gate of the US Air Force Base at Rhein-Main, 22 are killed and the Snooze Alarm is buzzing louder and louder as US soil is continually attacked. Fifty-nine days later a cruise ship, the Achille Lauro is hijacked and we watched as an American in a wheelchair is singled out of the passenger list and executed. The terrorists then shift their tactics to bombing civilian airliners when they bomb TWA

Flight 840 in April of 1986 that killed 4 and the most tragic bombing, Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988, killing 259. America wants to treat these terrorist acts as crimes; in fact we are still trying to bring these people to trial. These are acts of war & the Wake Up alarm is louder and louder.

The terrorists decide to bring the fight to America. In January 1993, two CIA agents are shot and killed as they enter CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. The following month, February 1993, a group of terrorists are arrested after a rented van packed with explosives is driven into the underground parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City.  Six people are killed and over 1000 are injured. Still this is a crime and not an act of war? The Snooze alarm is depressed again.

Then in November 1995 a car bomb explodes at a US military complex in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia killing seven service men and women. A few months later in June of 1996, another truck bomb explodes only 35 yards from the US military compound in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. It destroys the Khobar Towers, a US Air Force barracks, killing 19 and injuring over 500.

The terrorists are getting braver and smarter as they see that America does not respond decisively. They move to coordinate their attacks in a simultaneous attack on two US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. These attacks were planned with precision, they kill 224. America responds with cruise missile attacks and goes back to sleep.

The USS Cole was docked in the port of Aden, Yemen for refueling on 12 October 2000, when a small craft pulled along side the ship and exploded killing 17 US Navy Sailors. Attacking a US War Ship is an act of war, but we sent the FBI to investigate the crime and went back to sleep.

And of course you know the events of 11 September 2001. Most Americans think this was the first attack against US soil or in America. How wrong they are. America has been under a constant attack since 1979 and we chose to hit the snooze alarm and roll over and go back to sleep.

In the news lately we have seen lots of finger pointing from every high official in government over what they knew and what they didn't know. But if you've read the papers and paid a little attention I think you can see exactly what they knew. You don't have to be in the FBI or CIA or on the National Security Council to see the pattern that has been developing since 1979. The President is right on when he says we are engaged in a war. I think we have been in a war for the past 23 years and it will continue until we as a people decide enough is enough.

America has to "Get out of Bed" and act decisively now. America has changed forever. We have to be ready to pay the price and make the sacrifice to ensure our way of life continues. We cannot afford to hit the Snooze

Button again and roll over and go back to sleep. We have to make the terrorists know that in the words of Admiral Yamamoto after the attack on Pearl Harbor "that all they have done is to awaken a sleeping giant."

Thank you very much

Dan Ouimette

Pensacola Civitan

19 Feb 2003

U.S. Navy Capt. Ouimette is the XO of NAS, Pensacola. This is a copy of a speech he gave.

An Ode to America