In prairie towns and great cities, ceremonies honor those who fell under our flag. Some events are well attended. Others merely draw puzzled looks from passers-by. But those who served know what Memorial Day means. It isn't some horse-and-buggy-era custom, quaint and outdated. This holiday is ever renewed by the soldiers' blood that transfuses the body politic.
This year, in addition to honoring those who gave all or suffered grievous harm, I want to go a little way toward righting a grave wrong done to a courageous warrior, Rockaway's own General Ray Odierno.
In the early days of our engagement in Iraq, when too few troops struggled with a confused mission, the best commanders stepped up and did what needed to be done.
Among those who made the hard calls and damned the consequences, no one was more wronged by the media and the pundit platoon than Odierno.
As commander of the 4th Infantry Division in the first year of our "non-occupation," Odierno and his soldiers were assigned to the Sunni-Arab heartland from which Saddam Hussein's regime had drawn its strength.
Based in Tikrit - Saddam's home town - and other hotbeds of resistance, Odierno and his subordinates understood that bitter regime sympathizers had to understand that we meant business. So he showed them how tough American troops can be when violently challenged.
The result was an outcry from journalists: Odierno was too harsh, he was alienating the population. The model was supposed to be the kinder, gentler approach taken by the British, or by US commanders in areas that welcomed Saddam's removal.
But the Baathist heartland that backed Saddam had never felt the war, which was fought down south, in the Shia provinces. The Sunni-Arabs didn't feel defeated. They just felt cheated.
Ray Odierno fixed that.
His reward was to be pilloried as an uncomprehending brute who didn't understand the new age of conflict. One bestseller cast him as the prime villain in our mission in Iraq.
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