Posted by
Dave Perkins on Wednesday, December 13, 2006 1:02:28 PM
My favorite milblog has long been
Blackfive.
One of the many reasons is the space he gives to the Americans killed and wounded, the way he works to be sure nobody who reads his blog can forget what those people are giving of themselves for our sake.
here's
the latest entry. There is no starker illustration of the difference between us and them.
Our men sacrifice themselves, knowingly and willingly, so that others may live.
Their men sacrifice themselves so that in their deaths others may die, innocents among them.
And don't forget the transactional nature of their 'religious' motive; they're taught that upon doing this, they get all sorts of rewards, sexual and otherwise related to earthly understandings of what benefits them. They have little or no interest in the higher things of religion. They give a life, and take many lives, in order that in the next life they will receive things that will give them pleasure. It's a stupid teenage fantasy, sad to say.
I'll bet every nickel I have and will ever make that Ross McGinnis, who had previously wondered aloud what he would do if a grenade was thrown into the midst of his comrades, was not thinking of himself when he covered that grenade with his body. He gave a loud warning and had time to leap out of the way. But he did not.
He gave his life to save others. Honor, duty, love of his friends and his fellow men, these were his motives.
I fervently believe God will honor and bless those motives, just as I believe a 'martyr' arriving for his judgment will quickly be told, "get thee hence. I never knew you."
RIP Ross McGinnis. America owes everything to men like you.