Along with my fellow veterans, we will be teaching lessons in the Upper Freehold Regional, Jackson and Millstone Township elementary and middle schools about the meaning behind the National League of Families Prisoners of War Missing In Action (POW-MIA) flag — the only flag other than “old glory” to be recognized by the U.S. Congress and be placed on display in the U.S. capital rotunda.
No doubt, many readers of this newspaper have had their own fourth-graders “teach” them about the POW-MIA flag. If not, it is not too late to learn. How many readers have taken just two to three minutes to stand and closely look over the black POW-MIA flag flying beneath the U.S. flag at a nearby post office, police station, firehouse, school or town veterans memorial?
New Jersey is a pretty patriotic state. Many of our schools display the POW-MIAflag every day outside just beneath the U.S. flag.
In addition to the many thousands of MIAs from World War II, Korea and Vietnam, we remember there are two U.S. soldiers who are listed as captured/MIA from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
It is a federal law to display the POW-MIA flag on government buildings, veterans administration offices, veterans administration hospitals, veterans cemeteries and post offices on certain specified days.
There is finality in seeing a loved one buried that cannot be achieved merely by reading a U.S. Department of Defense casualty report of a plane shot down and the pilot (family member) missing and presumed dead, or of a soldier or Marine captured and held as a prisoner of war but never returned.
We have been taught that every story has a beginning and an end. For many Americans, though, the story of their loved one who served in the military in a war somewhere overseas has no ending.
As a veteran, I support the efforts of the mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers wives, sons and daughters of America’s MIAs who did not come home, to learn of their fate and to have our government strive for the fullest possible accounting of America’s MIAs from all wars.
Everyone is affected by or loses something in a war. For most of us, war does have a beginning and an end.
Please pause for a moment on Sept. 17 to recognize America’s POW-MIAs. Fly the POW-MIA flag. Our MIA soldiers, sailors, airman and Marines are not forgotten, nor are their families.
If you would like to show your support for the families of America’sMIAs, contact your local military veterans organization or the National League of Families at POW-MIAfamilies.org.
Richard D. Brody
State Commander
Veterans of Vietnam War and the Veterans Coalition
Chairman
Millstone Township Veterans Memorial Council
Millstone Township