So Long, Friend

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Lisa wrote her farewell to fellow blog writer Lurch a week ago. This is mine.

What Ranger knows about Lurch is very little. We met once, and John told me he was an E-5 Team Leader in the 101st Airborne in the Republic of Vietnam, ca. 1968. John had a Bronze Star for Valor and a Combat Infantry Badge. He was also Airborne-qualified (not all 101st were.) Although he was a new acquaintance, his wisdom and insights will be missed roundly.

He told Lisa that he understood me. In turn, I knew him. he was a type of soldier that no long exists in the U.S. Army. He was draft-era unit who was inducted, trained and deployed to a very nasty little war, and he performed his assigned duties with the normal dignity of U.S. troops.

But he was never totally owned by the Army. His greater allegiance was to America. The Army owned his body but not his soul.

Ranger remembers that long-ago draft Army, which was unlike today's. Draftees are led differently than professional bought soldiers, and Lurch remained a draftee soldier to the end. He dared to question when the troops around him had buttoned up.

Lacking the words or eloquence to eulogize Lurch adequately, I'll borrow some verses from the Dire Straits' Brothers in Arms:

Some day you'll return to
Your valleys and your farms
And you'll no longer burn
To be brothers in arm

Through these fields of destruction
Baptisms of fire
I've witnessed your suffering
As the battle raged higher

And though they did hurt me so bad
In the fear and alarm
You did not desert me
My brothers in arms

There's so many different worlds
So many different suns
And we have just one world
But we live in different ones

Now the sun's gone to hell
And the moon's riding high
Let me bid you farewell
Every man has to die

But it's written in the starlight
And every line on your palm
We're fools to make war
On our brothers in arms