You're an 19 year old kid. You're critically wounded, and dying in the jungle in the Ia Drang Valley , 11-14-1965, LZ X-ray, Vietnam . Your infantry unit is outnumbered 8 - 1, and the enemy fire is so intense, from 100 or 200 yards away, that your own Infantry Commander has ordered the MediVac helicopters to stop coming in.
You're lying there, listening to the enemy machine guns, and you know you're not getting out. Your family is 1/2 way around the world, 12,000 miles away, and you'll never see them again. As the world starts to fade in and out, you know this is the day.
Then, over the machine gun noise, you faintly hear that sound of a helicopter, and you look up to see an un-armed Huey, but it doesn't seem real, because no Medi-Vac markings are on it.
Ed Freeman is coming for you. He's not Medi-Vac, so it's not his job, but he's flying his Huey down into the machine gun fire, after the Medi-Vacs were ordered not to come.
He's coming anyway.
And he drops it in, and sits there in the machine gun fire, as they load 2 or 3 of you on board.
Then he flies you up and out through the gunfire, to the Doctors and Nurses.
And, he kept coming back..... 13 more times.... And took about 30 of you and your buddies out, who would never have gotten out.
Medal of Honor Recipient, Ed Freeman,died last Wednesday at the age of 80, in Boise , ID .......May God rest his soul.....
I bet you didn't hear about this hero's
passing, but we sure were told a whole
bunch about some Hip-Hop Coward
beating the crap out of his "girlfriend"
Medal of Honor Winner
Ed Freeman!
Shame on the American Media
I liked this story, and agree that our celebrity-obsessed media have a warped sense of priorities.
Now for the commentary.
The story about Major Freeman's actions in the Ia Drang valley is true. That he died last Wednesday, or last month while the media fawned over a couple of hip-hoppers and their domestic blisslessness is not. Mr. Freeman died August 20, 2008.
An insignificant detail? Perhaps. I have no doubt that little note was made in August 2008 of Ed Freeman's passing. Maybe, somewhere out there in email purgatory, someone thought it would be bright to update the juxtaposed 'news' story to make it seem current. But a story as inspirational as Major Freeman's deserves to be told with integrity. He's no less heroic when the tale's told honestly.
I hold several beliefs, and not a few opinions. My hope and prayer is that I will earn enough credibility with my readers that my thoughts are considered to be truthful and worth reading...
In other, more recent, news, veteran NBC newsman Irving R. Levine died last week.
4 comments:
I liked your integrity comment. Freeman sounds like a guy you might run into with one of those old Vietnam vet baseball caps; it would have been an honor to shake his hand and thank him for his service. That he was a man of such honor makes it that much more irritating when a story is altered. I've gotten used to doing fact checks before I believe what lands in the Inbox...
Wouldn't you love to have met that man?
Todd: You bet! And like David points out, he was probably one of those self-effacing guys who doesn't bring attention to himself and unless you asked, wouldn't mention his actions.
BTW, David, even though it wasn't Snopes that I ran this one to ground with, Todd the Blogger was the one who first got me started snopes-ing stories before I forwarded them on...
Post a Comment