A Time to Heal (Page 2 of 3)
    Another Congressional Medal of Honor winner that was present for this solemn ceremony was Colonel Walter Joseph Marm, Jr., retired, who was the keynote speaker. The Colonel spoke of the dedication of this site along Jack’s Creek as temporary hallowed ground as if it was an allegorical representation of our acknowledgement to those dedicated men, who served our nation to save Viet Nam from itself.

    Medal of Honor awardee Colonel Walter Joseph Marm, Jr. spoke of the honor of those good men inscribed upon that wall. Col. Marm received the nation's highest honor for his heroism in the Battle of Ia Drang, which was popularized by the book "We Were Soldiers and Young," and the film "We Were Soldiers." The then second lieutenant served under Lt. Col. Hal Moore, who was portrayed by Mel Gibson: Above. Accompanying the "Wall" is a trailer that displays a short museum of sorts of the Vietnam War soldiers' heroism: Below.



    Colonel Marm knew well of such dedication at the Battle of Ia Drang on November 14-18, 1965, where he was wounded, when, as a 1st Lieutenant, he led his platoon against an overwhelming enemy force to save another surrounded platoon. During his platoon’s assault to break the enemy’s stranglehold on the surrounded platoon, Lt. Marm exposed himself at great risk, and using whatever ordinance he could gather, killed 12 of the enemy, including the destruction of the concealed machine gun position that had pinned down his platoon, and kept them at great peril.

    Hearing the Colonel, who was willing to lay down his life so that his men could survive in the valley of Ia Drang, deliver his eulogy of those men, who paid the ultimate sacrifice under the direst circumstances, carried an extraordinary weight. His words bore the gravity all men lost in America’s wars, not just those immortalized within scribed names upon that hallowed Wall. And in that moment, one understands the enormity of the American soldier’s universal commitment to the preservation of peace that a nation and its people must endure to remain free. That there are those soldiers, whose names will remain on that memorial, who lost their lives at seventeen, eighteen, so that we may never know the hell of battle, or exist as a civilian populace under the oppressive yoke of a tyrant is their supreme gift to their fellow man, and we should all be eternally grateful. One of the worst sorrows in our American history is that many of us were not.

    The ceremony for the was made more colorful by the bagpipes: Above. They were designated as solemn by the signs: Below.



    As war escalated in late 1965 with the Battle of Ia Drang, which began the push to alleviate the South Vietnam of the Vietcong, to the fierce fighting of the Tet Offensive that began January 21, 1968, when 80,000 North Vietnamese regulars crossed the DMZ, separating North from South Vietnam, to link up with the Vietcong, and change the tide of the war for the Communists.

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    This article provided courtesy of our sister site: Beaufort County Now