Today we sadly fail our soldiers & vets even more than usual

To The Daily Sun,

On Memorial Day I had terribly mixed emotions. Our freedoms and opportunities to prosper have been purchased by our soldiers at great personal cost — moments of great stress and even terror, suffering, physical and mental wounds, loss of limbs, hearing and sight, and many gave their lives.

We owe our soldiers much more than we give them. We owe them political leaders who consider each soldier's life as precious. We must avoid war unless absolutely necessary for national defense, consider our soldiers the most precious things on the battlefield and to be protected above all else, and that there are no restrictions to our soldiers' ability to win.

Today's volunteer military represent a small percent of our population so most of us are unaffected by the consequences of our leaders' bad policies that cost our soldiers so dearly. Therefore we haven't been appropriately offended by, and demanding changes of, bad policies.

In my lifetime the political leaders we elected, and trusted to conduct our wars, have limited our soldiers' abilities to win...and even sometimes to survive. From President Johnson's "acceptable" 10-to-one kill ratio and off-limits enemy supply routes in Viet Nam to Bush's and Obama's limited objectives and restrictive rules of engagement, too many of our soldiers have been wounded and died unnecessarily.

Sadly, today we fail our soldiers and veterans even more than usual. Our soldiers returning from war are labelled potential "domestic terrorists" by President Obama's Department of Homeland Security and efforts have been made to limit their constitutional rights.

And our VA (government run) health care is even worse than usual. Many veterans needing health care are placed on secret lists so VA employees can claim bonuses for responsiveness. E.g., the Phoenix VA kept 1,700 veterans on secret lists and delayed their health care, as a result several dozen veterans died unnecessarily.

It is long past time for the American people to think of every soldier as their own child, parent or sibling, and demand that our political leaders do the same. Americans should not accept any war unless the lives of the children of our political leaders are put in jeopardy alongside the children of Third Street and Fifteenth Street, etc. If the children of our political leaders are in the front lines, perhaps our leaders will be more careful in their decision making.

Don Ewing

Meredith