Political Quotes

“Absolutely. That was one of the best stories that I have taken away from Iraq. Not only did we see firsthand the commitment and the bravery, the courage of our young men and women, but the decency of the American soldier. The story we were told was that when they found the mass grave site, the Iraqi people as they do to celebrate or in anger when they come together is they shoot their weapons off into the air. It is very dangerous because when you shoot a bullet up, it has to come down, and when you have several hundred people doing that, there were people being killed. The Marines told these folks that were going up to the mass grave site that they could not celebrate in that way. They were not allowed to shoot guns off into the air, so it was a very heated exchange. The Iraqis were angry because they could not do what they typically do. So they went to the mass grave site, they collected the remains of many of their family members, and as they came back into the village, they came face to face with a patrol of Marines. It was a tense moment. Without somebody from high up, some bureaucrat in Washington or some general in the Pentagon or some general in the field, a young sergeant decided the best thing to do was to order his men to stand aside, take their helmets off and bow their heads to pay respect to the families, to the people that had perished and to honor them as they passed.”