"The most basic principle of personal honor in America's armed forces is never willingly to leave a fellow serviceman behind. The black granite wall on the Mall in Washington is filled with the names of those who died in the effort to save their comrades in arms. That bond of loyalty and obligation which spurred so many soldiers to sacrifice themselves is mirrored by the obligation owed to every soldier by our nation, in whose name those sacrifices were made.
"Amidst the uncertainties of war, every soldier is entitled to one certainty--that he will not be forgotten. As former POW Eugene "Red" McDaniel (a U.S. Navy pilot, by the way) put it, as an American asked to serve: 'I was prepared to fight, to be wounded, to be captured, and even prepared to die, but I was not prepared to be abandoned.'"
The Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs was created to ensure that our nation meets its obligation to the missing, now including sizeable help from mandates passed to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, whose members are working on Scott Speicher's behalf. And we need to pay close attention to what goes on in Iraq and better understand the evil that resides there...