The Right to Be Free

Last night at 2 AM EST, a personal, long-time friend of mine, Sgt. W. Hawkins, boarded a military chartered plane heading from New Jersey to South Texas; an American soldier on his way to a thirteen month tour in Iraq. This is not one of the stereotypical, misrepresented, low-income, farm-boys from Smallville America. Quite the contrary; he is a college graduate that has already seen a full, four year military tour. Upon the completion of his first tour, he re-enlisted with the New Jersey National Guard while he completed his degree at Rutgers’s University. Somewhere during his senior year, he was activated by his old unit and called upon to serve his Country in Iraq. He immediately doubled his hours the next semester and graduated a few days before he was to return to full duty, an amazing accomplishment for someone under that kind of stress.


Over the next ninety days he will be trained by the greatest military leaders of our time in the art of war; urban combat, guerilla warfare and SERE’s (Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape). I am sending out this email as a reminder that it can not always be “someone else’s” son or friend. The war in Iraq touches us all in some aspect and regardless of how we feel about the war or our political views, the soldiers that are in Iraq, and those going, have been asked by our Country to serve. To suspend their lives, to say good-bye to their families and friends, to put everything on the line and give to the American people the greatest gift one human can give to another: The right to be free.