The attacks of December 7, 1941 are commemorated every year at Pearl Harbor. A moment of silence at 7:55am is observed, the moment the first aerial strike hit.
Video below via FilmArchivesNYC:
US Embassy Kabul, Afghanistan
Commemoration of 9/11 Anniversary 2011.09.11
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| Photo from US Embassy Islamabad |
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| Photo from US Embassy Manila |
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| Photo from US Embassy Beijing |
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| Photo from US Embassy Beirut |
This is my September 11, 2001. It was a lovely early autumn day in Washigton DC. Bright sun, warm but not hot. I was listening to a lecture by a noted academic at the State Department training center as we heard a terrible crash. I thought perhaps a serious construction accident or a building collapse. Soon after, we were all told to evacuate the building and head home. As I headed out, I passed a hallway TV showing scenes of the first plane to hit the Twin Towers. I started to run. The car radio had more information. A plane crashed into the Pentagon. A second plane into the Twin Towers. We then lived very near the Pentagon so as I got closer, I saw the smoke pouring out of the Pentagon. Sirens filled the air. Roads were blocked and I had to prove to the police that I did indeed live just a few blocks away to be allowed to drive on to my house. Neighbors were standing in the street — weeping. But I wasn’t yet sad. I was incredulous. How could anyone destroy so many lives? It defied belief. Once home the phone was ringing. My late father-in-law calling from West Texas to ask if we were okay. A decorated World War II career Army officer, he was normally crisp and composed. His voice on the phone was filled with fear. “Where is Bill? Did he have meetings at the Pentagon today?” I didn’t know. As usual, we had both dashed out the door, talking more about what time we’d be home that evening rather than exactly what each of us was doing that day. I promised to call as soon as I knew. Moments later, Bill literally ran in the door. Traffic was so jammed that Bill parked his car, put on his jogging clothes, and ran the five miles from the State Department to our house. We spent the rest of the day glued to the television. By nightfall, we were filled with sadness, knowing that thousands were dead, citizens from dozens of nations. Every September 11 since then, I get a lump in my throat when the film is shown of that day. But after ten years, I am determined that starting this year, I will remember instead the acts of heroism and compassion that characterized September 11. That I will remember with pride those who rescued victims, those who lost their lives diverting another plane that would have targeted Washington DC, the compassion of volunteers, and that feeling of immense unity we felt around the globe. I will not forget the lives lost but from now on when I think of September 11, I will remember heroism, compassion and unity.US Embassy Wellington, New Zealand
U.S. Ambassador Karl W. Eikenberry and Deputy U.S. Ambassador E. Anthony Wayne host a Memorial Day ceremony at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan on Monday, May 30, 2011.
On April 5, 1968, the day after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., Senator Robert F. Kennedy delivered this speech at the Cleveland City Club in Cleveland, Ohio. It seems fitting to listen to this again today in light of what happened in Tucson last week.
This is a time of shame and sorrow It is not a day for politics I have saved this one opportunity to speak briefly to you about this mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.
It is not the concern of any one race The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed No one - no matter where he lives or what he does - can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed And yet it goes on and on.
Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by his assassin's bullet.
No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of the people.
Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.
"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln, “there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and those who take such appeal are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."
Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire weapons and ammunition they desire.
Too often we honor swagger and bluster and the wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach nonviolence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.
Some looks for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear; violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleaning of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.
For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly, destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. This is a slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter.
This is the breaking of a man's spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all. I have not come here to propose a set of specific remedies nor is there a single set. For a broad and adequate outline we know what must be done. When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies - to be met not with cooperation but with conquest, to be subjugated and mastered.
We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community, men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear - only a common desire to retreat from each other - only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this there are no final answers.
Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is now what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of human purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.
We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of all. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.
Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanish it with a program, nor with a resolution.
But we can perhaps remember - even if only for a time - that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short movement of life, that they seek - as we do - nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.
Surely this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our hearts brothers and countrymen once again.
"There are few people in any time, but certainly in our time, who can say, I stopped a war. I made peace. I saved lives. I helped countries heal. Richard Holbrooke did these things. He believed that great men and women could change history. And he did. He wanted to be a great man so he could change history. He was, and he did."
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of State
The Kennedy Center
Washington, DC | January 14, 2011
Transcript
Will State run out of wall space if it includes the names of the victims of the 1983 US Embassy Lebanon bombing or the 1998 twin embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania?
AFSA News had this item in its latest issue of FSJ:
The Bureau of Human Resources unveiled two new plaques honoring those who have lost their lives overseas at the State Department Awards Ceremony on Nov. 3, 2010. A Locally Employed Staff plaque honors 19 individuals from countries as diverse as Saudi Arabia, Haiti and Pakistan, who lost their lives in the line of duty due to terrorism, in an act of heroism or in other compelling circumstances while serving the foreign affairs agencies. In honoring their sacrifice, the State Department testifies to the importance of locally employed staff in the United States’ ability to conduct diplomacy.
An Eligible Family Member plaque remembers those who have lost their lives due to terrorism, in an act of heroism or in other compelling circumstances while accompanying an employee serving overseas with a foreign affairs agency. In honoring the five individuals who lost their lives in Pakistan, Kenya and Haiti to terrorism, murder and natural disaster, we are reminded of the sacrifices made by our family members.
Both plaques, which cover the period from 1999 to the present, will be affixed to the wall in the C Street entrance of the department near AFSA’s Memorial Plaques honoring our fallen Foreign Service officers.
The committee that developed the criteria
for the plaques considered how far to go back
in time and decided to go back to just after
the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings. There is a
separate plaque for the employees who died there.
The committee did not go back further
because it would have had to go back to 1789
to provide complete equity, and no records of LE
Staff date that far back. The Cox Foundation
donated the money for the plaque and agreed
with its criteria, which are similar to those for
the Eligible Family Members plaque.
At the rising of the sun and at its going down,
We remember them.
At the Blowing of the wind and the chill of the winter,
We remember them.
At the opening of the Buds and in the rebirth of spring,
We remember them.
At the rustling of the leaves and in the beauty of Autumn,
We remember them.
At the beginning of the year and when it ends,
We remember them.
As long as we live, they too will live,
for they are now part of us as we remember them. When lost and sick at heart,
We remember them.
When we have joy we crave to share,
We remember them.
When we have decisions that are difficult to make,
We remember them.
When we have achievements that are based on theirs,
We remember them.
As long as we live they too will live,
For they are now a part of us as we remember them.
A case from 12 years ago. 224 murder counts. One guilty verdict. Not for murder. Not for destruction of US property. The conviction was for "one relatively minor charge of conspiracy to damage or destroy U.S. property by means of an explosive device," according to Reuters.
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| US Embassy Nairobi Memorial (used with permission) Photo Copyright © 2010 Derek Brown |
"So, we tried a guy (who the Bush Admin tortured and then held at GTMO for 4-plus years with no end game whatsoever) in a federal court before a NY jury with full transparency and international legitimacy and -- despite all of the legacy problems of the case (i.e., evidence getting thrown out because of Bush-Admin torture, etc,) we were STILL able to convict him and INCAPACITATE him for essentially the rest of his natural life, AND there was not one -- not one -- security problem associated with the trial."
NEW YORK—U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Preet Bharara announced that Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani was found guilty today for his role in the 1998 bombings of the U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that took the lives of 224 people, including 12 Americans. Ghailani, 36, a Tanzanian national, and the first detainee held at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba to be tried in a civilian court, was found guilty of conspiring to destroy property and buildings of the United States, following a five-week trial before U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan. Ghailani faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years in prison and a maximum sentence of life on this count. Ghailani was acquitted of the remaining counts against him.
“Ahmed Ghailani was today convicted of conspiring in the 1998 destruction of the United States Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, causing death as a result,” said U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara. “He will face, and we will seek, the maximum sentence of life without parole when he is sentenced in January. I want to express my deep appreciation for the unflagging commitment, dedication and talent of the agents who so thoroughly investigated this case and the prosecutors who so ably tried it.”
According to the evidence presented at trial, previous court proceedings in this case, and documents filed in Manhattan federal court:
Ghailani was first indicted on Dec.16, 1998, by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of New York. In that indictment and subsequent superseding indictments, Ghailani was charged with conspiring with Usama Bin Laden and other members of al Qaeda to kill American nationals and with several related crimes in connection with the twin bombings of Aug. 7, 1998, that destroyed the American Embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Ghailani was also charged with 224 individual murder counts for each of the victims of the two embassy bombings.
The evidence at trial showed, among other things, that each of the embassies was attacked by suicide bombers driving large truck bombs packed with approximately 1,000 pounds of TNT. Ghailani purchased the truck as well as tanks of oxygen and acetylene gas that were used in the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Tanzania. He also stored explosive detonators that were used in the bomb at his residence.
The evidence also showed that the day before the bombings, using a fake passport in an assumed name, Ghailani flew from Nairobi, Kenya to Pakistan in a coordinated escape from Africa. Two other al Qaeda operatives, a senior operations leader and an explosives expert who had traveled between Kenya and Tanzania in the weeks before the bombings departed Africa for Pakistan on the same flight as Ghailani. Those operatives were also involved with the bombings.
Ghailani is scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 25, 2011, at 11:00 a.m. EST.
Mr. Bharara praised the FBI and the National Security Division of the U.S. Department of Justice for their extraordinary work in the investigation of this case. He also thanked the Tanzanian Police for their assistance in the case.
This case is being handled by the Office's Terrorism and International Narcotics Unit with assistance from the Justice Department’s National Security Division. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Michael Farbiarz, Harry A. Chernoff, Nicholas Lewin and Sean S. Buckley are in charge of the prosecution.
David Willson is the author of REMF Diary (1988) and The REMF Returns (1992). Working from his diaries composed in Vietnam, Willson tells the story of the war as it occurred for most soldiers. Willson has now turned his eye to his current battle with cancer and the Veteran’s Administration. His REMF Diary of Dying and Bureaucratic Complexity appeared as a Special Feature of WLA Online. The magazine writes that it will be updated with new installments the first of each month. Four chapters ending in 2009 had been posted here.
Below is an excerpt from Charpter 1:
My ribs had been causing me some serious pain since June. I’d been to see Dr. Brooks several times and lots of theories had been pursued but none had panned out. Finally, in October, I was sent to a specialist. He did a biopsy and had me do a 24 hour urine collection. Dr. Lee gave me the diagnosis.
Multiple Myeloma. Okay. I thought I recognized the name of the disease from the Agent Orange Dirty Dozen list. Dr. Lee kept saying that she hoped that I had prostate cancer, and I didn’t get why she’d say that. She explained that prostate cancer could be cured, but that multiple myeloma had no cure and no remission. I got it then.
When I got home I looked up the Agent Orange disease list on the VA website and there it was, nestled between Hodgkin’s disease and respiratory cancers (lungs, bronchus, larynx, trachea.) Fine bedfellows. The big heading on this section was “Presumptive conditions for disability compensations.” An open and shut case. I am a Vietnam veteran who served in-country from September 13, 1966 through October 23, 1967. I was stationed in Tan Son Nhut and then in Long Binh, but because I worked for the Inspector General, I was all over the country. I was presumed to be exposed. I was diagnosed with multiple myeloma by several doctors, including Dr. Norman, my oncologist. I was told that I had Stage 2 B, and that my disease was in an aggressive mode. Looks to me as though I have hit the jackpot.
I sat right down and wrote the VA a letter apprising them of my situation. I included a copy of my DD 214, the one that my SS# is wrong on. Also I included a copy of a document from my doctor which showed that I had been diagnosed with multiple myeloma, with no remission. This should do it I thought. Here’s the short letter I sent them.
Dear Claims Office,
I wish to start the process for a claim for disability. I served in Vietnam for over 13 months from 13 September 1966 until 23 October 1967, in the U.S. Army. (please see attached DD214.) I was recently diagnosed with multiple myeloma at Group Health, Tacoma. (See attached.)
Please let me know what the next step is in this process. I would also appreciate notification of receipt of this letter. Thanks.
David A. Willson
I got a letter back from the VA in a week or so. I was given a file number, but not a claim number. That’s a start, but I wondered about the difference between a file number and a claim number. Is a file number different from a claim number? Does that mean my status is lower? I didn’t know. The letter assured me they had received my application for benefits. They sincerely desired to decide my case promptly. They have a lot of claims, so I shouldn’t hold my breath. I am paraphrasing here. They will contact me if they need additional evidence or information. They tell me that they don’t want me to contact them. They will contact me. Well, that was food for thought. I was getting a sinking feeling. They tell me that if my mailing address is different from that shown above that I should contact them. Please advise them of my new address.
Why would the address be different, I thought? I just gave them the address I’m going to live at until I die. I’ve been living at this address for 16 years. I looked at the address on the letter. It was wrong. So wrong that I couldn’t figure out how the letter got to me. They’d inverted the second and third numbers of the street address. Not good. My eyes danced to my name. My name was wrong, too. Oh, oh. I was beginning to think this process might not work as well as I’d hoped. How much faith can I place in an agency that gets my name and address wrong, when the information I provided them was correct? I suspected this agency didn’t care about me. I started to worry and fret.
I talked to Vietnam veteran friends. They told me that I was doomed if I didn’t have a service rep helping me get into the VA system. As a long time member of the VVA, I decided that I needed to get the name of a VVA rep in the Seattle office. A dear old friend who works for the national office of the VVA referred me to Roosevelt Ward and I set up an appointment with Roosevelt Ward.
I wrote another letter to the VA:
Dear T. Clark,
I know that your letter dated November 4, 2008, told me not to contact you , that you’d contact me, but I am worried that further letters you send me might not reach
me. The reason for that fear is that you got both my name and address wrong on your first letter. Those errors did not inspire confidence. My name is David A. Willson. Two
“L’s” in Willson. My address is: 23630 201st Ave SE, Maple Valley WA 98038. Not “210”—Not.
I have been diagnosed with multiple myeloma Stage II B, and my disease is aggressive. I cannot afford the cost of the thalidomide my doctor prescribed for me. That is not good. I will die sooner without it.
I had to pay $4,000.00 last Friday for my prescription. The U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs Website tells me that multiple myeloma is on the list of Agent Orange presumptive disabilities. So, as I did 13 months in Vietnam, I want the VA to pay for my medicine. That seems reasonable to me. Also, please get my name and address right.
Thanks.
Yours,
David A. Willson
I hoped that the VA would fix my name and address problem. I drove into Seattle and met with Roosevelt Ward in the VVA office on the tenth floor of the Henry Jackson Building. I spent a couple of hours with him as he patiently helped me through the forms for the VA. He gave me a serious orientation into what I had to deal with. Basically the VA had developed a series of hoops that are incredibly hard to jump through. I couldn’t answer many of the questions the VA asked. Not off the top of my head. I couldn’t answer the questions related to my marriages and divorces. Mr. Ward explained to me that my disability application wouldn’t go anywhere with the VA without copies of the documents related to my marriages and divorces. I went away from my meeting with Mr. Ward armed with the information I needed to do battle with the VA. I’d learned that the VA would not be easy to deal with.
My wife, Michele, and I spent the next Friday morning in the Seattle courthouse and the records center. The marriage records were in one building and the divorce records were in another building. I guess they didn’t want the records commingling. We did battle with ancient microfilm readers and ancient microfilm and microfiche. The film and fiche were damaged and tattered, and the faint entries from the divorce decree ledger of 1971 were almost unreadable. Without the decree number, the clerk could not retrieve the certified copy of the decree that we needed. I had to use a large magnifying glass to read the retrieval number of the divorce decree.
Around us were other sick old veterans, nearly crying tears of frustration as they tried to deal with the decrepit machines and the ruined microfilm. It was a struggle for me, too, and I had the advantage that I’d spent my thirty year career as a reference librarian working with old microfilm readers and with ancient microfilm. These old guys had never seen a microfilm reader or microfilm before today, and they weren’t doing well. They didn’t know which end was up on the microfiche.
We got our retrieval number, gave it to the clerk, and received our copy of the decrees and paid and were on our way. The other sick old vets were still struggling. Good luck to them. I saw the clerk come out from behind his counter and go over to them. It looked as though they would get professional help. Good.
Michele and I then drove down I-5 south to the Tacoma Group Health Building in rush hour traffic. We checked in with Dr. Norman’s office and completed the process of qualifying for the thalidomide.
It’s part of the Thal-Dex treatment. We went down to the pharmacy and learned that the thalidomide cost $9600.00 of which we had to pay $4,000.00 out of our pockets, due to something called “the donut hole.” This was the first I heard that Medicare had anything called a donut hole. What is it? I’d have to look into that. But for now we chanced maxing out our Visa card to pay for the needed medication. I wanted to start taking the stuff right now as my life depended on it.
We left Group Health feeling poor and bereft. Shouldn’t the VA be paying for this? Dr. Norman had informed us that some of his cancer patients did get their medication paid for by the VA. He didn’t know what process they went through to get the VA to pay for the medication. Neither did I, but I would try to find out. I knew it wouldn’t be easy. The book on Federal benefits for Veterans and Dependents says that I met the presumptive conditions for disability compensation. But when? In the fullness of time? When I got them every marriage and divorce document that they required?
Time passed. I took the thalidomide and the steroids as prescribed. Michele and I drove to American Lake and I registered for a VA medical card and got put into the VA system for medical care. That involved filling out a three page form that required detailed information about our income last year when Michele was still working fulltime as a principal, well before she quit her job to spend more time with me. Now she’s working part time, just enough to pay for our medical coverage.
Everyone I dealt with at the American Lake VA Hospital was kind and helpful. Michele and I watched the sick old vets (many of them Vietnam vets younger than I) stumble past us. Some of the veterans around us couldn’t even walk at all. The passing scene made me feel lucky. I looked good and felt good, except for the pain in my ribs, the pain in my back and the pain in my right leg. We waited about an hour while our paperwork was examined and entered into the system. Then we were called to Room B for our interview. We were informed of what was available for us and that I’d get my ID card in 7 to 10 days. We were informed that free valet parking would be available for us when we went to the VA Hospital in Seattle for the next step in this process, which would be the Agent Orange Registry. Then I was sent to Room A where my picture was taken for the ID card.
When I got home I called the Agent Orange Registry Office at the Seattle VA Hospital and was given an appointment for 10:30 Monday morning. This was on Friday. Things were moving along a bit faster. Good. I felt that I was making progress.
Saturday we got our mail. There was an 81/2 inch manila envelope from the Department of Veterans Affairs. I checked my name and address. Both were wrong, again. This is not an agency that will be easy to deal with. Why can’t they get my name and address right? How is their mail even reaching me with the address so wrong? They want service treatment records from the service department. Those records will help them determine how my claimed disabilities are connected to my military service. How? They have my name wrong, my address wrong, and they think my service treatment records will have something to do with my recently diagnosed multiple myeloma? They are incompetent or fools.
I am in a world of hurt. They prefer original records to copies. How would I have originals? The Army keeps the originals. I was a stenographer in the U.S. Army. I know how Army records keeping works. Soldiers never get the originals. The Army keeps them. That’s how it works. Included in the envelope was VA form 21-526. Many pages of mind boggling questions, questions that I’d struggled to answer with Roosevelt Ward’s help in the VVA Office. I need to call him and see if he’s got enough information now to submit the forms to the VA to move this attempt on my part to get disability for my multiple myeloma, and my medication paid for. I will also ask him for advice on how to correct my name and address with the VA. Writing them a letter didn’t work out.
Image via WikipediaOn October 11, the U.S. Embassy in Sana'a held a ceremony to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attack on the USS Cole, in which 17 American sailors were killed. Ambassador Gerald Feierstein led the Embassy community in a moment of silence in memory of those who lost their lives, and delivered remarks honoring the bravery and service of the USS Cole's crew.
Excerpt from the remarks of Ambassador Gerald Feierstein:
[W]e meet today to honor the memory of the men and women of the USS Cole who gave their lives ten years ago.
Ten years ago today, on October 12, 2000, America was at peace with the world. Aden was a thriving port, creating jobs, providing livelihoods, and giving Yemen a higher stature around the world with one of the globe's greatest natural harbors.
The USS Cole, under the command of Commander Kirk S. Lippold, set into Aden harbor for a routine fuel stop. At 11:18AM, a small craft with two suicide bombers aboard approached the side of the destroyer, rammed the vessel, and caused an explosion that put a 40' by 40' gash in the ship's port side. The blast hit the ship's galley at just before lunchtime. Seventeen sailors were killed, and 39 others were injured in the blast.
The attack on the U.S.S. Cole was not just an attack on the United States, but on civilized countries everywhere who want to trade and create prosperity and productive lives for their citizens.
Kenneth E. Clodfelter,
Hull Maintenance Technician Second Class
Richard Costelow,
Chief Electronics Technician (Surface Warfare)
Lakeina M. Francis,
Mess Management Specialist Seaman
Timothy Lee Gauna,
Information Systems Technician Seaman
Cherone Louis Gunn,
Signalman Seaman
James R. McDaniels,
Information Systems Technician Seaman
Marc Ian Nieto,
Engineman Second Class (Surface Warfare)
Ronald Scott Owens,
Electronic Warfare Technician Second Class
Lakiba Nicole Palmer,
Seaman
Joshua L. Parlett,
Engineman Fireman
Patrick Howard Roy,
Fireman
Kevin Shawn Rux,
Electronic Warfare Technician First Class
Ronchester Santiago,
Mess Management Specialist Third Class
Timothy L. Saunders,
Operations Specialist Second Class
Gary Swenchonis Jr.,
Fireman
Andrew Triplett,
Lieutenant (Junior Grade); and
Craig B. Wibberley,
Seaman
Image by nome joy via FlickrThis one excerpted from the September 11 blog post of David Huebner, the US Ambassador to New Zealand:
It is an abomination to suggest that one honors the memory of those killed on September 11, 2001 by burning holy books in the street. Religious fanaticism is no way to mourn the victims of religious fanaticism.
We Americans do not believe in outlawing or preventing free expression, no matter how foolish, craven, hateful, or offensive that speech might be. We suppress expression that sexually exploits children or directly promotes physical violence, but we go no farther.
We do not believe that expression should be suppressed just because someone offended by the expression might commit retaliatory violence. To accept potential retaliation as a rationale for suppression would gut the most deeply held of our American civic values.
So, we live with the bad apples and what crawls out of them. It’s the price of democracy. They embarrass us. They anger us. They worry us. But they don’t represent us.
It’s unfortunate that in our interconnected world the bad apples, however unrepresentative they may be, can easily command global attention. Anyone can tweet, blog, or set up a website on the internet. And traditional media outlets are too often attracted to the salacious or extreme.
[...]
As I write this, it appears that the bookburners are having second thoughts. Perhaps they’ve spent a few hours reading their Bibles or the Constitution. Or perhaps they think that they can better milk their 15 minutes of disruptive fame by stretching things out past the 11th. It doesn’t really matter. They don’t speak for the rest of us. Very few of us are like them. And everybody knows that.
Image via WikipediaSo many news stories, including the coverage of the attack in Yemen last month, simply note that no Americans died while ignoring the fact that Americans make up a tiny percentage of any embassy community. Some of my closest friends and colleagues at the embassy are Somali, Sudanese, Lebanese, Sri Lankan, Syrian, and Jordanian - and that's just in my section.
[...]
I had an hour or so to kill while my friend Joe finished up his work for the week, so he introduced me to Ty, one of our security officers there, who gave me a tour of the compound. It's the old embassy from the 1950s, so it's somewhat rundown and located on an enormous lot - we had to tour on fourwheelers, because it would have taken an hour or more to walk it all. We ended our tour at the memorials to the five people killed in the 2004 attack, between the front gate and the main consulate building. The granite blocks are placed haphazardly on the lawn, where the victims fell. Ty told me that the attackers chased one of the embassy cars, carrying an American woman, towards the gates. One of the guards grabbed the American, tossed her into the safe haven right at the entrance, and ran the other way to distract the attackers. He was killed almost instantly. The other four victims, who just happened to be outside at the time, knew where she was hiding, and they were executed over a ninety-minute period because they refused to give up her location and her life. The Saudi government gave their families permanent legal status in the Kingdom for their sacrifices. The US government gave them plaques of commemoration.
“And for Andrew Wyllie, who inconceivably, unimaginably lost his wife on her birthday and his seven-and-a-half and five-year-old children, he mentioned specifically the names of those who had been working with him in these very difficult days to recover the bodies of his wife and children,” said Clinton.
QUESTION: Can I ask you – just going back to that death toll --
MR. CROWLEY: Sure.
QUESTION: -- four U.S. official deaths, meaning the three were dependents?
MR. CROWLEY: Three were dependents.
QUESTION: Well, they actually – so they – but they count as official? I mean, I’m not sure --
MR. CROWLEY: Yeah, they’re part of the official – they were there in an official status as accompanying family members in Haiti.
QUESTION: From the --
MR. CROWLEY: But they’re not – obviously, they’re not U.S. employees.
QUESTION: Okay. But – okay, but – and the --
MR. CROWLEY: They’re children or spouses of.
QUESTION: Four Embassy workers, State Department people?
MR. CROWLEY: Yes, yes.
"Laurence Wyllie was an artist and writer who got involved in the local arts scene wherever she lived, whether DC or the DRC. Through her husband Andy’s job, they explored the world with their sons Evan and Baptiste. Last fall, they moved to Port-au-Prince, where Andy was a UN Coordinator for Humanitarian Assistance, on secondment from the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration here at State.Read more here:
As I expressed to Andy in January, the families of our staff are members of the State Department family. And each serves in his or her own way. But it is their love and support that make it possible for Foreign Service officers to do their jobs every day, far from home. Laurence, Evan, and Baptiste made Andy’s work possible. His mission was their mission. And this family’s happiness and love for each other was evident to everyone they met, and the entire State Department shares in Andy’s loss."
The active or "new" Memorial Plaque on the east side of the main entrance to the Department of State was dedicated in 1972. It bears the following inscription:
"Erected by the American Foreign Service Association in honor of those Americans who have lost their lives under heroic or other inspirational circumstances while serving the Government abroad in foreign affairs."
Policy
To include on the Plaque the names of those who have lost their lives under heroic or other inspirational circumstances distinctive to the Foreign Service. Death by accident or natural causes overseas, unless accompanied by heroic or inspirational circumstances, is not grounds for inclusion.
Eligibility
Eligibility for inclusion on the AFSA Memorial Plaque is limited to members of the Foreign Service and to U.S. citizen direct-hire employees of the five Foreign Affairs agencies serving the government abroad. In exceptional and compelling circumstances, the AFSA Governing Board may consider including other U.S. citizen direct-hire government employees serving abroad under Chief of Mission authority.
Additional Guidelines For Awards & Plaque Committee On Expanded Criteria "In the Line of Duty"
These guidelines are provided to help the Committee make judgments as to whether a death falls within the new criterion of "in the line of duty", recently established by the Governing Board, to be applied retroactively for Foreign Service personnel. The previous criteria of "heroic or inspirational" circumstances will continue to apply to all Americans serving under the Chief of Mission overseas.
• This criterion, like the earlier criteria, is meant to apply only to death outside the United States.
• Includes travel enroute to or from post
• May include death in the United States by disease or other cause that is the direct result of overseas duty (e.g. disease contracted overseas ).
• It includes any death that occurs in the active performance of official duties.
• It may include any death due to hazards distinctive to service overseas whether in the active performance of official duties or not. For instance:
• Disease related to particular circumstances of overseas assignment:
• If the danger of contracting such a disease is more than in the US;
• If death is related to the status of medical facilities.
• Crime related to particular circumstances of overseas assignment.
• Natural disasters related to particular circumstances of overseas assignment.
• The committee should consider excluding death due to negligent, reckless or selfish behavior, or death while in violation of law, on the grounds that the individual may have had an important degree of control over the situation.
