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Memorial Day 2008 at the Sacramento Valley National Cemetery

by Bill Durston, M.D.

Delivered at the Sacramento Valley National Cemetery, on Memorial Day, May 26, 2008.

Memorial Day, 2008

Speech by Guest Speaker Dr. Bill Durston at the Memorial Day Ceremony
Sacramento Valley National Cemetery
Dixon, California
May 26, 2008

It’s an honor for me to be asked to speak at this Memorial Day ceremony. I’d like to thank Jim Harris and the other Friends of the Sacramento Valley National Cemetery for asking me to share my thoughts with you about the significance of this Memorial Day, and I’d like to thank all of you for attending this event to pay your respects to our soldiers killed in war, to our living veterans, and to our men and women presently serving in the Armed Forces.

The tradition of setting aside a day to honor U.S. soldiers killed in war began after the Civil War, when the annual day of remembrance was called “Decoration Day.” People started calling this day of remembrance “Memorial Day” after the Second World War. Memorial Day was designated an official holiday in 1967, which coincidentally, was the same year that I graduated from high school and volunteered to join the U.S. Marines, at the height of the Vietnam War.

My father served in combat in World War II as a bombardier-navigator flying in B17’s over Europe. My mother’s brother was killed in combat in World War II. I served in combat in Vietnam as a patrol leader with the Marines 3rd Force Reconnaissance Company. My experience in Vietnam was certainly different from my father’s experience in World War II, and both of us clearly had a very different experience than my uncle who was killed in World War II. I know that many of you present today, and many of those buried in this cemetery before us, have all experienced war, in still different ways. I don’t think that anyone can claim to really understand war, and I certainly don’t come to speak to you today pretending to be an expert on war or a war hero. I do speak, though, as someone who has personally experienced war in one of its many forms.

Jim suggested that I share with you some of my personal experiences from Vietnam. It’s hard for me to talk about that war, just as it’s hard for my father to talk about World War II, and I’m not going to tell you any war stories. I will tell you a story, though, that my Marine Corps boot camp drill instructor told me.

Marine Corp drill instructors aren’t known for their sensitivity. Our drill instructor, Sergeant Williams, was one of the toughest people I have ever met, both physically and mentally. He demanded a lot of us recruits, but he never demanded more of us than he demanded of himself, and he and I developed a deep mutual respect. After long days of training, Sergeant Williams would sometimes show a softer side and come into our barracks just before taps and tell us a story. I still remember the story he told us one night about the drill instructor who went up to the recruit on the day of his graduation from boot camp and said, “Private, I know I’ve been hard on you, and I expect that when I die, you’ll probably come and spit on my grave.” And the private replied, “No sir, I won’t do that. I promised myself that after I get out of the service, I’m never going to stand in line again.”

I never saw Sergeant Williams again after boot camp, and I was later told that he had been killed in Vietnam. I don’t know where he’s buried, but if I did, I would gladly stand in line to honor him for his service to our country and for the lessons he taught me.

Over the years, Memorial Day has evolved into something much different from what it was originally intended to be. It’s now the last day of a three day weekend, celebrated by many people as the beginning of summer, with picnics and ball games, the running of the Indianapolis 500, and in Sacramento, the annual Jazz Jubilee. I personally think it’s OK to enjoy the Memorial Day weekend, as long as we take some time to stop and consider what Memorial Day is really about.

Memorial Day is a day to honor the U.S. service men and women killed in war, including more than 200,000 killed in the American Revolution, more than 600,000 killed in the Civil War, more than 100,000 killed in World War I, more than 300,000 killed in World War II, more than 35,000 killed in the Korean War, almost 60,000 killed in Vietnam, and now more than 4,000 killed in Afghanistan and Iraq. It’s also a day to honor the other soldiers who risked their lives in the service of our country, but who thankfully were not killed prematurely in war, and who went on to live out their lives and pass away of other causes. And finally, it’s a day to honor the veterans still alive, and the Americans still serving in uniform, who have pledged to put their lives on the line if necessary to support and defend the U.S. Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

And just how do we honor the veterans who have died, the veterans still living, and the soldiers still serving in uniform. Clearly, we should do more than just go to a picnic or a ballgame, watch the Indy 500, or go to the Jazz Jubilee on Memorial Day weekend. I commend Jim Harris and the Friends of the Sacramento Valley National Cemetery, Dean Moline and the other cemetery staff, and the National Cemetery Administration of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for creating this beautiful, dignified, and peaceful final resting place for veterans who have seen much less peaceful places during their lives. And I commend all of you for taking the time this morning to honor our veterans and our men and women presently serving in the Armed Forces.

I believe, though, that we should pledge this Memorial Day to do still more. I believe that we can best honor those who have died in the service of our country by pledging ourselves to do whatever we can to support and defend the U.S. Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, not just on Memorial Day, but every day. And I believe that we can best honor our men and women currently in uniform by never sending them to risk their lives in a war started on false pretenses or a conflict for which there is no military solution; by outfitting them with the very best equipment when they must serve in harms way; by providing their families with support they need to ease the hardship of a spouse or a parent being taken away from the home; by providing them with the very best medical care when they return injured, either physically or psychologically; and by giving them all the education and training they need to transition back into civilian life after their military service is over.

I was fortunate myself to return safely from the war in Vietnam, to go on and marry my high school sweetheart, Diane, to have two wonderful children, and, with the help of the GI Bill, to become an emergency physician. I experienced one aspect of war as a young Marine in Vietnam. I’ve since studied war from the point of view of a medical doctor. I recently came across a remarkable statement written in 1868 by a group of doctors who had studied the history of war up to that point. They wrote, “To accept war as an inevitable evil would be a blasphemy against humankind and the Creator and would mean renouncing any idea of progress.”

We’re here today to honor the U.S. soldiers killed in war. We’re not here to honor or glorify war itself. I believe that ultimately, the best way for the entire human race to honor those killed in war is to abolish war altogether.

The Vietnam War Memorial in Washington DC includes the names of all 58,000 U.S. soldiers killed in that war, beginning with the first soldier killed in Vietnam, and ending with the last. There are presently about 3,000 veterans buried in this cemetery before us, including four soldiers killed in the ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. When this cemetery is completed, it will have room for over 300,000 graves. I look forward to a time when every new gravesite in every national cemetery across the country will be reserved for a veteran who died of old age, and I look forward to the Memorial Day when we will commemorate the death of the very last human on earth to ever be killed in war.