Letter from SGT Walter J. Rausch and 1st Platoon of the 101st Airborne

Last week, milblogger SGT Hook posted this letter from an anonymous Army sergeant serving with the 101st Airborne in Iraq. OpSec - you know. SGT Hook (not his real name) recently acquired SGT Rausch's permission for a proper attribution.

Mom,

Be my voice. I want this message heard. It is mine and my platoon’s to the
country. A man I know lost his legs the other night. He is in another company in
our batallion. I can no longer be silent after watching the sacrifices made by
Iraqis and Americans everyday.Send it to a congressman if you have to. Send it
to FOX news if you have to. Let this message be heard please…

My fellow Americans, I have a task for those with the courage and fortitude
to take it. I have a message that needs not fall on deaf ears. A vision the
blind need to see. I am not a political man nor one with great wisdom. I am just
a soldier who finds himself helping rebuild a country that he helped liberate a
couple years ago.I have watched on television how the American public questions
why their mothers, fathers, brothers, and sisters are fighting and dying in a
country 9000 miles away from their own soil. Take the word of a soldier, for
that is all I am, that our cause is a noble one. The reason we are here is one
worth fighting for. A cause that has been the most costly and sought after cause
in our small span of existence on our little planet. Bought in blood and paid
for by those brave enough to give the ultimate sacrifice to obtain it. A right
that is given to every man, woman, and child I believe by God. I am talking of
freedom.

Freedom. One word but yet countless words could never capture it’s true
meaning or power. “For those who have fought for it, freedom has a taste the
protected will never know.” I read that once and it couldn’t be more true. It’s
not the average American’s fault that he or she is “blind and deaf” to the taste
of freedom. Most American’s are born into their God given right so it is all
they ever know. I was once one of them. I would even dare to say that it isn’t
surprising that they take for granted what they have had all their life. My
experiences in the military however opened my eyes to the truth.

Ironically you will find the biggest outcries of opposition to our cause
from those who have had no military experience and haven’t had to fight for
freedom. I challenge all of those who are daring enough to question such a noble
cause to come here for just a month and see it first hand. I have a feeling that
many voices would be silenced.

I watched Cindy Sheehan sit on the President’s lawn and say that America
isn’t worth dying for. Later she corrected herself and said Iraq isn’t worth
dying for. She badmouthed all that her son had fought and died for. I bet he is
rolling over in his grave.

Ladies and gentleman I ask you this. What if you lived in a country that
wasn’t free? What if someone told you when you could have heat, electricity, and
water? What if you had no sewage systems so human waste flowed into the streets?
What if someone would kill you for bad-mouthing your government? What if you
weren’t allowed to watch TV, connect to the internet, or have cell phones unless
under extreme censorship? What if you couldn’t put shoes on your child’s feet?

You need not to have a great understanding of the world but rather common
sense to realize that it is our duty as HUMAN BEINGS to free the oppressed. If
you lived that way would you not want someone to help you????
The Iraqi’s pour into the streets to wave at us and when we liberated the cities during the
war they gathered in the thousands to cheer, hug and kiss us. It was what the
soldier’s in WW2 experienced, yet no one questioned their cause!! Saddam was no
better than Hitler! He tortured and killed thousands of innocent people. We are
heroes over here, yet American’s badmouth our President for having us
here.

Every police station here has a dozen or more memorials for officers that
were murdered trying to ensure that their people live free. These are husbands,
fathers, and sons killed every day. What if it were your country? What would
your choice be? Everything we fight for is worth the blood that may be shed. The
media never reports the true HEROISM I witness everyday in the Iraqi’s. Yes
there are bad one’s here, but I assure you they are a minuscule percent. Yet
they are a number big enough to cause worry in this country’s future.I have
watched brave souls give their all and lose thier lives and limbs for this
cause. I will no longer stand silent and let the “deaf and blind” be the only
voice shouting. Stonewall Jackson once said, “All that I have, all that I am is
at the service of the country.” For these brave souls who gave the ultimate
sacrifice, including your son Cindy Sheehan, I will shout till I can no longer.
These men and women are heroes. Their spirit lives on in their military and they
will never be forgotten. They did not die in vain but rather for a cause that is
larger than all of us.

My fellow countrymen and women, we are not overseas for our country alone
but also another. We are here to spread democracy and freedom to those who KNOW
the true taste of it because they fight for it everyday. You can see the desire
in their eyes and I am honored to fight alongside them as an Infantryman in the
101st Airborne.

Freedom is not free, but yet it is everyone’s right to have.

Ironic isn’t it? That is why we are here. Though you will always have the
skeptics, I know that most of our military will agree with this message. Please,
at the request of this soldier spread this message to all you know. We are in
Operation Iraqi Freedom and that is our goal. It is a cause that I and thousands
of others stand ready to pay the ultimate sacrifice for because, Cindy Sheehan,
freedom is worth dying for, no matter what country it is! And after the world is
free only then can we hope to have peace.


SGT Walter J. Rausch and 1st Platoon
Charlie Co. 2/327 Infantry Regiment
101st Airborne Division (Air Assault)

- Eric