because this is important

for us ALL to witness
(and my thoughts and prayers go out to all of us)

no politics. no preaching. just sorrow

Doleful Arrivals Open to Public
18-Year Media Ban on War Casualties' Homecomings Lifted at Dover Air Force Base

By Christian Davenport

Washington Post Staff Writer

The wind can whip cold across the tarmac at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, freezing fingers that hold the flag-draped metal transfer case in which lie the remains of a fellow service member. You do not loosen your grip. You do not shuffle your feet. You do not grimace.

If you have to yawn, you do it through your nose. You swallow your coughs and sneezes, let itches go unscratched. Keep your mouth closed, eyes straight and the blinking to an absolute minimum.

Those are the rules.

Those are the rules when it's 4 a.m. and it's dark and there's no one around.

Those were the rules last night when the ritual of welcoming home the fallen was open to the public for the first time since President George H.W. Bush instituted a ban on news coverage in 1991.................

picture: The remains of Air Force Staff Sgt. Phillip A. Myers arrive at Dover Air Force Base. He was the first slain service member welcomed home publicly since 1991. (By Nikki Kahn -- The Washington Post)

the ban HAS been lifted

and i for one couldn't be happier. well NOT happy about how the men and women i'm talking about are coming home. i'm happy their families get to decide if we, the public gets to see pictures of their arrival at dover. war is human. it has a FACE AND LOVED ONES

Media Ban Lifted For Bodies' Return
Families Will Decide Privacy Level

By Ann Scott Tyson

Washington Post Staff Writer

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates announced yesterday that he is lifting a 1991 government ban on news coverage of the return of the remains of fallen service members to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware and will let families decide whether to allow photographs and videos.

The ban, upheld by both Republican and Democratic administrations, has generated lawsuits as well as conflicting emotions on the part of military families.

"After receiving input from a number of sources, including all of the military services and the organizations representing military families, I have decided that the decision regarding media coverage of the dignified transfer process at Dover should be made by those most directly affected: on an individual basis by the families of the fallen," Gates told reporters at a Pentagon briefing. "We ought not presume to make that decision in their place."................

i don't WANT to see them

but i think we all HAVE to see them. the people coming back this way are NOT just numbers. they were brave members of our military. they had family and friends. they served OUR nation and they served ALL OF US. it makes the war(s) PERSONAL. it puts faces on our fallen heroes. we NEED to see this

Pentagon Rethinks Photo Ban on Coffins Bearing War Dead
By Ann Scott Tyson and Mark Berman
Washington Post Staff Writers
Every week, Air Force cargo jets land and taxi down the runway at Dover Air Force Base, Del., carrying the remains of fallen U.S. troops. After a chaplain says a simple prayer, an eight-man military honor guard removes the metal "transfer cases" from the planes and carries them to a mortuary van.

The flag-draped coffins are a testament to the toll of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as to the sacrifice borne by those who serve in the military and their families. But this ceremony, known as the "dignified transfer of remains" and performed nearly 5,000 times since the start of the wars, is hidden from the American public view by the Pentagon.

President Obama said last week that he is considering lifting the ban on photographs and videos at Dover, in place since the Persian Gulf War in 1991, raising fundamental questions about the impact of such images on the public morale in wartime. .............


picture: Coffins of fallen troops arrive at Dover Air Force Base, Del. The Air Force released this undated photo after a Freedom of Information Act request. (U.S. Air Force - Via Reuters)

more and more and more

proof, THEY JUST DON'T CARE about our service men and women. they just don't (and once again i must ask myself, why oh why, do people STILL enlist after ALL they must endure)
personally, i would have no issues being cremated in a facility for animals BUT i understand how everyone else is NOT like me. i understand it is NOT respectful to our men and women who have given their lives to us

War dead cremated at facility for pets

By Ann Scott Tyson

WASHINGTON — The U.S. military has, since 2001, cremated some of the remains of U.S. service members killed in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere in a Delaware facility that also cremates pets, a practice that ended Friday when the Pentagon banned the arrangement.

The facility, in an industrial park near Dover Air Force Base, has cremated about 200 service members, manager David Bose said Friday night. It uses separate crematories a few feet apart to cremate humans and animals, he added.

Pentagon officials said they do not think any humans were cremated in the pet crematory. "We have absolutely no evidence whatsoever at this point that any human remains were at all ever mistreated," Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said late Friday.

Despite Bose's estimate, officials said they do not know the number of service members cremated at the Kent County facility, identified on a billboard as Friends Forever Pet Cremation Service.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates found "the site and signage insensitive and entirely inappropriate for the dignified treatment of our fallen," Morrell said. "The families of the fallen have the secretary's deepest apology," he said.

The revelation came to light when an Army officer who works at the Pentagon traveled to Delaware on Thursday to attend the cremation of a military comrade.............