LETTER FROM IRAQI

From Hugh Hewitt's Blog:

I was forwarded an e-mail from a Marine Corps Captain, which I know to be authentic, and requested permission from the Captain's friend who sent it to me to reprint it. I expect to receive it since the forwarding list was pretty long, but I haven't received that permission yet, so I am deleting the Captain's name, and the names of his children until I get the go-ahead. Here's the message, along with the intro note:

Friends,

All I could say is 'Wow' and 'Amen' when I read this latest from my friend in Iraq.

Rob
_____________________________________________
Subject: Why I missed the first day of school

Dear friends,

I'm sitting here listening to the hourly updates on the hostage situation in Chechnya. As I write this, I am looking directly at the picture that I have sent all of you. It's a picture of my girls' first day of school. On Tuesday, _____ started 5th grade, _____started 3rd grade, and my little 5 year old started Kindergarten. _____was so excited the night before that she could hardly sleep. ___told me that she rushed right into her classroom. Others in her class, like her best friend, _______, were a little more unsure. Still, our girls went to school with great expectations of what the year held in store for them.

Now I want you to imagine if what has just transpired over the last 72 hours in Chechnya happened in our country. If terrorists took over any number of our schools, and held our children hostage. What would you do? How would you feel?

Friends, this war is called The Global War on Terrorism for a reason. It's not the American War on Terrorism. Terrorists don't care what country you hail from. They don't care who they hurt. They don't care if they terrify kindergarteners, leaving them to run out of their school in only their underwear.
...
And that's why I'm here in Iraq, and why I believe we need to be over here - because what has happened in Chechnya, could very well happen in the United States if we sat back and "hunkered down" praying that the terrorists won't hit us again. (full post)