What does it mean to be a veteran?

By KARLA POMEROY
Big Horn County Commissioner Jerry Ewen gave a poignant speech last Wednesday as part of Cloud Peak Middle School’s annual Veterans Day program.
Along with honoring his fellow veterans, the Vietnam veteran talked to the students about what it means to be a veteran. Ewen said as an Army medevac helicopter pilot he was part of DUSTOFF (Dedicated Unhesitating Service To Our Fighting Forces(.
“We flew into the battlefield, sometimes while the fight was still going on to rescue the wounded,” he said, adding that the casualty rate for DUSTOFF crews was about 30 percent.
“I flew over 1,100 missions during my year in Vietnam … rescued over 2,300 people and was wounded just days before I was scheduled to come home. Service to my country in combat is what makes me a veteran, but being a veteran comes to mean so much more than serving in combat,” Ewen said.
He shared two stories to show the students what it means to him to be a veteran. The first story was about his crew chief in Vietnam. “We were together on some of the most dangerous mission, missions that still visit me in nightmares,” he said. One mission in particular he spoke about. He said they had to hover over the jungle for about 10 minutes to hoist a wounded soldier into the helicopter since they could not land. During that time, he said, “the bad guys have a lot of time to get you into their sights. That is what they did that day.”
They were under fire and at one point his crew chief hollered that he could see a “bad guy” and asked “What should I do.” Ewen said he hollered back, “Shoot him, shoot him,” and he did.
The two never spoke of the incident until this year when he reconnected with his crew chief and he asked him about that day. He was reluctant, Ewen said, but finally told him that that particular mission was “one of his worst memories.” He said the enemy soldier his crew chief shot was close enough for him to look into his eyes.
“Being a veteran means being asked to do things that other people, people who have not been there cannot imagine, and it means carrying the emotional scars from those things for the rest of their lives,” Ewen said.
The second story is about a lady named Carrie Pepper who wrote to Ewen over a year ago, seeking someone that could give her a horse ride.
“She had old family ties to this area, she told me, and had visited here and gone for a horse ride with her father when she was very young,” Ewen said. In fact, her father had grown up on the same ranch he did — on the “Pepper Place.”
He said in visiting with Carrie he learned her brother was a Marine and was killed in action while serving in Vietnam.
“One thing you need to understand about veterans is that we have a very strong bond with each other. When you are in combat you don’t fight for any lofty political ideas. You fight for each other, and you fight to keep your brothers in combat alive, and you fight to stay alive yourself … I considered Carrie’s brother to also be my brother, not a blood relationship you understand but a relationship of brothers in arms … It is this relationship of brothers that gave us the motivation to fly into hell every day, knowing that we might die in the process, rather than let one of our brothers die while they waited for us.”
He invited Carrie to come out and he would take her for ride.
He said he considers Carrie his little sister now.
“To be a veteran means that I am connected with other people who served in a way that is unique and special and it is available from nowhere else. To be a veteran means that I am part of a family that includes not only those who lived and their families but also the loved ones of those who were lost,” Ewen said.
He told the students that considering the cost of service he would choose to serve again if he had it do over again adding that he is proud of his service and proud of those he served with.
He said the sacrifices of veterans willing to lay down their lives to make this country great are honored during Veterans Day, and the sacrifices of the families of veterans should also be honored.
The program also included a reading of “Flanders Field,” a show of American symbols and performances by the fifth-grade class and middle school choir, the seven- and eighth-grade band and sixth-grade class choir. A flag folding demonstration concluded the ceremony with the attending veterans treated to cookies and punch.