WILL GIs GET PURPLE HEART?
Will they get the Purple Heart?
That’s the question that goes to the core of the matter.
The two soldiers gunned down in front of a Little Rock recruiting station Monday, will they be awarded the Purple Heart?
You might not have heard the story. It got surprisingly little press coverage. A terrorist guns down an abortion doctor on Sunday, and it’s big news. A terrorist guns down two soldiers on Monday, and it’s not that big a story.
It was about 10:30 Monday morning beneath a big red, white and blue sign that read, “Army and Navy Career Center.” The two privates were outside getting some fresh air.
Both had recently graduated from basic training and come home for a few weeks to help with hometown recruiting before they went to their permanent duty stations.
Private William Long was 23 and Private Quinton Ezeagwula was 18.
And Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad was 23.
And as the two GIs stood there in the Arkansas sun, the Muslim pulled up, rolled out and opened fire. He had loaded his car with three guns, including the SKS assault rifle he used on the soldiers, and had set out to kill somebody in the military. The more the better, he later told police.
Why?
Because of his religion.
Like four Muslim converts arrested two weeks ago for allegedly wanting to blow up a synagogue and shoot down a military plane, the man formerly known as Carlos Bledsoe believed his jailhouse Islam required him to kill non-Muslims.
So he did.
Private Long was dead by the time he got to the hospital. Private Ezeagwula is in critical condition.
Abdulhakin Mujahid Muhammad wanted to avenge his Muslim brothers in Iraq and Afghanistan. He wanted to shed some infidel blood. He wanted to take up arms against the country of his birth.
Now he is charged with murder and terroristic threat. Previously he was under investigation by the FBI, and had been arrested in Yemen for being in the country fraudulently.
But this isn’t about him and his twisted “faith.”
This is about how this country is going to treat Private Ezeagwula and Private Long. Will the government see them as victims or casualties? Were they victims of a random crime by a street thug, or were they soldiers killed in the line of duty by an enemy?
In short, do they get the Purple Heart or not?
The Purple Heart is awarded to GIs wounded in a combat zone as the result of enemy action.
And that’s where politics may get in the way of giving these soldiers and their families the medal they have earned. Because nobody in our government is willing to acknowledge that our own streets are a combat zone or that those who attack us are our enemies.
The pressure will be on to see this as a street crime, something separate from the now-disavowed War on Terror, and the murderer will be called a criminal, not a terrorist. In the name of political correctness, and the White House’s repackaging of Islam’s attacks against us, this is apt to be swept under the rug.
But it shouldn’t be.
These two young men were attacked in the service of their country. Private Long died for his country. They were casualties in a war that saw its bloodiest day on September 11. They were attacked on American territory by an enemy of our nation, just as assuredly as were the sailors and soldiers at Pearl Harbor so many years ago.
There is no difference between being shot to death by a Muslim terrorist on an American street and being shot to death by a Muslim terrorist on an Iraqi street. Both are acts of war.
And both should be commemorated in the same way.
By the awarding of the Purple Heart.
These men served their country. Now we will see if their country has the grit to serve them.
- by Bob Lonsberry © 2009
