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 Flag Day honors American ideals, sacrifices By Donna Miles
                American Forces Press Service
 WASHINGTON, - Military personnel at Dover Air  Force Base, Del., performed their duties with solemn respect over the past  several weeks as U.S. servicemembers killed in Afghanistan returned to U.S.  soil. Military "carry teams" marched in slow, measured  steps as they carried their fallen comrades from the aircraft and transferred  them to awaiting mortuary transfer vehicles. 
The fallen servicemembers – representing all services,  all ranks and every corner of America – all returned home in transfer cases  draped in the American flag. Today, the United States observes National Flag Day, an  annual tribute to the American flag, the ideals it stands for and the  sacrifices made to preserve them. President Woodrow Wilson recognized during his first Flag  Day address in 1915 that the freedoms the U.S. flag stands for weren't and  never would be free. "The lines of red are lines of blood, nobly and  unselfishly shed by men who loved the liberty of their fellowship more than  they loved their own lives and fortunes," he said. "God forbid that  we should have to use the blood of America to freshen the color of the  flag." But American blood has spilled time and time again to  preserve American liberties, most recently, in Afghanistan. 
Just as during heartbreaking ramp ceremonies in  Afghanistan before fallen servicemembers return, and during dignified-transfer  ceremonies at Dover, history is filled with examples of how the flag has  inspired Americans through their proudest as well as darkest days as a symbol of  patriotism, strength and resilience. It provided strength to now-retired Air Force Col. David  M. Roeder as he and more than 50 other Americans held hostage in Iran for 444  days from 1979 to 1980 watched their captors taunt them by carrying garbage  wrapped in the U.S. flag. "When someone attacks the American flag, it's  because they recognize all that it represents and the greatness of this  country," Roeder said, thinking back over the experience. It inspired retired Marine Chief Warrant Officer Charles  W. "Bill" Henderson as he watched the flag-draped remains of Marine  Cpl. Robert V. McMaugh carried from the rubble after the bombing of the U.S.  Embassy in Beirut in 1983. "Yes, it is just a piece of cloth," Henderson  later reflected. "But what it represents are the lives of thousands of  Americans who have given everything for this nation – who ask nothing in return  but felt an obligation of duty to their country." Few Americans will forget their shared sense of pride as  they watched televised images of three firefighters raising an American flag  over the World Trade Center ruins just hours after the Sept. 11, 2001,  terrorist attacks. Army Capt. Joe Minning and his fellow New York Army  National Guardsmen, many of them New York City firemen and police officers,  were sifting through the rubble in a desperate search for survivors that day  when they paused to watch Old Glory rise. "Seeing the flag raised above all of the rubble and  ruins of the World Trade Center instilled a new sense of pride in me for our  country," Minning recalled. The flag continued to inspire Minning and tens of  thousands of other U.S. servicemembers during deployments to Iraq and  Afghanistan. In April, it provided strength to Sal Corma, who left his  hospital bed following a stroke and amputation against his doctor's orders to  see the body of his son, Army 1st Lt. Salvatore S. Corma II, who had been  killed in Afghanistan, arrive at Dover at 2 a.m. on an April morning. Less than  three weeks ago, he and his wife, Trudy, recognized a Memorial Day that had  taken on a deeply personal meaning by placing 60 American flags around their  home. Today, as operations intensify in Afghanistan, troops at  Forward Operating base Baylough in Afghanistan's Zabul province have an  enduring reminder of the ideals they are fighting for. High on their  observation post overlooking a mountain value, standing proudly amid a pile of sandbags,  Old Glory waves in the breeze.
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