11/11/2006

Editorial

On Veterans Day 2006, take time to thank a vet

This is a tough time to be an American soldier. All the more reason to thank a veteran today.

The war in Iraq is intensifying. In Afghanistan, the Taliban are suddenly resurgent. Some Army and Marine units are being sent back to Iraq for a third or even fourth tour of duty. More National Guard troops are involved in front-line fighting than in any time in recent history.

All that gives this Veterans Day even more meaning and brings home, again, the debt we owe the men and women who volunteer to serve. Their lives are filled with danger; many are paying the ultimate price — their lives.

Against that backdrop, people like Douglas Sloan are all the more inspiring.

The 40-year-old Sloan, a Charlevoix native, died last week in Afghanistan, not long after returning to the Army's 10th Mountain Division, where he had just been promoted from captain to major. He was a rising star in the division and was, friends say, excited about his new job.

Sloan was showing the man who was to replace him as captain the Korengal Valley region of northern Afghanistan when their vehicle was struck by what the Army calls an IED, or improvised explosive device, the kind of weapon that has created so much havoc in Iraq.

Three men, including Maj. Sloan, were killed.

He left behind a wife and four children, who live at Fort Drum, N.Y. He was the first Charlevoix native to die in combat since the Vietnam War.

The city put up the decorations normally reserved for Memorial Day and asked that flags be flown at half staff. A local service was planned for 11 a.m. today in the Charlevoix middle school gym or, if the weather cooperates, at Veteran's Memorial Park.

Sloan is to be buried today in Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.

Douglas Sloan epitomized the volunteer Army. He was bright and a natural leader who probably could have done well in the civilian world. But he chose the Army.

His friends described him as a fun-loving prankster in high school, and a friend told how Sloan would get kicked out of the library for being too loud, only to sneak back in again.

But in Afghanistan, he was all business.

An Army officer who toured a number of combat units there had high praise for Sloan, describing him as "truly a leader of his men and his company, setting the standard ..."

In an e-mail to Sloan's family, the officer said "He was calm, cool, decisive."

"He displayed the finest leadership I have ever observed in combat."

As the people in Charlevoix remember a fallen friend today, take a moment to think about him and, if you get the chance, thank a veteran.