Stan, mourning US military personnel who died while serving is what Memorial Day is all about. Veterans Day is for all Veterans who served in the US military, peacetime or wartime, and that includes the KIA and those who repaired the tanks, typed the orders, did the intelligence work, supplied the armaments.

"Veterans Day honors all who have served in the U.S. military, not just those who have served in combat. It is a day to thank and honor all American veterans, both living and deceased, who served honorably during wartime or peacetime."

So I sort of think of Memorial Day as solemn. Veterans' Day as that raucous parade down Constitution Avenue in 1982 led by Gen. Westmorland to celebrate the opening of the Vietnam Memorial (and the return to "respectability" of the Vietnam era Veteran - grudgingly so by the Ho Chi Minh loving media):

[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]
[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]
[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]

(And I missed that parade. I came back from Africa in late September 1982 and got married, attended the hearings on putting a statue and flag on the memorial - an amazing experience, the room filled with big angry men outraged at Jane Fonda. I wanted to stay for the parade but was told that if I were gone "more than three weeks," I wasn't necessary. So new wife represented me. And the 6 page letter she wrote to me in French on attending the reading of the names at the Cathedral to the march itself was so evocative that I translated it three times in three different ways for the Marine Gunney Sgt in Brazzaville. Perhaps I'll post it.)

Last edited by Argo44; 11/08/25 08:51 PM.
Baluch are not Brahui, Brahui are Baluch