Charles Dickens’ classic “A Christmas Carol” is an entertainment staple of the holiday season. In the story, a wealthy and miserly Ebenezer Scrooge is visited on Christmas Eve by a procession of three ghosts who accompany him through scenes of Christmases past, present, and future. It is a story that resonates with us.
In a Christmas past, I found myself searching house ...
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Years ago when I was a young Army lieutenant, my reconnaissance platoon was preparing to conduct a night-time helicopter insertion far behind enemy lines to seek out intelligence critical for a large-scale operation to be conducted 48 hours later. The operation was high risk. That night as I back-briefed my Troop commander over the hood of a Humvee in the German woods, I expressed my concern about ...
As we reported earlier, Veteran Eric Bivins committed suicide after being unable to find the support and care he needed from the Department of Veterans Affairs (“the VA”).
Found below are a moving – AND MOST SAD – series of videos by Kimi Bivins, Eric’s spouse which describes her experiences with the VA in attempting to find the proper care for her husband.
Kimi’s experiences with the VA are not dissimilar from my own and countless of others who have ...
Continue Reading →As a military veteran with PTSD and TBI, I encounter many brave warriors who have had difficulties getting proper treatment from the Department of Veterans Affairs (“the VA”).
All of these conversations have been disturbing and caused me to relive the terrible ordeals I faced when dealing with the VA. Nothing quite compared to the disturbing letter I received from Debbie Lee, the founder of America’s Mighty Warriors (“AMW”).
In her open letter (summarized and slightly edited below), Debbie ...
Continue Reading →Military suicides, particularly among Veterans, show no signs of abating. Despite recent efforts by Secretary of Shulkin of the Department of Veterans Affairs (“the VA”), the “silent wounds of war” follow our Veterans into civilian life.
In a most informative report published by CNN, Veteran suicides account for roughly 20% of all suicides in the United States.
SFTT has reported on this disturbing trend for several years, but little has been done to curb Veteran ...
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Stand for the Troops (“SFTT”) is mourning the passing of Lieutenant General (ret.) Hal Moore. Every generation shares its own greatest men and women and LTG Moore was one of them. He is best known for his combat leadership as the commander of 1-7 Cavalry in 1965 Battle of Ia Drang memorialized in the movie We Were Soldiers where Moore was played by actor Mel Gibson. LTG Moore ...
Continue Reading →Not long ago I had the opportunity to represent the warrior-run non-profit One Mind for Research at a Hollywood Telethon to raise money for Veteran charities. My role in the production was a live, 90-second interview on stage with actor and host Alan Alda. We talked very briefly about my experience as a wounded warrior with a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and a Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Mr. Alda asked me: what did I expect when I returned home from a ...
Continue Reading →COLIN AND KAREN ARCHIPLEY ARE TWO-TIME NATIONAL TREASURES!
The first occasion was defending the nation as a Marine Corps husband-wife team. Colin was not only a Marine Rifleman, he was a Marine noncommissioned officer. While media pundits and politicians focus on super fighter jets, unmanned drones and the Hollywood virtues of thermobaric Hellfire missiles, combat soldiers know that the ...
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