As the Iowa voters cuss and discuss the current presidential campaign leading to their state caucus, I had an opportunity this past week to meet and speak with many Iowa voters and veterans.
Coming from a Midwestern farm family, it was interesting to hear what veterans were saying about Bill Richardson and their reasons for supporting his bid for the White House.
I served in the United States Army Special Forces for nearly twelve years, including multiple tours in Vietnam, as well as assignments in South America. My years in Vietnam were some of the best and worst of my life and definitely the defining point in my life as a young man and soldier. As a result, I got to experience real courage, up close and personal while serving with my fellow "Green Berets".
After leaving the military, I went to work in the "bush pilot' business, flying for the United Nations and the International Committee for the Red Cross in conflict areas in Somalia, Rwanda, Ethiopia, The Congo and Sudan and other garden spots in central and eastern Africa. During one of these medevac mission in the Sudan in 1996, my aircraft, crew and patients were hijacked and held hostage by one of the rebel factions in the Sudanese civil war. For 38 days, the Red Cross and the rebel commander haggled over his ransom demands with no progress being made on either side. After being threatened with execution if the demands were not met, you can bet our morale was hitting rock bottom. After learning that two of our patients in the aircraft had been shot, we knew that our options had been reduced to escape or some sort of miracle.
It was at this point the "miracle" arrived in the form of Bill Richardson. My wife, Sherry, had been in Kenya trying to get the US Embassy to intervene, when one of my old Special Forces friends suggested contacting Bill Richardson. She called Richardson's office and within hours he personally called to reassure her that he was on the case and had a plan. Four days later, Bill walked into the compound where we were being held, amidst a rebel group of 14 and 15 year old AK totting boy soldiers to begin negotiating our release. Dressed in a blue blazer and gray flannel slacks in 120 degree heat, I have never seen anyone so out of place. Smiling and shaking hands with the rebels as though he were in some sort of town hall meeting, he walked up to me and said, "Hi John, I'm Bill Richardson. We're going to get you out of here."
He had no security detail, no body guards, nothing...just his lucky blue blazer, as he later told me. I was so surprised that the only thing I could think to say was, "well, we appreciate it, but don't feel bad if it doesn't work." He just looked at me a said, "This isn't a done deal and this guy isn't giving any ground, but I promise you, I will not leave here without you." And he didn't. Several hours later, the same kids who had days before been threatening us with their AK-47's, can back with one of Richardson's aides and escorted us to the table under the acacia trees where an agreement had been completed and we were formally released to Richardson and a Sudanese government delegation.
All during our captivity, I had told my crew, an Australian nurse and my Kenyan co-pilot, that someone would come for us. I was trying to keep our spirits up and I suppose still clinging to the old army credo of "no man left behind."
My point to this story is that Bill Richardson displayed the kind of moral and personal courage that we need and expect of our leaders. No other candidate has displayed courage anywhere near the scale of this man. No other candidate has the experience of this magnitude in international affairs. I wasn't the first or the last person Bill Richardson has rescued over seas and I probably will not be the last.
As veterans, we understand and value this kind of action. We know what courage looks like and we have been in its presence before and we know the "real deal" when we see it.
I hope when you go to your caucus meetings and later when you go to the polls, you will remember this story. This is the kind of leadership this country has been seeking and needing for the last eight years.
Bill Richardson did not leave me and my crew behind and he will not leave you veterans or this country behind.