Pledge of Allegiance

["Tom Hansen" <thansen@moscow.com>]

>From a speech made by Capt. John S. McCain, US, (Ret) who represents
Arizona in the U.S. Senate:

As you may know, I spent five and one half years as a prisoner of war
during the Vietnam War. In the early years of our imprisonment, the NVA
kept us in solitary confinement or two or three to a cell.

In 1971 the NVA moved us from these conditions of isolation into large
rooms with as many as 30 to 40 men to a room. This was, as you can
imagine, a wonderful change and was a direct result of the efforts of
millions of Americans on behalf of a few hundred POWs
10,000 miles from home.

One of the men who moved into my room was a young man named Mike Christian.
Mike came from a small town near Selma, Alabama. He didn't wear a pair of
shoes until he was 13 years old. At 17, he enlisted in the US Navy. He
later earned a commission by going to Officer Training School. Then he
became a
Naval Flight Officer and was shot down and captured in 1967.

Mike had a keen and deep appreciation of the opportunities this
country-and our military-provide for people who want to work and want to
succeed. As part of the change in treatment, the Vietnamese allowed some
prisoners to receive packages from home. In some of these packages were
handkerchiefs, scarves and other items of clothing. Mike got himself a
bamboo needle.
Over a period of a couple of months, he created an American flag and sewed
on the inside of his shirt.

Every afternoon, before we had a bowl of soup, we would hang Mike's shirt
on the wall of the cell and say the Pledge of Allegiance. I know the
Pledge of Allegiance may not seem the most important part of our day now,
but I can
assure you that in that stark cell it was indeed the most important and
meaningful event.

One day the Vietnamese searched our cell, as they did periodically, and
discovered Mike's shirt with the flag sewn inside, and removed it. That
evening they returned, opened the door of the cell, and for the benefit
of all us, beat Mike Christian severely for the next couple of hours.
Then, they opened the door of the cell and threw him in. We cleaned him up
as
well as we could.

The cell in which we lived had a concrete slab in the middle on which we
slept. Four naked light bulbs hung in each corner of the room. As said,
we tried to clean up Mike as well as we could. After the excitement died
down, I looked in the corner of the room, and sitting there beneath that
dim light bulb with a piece of red cloth, another shirt and his bamboo
needle, was my friend, Mike Christian. He was sitting there with his eyes
almost shut
from the beating he had received, making another American flag.

He was not making the flag because it made Mike Christian feel better. He
was making that flag because he knew how important it was to us to be able
to
pledge allegiance to our flag and our country.

So the next time you say the Pledge of Allegiance, you must never forget
the sacrifice and courage that thousands of Americans have made to build
our nation and promote freedom around the world. You must remember our
duty, our honor, and our country.

"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to
the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with
liberty and justice for all."

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