A DAY TO PAY RESPECTS REFLECT AND REMEMBER TROOPS' SACRIFICES.

Byline: STEVE VLASICH Local View

OLD Glory waving proudly in a brisk wind. A high school marching band leading a parade down Main Street. The explosion of a 21-gun salute at a veterans' cemetery. A mother sobbing uncontrollably as she places a rose on the fresh grave of her soldier son. The poignant refrain of the bugler blowing taps.

These are the sights and sounds of America as we stop and pay our respects to our fallen military men and women this Memorial Day.

How different the sights and sounds in Iraq: Heavy combat boots hitting the pavement as American troops zigzag across dangerous streets in pursuit of insurgent killers. Billows of smoke and crackling flames burning through flesh and metal. Moans of wounded American soldiers and Iraqi civilians, unrelated, except in pain. The stillness of the new dead, all orchestrated by the ominous sound of rocket-propelled grenades adding to the ugly sounds of war, marking another year of fighting in the Iraq war zone.

The history of Memorial Day dates back to 1868, when Gen. John A. Logan, commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, ordered the graves of the Civil War dead be decorated with flowers. Appropriately, the holiday was called Decoration Day. Years later, it was renamed Memorial Day.

Gen. Logan challenged his fellow Americans when he said, ``Let no ravages of time testify to coming generations that we have forgotten as a people the cost of a free and undivided republic.'' Decades have gone since then, but we as a nation choose to remember and not forget the thousands of our finest people struck down in the full prime of their lives.

Our sons and daughters who fight today in Iraq do so under extremely dangerous and difficult conditions. We who served in previous wars know that war is inherently dangerous, but Iraq is unique and truly different.

Our invasion of Iraq, coupled with bold strikes and overpowering firepower, resulted in a quick victory with minimal casualties of 150-plus killed and 500-plus wounded. But the sense of euphoria was short-lived when anti-American religious zealots organized thousands of insurgents into a deadly force whose mission was to make American forces pay dearly for their success.

While the Iraqi regular army wore uniforms and was organized in traditional military units, insurgents dressed in civilian clothes and operated in highly mobile and well-armed small groups that struck quickly, then just as quickly dissolved into the Iraqi street scene. Highly motivated, their suicide bombers and rocket-propelled grenades would return the next day on another urban street.

Given the shadowy nature of guerrilla warfare, the insurgents have added 1,000-plus kills and 6,000-plus wounded Americans for total casualties of 1,500-plus killed and 11,000-plus wounded. Iraqi streets have become killing fields for combat and combat-support troops alike as the rules of warfare changed dramatically under terms of jihad. Combat-support troops endured the same tension and risk normally reserved in past wars for only infantry.

In Iraq, all troops realized sadly that the only safe haven is the morgue.

As the insurgents' attacks escalated, so did their depravity and boldness - hundreds of Iraqi police and civilians who cooperated with American authorities to rebuild the government and infrastructure have been killed or wounded. Foreign contractors have been taken hostage and held for ransom, some beheaded when ransom requests were not met. Such renegade conduct goes beyond resistance and smacks of ordinary murder.

In the meantime, today's soldiers do what they do best - fight the enemy and curse the elements, write letters home and yearn for the day they will return to their beloved ones. They serve at great personal sacrifice to themselves and their families. In Iraq, in addition to the regular Army, reservists and National Guardsmen team up to chase down the enemy. They share the casualty figures since Iraqi bullets do not distinguish the regular soldier, the reservist or the guardsman.

The millions of Americans who fought and died to keep us and our children free ask for nothing but a moment of our reflection and remembrance. They ask for our prayers as they fight to stay alive. They ask for our continued support in providing necessary funding to provide the continuing medical services that the badly wounded will require for years in the future.

In response, millions of Americans will attend memorial services at veterans' cemeteries, houses of worship and those conducted at veterans' halls in appreciation of all who have served America in her times of need.

To all those who died young, the following poem by the English poet Laurence Binyon sums it up best:

They shall not grow old, as we that are left to grow old

Age shall not weary them, not the years condemn,

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them.