“I took basic training in Hawaii,” Mr. West, 80, said Friday during a Veterans Day celebration in the Scioto County city of Portsmouth. “Then they shipped us across the pond to a little place called Korea that I had never heard of before in my life.”

            On Oct. 12, 1952, while serving with the Army’s 25^thInfantry Division, Private West, an ordinary 21-year-old native of Kentucky, did something extraordinary.

            The Medal of Honor, held by a blue ribbon draped around his neck, gave evidence of that Friday. He braved intense fire to rescue several comrades wounded in combat near Sataeri. Mr. West lost an eye as a result of being wounded himself, and he killed at least six of the enemy.

            “Private First Class West distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry above and beyond the call of duty in action against the enemy,” reads the citation that accompanied his Medal of Honor.

            I had the privilege of sitting next to Mr. West at the Hill View Retirement Center during its Veterans Day Service on November 11. He doesn’t live there, but 63 other veterans do, including Catherine Noel, who told me she served as a second lieutenant with the Navy WAVES during World War II.

            I presented Hill View with a flag flown over the U.S. Capitol in honor of all the veterans who live there. And, at the invitation of the center, I shared a few words about what makes this country of ours so great.

            Because of men like Ernie West and women like Catherine Noel, “you and I have the freedom to choose to be the person we want to be,” I said. “We have the right to chart our destiny.

            “We have the right to believe in God,” I added. “So many parts of the world don’t have that right, and that’s why so many people want to live in the United States.”

            After I returned to my seat, Mr. West leaned over and said: “That was very good.”

            I replied: “You inspired me.”

            Later, I went to the room of Dr. Miller F. Toombs, a Hill View resident who fought in World War II but was unable to attend the ceremony. About his neck, a ribbon held a medal that had been presented to him the day before to mark his induction into the Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame.

            Dr. Toombs, 86, landed on Omaha Beach not long after D Day, his son Rick told me. The Purple Heart was awarded to him because of wounds suffered in combat in Germany, as well as two Bronze Stars with the V device for valor. He later was a surgeon and chief of staff at Scioto Memorial Hospital.

            Dr. Toombs and his wife, Genevieve, thanked me for taking the time to come to the room. I told Dr. Toombs that I was there to thank him – for his service to our country.

            Then I drove to the opposite end of the Second Congressional District, arriving just in time for the singing of the National Anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance at the Sycamore Senior Center in Hamilton County.

             There, a trim 86-year-old veteran of World War II, Homer Wilson of Blue Ash, had on the private’s uniform he had worn while serving his country in combat in Europe. He told me a little about himself before I made a few remarks at the invitation of those gathered for the Veterans Day observance.

            While serving with the Army’s 97^thInfantry Division, Mr. Wilson said, he helped liberate a part of the Flossenburg concentration camp in Czechoslovakia. It’s estimated that 30,000 people died there.

            While speaking a few minutes later to the audience, I couldn’t help but recall that the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, had denied that the Holocaust happened. He had the audacity to say that while in our country to address the United Nations.

            I asked Mr. Wilson to share with the audience what he had told me.

            “I can still see those people come running toward me,” Mr. Wilson said of the starving inmates of the concentration camp. “They can’t tell me the Holocaust didn’t happen. I saw it with my own eyes.”

            Americans don’t always agree on whether fighting a war is justified. But I’m pleased that some attitudes have changed since I was a college student in the 1970s. Now, most people appreciate the service and sacrifices made by the defenders of our freedom.

            Some who put on the uniform made the ultimate sacrifice.

            After my remarks, a man approached and told me that he had visited a cemetery that day out of respect for a grandson who was killed in combat in Iraq. He could not keep from crying.      

            Years go by, but for many who lost loved ones in military service, the tears on their faces remain fresh. God bless them.

            And may God bless every single veteran of this great nation.