[an error occurred while processing this directive]
National/World
News
Home Page | News | Sports | Business | Politics | Opinions | Arts & Entertainment | Science/Technology | Columns | Archives | Weather | Classifieds | Obits | Subscribe | Forums | Food | Travel | Health & Fitness | People | E-mail
Us |
Sunday, November 12, 2000
Clinton cites USS Cole, Vietnam on Veterans Day
Speech at Arlington National Cemetery is followed by groundbreaking for World War II Memorial
By Lawrence L. Knutson
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - On a Veterans Day of remembrance spanning generations, President Clinton saluted the crew members of the USS Cole for heroism and sacrifice, and broke ground for a national memorial honoring Americans for their service at home and abroad during World War II.
The president also told an audience at Arlington National Cemetery that he will use his historic trip to communist Vietnam this week to heal old wounds and press for a full accounting of missing Americans.
Applause greeted 23 officers and crew members from the Cole when they stood at Clinton's request during the ceremony at the Memorial Amphitheater. The guided-missile destroyer was bombed in a suspected terrorist attack while in a Yemeni port on Oct. 12. The blast killed 17 sailors and injured 39 others.
Three of the dead were interred at Arlington in the past few weeks. Addressing the families of those killed, the president said, "We are grateful for the quiet, heroic service of your loved ones. Now they are in God's care. We mourn their loss, and we shall not rest until those who carried out this cruel act are held to account."
Clinton then went to the National Mall where he and his rival in the 1996 presidential race, former Sen. Robert J. Dole - joined by World War II veterans and officials - used 56 gold-painted shovels to symbolically break ground for the $100 million memorial. It is to honor Americans who served in uniform during the war and supported the war effort at home. "With this memorial we secure the memory of 16 million Americans, men and women who took up arms in the greatest struggle humanity has ever known," the president told a crowd of several thousand people.
Dole, wounded in Europe during the war, spoke a few moments earlier. "For some, inevitably this memorial will be a place to mourn," he said.
| Talk
about this story | Next Story
| Home |
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
© 2000,
a Scripps Howard newspaper. All rights reserved.
|
 |
 |
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
|
