Corpus Christi Caller Times Editorials - Keep faith with the fallen

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Friday, October 27, 2000

Keep faith with the fallen
U.S. must learn, and act upon, lessons of the Cole tragedy.

Happily situated as we are in a nation that is stable, prosperous and for the most part at peace with itself, it is all too easy for us to lose sight of just how strange, volatile and sometimes terrifying the world beyond the borders of this happy land can be.
   The devastating terror bombing of the USS Cole on Oct. 12 in the Yemeni port of Aden drove home that point with brutal impact - and the Coastal Bend has, sadly, felt its force.
   This week residents of two area communities are saying farewell to two young men killed in the explosion that ripped through the Cole.
   Funeral Mass for Petty Officer Ronchester Santiago, 22, will be celebrated at 10 a.m. today at St. Gertrude's Catholic Church in Kingsville, with burial to follow in Santa Gertrudis Cemetery. In Rockport, funeral services were held Thursday for Fireman Gary Graham Swenchonis Jr. Burial is to take place at 11 a.m. today at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio.
   In the days immediately ahead, families and friends of these two young men will struggle with their loss and seek to come to terms with it.
   But there is urgent work that remains to be done even as the sailors of the Cole work relentlessly in stifling heat to prepare their crippled ship to be transported back to the United States for repair.
   The most urgent task, of course, is to heighten security for Navy vessels and other U.S. detachments and commands in the region.
   To all indications, that is being done. All of the ships of the Navy's 5th Fleet on station there have been ordered out of port and will remain at sea indefinitely. Other forces are taking similar measures.
   Another piece of business will of necessity be both painstaking and painful: a thorough review of the attack on the Cole and the security lapses, if any, that allowed it to succeed. Last week, Defense Secretary William Cohen appointed a recently retired admiral, Harold W. Gehman, fomer chief of U.S. Joint Forces Command, and Army Gen. William Crouch, who was Army deputy chief of staff before his retirement in 1999. If there have been lapses, they must be exposed and corrected. Nothing less will suffice.
   Finally, there is the matter of identifying the attackers and punishing those who sent them on their terrible errand. This time the counter-blow must be conceived and delivered with cold calculation. There must be no replay of the Clinton administration's decision in 1998, following the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, to launch cruise missiles against what turned out to be an innocuous pharmaceuticals plant in Sudan. The U.S. military's counter-blow must be swift, devastating - and accurate.
   None of these measures will ease the pain of the families and friends of those who perished in the attack on the Cole. They will, however, serve notice that we do not forget the young men and women who willingly place themselves in harm's way in the service of their nation - and that those responsible will have no rest from this day forward.

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