Not forgotten

Above: Korean Lt Col. Byung Goo Kim meets U.S. veterans George Dixon and Jack Krumme at KU’s Korean War Memorial dedication April 16. The new memorial is located on the hill above Potter Lake, on Memorial Drive just west of the campanile. Forty-four KU alumni, students, faculty and staff were killed in the Korean War.

Right: KU AF ROTC Cadet Eric Buschelman delivers an address during the dedication ceremony.

Doug Koch/University Relations

Comments made by KU AFROTC Cadet Eric Buschelman at the Koreran War Memorial dedication April 16

Chancellor Hemenway, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen:

Today we recognize the total and humbling sacrifice made by 44 members of our KU family, made in service to our country, so that others might have liberty. They were students, staff, faculty and alumni, serving 8,000 miles from home, and are counted among the nearly 55,000 Americans who lost their lives between June 1950 and July 1953 in the Korean War.

They hail from a University that has a storied history of support for the nation’s military. A variety of our beloved “Rock Chalk Chant” was first used as a battle cry in the Philippines during the Spanish American War. ROTC units first appeared on campus in 1918, and in 1942, KU was named an official military training center for over 500 Naval junior officer trainees. Even as the Korean War raged on, legendary Allen Field House was designated an “armory” during its construction, allowing ROTC units to drill on its floors. And in 1986, KU was the first school nationwide to dedicate an on-campus memorial to its Vietnam War dead.

And fifty years after Korea, times are not as different as they seem. Today, as before, KU students and alumni are serving their country in the new war, in Iraq, Afghanistan, and across the globe. They are officers and enlisted, men and women, putting their personal lives on hold in order to be both leaders and servants to their comrades-in-arms. Maybe just a few months ago they walked along Jayhawk Boulevard and heard the bells of the Campanile, and brought to mind those whose sacrifice it recalls. Today, cadets, midshipmen and officer candidates like myself are reminded of the legacy of those who came before us, how they carried the banner of freedom on the front lines of mankind’s struggle for liberty; how they gave their lives because their country asked them to.

Today we are students, engaged in intellectual and academic pursuits that are the envy of the world. In a few short weeks, I and my fellow cadets will receive our Officer’s Commission, and take up the yoke of service to our country. As we turn this corner, we uphold the dignity of our honored dead, and stand ready to fill their place in the ranks of America’s finest.

“ We take this obligation freely,” for these men and women strengthen and inspire us – may their struggle and sacrifice never be forgotten, and may we faithfully bear the light of their memory into the future, where with great thanks and humility, we will remember what they have done.

Thank you.