Pat Tillman

[BLUEHAWK]

Thank you for doing your duty for our people and our nation.

See ya in the sweet by and by...

We'll have a talk or more that day on earthly concepts of offense and defense having to do with balls being in certain courts.

[darrels joy]

Privileged to Serve
In this war, not only the sons and daughters of the poor are enlisting.

Friday, April 23, 2004 1:45 p.m. EDT

(Editor's note: This column appeared on July 12, 2002. Pat Tillman died in combat in Afghanistan yesterday.)

Maybe he was thinking Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. Maybe it was visceral, not so much thought as felt, and acted upon. We don't know because he won't say, at least not in public. Which is itself unusual. Silence is the refuge of celebrities caught in scandal, not the usual response of those caught red-handed doing good.

All we know is that 25-year-old Pat Tillman, a rising pro football player (224 tackles in 2000 as a defensive back for the Arizona Cardinals, a team record) came back from his honeymoon seven weeks ago and told his coaches he would turn down a three-year, $3.6 million contract and instead join the U.S. Army. For a pay cut of roughly $3.54 million dollars over three years.

On Monday morning, Pat Tillman "came in like everyone else, on a bus from a processing station," according to a public information officer at Fort Benning, Ga., and received the outward signs of the leveling anonymity of the armed forces: a bad haircut, a good uniform and physical testing to see if he is up to the rigors of being a soldier. Soon he begins basic training. And whatever else happened this week--Wall Street news, speeches on the economy--nothing seems bigger, more important and more suggestive of change than what Pat Tillman did.

Those who know him say it's typical Tillman, a surprise decision based on his vision of what would be a good thing to do. When he was in college he sometimes climbed to the top of a stadium light tower to think and meditate. After his great 2000 season he was offered a $9 million, five-year contract with the St. Louis Rams and said thanks but no, he was happy with the Cardinals.

But it was clear to those who knew Mr. Tillman that after September 11 something changed. The attack on America had prompted a rethinking. Len Pasquarelli of ESPN reported last May that the "free-spirited but consummately disciplined" starting strong safety told friends and relatives that, in Mr. Pasquarelli's words, "his conscience would not allow him to tackle opposition fullbacks where there is still a bigger enemy that needs to be stopped in its tracks." Mr. Tillman's agent and friend Frank Bauer: "This is something he feels he has to do. For him, it's a mindset, a duty."





"I'm sorry, but he is not taking inquiries," said the spokeswoman at Fort Benning. She laughed when I pressed to speak to someone who might have seen Mr. Tillman or talked to him. Men entering basic training don't break for interviews, she said. Besides, "he has asked not to have any coverage. We've been respecting his wishes. And kinda hoping he'd change his mind." Mr. Tillman would, of course, be a mighty recruiting device. The Army might have enjoyed inviting television cameras to record his haircut, as they did with Elvis. But Mr. Tillman, the Fort Benning spokesman says, "wants to be anonymous like everyone else."
Right now he has 13 weeks of basic training ahead of him, then three weeks of Airborne School, and then, if he makes it, Ranger School, where only about a third of the candidates are accepted. "It's a long row," said the Fort Benning spokesman, who seemed to suggest it would be all right to call again around Christmas. Until then he'll be working hard trying to become what he wants to become.

Which I guess says it all.

Except for this. We are making a lot of Tillmans in America, and one wonders if this has been sufficiently noted. The other day friends, a conservative intellectual and his activist wife, sent a picture of their son Gabe, a proud and newly minted Marine. And there is Abe, son of a former high aide to Al Gore, who is a lieutenant junior grade in the Navy, flying SH-60 Seahawk helicopters. A network journalist and his wife, also friends, speak with anguished pride of their son, in harm's way as a full corporal in the Marines. The son of a noted historian has joined up; the son of a conservative columnist has just finished his hitch in the Marines; and the son of a bureau chief of a famous magazine was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Army last month, on the day he graduated from Princeton.

As the Vietnam-era song said, "Something's happening here." And what it is may be exactly clear. Some very talented young men, and women, are joining the armed forces in order to help their country because, apparently, they love it. After what our society and culture have been through and become the past 30 years or so, you wouldn't be sure that we would still be making their kind, but we are. As for their spirit, Abe's mother reports, "Last New Year's, Abe and his roommate [another young officer] were home and the topic came up about how little they are paid [compared with] the kids who graduated from college at the same time they did and went into business.

"Without missing a beat the two of them said, 'Yeah--but we get to get shot at!' and raised their beer bottles. No resentment. No anger. Just pure . . . testosterone-laden bravado."





The Abes and Gabes join a long old line of elders dressed in green, blue, gray, white, gold and black. Pat Tillman joins a similar line, of stars who decided they had work to do, and must leave their careers to do it. They include, among others, the actors Jimmy Stewart, Clark Gable and Tyrone Power in World War II; sports stars Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio in the same war; and quarterback Roger Staubach in Vietnam. It is good to see their style return, and be considered noble again.
And good to see what appears to be part of, or the beginning of, a change in armed forces volunteering. In the Vietnam era of my youth it was poor and working-class boys whom I saw drafted or eagerly volunteering. Now more and more I see the sons and daughters of the privileged joining up.

That is a bigger and better story than usually makes the front page. Markets rise and fall, politicians come and go, but that we still make Tillmans is headline news.

Ms. Noonan is a contributing editor of The Wall Street Journal and author of "A Heart, a Cross, and a Flag" (Wall Street Journal Books/Simon & Schuster), a collection of post-Sept. 11 columns, which you can buy from the OpinionJournal bookstore. Her column appears Thursdays.

[Hardball]

It comes with the territory...that of being Managing Editor of the Veterans Journal... I can build ads for our online paper in any way I see fit....

www.veteransjournal.net

HARDBALL

[darrels joy]

Cool!

[frisco-kid]

Pat Tillman was a local boy from San Jose in the South Bay Area. Been hearing the news all day today. I was touched. This has to be the epitome of Patriotism. To put his football career on hold, and give up that paycheck, to serve his country was astounding enough, but to volunteer for the combat arms, join an elite combat unit, put himself in harms way, and pay the ultimate price is mind-boggling, tragic, inspirational, and humbling all at the same time. It's also reassuring to be reminded that we still have this caliber of young Americans. Like many of us on this site, and the ones that continue to serve in harm's way, he is truly one of the best of his generation. My deepest sympathies to his family.

AIRBORNE ALL THE WAY, PAT!

[usmcsgt65]

What an American. Our prayers to his family.

[sn-e3]

Truely a fine young man. like all our troops in all branchs of the service the Best of the Best

[David]

A true Patriot. God bless his wife and family left behind.

[reeb]

What about the other 700 plus.??????

Just cause he was a sports figure ( and if you dont like the Cardinals ) you wouldnt even know who he was.

Sure he will be missed, just like the rest of them and for what??? The capture of Suddam instead of the Bin that is in charge.

My sorry goes out for all troops , but why just pinpoint one. What about the other families that have lost and alot more than a person that has a upstanding citiznship.

Yep, you can delete this if you want, but no matter what, the other replies will keep on coming.

At least he wasnt a Walker. Just a everyday common Specialist that made up his mind that he wanted the service instead of the high life.

No, I am not Morbid, but just think about it.....

May God Bless him .................

enough............

[melody1181]

I bet he would of been the first to say i'm not the only one....He knew this could happen and was still willing to do it. He gave up a mulit million dollar deal to be in the army with 18,000 as his yearly income. Not many would do that these days....which is one thing that is different.

Praying for his family.