THIS STORY IS DEDICATED to my dad and to all veterans who have served this country whether by choice or by draft.
Thank you for serving. Those words seem insufficient on November 11, a day which honors our nation’s veterans. But they are what I have—words.
War is hell. My dad as much as stated that in letters sent from the mountains of Korea where he fought as a frontline infantryman during the Korean War. He called that country a “hell hole,” bringing home a patch with this message: “Returned from Hell, Korea 1952-1953.” I’ve never doubted Dad’s assessment of his war-time military service.
To see your best buddy blown up before you, to suffer shrapnel wounds at the hands of an enemy sniper, to endure cold and hunger, and to see Korean orphans begging for food scraps across barbed wire fencing forever changed my father.
How could he not be changed? Nothing could have prepared this young Minnesota farmer for war, for shoot or be shot. This was not war from afar. This was a seeing the whites of the enemies’ eyes up close and personal war.
There is no glory in war. No joy in the taking of lives. No victory other than that of one nation (or several nations) claiming victory in defense of freedom or land or for some other reason.
My dad suffered because of his war experiences. Just like many before him, after him and yet to come. Anxiety. Depression. Alcoholism. Post traumatic stress disorder. All came to be for him during a time when soldiers were not warmly welcomed home, but rather dismissal as having served in “The Forgotten War.”
He never forgot, though.
This Veterans Day as I remember Dad, gone 23 years already, I think of all the men and women who have served whether in war or not, but mostly in war. I think, too, of their loved ones back home who supported, and continue to support, them. I think of those wounded, those who died in battle, those held as war prisoners, those still missing in action. I think of those who returned home safely, only to take their own lives via suicide.
War is hell.
If only we could settle our differences with diplomacy, by discussion, by compromise (if possible), by understanding that killing seems to solve nothing long-term.
I often think that modern-day warfare—with targets on a screen, the click of a mouse, the push of a button—has distanced us from the truth of outcome. Maybe I’m wrong in that assessment, never having served in the military.
But I do understand, as the daughter of a Korean War veteran, the ravages of war upon the human psyche. The damage wrought may be acknowledged and treated. Or not. But trauma cannot be unseen, actions undone, death reversed.
To every single veteran who has struggled upon returning home from war, I am sorry. You deserve our respect, our help, our compassion and understanding well beyond just words of gratitude.
© Copyright 2026 Audrey Kletscher Helbling
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