The Department of Veterans Affairs instituted the policy of placing the words "Operation Enduring Freedom" or "Operation Iraqi Freedom" on gravestones. Nadia and Robert McCaffrey say they were not asked for their approval.

I was a little taken aback," Robert McCaffrey said, describing his reaction when he first saw the operation name on Patrick's tombstone. "They certainly didn't ask my wife; they didn't ask me." He said Patrick's widow told him she had not been asked either.

"In one way, I feel it's taking advantage to a small degree," McCaffrey said. "Patrick did not want to be there, that is a definite fact."

The VA claims that the new policy is not a PR stunt. Max Cleland pointed out, "Most of the headstones out there at Arlington and around the nation just say World War II or Korea or Vietnam, one simple statement ... It's not, shall we say, a designated theme or a designated operation by somebody in the Pentagon. It is what it is. And I think there's power in simplicity."

President Bush will not attend funerals for fallen soldiers from "Operation Enduring Freedom." In 2003, the Pentagon issued the order that "there will be no arrival ceremonies for, or media coverage of, deceased military personnel returning to or departing from Ramstein [Germany] airbase or Dover [Del.] base, to include interim stops." How is engraving Pertagon slogans consistent with the administration's policy to shed little media attention towards dead soldiers and Marines? I wish someone at the VA would explain that to me.

(Crossposted at Last Day of My Life)

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