It’s callous, unbelievably unpatriotic, mean and sad that Whitey Harwood wrote, “No need to thank me for my service” in a letter to the editor published June 9. I suggest Harwood visit Arlington, Virginia, Normandy, France, and the local veterans cemetery.

Our loved ones, friends and neighbors are there, with some arriving in wooden boxes and others arriving with nothing but a dog tag, a fragment of bone or tooth. Many are not there, with their remains in the jungles of Iwo Jima, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Europe, or Asia and in the waters of Pearl Harbor.

My husband and fellow Navy aviators on the USS Forrestal suffered a loss of 134 men in the Gulf of Tonkin. Those lives lost will haunt the men who survived forever. Think, too, of the wives, children, families who will never see loved ones who, unlike Harwood, would never say, “Do not thank me.”

Harwood espouses much too often. He should stick to cigarettes or balloons and get off the grid for those of us who value freedom we have as a result of the sacrifices made by so many.

I am happy to say “thank you” to any person in uniform and to all who have served for us, our country and our liberty.

— Julie S. Pinkston

Salisbury