0:00:00.755,0:00:03.046
I'm excited to be here to speak about vets,

0:00:03.046,0:00:04.652
because I didn't join the Army

0:00:04.652,0:00:06.800
because I wanted to go to war.

0:00:06.800,0:00:09.518
I didn't join the Army because I had a lust

0:00:09.518,0:00:13.175
or a need to go overseas and fight.

0:00:13.175,0:00:15.515
Frankly, I joined the Army because

0:00:15.515,0:00:17.242
college is really damn expensive,

0:00:17.242,0:00:18.951
and they were going to help with that,

0:00:18.951,0:00:21.291
and I joined the Army because

0:00:21.291,0:00:23.447
it was what I knew,

0:00:23.447,0:00:26.309
and it was what I knew that I thought I could do well.

0:00:26.309,0:00:28.707
I didn't come from a military family.

0:00:28.707,0:00:29.950
I'm not a military brat.

0:00:29.950,0:00:32.729
No one in my family ever[br]had joined the military at all,

0:00:32.729,0:00:35.015
and how I first got introduced to the military

0:00:35.015,0:00:37.110
was when I was 13 years old

0:00:37.110,0:00:39.789
and I got sent away to military school,

0:00:39.789,0:00:41.458
because my mother had been threatening me

0:00:41.458,0:00:44.564
with this idea of military school[br]ever since I was eight years old.

0:00:44.564,0:00:47.631
I had some issues when I was coming up,

0:00:47.631,0:00:49.659
and my mother would always tell me, she's like,

0:00:49.659,0:00:51.105
"You know, if you don't get this together,

0:00:51.105,0:00:52.371
I'm going to send you to military school."

0:00:52.371,0:00:53.931
And I'd look at her, and I'd say, "Mommy,

0:00:53.931,0:00:55.863
I'll work harder."

0:00:55.863,0:00:57.347
And then when I was nine years old,

0:00:57.347,0:00:59.575
she started giving me brochures[br]to show me she wasn't playing around,

0:00:59.575,0:01:00.870
so I'd look at the brochures, and I'm like,

0:01:00.870,0:01:03.197
"Okay, Mommy, I can see you're[br]serious, and I'll work harder."

0:01:03.197,0:01:05.349
And then when I was 10 and 11,

0:01:05.349,0:01:08.503
my behavior just kept on getting worse.

0:01:08.503,0:01:10.870
I was on academic and disciplinary probation

0:01:10.870,0:01:14.601
before I hit double digits,

0:01:14.601,0:01:17.543
and I first felt handcuffs on my wrists

0:01:17.543,0:01:19.491
when I was 11 years old.

0:01:19.491,0:01:21.107
And so when I was 13 years old,

0:01:21.107,0:01:23.121
my mother came up to me, and she was like,

0:01:23.121,0:01:24.857
"I'm not going to do this anymore.

0:01:24.857,0:01:26.403
I'm going to send you to military school."

0:01:26.403,0:01:28.241
And I looked at her, and I said, "Mommy,

0:01:28.241,0:01:31.381
I can see you're upset, and[br]I'm going to work harder."

0:01:31.381,0:01:33.476
And she was like, "No, you're going next week."

0:01:33.476,0:01:35.881
And that was how I first got introduced

0:01:35.881,0:01:38.471
to this whole idea of the military,

0:01:38.471,0:01:41.367
because she thought this was a good idea.

0:01:41.367,0:01:43.179
I had to disagree with her wholeheartedly

0:01:43.179,0:01:44.479
when I first showed up there,

0:01:44.479,0:01:46.279
because literally in the first four days,

0:01:46.279,0:01:48.447
I had already run away five times from this school.

0:01:48.447,0:01:50.333
They had these big black gates[br]that surrounded the school,

0:01:50.333,0:01:52.423
and every time they would turn their backs,

0:01:52.423,0:01:54.879
I would just simply run out of the black gates

0:01:54.879,0:01:56.741
and take them up on their offer[br]that if we don't want to be there,

0:01:56.741,0:01:58.171
we can leave at any time.

0:01:58.171,0:01:59.864
So I just said, "Well, if that's the case,

0:01:59.864,0:02:03.112
then I'd like to leave." (Laughter)

0:02:03.112,0:02:05.223
And it never worked.

0:02:05.223,0:02:07.397
And I kept on getting lost.

0:02:07.397,0:02:08.579
But then eventually,

0:02:08.579,0:02:11.109
after staying there for a little while,

0:02:11.109,0:02:12.511
and after the end of that first year

0:02:12.511,0:02:14.359
at this military school,

0:02:14.359,0:02:19.015
I realized that I actually was growing up.

0:02:19.015,0:02:22.539
I realized the things that I enjoyed about this school

0:02:22.539,0:02:24.887
and the thing that I enjoyed about the structure

0:02:24.887,0:02:27.634
was something that I'd never found before:

0:02:27.634,0:02:30.503
the fact that I finally felt like I[br]was part of something bigger,

0:02:30.503,0:02:32.953
part of a team, and it actually mattered to people

0:02:32.953,0:02:34.665
that I was there,

0:02:34.665,0:02:37.855
the fact that leadership wasn't just a punchline there,

0:02:37.855,0:02:41.131
but that it was a real, actually core part

0:02:41.131,0:02:43.280
of the entire experience.

0:02:43.280,0:02:45.404
And so when it was time for me to actually

0:02:45.404,0:02:47.448
finish up high school,

0:02:47.448,0:02:50.116
I started thinking about what I wanted to do,

0:02:50.116,0:02:51.920
and just like probably most students,

0:02:51.920,0:02:55.314
had no idea what that meant or what I wanted to do.

0:02:55.314,0:02:57.009
And I thought about the people who I

0:02:57.009,0:02:59.298
respected and admired.

0:02:59.298,0:03:00.984
I thought about a lot of the people,

0:03:00.984,0:03:03.803
in particular a lot of the men, in my life

0:03:03.803,0:03:05.732
who I looked up to.

0:03:05.732,0:03:07.607
They all happened to wear the uniform

0:03:07.607,0:03:09.546
of the United States of America,

0:03:09.546,0:03:11.791
so for me, the question and the answer

0:03:11.791,0:03:13.858
really became pretty easy.

0:03:13.858,0:03:15.606
The question of what I wanted to do

0:03:15.606,0:03:17.244
was filled in very quickly with saying,

0:03:17.244,0:03:20.443
I guess I'll be an Army officer.

0:03:20.443,0:03:22.267
So the Army then went through this process

0:03:22.267,0:03:23.468
and they trained me up,

0:03:23.468,0:03:24.870
and when I say I didn't join the Army

0:03:24.870,0:03:26.500
because I wanted to go to war,

0:03:26.500,0:03:28.583
the truth is, I joined in 1996.

0:03:28.583,0:03:31.353
There really wasn't a whole lot going on.

0:03:31.353,0:03:33.419
I didn't ever feel like I was in danger.

0:03:33.419,0:03:34.542
When I went to my mom,

0:03:34.542,0:03:36.155
I first joined the Army when I was 17 years old,

0:03:36.155,0:03:37.864
so I literally needed parental permission

0:03:37.864,0:03:38.947
to join the Army,

0:03:38.947,0:03:40.427
so I kind of gave the paperwork to my mom,

0:03:40.427,0:03:42.420
and she just assumed it was[br]kind of like military school.

0:03:42.420,0:03:43.724
She was like, "Well, it was good for him before,

0:03:43.724,0:03:46.107
so I guess I'll just let him keep doing it,"

0:03:46.107,0:03:48.908
having no idea that the[br]paperwork that she was signing

0:03:48.908,0:03:50.940
was actually signing her son up

0:03:50.940,0:03:54.138
to become an Army officer.

0:03:54.138,0:03:55.912
And I went through the process,

0:03:55.912,0:03:57.706
and again the whole time still just thinking,

0:03:57.706,0:04:01.529
this is great, maybe I'll serve on a weekend,

0:04:01.529,0:04:06.643
or two weeks during the year, do drill,

0:04:06.643,0:04:09.359
and then a couple years after I signed up,

0:04:09.359,0:04:11.945
a couple years after my mother signed those papers,

0:04:11.945,0:04:15.671
the whole world changed.

0:04:15.671,0:04:18.875
And after 9/11, there was an entirely new context

0:04:18.875,0:04:22.865
about the occupation that I chose.

0:04:22.865,0:04:27.430
When I first joined, I never joined to fight,

0:04:27.430,0:04:29.100
but now that I was in,

0:04:29.100,0:04:32.887
this is exactly what was now going to happen.

0:04:32.887,0:04:36.234
And I thought about so much about the soldiers

0:04:36.234,0:04:38.091
who I eventually had to end up leading.

0:04:38.091,0:04:40.601
I remember when we first, right after 9/11,

0:04:40.601,0:04:43.224
three weeks after 9/11, I was[br]on a plane heading overseas,

0:04:43.224,0:04:45.210
but I wasn't heading overseas with the military,

0:04:45.210,0:04:47.245
I was heading overseas because I got a scholarship

0:04:47.245,0:04:48.566
to go overseas.

0:04:48.566,0:04:50.416
I received the scholarship to go overseas

0:04:50.416,0:04:52.716
and to go study and live overseas,

0:04:52.716,0:04:54.788
and I was living in England and that was interesting,

0:04:54.788,0:04:56.254
but at the same time, the same people who

0:04:56.254,0:04:58.998
I was training with,

0:04:58.998,0:05:01.411
the same soldiers that I went[br]through all my training with,

0:05:01.411,0:05:03.600
and we prepared for war,

0:05:03.600,0:05:07.086
they were now actually heading over to it.

0:05:07.086,0:05:08.967
They were now about to find themselves

0:05:08.967,0:05:11.151
in the middle of places the fact is

0:05:11.151,0:05:12.719
the vast majority of people,

0:05:12.719,0:05:14.985
the vast majority of us as we were training,

0:05:14.985,0:05:18.924
couldn't even point out on a map.

0:05:18.924,0:05:20.690
I spent a couple years finishing graduate school,

0:05:20.690,0:05:22.950
and the whole entire time while I'm sitting there

0:05:22.950,0:05:24.536
in buildings at Oxford

0:05:24.536,0:05:26.910
that were literally built hundreds of years

0:05:26.910,0:05:28.758
before the United States was even founded,

0:05:28.758,0:05:31.930
and I'm sitting there talking to dons

0:05:31.930,0:05:35.894
about the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand,

0:05:35.894,0:05:40.216
and how that influenced the start of World War I,

0:05:40.216,0:05:42.460
where the entire time my heart and my head

0:05:42.460,0:05:45.344
were on my soldiers

0:05:45.344,0:05:47.314
who were now throwing on Kevlars

0:05:47.314,0:05:48.750
and grabbing their flak vests

0:05:48.750,0:05:51.298
and figuring out how exactly do I change around

0:05:51.298,0:05:53.590
or how exactly do I clean a machine gun

0:05:53.590,0:05:56.638
in the darkness.

0:05:56.638,0:05:59.571
That was the new reality.

0:05:59.571,0:06:01.944
By the time I finished that up and I rejoined

0:06:01.944,0:06:04.634
my military unit and we were getting[br]ready to deploy to Afghanistan,

0:06:04.634,0:06:06.222
there were soldiers in my unit who were now

0:06:06.222,0:06:08.320
on their second and third deployments

0:06:08.320,0:06:09.740
before I even had my first.

0:06:09.740,0:06:11.728
I remember walking out with[br]my unit for the first time,

0:06:11.728,0:06:13.092
and when you join the Army

0:06:13.092,0:06:14.748
and you go through a combat tour,

0:06:14.748,0:06:16.082
everyone looks at your shoulder,

0:06:16.082,0:06:19.860
because on your shoulder is your combat patch.

0:06:19.860,0:06:21.136
And so immediately as you meet people,

0:06:21.136,0:06:22.552
you shake their hand,

0:06:22.552,0:06:24.411
and then your eyes go to their shoulder,

0:06:24.411,0:06:26.024
because you want to see where did they serve,

0:06:26.024,0:06:27.330
or what unit did they serve with?

0:06:27.330,0:06:29.024
And I was the only person walking around

0:06:29.024,0:06:31.314
with a bare shoulder,

0:06:31.314,0:06:35.404
and it burned every time someone stared at it.

0:06:35.404,0:06:38.412
But you get a chance to talk to your soldiers,

0:06:38.412,0:06:42.190
and you ask them why did they sign up.

0:06:42.190,0:06:46.279
I signed up because college was expensive.

0:06:46.279,0:06:50.700
A lot of my soldiers signed up[br]for completely different reasons.

0:06:50.700,0:06:52.632
They signed up because of a sense of obligation.

0:06:52.632,0:06:54.441
They signed up because they were angry

0:06:54.441,0:06:56.258
and they wanted to do something about it.

0:06:56.258,0:06:57.570
They signed up because

0:06:57.570,0:06:59.416
their family said this was important.

0:06:59.416,0:07:01.628
They signed up because they[br]wanted some form of revenge.

0:07:01.628,0:07:06.276
They signed for a whole[br]collection of different reasons.

0:07:06.276,0:07:09.044
And now we all found ourselves overseas

0:07:09.044,0:07:12.945
fighting in these conflicts.

0:07:12.945,0:07:15.456
And what was amazing to me was that I

0:07:15.456,0:07:19.778
very naively started hearing this statement

0:07:19.778,0:07:23.044
that I never fully understood,

0:07:23.044,0:07:25.402
because right after 9/11, you start hearing this idea

0:07:25.402,0:07:26.759
where people come up to you and they say,

0:07:26.759,0:07:29.396
"Well, thank you for your service."

0:07:29.396,0:07:31.359
And I just kind of followed in and started saying

0:07:31.359,0:07:32.994
the same things to all my soldiers.

0:07:32.994,0:07:34.575
This is even before I deployed.

0:07:34.575,0:07:38.070
But I really had no idea what that even meant.

0:07:38.070,0:07:40.074
I just said it because it sounded right.

0:07:40.074,0:07:41.850
I said it because it sounded like the right thing to say

0:07:41.850,0:07:43.494
to people who had served overseas.

0:07:43.494,0:07:45.924
"Thank you for your service."

0:07:45.924,0:07:47.940
But I had no idea what the context was

0:07:47.940,0:07:50.270
or what that even,

0:07:50.270,0:07:53.840
what it even meant to the people who heard it.

0:07:53.840,0:07:58.626
When I first came back from Afghanistan,

0:07:58.626,0:08:02.100
I thought that if you make it back from conflict,

0:08:02.100,0:08:05.941
then the dangers were all over.

0:08:05.941,0:08:08.138
I thought that if you made it[br]back from a conflict zone

0:08:08.138,0:08:10.437
that somehow you could kind of

0:08:10.437,0:08:11.671
wipe the sweat off your brow and say,

0:08:11.671,0:08:15.415
"Whew, I'm glad I dodged that one,"

0:08:15.415,0:08:17.223
without understanding that for so many people,

0:08:17.223,0:08:19.366
as they come back home,

0:08:19.366,0:08:21.665
the war keeps going.

0:08:21.665,0:08:23.919
It keeps playing out in all of our minds.

0:08:23.919,0:08:26.557
It plays out in all of our memories.

0:08:26.557,0:08:31.220
It plays out in all of our emotions.

0:08:31.220,0:08:32.557
Please forgive us

0:08:32.557,0:08:37.767
if we don't like being in big crowds.

0:08:37.767,0:08:40.030
Please forgive us

0:08:40.030,0:08:42.354
when we spend one week in a place

0:08:42.354,0:08:44.702
that has 100 percent light discipline,

0:08:44.702,0:08:46.930
because you're not allowed to[br]walk around with white lights,

0:08:46.930,0:08:48.417
because if anything has a white light,

0:08:48.417,0:08:49.894
it can be seen from miles away,

0:08:49.894,0:08:51.607
versus if you use little green

0:08:51.607,0:08:52.774
or little blue lights,

0:08:52.774,0:08:54.706
they cannot be seen from far away.

0:08:54.706,0:08:56.839
So please forgive us if out of nowhere,

0:08:56.839,0:09:00.046
we go from having 100 percent light discipline

0:09:00.046,0:09:02.599
to then a week later being back[br]in the middle of Times Square,

0:09:02.599,0:09:07.730
and we have a difficult time adjusting to that.

0:09:07.730,0:09:09.162
Please forgive us

0:09:09.162,0:09:11.001
when you transition back to a family

0:09:11.001,0:09:15.105
who has completely been maneuvering without you,

0:09:15.105,0:09:17.132
and now when you come back, it's not that easy

0:09:17.132,0:09:20.776
to fall back into a sense of normality,

0:09:20.776,0:09:25.258
because the whole normal has changed.

0:09:25.258,0:09:28.820
I remember when I came back,[br]I wanted to talk to people.

0:09:28.820,0:09:31.579
I wanted people to ask me about my experiences.

0:09:31.579,0:09:33.327
I wanted people to come up to me and tell me,

0:09:33.327,0:09:34.642
"What did you do?"

0:09:34.642,0:09:36.129
I wanted people to come up to me and tell me,

0:09:36.129,0:09:37.747
"What was it like? What was the food like?

0:09:37.747,0:09:42.272
What was the experience like? How are you doing?"

0:09:42.272,0:09:44.333
And the only questions I got from people was,

0:09:44.333,0:09:47.064
"Did you shoot anybody?"

0:09:47.064,0:09:48.890
And those were the ones who were even curious

0:09:48.890,0:09:52.548
enough to say anything.

0:09:52.548,0:09:54.218
Because sometimes there's this fear

0:09:54.218,0:09:55.783
and there's this apprehension that if I say anything,

0:09:55.783,0:09:57.259
I'm afraid I'll offend,

0:09:57.259,0:09:58.633
or I'm afraid I'll trigger something,

0:09:58.633,0:10:03.291
so the common default is just saying nothing.

0:10:03.291,0:10:05.890
The problem with that

0:10:05.890,0:10:07.496
is then it feels like your service

0:10:07.496,0:10:10.010
was not even acknowledged,

0:10:10.010,0:10:13.017
like no one even cared.

0:10:13.017,0:10:16.040
"Thank you for your service,"

0:10:16.040,0:10:19.133
and we move on.

0:10:19.133,0:10:21.809
What I wanted to better understand

0:10:21.809,0:10:25.123
was what's behind that,

0:10:25.123,0:10:30.875
and why "thank you for your service" isn't enough.

0:10:30.875,0:10:34.491
The fact is, we have literally

0:10:34.491,0:10:37.048
2.6 million men and women

0:10:37.048,0:10:39.972
who are veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan

0:10:39.972,0:10:42.642
who are all amongst us.

0:10:42.642,0:10:44.122
Sometimes we know who they are,

0:10:44.122,0:10:47.234
sometimes we don't,

0:10:47.234,0:10:49.401
but there is that feeling, the shared experience,

0:10:49.401,0:10:52.325
the shared bond

0:10:52.325,0:10:54.197
where we know that that experience

0:10:54.197,0:10:56.206
and that chapter of our life,

0:10:56.206,0:10:58.921
while it might be closed,

0:10:58.921,0:11:02.967
it's still not over.

0:11:02.967,0:11:04.596
We think about "thank you for your service,"

0:11:04.596,0:11:06.665
and people say, "So what does 'thank[br]you for your service' mean to you?"

0:11:06.665,0:11:08.345
Well, "Thank you for your service" means to me,

0:11:08.345,0:11:12.423
it means acknowledging our stories,

0:11:12.423,0:11:15.289
asking us who we are,

0:11:15.289,0:11:17.702
understanding the strength

0:11:17.702,0:11:21.932
that so many people, so many[br]people who we serve with, have,

0:11:21.932,0:11:25.652
and why that service means so much.

0:11:25.652,0:11:27.786
"Thank you for your service"[br]means acknowledging the fact

0:11:27.786,0:11:29.604
that just because we've now come home

0:11:29.604,0:11:30.895
and we've taken off the uniform

0:11:30.895,0:11:33.175
does not mean our larger service to this country

0:11:33.175,0:11:35.851
is somehow over.

0:11:35.851,0:11:38.732
The fact is, there's still a tremendous amount

0:11:38.732,0:11:42.922
that can be offered and can be given.

0:11:42.922,0:11:44.352
When I look at people

0:11:44.352,0:11:49.010
like our friend Taylor Urruela,

0:11:49.010,0:11:50.754
who in Iraq loses his leg,

0:11:50.754,0:11:53.412
had two big dreams in his life.

0:11:53.412,0:11:56.480
One was to be a soldier. The other[br]was to be a baseball player.

0:11:56.480,0:12:01.280
He loses his leg in Iraq.

0:12:01.280,0:12:02.904
He comes back

0:12:02.904,0:12:04.598
and instead of deciding that,

0:12:04.598,0:12:07.016
well, now since I've lost my[br]leg, that second dream is over,

0:12:07.016,0:12:09.430
he decides that he still has that[br]dream of playing baseball,

0:12:09.430,0:12:11.402
and he starts this group called VETSports,

0:12:11.402,0:12:13.313
which now works with veterans all over the country

0:12:13.313,0:12:18.648
and uses sports as a way of healing.

0:12:18.648,0:12:20.991
People like Tammy Duckworth,

0:12:20.991,0:12:22.239
who was a helicopter pilot

0:12:22.239,0:12:24.105
and with the helicopter that she was flying,

0:12:24.105,0:12:25.644
you need to use both your hands

0:12:25.644,0:12:27.175
and also your legs to steer,

0:12:27.175,0:12:28.644
and her helicopter gets hit,

0:12:28.644,0:12:29.906
and she's trying to steer the chopper,

0:12:29.906,0:12:31.823
but the chopper's not reacting

0:12:31.823,0:12:33.504
to her instructions and to her commands.

0:12:33.504,0:12:36.015
She's trying to land the chopper safely,

0:12:36.015,0:12:37.656
but the chopper doesn't land safely,

0:12:37.656,0:12:38.768
and the reason it's not landing safely

0:12:38.768,0:12:41.441
is because it's not responding to the[br]commands that her legs are giving

0:12:41.441,0:12:46.289
because her legs were blown off.

0:12:46.289,0:12:49.194
She barely survives.

0:12:49.194,0:12:53.100
Medics come and they save her life,

0:12:53.100,0:12:55.561
but then as she's doing her[br]recuperation back at home,

0:12:55.561,0:12:59.871
she realizes that, "My job's still not done."

0:12:59.871,0:13:01.355
And now she uses her voice

0:13:01.355,0:13:03.547
as a Congresswoman from Illinois

0:13:03.547,0:13:06.505
to fight and advocate for a collection of issues

0:13:06.505,0:13:10.370
to include veterans issues.

0:13:10.370,0:13:13.096
We signed up because

0:13:13.096,0:13:17.566
we love this country we represent.

0:13:17.566,0:13:19.910
We signed up because

0:13:19.910,0:13:22.468
we believe in the idea and we believe in the people

0:13:22.468,0:13:25.256
to our left and to our right.

0:13:25.256,0:13:27.168
And the only thing we then ask is that

0:13:27.168,0:13:29.430
"thank you for your service"

0:13:29.430,0:13:32.554
needs to be more than just a quote break,

0:13:32.554,0:13:35.180
that "thank you for your service" means

0:13:35.180,0:13:37.406
honestly digging in

0:13:37.406,0:13:40.356
to the people who have stepped up

0:13:40.356,0:13:44.199
simply because they were asked to,

0:13:44.199,0:13:46.228
and what that means for us not just now,

0:13:46.228,0:13:49.720
not just during combat operations,

0:13:49.720,0:13:53.069
but long after the last vehicle has left

0:13:53.069,0:13:57.943
and after the last shot has been taken.

0:13:57.943,0:14:00.773
These are the people who I served with,

0:14:00.773,0:14:04.477
and these are the people who I honor.

0:14:04.477,0:14:06.648
So thank you for your service.

0:14:06.648,0:14:10.500
(Applause)