ADM. MICHAEL MULLEN: Thank you, Lt. Gen. Ashkenazi. Actually, my wife always tells me these are too high in – (inaudible, laughter). Sometimes it makes me look like I come from space. (Laughter.) Maj. Gen. Golan – (inaudible, background noise) – Col. Wright (sp), Capt. Moskovitch, it is really a great privilege to be able to say a few words here. (Pictures)
And I guess I’ll start – and it’s not unknown that your chief and I are pretty good friends, but – and he is very proud of you – but I suspect that pride and his verbalization of that is consistent with what he said today. But I will tell you just a brief story that I actually had dinner with him in Brussels about three weeks ago, while you were still there, in Haiti.
And it was just the two of us, and he – and it was in this room – we were by ourselves, but he filled the room with his pride in you. He just exploded. (Laughter.) He was actually trying to explain to me how all this happened, and it was clearly your leadership, among others, that came to him and said, we’ve got to go. And he – and I am a great admirer of his leadership – he basically got out of the way – certainly knew this was going to happen. But he just could not find words that explained how good he felt about what you were doing.
And he was, at that point in time, trying to figure out how to arrange for your return, which was going to happen in a few days, as I recall. So I just want to express that from my view, in terms of, you know, I know who the Israeli CHOD is and I understand the job and I understand what he represents, but he’s – and he’s very proud of everybody who serves – but he, believe me, exhibited a pride in you that is equal to any that I’ve ever seen. He would never tell you that, but – (laughter) – that’s what I watched.
Secondly, I just want to express my gratitude. In fact, we got – I started talking to him about this because you represented hope so quickly in that terrible tragedy for your ability to get there, your ability to organize and your ability to do exactly what you just described – save lives and do it quickly in what was a sea of tragedy. And you did create hope and you did sustain life, and you created futures or allowed futures to continue to exist where they clearly were – the lights were going out incredibly rapidly.
And so for that, the human race is grateful for what you did. And as you said, you didn’t do this alone – I understand this – but it was a – what you did was such a wonderful beacon of hope. And in that short video, there’s an awful lot packed in there, but at the end of it, where it said something along the lines – I mean, I’ll quote it exactly – “shall guide us to the future,” is very powerful.
So I know we’re going to do the after-action report and we’ll finish up and we’ll move on here, but I know, because I’ve had many of my people over in recent years in Indonesia – that terrible tragedy out there – in our own country with Katrina – had many, many military members, and we have them now, whose lives have changed forever because of what they saw and what they did.
And many of these hard warriors have told me the most important mission they’ve ever carried out in their life, that they feel best about, were the humanitarian missions where they saved lives. And I’m sure that is the case with you, as well. So from my perspective, I just wanted to say how much – how grateful I am, the United States is, because you really made a big difference. And we’ll never forget that and, actually, the people of Haiti will never forget that.
And then, haven’t we all been, in this tragedy, fortunate to come to know them better? They are a remarkably resilient people. They have a spirit that inspires, and they have been through very, very challenging times – certainly, in this tragedy – none so tragic as this – but throughout their history. And I hope none of us forget, when the lights go off and the cameras shut down, none of us forget that there is a great deal to be done – not by your country or my country, but by the international community – so that these very special people, who have borne a great burden for a long time, have a brighter future and then can come out of this in much better shape than when they went in.
And then lastly, Gen. Ashkenazi leaned over early in, just, the briefing and talked to me about the medical side of this and the ethical challenges and how you dealt with that. And I know, from my own country, the dilemmas that our medical personnel have been in and decisions they’ve had to make. And the only thing that I would add, or offer, is that in that, you are extraordinary people. You’ve been well trained and you were giving everything that you could possibly give. You should, to the best of your ability, rest comfortably that you made the best decisions you could and move on. And you saved lives in doing that.
And yes, there were some that were lost, but you, as a group, as a leadership group, you made those very tough decisions and they were the best decisions in a very, very difficult time, that you could make. And I have great admiration for that and for you. So thanks. It’s a privilege to be here with you and to know that you have made such a difference. And we look forward to continuing to work so closely together. Thank you. (Applause.)
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