Sisters exhibit courage

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Rachel Witmer, 24, and Charity Witmer, 20, said they had faced "a profoundly difficult and complex decision" -- and even that, if anything, understated the excruciatingly painful choice these young soldiers were forced to make. Their sister Michelle -- Charity Witmer's identical twin -- had been killed in Iraq less than three weeks earlier. In the aftermath, they had two options: Return to their units or request reassignment to a noncombat role under a Defense Department policy that honors such requests when a family member dies in combat.
There were no wrong choices here, and their decision to seek reassignment should go unremarked on this page except as an opportunity to offer condolences to the Witmer family for their loss, to express admiration for these young women and to note what one element in this tragic affair says about the modern U.S. military.
It says something too often overlooked in reporting of the war in Iraq -- the extraordinary unit cohesion so critical in the post-Vietnam era to the career military and to support units such as the Reserves and the National Guard. In a sense, what made Rachel and Charity Witmer's decision so difficult was that unit cohesion was both an argument for returning to Iraq and an argument for requesting reassignment.
Rachel Witmer, a specialist in a Wisconsin Army National Guard military police company, and Charity Witmer, a sergeant in a Wisconsin Army National Guard medical battalion, made it clear that they did not want to let their units down, which was a reason to return to the battlefield. But many military people argued that they should not return.
Persuasive case
One of them, Maj. Gen. Al Wilkening of the Wisconsin National Guard, made the persuasive case to the Witmers. His request, he said, was based on more than the needs of the two soldiers and their grieving family. It was also based on military considerations for their units. Wilkening worried that the heightened visibility of their units, especially with the two women returning, might expose the other 225 soldiers in those units to greater battlefield risks. As the Witmers themselves said in their statement, "a decision to return to Iraq might expose our fellow soldiers to increased danger. This we will not do."
Lori and John Witmer, Michelle's parents, have suffered a terrible loss. But they certainly can take a measure of solace in the grace, dignity and courage demonstrated by the two other soldiers in their family.