Search for Viet MIAs remains a priority

...the extraordinary effort is worth it to the families who've waited and hoped for so long that word would finally come that their son, husband, father or brother has been found and is coming home at last.

It's worth it to those who wear the uniform of their country and believe in a simple creed that we are Americans and we will leave no one behind on the battlefield.

That implicit contract is best expressed in the words of a letter that Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman wrote to his friend Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at the end of the Civil War:

"I knew wherever I was that you thought of me, and if in trouble you would come for me, if alive."

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Read the full article at the Knight Ridder Washington Bureau.