Yesterday I participated in my community's annual Veterans Day festivities. I was invited by the organizers after they heard about my deployment to Haiti earlier this year, which I blogged about here in June.

Like many Veterans Day celebrations, there was a motley mix of participants from various generations, all joined by the common pride and experience of having served in the armed forces. It is a humbling experience to stand among them.

But one veteran in particular caught my eye in the crowd…a tiny specimen in dress uniform, barely five feet tall.  As she turned toward me, I saw the insignia on her arm and realized she was a Navy WAVE.  Almost 90 years old, she still had that spry spring in her step and feisty personality that I have come to recognize in all our female World War 2-era vets.

During the course of my 19-year Air Force career, I've had the chance to meet several of these pioneers who served our nation in uniform during World War 2. First came the Army's Women's Army Corps (known as WACs), authorized shortly after Pearl Harbor. Then the Navy created its Naval Reserve “WAVES” (Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service) and the Marine Corps Women's Reserve. The Coast Guard established a Women's Reserve program called “SPARS” (Semper Paratus—Always Ready). 

As an Airman, I am particularly proud of the U.S. Army Air Forces' select group of women pilots known as the “WASPs” (Women Air Force Service Pilots). These women ferried planes and cargo, served as flight instructors and test pilots, towed aerial targets for anti-aircraft artillery training  in order to free male pilots for overseas combat missions. They flew 60 million miles in all types of military aircraft; 38 WASPs gave their lives in the process.  Yet they were never officially recognized as veterans by the U.S. government.

In 1977, the U.S. Air Force officially opened pilot training to women pilots, and the WASPs organized and began to lobby for recognition.  As an Arizona resident, I am proud to say that it was U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, himself a WW2 aviation veteran, who sponsored the bill that finally granted WASPs the legal veteran status they deserved.  They received the Congressional Gold Medal in 2009.

Even in my own career, I've seen the legacy of the WASPs continue. When I started my active duty Air Force career in 1991, women were flying non-combat aircraft like aerial tankers and cargo transport jets, but were still barred from flying combat aircraft like bombers and fighters. That changed in 1993 when the Air Force opened those aircraft to women pilots. 

Whether you serve in uniform or not, all women stand on the shoulders of the WASPs, WAVES, WACs and SPARs.   Sure they broke barriers—but first and foremost, these were young women who answered their nation's call and followed their dreams. They weren't activists and they weren't glory seekers, they were just Americans who put their boots on the ground, on the seas and in the air to get the job done.  
 
Today, around the world, there are thousands of American men and women doing just that for our nation in a time of war.  They stand on point not for the recognition, but because they're simply getting the job done.  It's that American spirit that I salute on this Veterans Day.
 
 "You can be whatever you set your heart and head to be, and don't let anybody tell you can't be, because 1078 women pilots did it in World War II."   -- WASP Annelle  Henderson  Bulechek
 
Photo: The first female WW2 vet I met, in 1994 when I was a 1st Lieutenant, stationed with the 28th Bomb Wing at Ellsworth A.F.B., South Dakota.  This former WASP had accompanied her husband, an 8th Air Force veteran who had flown bombing missions over Europe, to our base for his unit's WW2 50th Anniversary reunion. There are sadly fewer and fewer of these "Greatest Generation" members left among us, but I'm always impressed by their spunk, selflessness and humility.