It is appropriate to honor Idaho’s Dirk Kempthorne on this Memorial Day

In 1968, Congress designated the last Monday in May as Memorial Day, a day to remember, honor and mourn those who have died in America’s wars. Beginning with the Revolutionary War, over 1.3 million Americans have died in the nation’s conflicts and wars. There were 58,220 US troops killed in Vietnam, including 251 from Idaho.

To make sure those 251 were honored and remembered, I worked with the Freedom Bird group in Eastern Idaho to establish Idaho’s official Vietnam Veterans Memorial in the city of Idaho Falls. We decided to write a book about the Idaho fallen. I started the job but found it too emotionally draining. Marilyn Whyte of Blackfoot stepped in to get the job done and wrote a touching tribute to Idaho’s war dead, Reasons to Remember.

PFC Jimmy Nakayama of Rigby appears in Reasons at page 242. Jimmy was on an operation in the Ia Drang Valley when a misdirected U.S. napalm canister exploded on his position. He died from his wounds on Nov. 17, 1965, 10 days after his daughter Nikki was born. Capt. Troy Oliver Jr. of Boise died on patrol in Quang Tin Province on May 19, 1968. He had been serving in a staff job, but requested a combat role at Khe Sanh. 1st Lt. Frank Reasoner of Kellogg died on patrol on July 12, 1965. Lt. Reasoner received the Congressional Medal of Honor for protecting his Marines from withering enemy fire near Da Nang Air Base. 248 other stories of sacrifice, valor and heartache are told in Reasons.

Incidentally, on the back dust cover of Reasons, then-Gov. Dirk Kempthorne commended the tribute and said of those who died in Vietnam, “We will never forget their love of country, their legacy of service and their ultimate sacrifice.” Well said, governor. Unfortunately, the book is out of print but a few are still available on Amazon.

Similar stories could be told of the 4,492 Americans who died in the Iraq War, the 2,459 who died in the Afghanistan War and the 13 who have died thus far in the Iran War.

But to get a true picture of the death toll of our wars, we must take into account the hundreds of thousands of war veterans who died from the insidious after-effects of war, including physical and psychological injuries, substance abuse, suicide and exposure to toxins. America’s seemingly insatiable appetite for foreign conflicts since the turn of the last century has produced many other stories to be told on Memorial Day.

Those death tolls would have been significantly greater were it not for the faithful support and assistance American troops received from allied forces. I can attest that our allies in Vietnam were instrumental in reducing American deaths. I lived and worked with South Vietnamese soldiers during most of my tour of duty. I trusted them with my life and they reciprocated.

I’ve read many reports of similar relationships between American forces and both Iraqi and Afghan allies. This brings me to the heroic role played by our recently-departed former Gov. Dirk Kempthorne in saving a planeload of Afghans from the murderous clutches of the Taliban. 

While I’d known of Kempthorne’s legendary support of the U.S. military, I was blown away by his audacious act of arranging for the airlift of 395 Afghan allies and their families from almost certain death at the hands of the Taliban. In a 2023 interview at the George W. Bush Presidential Center, Kempthorne outlined how he, with the help of two Army officers and an Afghan national, raised a million private dollars to finance the rescue operation.

They chartered an Airbus 340 to transport the evacuees to Abu Dhabi and all but four were then resettled in the United States. It was an operation that took intricate coordination with and from a wide variety of entities, both foreign and domestic. When it looked like there were not going to be enough seats to accommodate all of the passengers, Kempthorne had an inspiration to have the infants sit on their parents’ laps, which solved the problem.

Kempthorne’s reasoning resonated with me.

I often think of my Vietnamese friends who were abandoned to their fate at the end of the Vietnam War. I mourn the 58,220 Americans who died, but also my friends in the South Vietnamese Army who perished at the hands of the communists.

Kempthorne displayed his profound honor and decency by saying that his rescue operation was “devoted to make good on the promise of America – if you help America, we will not abandon you.” What a remarkable person he was. He deserves the honor and respect of his countrymen as we observe this Memorial Day on May 25.