There’s a category of #military brats that are especially deserving of the nation’s recognition, gratitude, and serious study: the roughly 2 million Post-9/11 military children who experienced at least one if not multiple parental deployments—most often to theaters of #war—in the 20yr period after 2001.
Already by 2011 (the formal end of the Iraq War), more than 4,300 of these children had had a parent killed in the Iraq & Afghanistan wars. As of 2015, that number had reached some 5,000. It’s difficult to know exactly how many American military kids are survivors or orphans of troops who were killed in the line of duty during the #GWOT, or who they are, let alone the total numbers of children survivors of all those who’ve served in the Post-9/11 era: There does not appear to be any type of database or central repository of information from which to find them. Surveying the past 35 years with the Lucas Group, however, the nonprofit Fallen Patriots has estimated that approximately 25,000 children have lost an active duty parent during that time (whether from accident, illness, hostilities, or suicide). The majority of these fatalities were their fathers.
We owe a debt to these military children that goes far beyond media pronouncements and themed events once a year in April.
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2moJeremy Henry - some more great shots of Braden here!