[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 148 (2002), Part 3]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 3542]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      TRIBUTE TO JASON CUNNINGHAM

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. HEATHER WILSON

                             of new mexico

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, March 19, 2002

  Mrs. WILSON of New Mexico. Mr. Speaker, it rained in Washington last 
Wednesday. By Thursday morning the sun was burning through the mist 
that blanketed Arlington National Cemetery. On the north side of a 
ridge near a grove of evergreen trees an Air Force honor guard carried 
Jason Cunningham's casket to his final resting place.
  There were six honorary pall bearers who followed the casket up the 
incline to where the family and a small cluster of others waited. Those 
six all wore the maroon berets of the Air Force elite pararescuemen. 
There were dozens of PJs there, mostly from Jason's squadron in 
Georgia. All of them had completed their PJ training at Kirtland Air 
Force Base.
  Over the ridge to the south of where we stood two cranes lined the 
sky where crews work feverishly to rebuild the Pentagon. You could hear 
the throb for work from the site and it was comforting, somehow, to 
know that even as we grieve deeply for those lost we are rebuilding and 
going on.
  Jason Cunningham was a New Mexican and, by all accounts, a good man 
who was willing to risk his life in daring missions to rescue others. 
That's what PJs do. When Navy SEAL Petty Officer Neil Roberts was left 
behind after his helicopter was attacked in a mountain valley in 
Afghanistan, Jason and his team went in to try to rescue him. They got 
into a vicious fire fight. Jason, the Navy SEAL, and five others were 
killed. Eleven Americans were wounded.
  Even when you know a cause is just, when those who fight do so 
willingly, when you know it's a fight we have to win, the grief is just 
as deep. The rifle shots of the honor guard, the echoes of taps, the 
rescue choppers flying by in a last salute, the wide-eyed children of a 
soldier who won't be coming home, weighed heavily on everyone at 
Arlington on Thursday.
  There were thousands of New Mexicans who would have been at Arlington 
if they could have. I went to represent them and to let the Cunninghams 
know that the thoughts and prayers of thousands of New Mexicans are 
with them. We are sorry that Jason isn't coming home and grateful for 
his service and his sacrifice defending us and our way of life.
  Operation Anaconda has been the costliest battle so far in 
Afghanistan. There will be more battles in this war against terrorism. 
Let's keep the troops in our thoughts and prayers.

                          ____________________