[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Page 5524]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       HONORING OUR ARMED FORCES


                     Lance Corporal Abraham Tarwoe

  Mr. REED. Mr. President, I rise today, along with my colleague, the 
Presiding Officer, to pay tribute to Lance Corporal Abraham Tarwoe, a 
Rhode Islander who served in the U.S. Marine Corps.
  On April 12, Lance Corporal Tarwoe was killed while conducting combat 
operations in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. A memorial service will be 
held on Saturday in Rhode Island to honor his selfless sacrifice, and 
he will then be laid to rest in his native home of Liberia.
  When he was about 7 years old, Lance Corporal Tarwoe left Liberia and 
started a new life in the United States. He was one among thousands of 
Liberians who came to the United States seeking safety from a civil 
war. We are proud that so many of these brave individuals and their 
families now call Rhode Island their home, and our State continues to 
be enriched by this strong community.
  Lance Corporal Tarwoe enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in June 2009. 
He was on his second deployment to Afghanistan, assigned to the 2nd 
Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine 
Expeditionary Force, where he was serving as a mortarman and had 
additional duties as a military dog handler.
  Each generation of Americans is called upon to protect and sustain 
our democracy, and among our greatest heroes are the men and women who 
have worn the uniform of our Nation and have sacrificed for our country 
to keep it safe and to keep it free.
  It is our duty to protect the freedom they sacrificed their lives for 
through our service, our citizenship. We must continue to keep their 
memories alive and honor their heroism, not simply by our words but by 
our deeds as citizens of this great country.
  Today, our thoughts are with Lance Corporal Tarwoe's loving family in 
Liberia, Famatta and Abraham Kar, his brother Randall, his wife Juah, 
and his son Avant, and all his family, friends, and his comrades-in-
arms. We join them in commemorating his sacrifice and honoring his 
example of selfless service, love, courage, and devotion to the Marines 
with whom he served and the people of Afghanistan he was trying to 
help.
  Lance Corporal Tarwoe is one among many Rhode Islanders who have 
proven their loyalty, their integrity, and their personal courage by 
giving the last full measure of their lives in service to our country 
in Afghanistan, in Iraq, and elsewhere around the globe.
  Today, we honor his memory and the memory of all those who have 
served and sacrificed as he did. He has joined a distinguished roll of 
honor, including many Rhode Islanders who have served and sacrificed 
since September 11, 2001.
  All of these men and women who have given their lives in the last 
decade in Afghanistan and Iraq have done a great service to the Nation. 
It is a roll of honor. It is a roll that Lance Corporal Tarwoe joins, 
and it should be for us a roll not just to recognize and remember but 
to recommit, to try in some small way to match their great sacrifice 
for this great Nation.
  In Lance Corporal Tarwoe's situation, it also should remind us that 
this young man, born in Liberia, who came as a child and to Rhode 
Island, demonstrates to us all that being an American is about what is 
in your heart, not necessarily where you were born or what language you 
may have spoken as a child. It is about believing in America--believing 
so much that you would give your life to defend the values that we so 
much cherish.

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