TUCSON, Ariz. — In a divided climate we're living now, our veterans remind us that for them there was a time when race, religion, gender, politics didn't exist.
"None on of that mattered at any time in the service, we had a job to do, we did it," Army and Navy veteran, Russell Thompson, said.
"You just have to get the job done, you know, the mission first," Army and Navy veteran, Wayne Eric Eckerman, said.
"Ain't no such thing as god and flag in the foxhole. It's your buddies, it's the people that's with you," Thompson said.
Retired Army Ranger, Raymond Gauthier said his family always put duty to country before politics.
"I was in the service, first time, 1952, I fought in the Korean War, got out of that then I ended up going to 'Nam' in 67', 68'."
"I got hit twice in 'Nam,' lost one of my sons in 'Nam' and one son in Iraq."
Sacrifice, they say, isn't red or blue, liberal or conservative.
"Those sorts of things never really mattered to me when I was in the military, even now," Eckerman said.
"Got to put your differences aside, I mean we're all people, we're all Americans."
On this Veterans Day, they remind us of our duty to a nation, to them, to each other.
"Everybody has an opinion; I keep in my mind a statement from Lord Byron: nobody ever learned anything listening to the sound of their own voice," Thompson said.
