I pulled out a letter from my childhood recently that represents my memories of growing up on Whiteman Air Force Base in northwest Missouri. As a child of no more than 9 or 10 years old, I lived with a heightened sense of politics and war.

The letter was from the father of my grade school friend Jackie. He was somewhere in the Middle East when he wrote it.

For more than a decade I lived on Air Force bases in the United States and abroad. In 1991 we wrote letters at school and sent them to the U.S. troops telling them about our struggles with long division and we sent our love in the unconditional way only a child can truly articulate.

In return, they sent high-spirited letters from isolated surroundings -- never mentioning fear.

War is not something I learned about from CNN.

Last month, I watched protesters as they marched from Old Main to the State College Municipal Building with a petition urging the Borough Council to pass an anti-war resolution.

From my vantage point, a second story window on Allen Street, the protesters and their entourage of onlookers dominated my view of the scene at first glance.

Then my eyes trailed over to less than a block away. There stood two gray haired military men intently watching the protest. Dressed in green coats with puffy white fax fur on the hood, I was taken back to my childhood -- they were also wearing Air Force uniforms.

I wanted to go outside and shake the service men's hands. I wanted them to see a student who looked beyond politics, party lines and anti-war rhetoric. But stuck in my apartment with a nasty cold, all I could do was sit back and watch, hoping that at least one protester would thank the soldiers.

A few minutes later the screams and passions of the protest escalated and I changed my mind.

I hoped they wouldn't notice the servicemen; I feared the angry mob would degrade the men in the same way many protesters spat in the faces of Vietnam vets in the '60s and '70s.

Or in the same way the Red Army Fraction, shaped from student protesters in the '60s, threatened to put bombs in our cars when I lived on what was Hahn Air Force Base in West Germany.

The protesters never acknowledged the men, and they left the municipal building grinning with self-satisfaction. The military men walked away with no expression.

I doubt any of the anti-war activists noticed the service men. This is exactly what's wrong with many people in State College, across the nation and abroad.

Many times, protesters forget the soldiers. The people in the military are a momentary afterthought to some of these people.

U.S. soldiers do not kill civilians intentionally. By contrast, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein deliberately massacred thousands of his own people -- 75 percent of them women and children -- with mustard gas and other poison gases on March 16, 1998. If you are truly concerned about the Iraqi people, why weren't you walking out of class and demonstrating on the anniversary?

Mustard gas, in essence, rots the body. It's a horrifying way to die. The gas burns away the lining of the lungs that allows air to enter the bloodstream and people suffocate to death. It produces massive yellow sticky blisters on exposed skin.

The gas also attacks and inflames the eyes causing blindness. The people who were not killed are still dealing with its effects: cancer, birth defects, asthma, sterility and miscarriages. If that isn't a crime against humanity, what is?

Maybe this second war with Iraq is unjust. Maybe too many innocent lives will be lost. Maybe it really is about oil. I don't know. No one can say for sure.

But I know today there are hundreds of thousands of U.S. women and men fighting because they were called to duty.

They would fight and die for you if Saddam had dropped a mustard gas bomb on your hometown and killed your mother and father -- even if you weren't grateful.

If you oppose the war, you should voice your opinion. It's your right; as a journalist, I'm a huge fan of free speech.

Also, I respect your opinion. But do not forget about our service women and men.

As you read this, there is a 10-year-old girl on an Air Force base in Missouri who just kissed her dad goodbye. She is terrified beyond words.

Instead of worrying about who gets the good swing at recess she is dealing with fears well beyond her years. In her living room she is watching you shriek and chant on TV and wondering why you don't appreciate or at least respect her dad.

Please appreciate what could be the largest sacrifice of her young life -- the loss of her father.