USO Gala honors servicemembers, families

  • Published
  • By Karen Parrish
  • American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON (AFNS) --  Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen was among the military, government and community leaders and celebrities who gathered to salute servicemembers and their families at the annual USO Gala here Oct. 7.

The event featured entertainment, award presentations to five servicemembers and highlights of USO programs, but it focused on the bravery and sacrifices of servicemembers deployed or recovering in hospitals, and the parents, spouses and children who support them.

Admiral Mullen told attendees that the USO has connected servicemembers and Americans since its founding in 1941.

"Wherever our nation sends our troops, we can count on the USO to be out in front with us, to serve alongside us, providing its special brand of comfort in airports, foreign ports and battle zones across the globe," he said.

"As we celebrate tonight," he continued, "I ask all of us to please remember the more than 200,000 young men and women out in front right now: on point, serving and sacrificing and making a difference around the world."

After more than nine years of war, Admiral Mullen said America's troops and their families are being tested as never before.

"They're resilient, so they don't always show it. And they're proud, so they don't always talk about it, but there are hard realities that they face every day," he said. "Not a moment goes by that I don't think about the great pressures on these young men and women, and the sacrifices of their families. The challenges that will stay with them for the rest of their lives -- challenges that all of us must help them shoulder, as (they) have already shouldered such burdens for us."

Sloan Gibson, the USO's president and chief executive, told the thousand or so attendees they were there to salute the efforts of America's servicemembers and their families. The USO's mission, he said, is "to lift the spirits of America's troops and their families."

Mr. Gibson praised the courage of families of deployed troops who run households and hold down jobs while supporting and encouraging their far-away servicemembers; families of wounded warriors, who are in hospitals often around the clock providing care to injured loved ones; and the families of the fallen.

The USO works to support military families, as well as servicemembers, Mr. Gibson said, noting more than half of U.S. servicemembers are married and another 7 percent are single parents.

USO-sponsored programs for children of servicemembers, he said, assist them to cope with "parents who come home changed or parents who don't come home at all."

USO partners with many other organizations to offer deployment and family support services ranging from free phone calls at forward locations, to videotaping bedtime stories deployed servicemembers can send home to their children, to grief camps for the sons and daughters of servicemembers who die or are killed in action.

During the gala, five servicemembers took the stage to receive the USO's Servicemember of the Year award. A Soldier, Sailor, Airman, Marine, and a Coast Guardsman, each selected by their respective service's chief enlisted advisor, were recognized for courageous actions performed during the course of their duties.

Staff Sgt. Gino Kahaunaele, who is currently deployed, was selected for the Air Force award. His mother, Kimberly Watkins accepted it upon his behalf. 

During a mission in an undisclosed location, Kahaunaele saved a teammate and a helicopter crew while serving with the 24th Special Tactics Squadron. He sprinted into gunfire to drag a pinned-down, wounded teammate to safety, stabilized the patient and ensured a quick evacuation, saving the man's life.

In another incident, he exposed himself to enemy fire to shoot and kill two enemy combatants engaging an exposed assault team, and fired on an enemy targeting a coalition helicopter, saving the crew. His bravery in the face of direct enemy fire saved eight lives.