A hero has just left this world. I want to call attention briefly to what this man did during a terrible time of duress.

Jeremiah Denton was captured by North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. He was a Navy aviator who was shot down over Hanoi in 1965. In 1966, the North Vietnamese put him on television supposedly to tell the world of his “war crimes.” They sought to use him as a propaganda tool.

But Denton instead blinked out the word “torture” in Morse code, informing the world of what his captors were doing to him and his fellow prisoners of war. Denton would spend several years in solitary confinement at the infamous “Hanoi Hilton” encampment.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/jeremiah-denton-ex-senator-and-vietnam-pow-who-blinked-torture-in-morse-code-dies-at-89/

I wonder how it is that some individuals have the presence of mind under such terrible circumstances to do something creative and meaningful.

Young Jeremiah Denton showed the world how a hero can resist his foes and inform his allies far away of the terrible circumstances of a captivity that should have been conducted under the rules of war.

Denton served more than seven years as a war prisoner. He came out in 1973 along with many other young men. He went on to serve Alabama as a Republican U.S. senator.

Denton, who died today at age 89, spoke with simple eloquence when he stepped off the plane in 1973 upon his release from captivity. He was the senior U.S. officer aboard the aircraft that flew him and his comrades to the Philippines. Denton said, “We are honored to have had the opportunity to serve our country under difficult circumstances. We are profoundly grateful to our commander-in-chief and to our nation for this day. God bless America.”

A nation is grateful for this man’s service.