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Joint Chiefs chair to graduates: 'I fear they do not know us'

By the CNN Wire Staff
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addresses West Point cadets Saturday.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addresses West Point cadets Saturday.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • Adm. Mike Mullen tells West Point graduates to close the military-civilian gap
  • He says civilians know little about the sacrifices of the military
  • He asks America's newest officers to help solve the problem

(CNN) -- America's top military official nudged the nation's newest class of officers Saturday to fight a different sort of battle and close a gap between themselves and civilians who do not always understand a soldier's sacrifice.

Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told graduating cadets at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point that despite a decade at war, men and women in uniform are not always on the radar of America's non-military families.

"Our work is appreciated, of that I am certain," Mullen said in a commencement speech Saturday. "There isn't a town or a city I visit where people do not convey to me their great pride in what we do."

"But I fear they do not know us. I fear they do not comprehend the full weight of the burden we carry or the price we pay when we return from battle," he said.

He spoke to more than 1,000 young officers who grew up with America at war in Afghanistan and Iraq.

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"When this country was attacked on 9/11, most of you were just 11 or 12 years old," Mullen said. "We've been at war nearly half your young lives. Yet all you made a choice freely to serve your country."

He said he was giving the newly commissioned officers an additional assignment over their duty to serve.

America's all-volunteer military of 1.4 million members, he said, was a small, insular force compared to the general population -- scattered on bases across America or deployed to faraway places. It was imperative that the public know more about the men and women who choose to serve, he said.

"This is important, because a people uninformed about what they are asking the military to endure is a people inevitably unable to fully grasp the scope of the responsibilities our Constitution levies upon them," Mullen said.

Both Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have previously sounded concern over potential alienation of the military and have urged more dialogue to end the disconnect.