Defence Minister Tony Tan reads aloud the letter with the line
'Whatever you can't defend, doesn't belong to you'
DEFENCE Minister Tony Tan yesterday wrapped up the debate on his
ministry's budget by reading a letter from a young national servicemen which he said
summed up eloquently why Singapore needed a strong SAF.
One line in particular struck him. It read: "Whatever you can't
defend, doesn't belong to you".
Reading the line aloud twice, he added: "In this time of
uncertainty, a sustained and steady effort to maintain and enhance our defence capability
is our guarantee that what we have built up in Singapore over the last 35 years will
belong to us."
The letter, he told MPs, was published in The New Paper last Friday. It
was written by Third Sergeant (NS) Chong Yu Meng, 30.
He wrote about his National Service experiences in response to a reader
who had written in earlier, complaining about NS.
Mr Chong wrote that he had been terrified of going into the army when
he was 17 because he was unfit and could not even do one chin-up.
The training was tough and sometimes he felt really miserable, but by
the time he turned operational as a specialist in the combat engineers, the army had
transformed him from a 69 kg weakling into someone who could do at least 18 chin-ups and
run 2.4 km in nine minutes 15 seconds.
Coming from a comfortable family background, NS was also an eye-opener
for him.
"In my platoon, there were ex-pimps, machinists, ex-loan sharks
and former secret society members.
"I met people who came from broken homes and some who were thrown
out by their own families."
But he remembers them as loyal, faithful, and honourable men who could
be counted on to fight if the need ever arises.
DPM Tan said that the letter, and especially its last line, summed up
eloquently why Singapore needed a strong defence force.
(taken from The Straits Times, 11/3/99)