Thread by @18airbornecorps

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In its 79th year, the 101st Airborne Division is once again out front for the Nation, sending medics to Chicago and Orlando to support the federal government's efforts to vaccinate our most vulnerable Americans.

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This is in concert with the broad sweep of 101 history. Since inception, the Screaming Eagles have stood at the knife's edge of military innovation & National defense. But more than that, the Screaming Eagles have long served as a critical actor within American culture

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Starting in 1942, the 101st pioneered the concept of vertical envelopment, an innovation the division designed and developed and has been improving on ever since.

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From the parachute to the glider to the flying boxcar to the helicopter, the Screaming Eagles have always revolutionized land power mobility.

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In fact, the guiding principle behind the Old Abe insignia has always been thus: strike through combat's third dimension, thereby providing a heavy ground force with a position of advantage against our enemies.

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In 1968, with the development of the airmobile formation, Harry W.O. Kinnard (the namesake of the Mission Training Complex on Fort Campbell) declared the 101st freed forever from the tyranny of terrain. So it shall be into the next mobility formation.

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And, of course, the 101st conducted the largest air assault in world military history during Operation Desert Storm.

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But beyond the concept of battlefield mobility for ground forces, the 101st led the Army in many other military innovations: the light infantry formation, the Pentomic restructure, the concept of rapid-deployment forces for contingency operations.

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Today, the 101st, through its visionary EagleWerx program, continues to lead the Department of Defense in revolutionizing the way we think about organizing for combat.

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Evan Adams, the winner of Dragon's Lair Episode 1, and the programmer of the revolutionary RangeFinder App, is a progeny of this bloodline of innovation.

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As with the current focus on vaccinating the American population to allow the Nation to return to pre-COVID normalcy, the 101st has also led through cultural and social transitions within the United States.

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For example, in 1957, the 101st Paratroopers escorted "the Little Rock Nine," a group of African-American students enrolled in the previously segregated Little Rock Central High School, into the school amidst protests and calls for racially-motivated violence.

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This was a critical moment for the civil rights movement in the aftermath of Brown vs. Board of Education. The Screaming Eagles met that moment.

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The division was central to another historic moment for American civil rights: the enrollment of activist James Meredith, into the University of Mississippi. James was the first black student accepted by the university.

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James' admission triggered a riot spurred by a mob of 3,000 whites from across the South. Paratroopers from the 101st ensured Mr. Meredith safely entered the campus.

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The world knows of the 101st at D Day and Bastogne, but the Screaming Eagles also fought in another American cultural flashpoint: the Battle for Hamburger Hill, a violent, chaotic 10-day struggle that helped turned public opinion against the Vietnam War.

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And then there is the impact the 101st has had on American popular culture.

From books to movies, the 101st is the most celebrated military unit in the Nation, its patch the most recognized across all of the US military.

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In fact, much of the country associates the Army with the Old Abe insignia.

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So the current deployment of Screaming Eagles to American cities to assist FEMA's efforts to vaccinate our way out of COVID-19 is consistent with a rich heritage of leading the way for the Nation.

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After all, if you want it done, go ask the One-Oh-One.