Personal Story: From Lyman Ward in ’79 to Honoring Wounded Warriors—Time for Payback

This is very personal for me.

From 1976 to 1979, when I was just 12 years old starting out, I attended Lyman Ward Military Academy, a small Southern military school in Alabama. That was the first time in my life I came into real, day-to-dayntact with the Persian mindset, Iranian cadets who were there as international students under the Shah’s regime. Iran has always been a complicated place, full of many factions, ethnic groups, and tensions. Like many who’ve studied it closely, I’m still baffled that a small ruling clique, essentially the hardline Shia clerical elite and their IRGC enforcers, controls everything, even though they represent only a narrow slice of the population. The vast majority of Iranians, Persians, Azeris, Kurds, Baluchis, Arabs, and others, along with the Sunni minority, live under this system that does not reflect the full diversity or will of the people. It is a tiny percentage imposing its vision on the rest, and it calls to mind Isaiah 5:20, which warns against those who call evil good and good evil, because that kind of inversion always produces resentment, fear, and repression.

I was right there at the academy the night after the Shah fell and Ayatollah Khomeini took power in early 1979. All the Iranian cadets, smart, proud young guys who carried themselves with that classic Persian confidence, were suddenly rounded up in the middle of the night. They were hustled onto buses and rushed out of the country as fast as possible. It was chaotic, tense, and surreal for a kid like me watching it unfold on campus. Those cadets were not revolutionaries; they were products of the old regime, sent abroad for education and military training. But in an instant, everything changed, their world flipped, and so did ours. It was one of those moments that burned into memory, because as Ecclesiastes 3:3 says, there is a time to tear down and a time to build, and what I witnessed that night was the violent tearing down of one world before anyone understood what the next one would become.

Persians are undeniably smart, capable people; history proves that. But mix in that deep-seated arrogance you sometimes see, and then layer on the ideology brought by the theocrats who seized control, and you get a toxic combination. It has produced a regime that has exported violence, repression, and terror for decades. Jesus said in Matthew 7:16 that you will know them by their fruit, and the fruit of this regime has not been liberty, dignity, or peace, but bloodshed, tyranny, and fear.

None of that erases the cold, hard reality of how many Americans they have killed and maimed. I know their personal stories, not from news clips, but from looking into the eyes of the wounded veterans I have met through the Lettermen of the USA, LotUSA, and our Autographs for Heroes program. For several years now, I have been deeply and humbly involved, helping deliver autographed college footballs to over 750 of these heroes, many from places like the San Antonio Military Medical Center and Walter Reed. These are the guys torn apart by IEDs and EFPs supplied, trained on, and directed by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the IRGC, and their proxies in Iraq. The Pentagon numbers are brutal; Iranian-backed militias killed at least 603 U.S. troops in Iraq from 2003 to 2011, about one in every six American combat deaths there. I have handed them those signed footballs from their favorite teams, presented by LotUSA members alongside partners like the Semper Fi Task Force during Heroes Week in Huntsville, Alabama. I have seen the gratitude, the pain, the missing limbs, the lifelong scars. That is not abstract; that is brothers I have met, honored, and tried to lift up. Galatians 6:2 says to carry one another’s burdens, and in a small way, that is what I have tried to do, even knowing some burdens can never fully be lifted on this side of heaven.

But the IEDs are not even my deepest beef. My anger goes all the way back to Curry College, Milton, Massachusetts, watching 241 American service members, 220 of them Marines, die in the Beirut barracks bombing on October 23, 1983, carried out by Hezbollah, the group Iran created, funded, trained, and directed. It was one of the deadliest attacks on U.S. forces since World War II. Before that, the April 1983 U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut killed 17 Americans. Then, in 1996, the Khobar Towers, 19 U.S. airmen were killed, hundreds were wounded, tied directly to Iranian-backed Hezbollah al Hejaz and the IRGC. The USS Cole in 2000, 17 sailors killed, with facilitation links to Iranian elements. When I think of those graves, those folded flags, those broken families, I cannot help but hear Psalm 94:3 asking how long the wicked will keep celebrating, because for decades it has seemed as though they struck, and struck again, with no end to their malice.

It started with the 1979 embassy takeover, 66 Americans held hostage for 444 days, the failed Eagle Claw rescue killing eight of our men in the desert. That regime has called us the “Great Satan” ever since and kept coming, the 2007 Karbala raid by IRGC Quds Force killing five Americans, the 2020 ballistic missile strikes on Ain al Asad causing over 100 traumatic brain injuries, and ongoing proxy attacks killing and wounding more, right up to the three soldiers in Jordan in 2024. Proverbs 29:2 says that when the wicked are in power, people groan, and that has been the story not only of Iran’s own people, but of far too many American families who have had to bury their dead because of this regime’s reach.

And let us not forget Qasem Soleimani, the IRGC Quds Force commander who orchestrated so much of this bloodshed against Americans. In January 2020, during President Trump’s first term, a U.S. drone strike near Baghdad International Airport took him out, along with others like Abu Mahdi al Muhandis. Soleimani was directly responsible for directing attacks that killed hundreds of U.S. troops through his proxies. That strike was a bold move to stop imminent threats and degrade Iran’s terror network. Romans 13:4 says that governing authority does not bear the sword for nothing, but is an agent of justice against evil, and there are times when justice requires strength, not speeches.

The regime’s vengeance did not stop there. There is pretty strong evidence, laid out in U.S. Department of Justice charges and FBI statements, that Iranian-backed operatives and IRGC assets plotted to assassinate President Donald John Trump himself, including during the 2024 campaign. Federal prosecutors unsealed cases detailing IRGC-directed efforts to surveil and kill him, using murder for hire schemes with operatives in the U.S. These plots were part of their revenge for Soleimani and their broader hatred toward America. They targeted not just President Trump but other officials and dissidents, too. This cannot go unanswered; it is an attack on our sovereignty, our representative government, our Republic, and our people. Psalm 11:3 asks what the righteous can do when the foundations are destroyed, and that is exactly why a free people cannot shrug at threats against its leaders and institutions.

For more than 47 years, through the IRGC and proxies like Hezbollah, Kataib Hezbollah, and others, they have targeted us, Marines, airmen, sailors, soldiers, diplomats, contractors, and even presidents. More U.S. personnel have died from Iran’s network than from any other state sponsor of terrorism. It is an unbroken campaign of bloodshed, scarring generations of military families. Jeremiah 6:14 warns about those who keep saying peace when there is no peace, and that warning matters here, because pretending this record is something less than a sustained war against Americans only dishonors the dead.

And it has scarred me too. From that night at Lyman Ward watching those cadets vanish, to today handing footballs to men whose bodies bear Iran’s handiwork, I carry it all. This is not politics or a passing grudge. It is about justice for the Beirut Marines, the Khobar airmen, the Cole sailors, the IED-shredded troops, Soleimani’s victims, and every veteran whose story I know personally, plus the brazen attempts on American leaders that demand a reckoning. Micah 6:8 says that the Lord requires us to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with God. Justice comes first in that charge, and for some of us, this runs bone deep, personal, visceral, and long overdue. That is why, to me, it feels like 47 years of payback. It is time to pay the piper.

Spot me in the top middle photo: Lyman Ward, 1970s—me (left) in crisp dress blues with white trousers, striding alongside my platoon sergeant on this shaded campus trail at year’s end. Tradition and camaraderie… shattered soon after when my Iranian cadet classmates vanished in the night amid the revolution. From these paths to the Beirut bombing, IEDs, Soleimani, and plots on our leaders—it’s why this fight is personal.

Before: The Brutal Cost of Iranian Terror

This is the grim reality—an American warrior evacuated by helicopter after an Iranian-supplied EFP (explosively formed penetrator) blast in Iraq. Chest torn open, exposed wounds, blood everywhere, hand pressed to his face in agony. These copper-lined, precision IEDs—designed and directed by Iran’s IRGC Quds Force and funneled to Shia militia proxies—punch through armored vehicles and devastate the troops inside. Pentagon assessments confirm Iranian-backed EFPs/IEDs killed at least 603 U.S. troops in Iraq (2003–2011), with many more suffering life-altering injuries like this: shredded bodies, lost limbs, permanent scars. This isn’t random violence; it’s state-sponsored murder exported to our service members.

After: Honored and Remembered

Fast-forward to 2015 during Heroes Week in North Alabama: The same wounded veteran (the warrior in the helo photo) receives an autographed college football from his favorite team, presented through Lettermen of the USA (LotUSA)‘s Autographs for Heroes program in partnership with the Semper Fi Community Task Force of North Alabama (SFCTF). Standing strong, holding that ball with pride beside a LotUSA member at one of their great events around Veterans Day. SFCTF hosts Heroes Week annually—a week of food, friendship, activities, the Huntsville Veterans Day parade, and heartfelt recognition for wounded warriors and their families. Most of LotUSA’s over 750 autographed footballs have been delivered through SFCTF during these powerful gatherings, bringing a moment of normalcy, gratitude, and connection to heroes who’ve given so much.

But the contrast hits hard: Iran caused this. Their regime—through Soleimani (until the 2020 U.S. strike), the IRGC, and proxies—supplied the weapons, trained the attackers, and directed the ambushes that put this man on that stretcher. From the 1979 embassy hostage crisis, to Beirut barracks (241 dead), Khobar Towers (19 airmen), USS Cole (17 sailors), hundreds from EFPs, Jordan strikes in 2024, and even IRGC plots to assassinate Trump—this is 47 years of unbroken bloodshed against Americans.

It’s deeply personal for me. I’ve been part of these moments—handing those signed footballs at Heroes Week, seeing the pain turn to pride, knowing the chain starts with Iran’s regime. From my days at Lyman Ward Military Academy watching Iranian cadets vanish in 1979 after the revolution, to today honoring the maimed and murdered “kids” they’ve targeted—this is visceral. These are our brothers, our sons—wounded by a death-cult elite that rules through terror.

This before-and-after isn’t just photos; it’s the unbreakable argument. Iran’s regime must be held accountable. No more excuses, no more proxies. Justice for the wounded, the fallen, and every veteran we’ve lifted up. Time to pay the piper.

#AutographsForHeroes #LettermenUSA #SFCTF #HeroesWeek #IranTerror #Veterans #NeverForget