In his essay for We Are the Mighty, Stephen Ruiz declared that President Ronald Reagan’s 1984 Memorial Day speech observing the interment of an unknown Vietnam service member at Arlington National Cemetery “healed scars.”

“We write no last chapters,” Reagan told the crowd, Ruiz recalled. “We close no books. We put away no final memories. An end to America’s involvement in Vietnam cannot come before we’ve achieved the fullest possible accounting of those missing in action.”

‘The Vietnam Unknown never heard such cheers.’

More from Ruiz’s essay:

A decade after the final U.S. troops left Vietnam on March 29, 1973, some service members who fought in Southeast Asia couldn’t forget the harsh treatment that fellow Americans heaped upon them. Some were spat on while others received the middle finger or were called “baby killers.” They served their country and were blamed for the United States not defeating the North Vietnamese.

Reagan realized old wounds can’t go unattended. Two years after the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., Reagan used his oratorical gifts to promote a better understanding of what Vietnam veterans endured.

The president continued a tradition from past wars and awarded the Medal of Honor to the Vietnam Unknown. That nice moment was not enough for Reagan. He reached out to military families residing in a continual, painful limbo because of a loved one MIA. Reagan told them that a grateful nation understood their plight.

“They live day and night with uncertainty, with an emptiness, with a void that we cannot fathom,” Reagan said, Ruiz recalled.

The author noted that Reagan’s speech added references to President Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address — and that volunteers read nearly 58,000 names on the Vietnam Veterans Wall in 1982 over the course of three days.

Ruiz also noted that Reagan read from a newspaper article about a restaurant dinner former Marines shared and that a group of college students — “some of them likely still in diapers when the first U.S. troops arrived in Vietnam in 1965,” Ruiz wrote — mingled with them, then applauded them as the veterans left the eatery.

Ruiz remembered that Reagan, reading from the newspaper article, quoted one former Marine’s response: “The whole week, it was worth it just for that.”

RELATED: Stories Behind the Stars: On a mission to honor every American who died in WWII

“The Vietnam Unknown never heard such cheers,” Ruiz added in his essay. “In so many ways, wars never end for those who knew someone MIA. So many unanswered questions remain, threatening to expose a deep sense of loss always lingering just below the surface.”

The author added that “in 1984, Reagan was acutely aware of that.”

In his speech, the president said of the unknown soldier, “About him we may well wonder, as others have: As a child, did he play on some street in a great American city? Or did he work beside his father on a farm out in America’s heartland? Did he marry? Did he have children? Did he look expectantly to return to a bride?”

In conclusion, Reagan noted, “Today, we simply say with pride, ‘Thank you, dear son. May God cradle you in His loving arms.'”

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This Memorial Day, thousands more U.S. servicemen and -women than usual are stationed in the Middle East due to the ongoing tensions with Iran, even as recent developments suggest a peace agreement may be near.

In late March, the New York Times reported that 50,000 U.S. troops were in the Middle East, an increase of about 10,000 from the 40,000 troops who are typically in the region. Many of those troops were stationed “at sea,” the outlet noted.

At the time, an additional 2,500 Marines, 2,500 sailors, and 2,000 Army soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division had just arrived. While the exact location of the Army paratroopers was not made public, they would be “within striking distance of Iran,” the Times reported.

It seems that little has changed in the weeks since. The Times reported on May 6 that the 50,000-strong U.S. forces remain “on standby in the region” as the delicate ceasefire with Iran hangs in the balance.

As recently as May 11, Trump said the ceasefire is on “life support” after Iranian officials sent a proposal that Trump called a “piece of garbage.”

RELATED: Trump administration establishes ‘red, white, and blue dome’ to allow safe passage through Strait of Hormuz

U.S. Navy/Getty Images

When reached for comment, the War Department referred Blaze News to U.S. Central Command. A source familiar with the matter told Blaze News that for safety reasons, CENTCOM does not comment on troop movements or schedules.

The four-to-six-week timetable President Donald Trump initially gave for the attacks on Iran has long since expired, but the president does not seem as focused on the protracted process as he is on the results.

And his patience may be paying off.

Over Memorial Day weekend, news of a possible peace deal began spreading online. While Trump has not divulged many details, he wrote on Sunday that “negotiations are proceeding in an orderly and constructive manner” and that America’s “relationship with Iran is becoming a much more professional and productive one.”

Trump even teased that should a deal be reached, Iran may someday join the “Nations of the historic Abraham Accords.” Still, he cautioned that the U.S. would not “rush into a deal in that time is on our side.”

Above all, Trump pledged that Iran will never have nuclear weapons and that any agreement he reaches with Iranian officials will be “THE EXACT OPPOSITE” of the “pallets of cash” deal former President Barack Obama made in 2016, quipping, “Unlike those before me who should have solved this problem many years ago, I don’t make bad deals!”

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