Bracelet
- Description
- Religious bracelet known as a “kara" created in memory of Barett McNabb. The silver metal is engraved with text that reads: “Sergeant Barett McNabb 6/12/2012.”
- Historical Notes
Before receiving asylum in the United States, Simratpal Singh grew up in Punjab, India, where his Sikh family faced religious persecution. A teenager on 9/11, he saw both the discrimination against his Sikh community in the aftermath of the attacks, as well as family friends enlisting in the U.S. Armed Forces and felt a call to military service himself. Singh graduated from United States Military Academy at West Point in 2010 and deployed to Afghanistan. In 2015, he partnered with the Sikh Coalition to help secure religious accommodations for Sikh Americans in uniform.
This bracelet, called a kara, is one of the five articles of the Sikh faith. Engraved with the name of Simratpal Singh’s platoonmate Sergeant Barett McNabb, killed in Afghanistan in 2012, the kara connects Singh’s faith to his devotion to military service. Thanks to his advocacy efforts with the Sikh Coalition, Singh no longer required a special religious accommodation to wear the kara while in uniform.
Before the fires at Ground Zero were extinguished, the United States and its allies launched Operation Enduring Freedom in October 2001, a military campaign that targeted al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. Many stepped forward to serve in the military or in national security. For some, this meant extending their service. For others, it meant facing danger for the first time.
Over more than 20 years, across the battlefields that came to encompass the Global War on Terror, these Americans volunteered to assume the burdens of combat and the price they might pay.
- Accession Number: IL.2025.23.2
- Dimensions: 2.5 in
- Dimensions (Metric): 6.35 cm
- Credit Line: Courtesy of Simratpal Singh
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