A Red Bay Caymanian who kept U.S. Navy helicopters flying from an aircraft carrier says, ahead of Remembrance Sunday on 8 November, that two years of service built his George Town business. Joseph L. Watler Jr enlisted in 2010 and completed his service in 2012, he told The Caymanian Journal (TCJ).

His account comes as the Cayman Islands Government (CIG) prepares for the annual Remembrance Day parade and ceremonies on Sunday, 8 November, in Grand Cayman and Cayman Brac, according to a Protocol Office notice published on 4 November. Remembrance Day is observed as a public holiday on Monday, 9 November, the CIG's published holiday calendar states.

Known to family and friends as Junior, Mr Watler is, by his own account, the youngest Caymanian veteran, a description TCJ has not been able to independently confirm. He returned home after his discharge and now owns HALO Legal Solutions, a George Town firm.

Why he enlisted

Asked what military service offers young people today, Mr Watler told TCJ: "If you want everything in the world, in the palm of your hands…just enlist!" His own route to enlistment, by his account, ran through five lines of work at home first.

After leaving high school he worked in tourism, banking, policing and watersports, and as a second-generation officer with the Department of Environment (DoE), he said. He considered the British armed forces first but found the move to the U.S. military easier because he held U.S. papers through his parents, he said, and he chose the Navy because it was "the most diverse branch, with more to offer, and more in-line with who I am."

Learning the water at his father's side

Mr Watler's familiarity with boats and the sea came from his father, Joseph L. Watler Sr, who he said was Cayman's first marine enforcement officer, working before there was a formal marine unit within the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service (RCIPS), where the elder Mr Watler also served. The son accompanied his father on near-shore patrols as a boy, he said, in the years before the DoE was established. The CIG's historical timeline on gov.ky dates the department's creation to 1993.

According to his son, the elder Mr Watler spent decades protecting both human life and marine life, and the boy who watched that work went on to work on outboard engines and fishing reels before the electronics of a naval helicopter. Those early years on the water, Mr Watler said, were the natural preparation for what came next.

Boot camp to the flight deck

Mr Watler said he completed basic training in San Diego, California, and was then assigned to a helicopter squadron whose job was to keep MH-60R Seahawk helicopters airborne from the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln. A U.S. Navy release of 26 March 2012, written by the public affairs officer of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron (HSM) 77, the "Saberhawks", identifies that squadron's aircraft as the Sikorsky MH-60R Seahawk.

U.S. Navy records from the period describe the deployments Lincoln made while he served. A release from USS Abraham Lincoln Public Affairs dated 22 March 2011 recorded that the ship left its home port of Everett, Washington, on 7 September 2010 for a six-month deployment to the Western Pacific and the U.S. Central Command area, and was due back in Everett on 24 March 2011. The strike group spent 198 days deployed, including 136 days at sea supporting Operation Enduring Freedom, and flew more than 8,300 sorties, the release said. It listed the embarked squadrons of Carrier Air Wing 2, among them four strike fighter squadrons, an electronic warfare squadron and two helicopter squadrons, including the Saberhawks of HSM-77.

A second deployment began in early December 2011, according to the HSM-77 release of 26 March 2012, which said the squadron had by then "flown more than 450 sorties from Lincoln", had "navigated through the Strait of Hormuz numerous times" and was "supporting Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) in the Arabian Sea". A Navy release of 13 December 2011 said the squadron left Naval Air Station North Island, California, that day with five MH-60R Seahawks and 270 sailors to join the ship. The ship's official history records that Lincoln arrived at Naval Station Norfolk, Virginia, its new home port, on 7 August 2012, having "sailed more than 72,000 miles during its 245 days deployed", including "105 days in the Arabian Sea supporting OEF".

Mr Watler said the highlight of his service was qualifying as an avionics specialist and joining the maintenance squadron that kept 12 of the helicopters in operation. The Navy's occupational standard for aviation electronics technicians, updated in January 2026, describes the rating as maintaining aircraft electronics systems including "computers, communications, Radio Detection and Ranging (RADAR), navigation, Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) sensors, fiber optics, Forward Looking Infrared (FLIR), wiring, weapons systems" and other equipment. Each helicopter squadron aboard had three to four aircraft, he said, on what he called "a floating airport and a small city, out in the ocean", alongside the air wing's other squadrons.

He said he served on tours connected to Operation New Dawn, Operation Enduring Freedom and the Global War on Terrorism. The detail of his Persian Gulf deployments, he said, is not something he can discuss.

From Navy benefits to a George Town office

Mr Watler said he used the education benefits earned through his naval service to study in Florida. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs says its Post-9/11 GI Bill, for those who served on active duty after 10 September 2001, can cover tuition and fees, a monthly housing allowance for students enrolled more than half time, and money for books and supplies. According to the HALO Legal Solutions website, he holds a bachelor's degree in alternative and renewable energy management from Everglades University in Boca Raton, awarded in 2017, and a Master of Science in Law and Policy, in U.S. jurisprudence and cybercrimes law, from Nova Southeastern University's Shepard Broad College of Law in Fort Lauderdale, awarded in 2020. Today he runs HALO Legal Solutions in George Town, providing notary public, paralegal and corporate administration services.

Mr Watler said he is newly married and that his wife, Caterine, lives in Cayman with him. Service to the islands runs through the family, he said: his mother, Pam, spent her career in the CIG's administration, and his sister works there now. "I grew up in a service environment: police, military and government," he said.

A seafaring tradition of service

Mr Watler's path follows a long Caymanian record of service in other nations' forces. A Brief History of the Cayman Islands, written by David Wells of the West India Committee for the CIG's London office to mark the 60th anniversary of the grant of the islands' coat of arms in 1958, records that "approximately 800 Caymanian sailors served in the Merchant Navy" in the Second World War and that "over 200 signed up to serve" in the Trinidad Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve when it was formed in 1941 to protect oil supplies from Trinidad to Britain. "It is worth noting that of all Allied countries to fight in the Second World War, the Cayman Islands had the highest number of servicemen per capita, amounting to two-thirds of the adult male population," the history states, adding that servicemen from the islands "have served in more recent conflicts, such as the campaign in Bosnia, the first Gulf War and the Falklands War".

At home, the Cayman Islands Regiment was announced in December 2019, when the Governor's Office said the National Security Council had approved "an initial force of seven officers and 50 reserve volunteers" to be trained and equipped before summer 2020, according to a CIG notice of 16 December 2019. The Governor at the time, Martyn Roper, said: "The primary role of the Regiment will be to provide Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief support following disasters."

Who counts as a Cayman veteran

The Cayman Islands Veterans Association (CIVA) states on its website that it is "a charitable, not-for-profit organization which seeks to ensure that every ex-serviceman or woman in the Cayman Islands has someone to whom they can turn for help when they need it." "CIVA is not just for war veterans!" the site states, adding that "membership is open to all past serving members of the military forces (or merchant naval forces in war zones) of any commonwealth or allied country." Associate membership, its application page says, "includes parents, spouses, widows, widowers, children, grandchildren, siblings, nieces as well as nephews" of a person who is or was eligible for ordinary membership.

CIVA launched its 2026 Poppy Appeal at its annual Veterans Gala on 10 October, the 13th, according to a CIG release of 15 October, which named Andrew McLaughlin as the association's president. The first poppies were pinned on the Acting Governor, Gloria McField-Nixon, and on Katherine Ebanks-Wilks MP, Minister for Health, Environment and Sustainability. The release described the gala as "a key fundraising event, helping former service members facing financial hardship through assistance with essential living expenses and other welfare needs", and said the appeal "will continue through October and culminate with the Remembrance Parade and Ceremony on Sunday, 8 November".

The keynote speaker, retired Brigadier Clare Phillips CBE, who the release said had concluded a 31-year career in the British Army's Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, told guests: "Determination, readiness, integrity, loyalty and discipline. These values are not handed in with an ID card. They come home with the veteran."

Sunday's ceremonies

The CIG, through its Protocol Office, has invited the public to the parade and ceremonies at 10:45am on Sunday, 8 November, held simultaneously at the Cenotaphs at Elmslie Memorial United Church in Grand Cayman and on the District Administration lawn in Cayman Brac. Attendees are asked to be seated by 10:30am, and the programme includes a religious service, the laying of wreaths and a parade of the uniformed services.

This year's ceremony will include a tribute to the late Graham Walker, a former Royal Air Force radio engineer who served during the 1956 Suez Canal crisis and was a long-serving secretary of the association, the notice said. Poppies are available at the Government Administration Building in Grand Cayman and the District Administration Building in Cayman Brac, and CIVA will also have them at the event.