One of the things I been ruminating over with the
reality of the quarantine/isolation condition we find ourselves in is trying to
keep present in my head things that are important and things that are
unimportant. We live in a world with so much going on that it seems to me that
we have been neglecting active thought and action on matters in need of our
attention. To wit…we are at war and have been for almost two decades!
There is much concern over the Covid situation, and
it is of major importance, but dealing with it is simple. Follow the directions
that are posted everywhere as to what to do to stay safe, wash your hands a lot.
Don’t
try to kiss any strangers, and be safe.
What I want to know is why in the fuck we are still
sending the cream of our society to foreign locales to kill or be killed, maim
or be maimed? Must we irreparably damage the mental state of the people who
live in those locales, or irreparably damage the mental state of the cream of
our society when they come home and are poorly suited to living a normal life
after all that kill or be killed/maim or be maimed bullshit?
Now, for those still reading, this is not some
unpatriotic rant from a bleeding heart liberal peacenik moron. I am a veteran
of the United States Army from which I was Honorably Discharged after
completing the term of service for which I VOLUNTEERED.
I was not much of a soldier but I did what I was
told and went where I was sent. I did not receive any medals for bravery and/or
valor. I was a Private First Class who drove a truck in an Artillery Battalion.
For some reason I had a Top Secret clearance which made me eligible for some
unusual duty in various places around the world. The most interesting of these
extra duties was a seven day posting to Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin when there
was still such a thing as East and West Berlin/Germany.
Volunteering was not a popular thing to do when I
did. Many were protesting the war that was being fought at the time with many
of my friends doing the opposing. There were people being drafted based on a
birth date lottery. My number was well out of the range of being chosen. I
volunteered anyway.
I did so because my father did in WWII. I did
because America is worthy of “…heroic labor and the most difficult sacrifice.”
I did so because it was a choice I had having recently graduated high school
and not entering college. I regret nothing about being a soldier, and never
will. If it was today…I would still enlist.
What I would not do is recommend, counsel, entreat,
or otherwise persuade any young person to join the Armed Forces.
We have grown obtuse, which the dictionary defines as,
“annoyingly insensitive, or slow to understand.” We fight wars that do not have
the meaning they are assigned. We fight wars that we lose. WWII had a reason.
We were attacked by an enemy whose stated objective was the decimation of the
American way of life and thus was in dire need of defense.
Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan were
unnecessary wars that killed a huge number of people that did not deserve to
die. We went to Korea and never finished what we were supposed to do there with
the result that N. Korea is now a dangerous enemy. We spent 9305 days in
Vietnam and were forced to leave while communist forces took over the country.
We were attacked on 911 by citizens from Saudi Arabia and attacked Iraq. We
went to Afghanistan to find Osama Bin Laden and are still there…almost twenty
years later. Not one of these countries is significantly better because of our
presence within their borders. Korea is a hotbed of divisiveness and holds the
potential for the beginning of another war every day. Vietnam is a thriving
nation but not due to our American values. Iraqi citizens had a decent lifestyle
before we came in and blew up their cities and plunged then into poverty
because we did not like their leader.
Realistically, the inspiration for these wars, on a
rhetorical level was sound. Communism was a terrible system and hurt many
people. Not so much today. On principle it made sense to attack Korea and
Vietnam because of the atrocious lives led by people in China, Cuba, and the
Soviet Union. Yes, Saddam Hussein was a tyrant and needed to be removed. Yes,
Osama Bin Laden needed to be found. But let’s look at a few realities.
Korea has a history of incursions on their society
dating to its founding in 2233 BC. We did nothing to help that trend to stop.Vietnam was possibly the most conquered country in
Asia for nearly the last four thousand years. It wasn’t until America came
around that they were able to throw an invader out and thrive.
Iraqi’s had a normal life with employment and wealth
available. They lived under Draconian rule but should have had the choice to
change that on their own. These were not uneducated poor peasants. They lived
better than most people on Earth. Until America decided to carpet bomb their
capital, a city 1250 years old which, at one time, was the largest metropolitan
area in the world. The only things the Americans really did in Iraq was send it
back to the 7th Century by rendering the electricity, water, and other
essential services useless.
The only thing we have accomplished in Afghanistan
was to perpetuate a warlike culture that has existed for as long as there has
been a country in some form in that area. We should have packed up and left the
minute we got Osama Bin Laden who we found in PAKISTAN!
Being a veteran I grieve for the fallen. We have
given out too many medals. Awards for bravery are necessary when we send our
people to war. They give the most of themselves and absolutely deserve to be
honored. How about honoring them when they get home? Why are 22 veterans
committing suicide every day? Why does the VA allow a sick or troubled
ex-warrior to wait months for doctor’s appointments? Why do they have to go to
the emergency room to get help (the most expensive type of care) and be turned
away?
Because politicians wave flags and vomit rhetoric
they do not fully understand in order to send out valiant Service people across
the globe to get killed, crippled, maimed, and damaged in the name of a country
that thinks it is noble. These selfsame politicians that do all that flag waving
and vomiting because they are being bribed to keep the war going. By who you ask? By those who worship money and want nothing but to make profit out of the atrocity that is war. Just like the moneylenders at the temple
they are. Would that we could do them as Jesus did in his time…there might just
be an end to the horror we accept in the name of our country.
