1000's of soldiers who died to keep me free!

My sister who has a soldier son wrote in an e-mail, "1000's of soldiers who died to keep me free!"

I have no wish to argue with a mom who worries about her son's safety as he does the politicians' dirty work. So, I won't reply directly. I'll put my reply here, where hardly anyone will ever see it.

I have this to say about those thousands of soldiers.

I wonder if you can explain how soldiers dying keeps you free?

It would help me to hear what you think, because I don't understand that common saying.

I know we're taught that in school, but the more I study history, the more I find out that we were lied into almost every war.

So, maybe American soldiers have died in vain repeatedly, but that thought is too terrible to bear. 

So, maybe we need to say, "they died for our freedom" to sooth our wounded consciences.

I'm not saying that I know anything. I'm just suspicious when I'm told to believe something without explanation that makes moral sense.

I'm just being curious, because I've searched and searched for a good answer to this sad question. I care about moral truth, not the lies coming from the mouths of millionaire politicians. Voting gives creeps in D.C. the "mandate" to dream up more and more battlefields where they can send our kids into harms way. And cheer-leading chants like "they died for our freedom" keep people coming back and flipping those levers in the voting booth. A never-ending cycle that feeds on young soldiers, thanks to our gullibility.

What good did the Iraq war do? For one thing, of interest to a Catholic; there was a Catholic presence in Iraq under the old regime, but now the Shia have driven out all Christian groups. What good is the Afghan war doing? And Pakistan and Syria and now we're supposed to fear and hate the Russians once again. Many US politicians would love to start a war with Iran, a country that hasn't attacked anyone else in over 200 years.

I hate seeing flags at half-staff and I'm sick of seeing that symbol of wasted young lives. I cry at the sight.

It makes me sad, angry, but most of all confused. I think that war will not end until politics ends. Just my dream.

I wonder what lies our young soldiers are being told nowadays, because there are always lies behind the scenes.

We don't find out the truth until many years later.

I'm sorry if this is a touchy question. But I don't know the answer. 

Thanks for listening,

Rick

PS - It's interesting and sad to read Major General Smedley Butler's 1930 essay "War Is A Racket".

He was the most highly decorated US soldier ever at the time of his retirement. I think he might have something valuable to say.

His suggestions included that war financiers should be conscripted to fight in the front lines, with the young boys. He also suggested that boys on the front line be included in the decision-making process for choosing battle strategy. And, he suggested that the US military never be allowed more than 200 miles from the US coastline, so that the military can only be used for defensive purposes.

Excerpt: "War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small 'inside' group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes."

Excuses for Obama's war

It seems incredible to me that I should have to point out the evil of keeping a war going that has lasted longer than WWI and WWII combined.

On Oct 17, 2009, my friend wrote to me:

The Real Problem is that conservative republicans got us neck-deep in Afghanistan and then conveniently hid it behind the Iraq mess. Then left both disasters for Obama to try to clean up.

Yeah, the old "if only the leaders I like were in charge, things would be great" argument.

The fact is that liberals love government more than they hate war, and your reaction proves that, ... sad to say.

Obama has the power to stop the carnage now - withdrawing is the only compassionate thing to do.

The same argument is always used to keep wars going indefinitely; "we can't stop now, there would be chaos and death". You don't see the irony of that? We'd still be in Vietnam today if everyone followed that line of irrational thinking.

Can Obama do anything wrong in your eyes?

Sometimes I think that the best thing America can do is quick, complete withdrawl from the whole region. Let them all kill each other and we'll deal with whoever is left standing after the carnage. But then, I'm too compassionate to advocate that. Damn it.

Keeping a war going because of your "compassion"? That's Orwellian double-speak to the max.

But if we continue what we've been doing the last 10 years, is that better? No, I'd say.

Obama is ramping things up and spilling the war over into Pakistan. And you still refuse to admit that Obama is a war monger.

He is beholden to the corporate entities and politicians who got him elected, and most of them want war to continue. It's good for business and good for the politicians.

Liberals love a war when it's started by a liberal, conservatives love a war that's started by a conservative.

And around and around it goes. When the killing will stop, nobody knows. - All in the name of "peace" and "compassion".

Perhaps, read some history about wars, and the popular arguments of the time - they are no different now than they were a hundred years ago when the US invaded the Philippines to "protect the locals". And then the slaughter began.

But, pick a war, any war. I just randomly picked the war in the Philippines because I knew it was about a hundred years ago.

Read what Mark Twain wrote about war back then.

In my eyes, you either are adamantly and always against war, or you are forever going to be making excuses for double-talk; "war is peace, ignorance is strength, slavery is freedom".

Note that in all modern history NO invading force has ever done any good in Afghanistan nor has any foreign power ever subdued- permanently- any bit of the violence, nor has anyone ever succeeded with any plans for whatever future they had in mind in this country.

I don't see how that is relevant to the argument that war can stop NOW, no excuses. There is no good way to stop a war, especially not by extending the violence like Obama is doing.

I think at least Obama is trying to change the way Americans think about the Middle East. That has to be the first step. I wish things would move faster but remember he's fighting against a lot of very ingrained and inbred thinking. He can't change the world right this minute any more than you or I can?

Baloney. He can stop it. He loves his political career more than he hates innocent bloodshed.

Smile, man. We can agree, disagree, or agree to disagree. And that's a good thing!

That is not right. The truth is the truth, regardless of who agrees. And war is wrong. You wanna dig up the old Catholic argument about a "just war"?

These are innocent lives that are being destroyed by your tax dollars, and you treat it like a coffee-table discussion.

Stand up for what is right, not for which side of the left / right debate you are on.

Liberals Against Obama