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• Wednesday, April 30, 2008 04:29 PM

  @Bucky, Omooex

  I really do not have time to get into this fight with you two right now. A quick response:

  Omo - we've had this discussion briefly on another thread, and I shared my feelings with you there. I understand your position, as much as I can, and sympathize for the reasons I gave you there. And as I said there, every time I read about another crime like Haditha, or Abu Ghraib, or the analysts' bullshit, I get physically sick to my stomach. When I see how little corrective action is applied, I worry about the institution itself. That goes for the big 'corrective action' about the abuse of the military for a pack of lies that killed (at this point still) untold numbers of innocents. And the point about not joining up if you know this is what you're heading into, I cannot argue with (and as I told you, have made the opposite argument).

  I'd like it if the vast majority of society as a whole were highly skeptical about war, grudgingly accepted the necessity of a defense capability but only went into using it kicking and screaming. Sure, I'd like it if things were not the way they were when I was in, e.g. not being able to go downtown without getting jumped because you were a soldier ... but all the reverance you see now would have creeped me out, even then. I'd also like to see some of the benefits a young person would get form the military ... discipline, self respect, confidence, the chance to meet and work with other people from around your country and learn to understand them ... available through some more constructive means, like reactivating the CCC (which is where, in the American army, many of those values originated during the army's growth in WWII).

  Alas, the collective dynamic in any society tends to become more martial at critical moments ... the best (brief) writing about this I have read recently was Chris Hedges' 'War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning', which I recommend (He does not mean the title in a supportive way).

  If you join an organized gang of thugs engaged in murder, theft, intimidation, and destruction then do not claim to be surprised when you are ordered to commit heinous crimes. Do not claim shock

  Gee, you make it sound so inevitable. So nobody really has any personal responsibility for atrocities, is that it? They're all actually policy, part of the DNA of the institution, is that it? If you think that's true, then you really don't know anything, and I don't know where to start correcting you.

  The description is also valid, and moreso on a per capita basis I'd wager, for law enforcement world wide. So I guess nobody should be cops, either. And we should spit on them in the streets when they walk by. Certainly not call them if there's a problem (which in a lot of places I've been, I wouldn't). And disown anyone in your family, instantly, who becomes a cop.

  Honestly, Bucky, is this the best you can do? A bunch of ill-informed and provocative slogans?

  Also, when I was in the army we had mandatory quarterly training on lawful and unlawful orders and how to disobey them and report them through the chain of command without getting court martialled. Nobody has an excuse. And there are good reasons why you don't allow shit like this, even in wartime, that have nothing to do with humanitarian concerns.

  I'll be out the rest of the night and all day tomorrow, so I won't be able to respond. Bucky, you'll be able to peddle all your twaddle without interference, so bang on. Now's your chance.

  —quickstrategy Read quickstrategy's other letters
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