Random thoughts on war

General James Mattis mocked Donald Trump yesterday, telling an audience that the only military man Trump respects is Colonel Sanders.  He said he earned his spurs on the battlefield, while Donald got his in a letter from his doctor.  
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2019/oct/18/james-mattis-trump-mocks-spurs-doctor

Donald Trump has talked since the campaign about bringing all of our troops home.  He does not believe in overseas engagements, even if they advance the purpose of world peace or preventing the spread of extremist terrorism.

Susan Rice's book talks a lot about the vagaries of overseas diplomacy, the calculations in military intervention, the messiness of real politics in the world.  Whether to intervene in genocides, whether to sanction dictators who starve or kill their own people, what kind of moral obligations we have to "help people who won't help themselves."  These are complex questions with no easy answers.

I'm listening to a CD which includes an excerpt from a Vietnam-era anti-hippie screed about draft dodgers and card burners and "freedom isn't free." I see bumper stickers like this all the time and they still make me sick.

My dad and I never saw eye to eye on war. He grew up, literally, fighting WWII and winning a war against true evil.  I grew up resisting the draft to send college boys to Southeast Asia to fight, well, to this day I couldn't tell you what that war was about.  To prevent the spread of communism?  To safeguard the world's supply of titanium?  To reduce unemployment numbers before the election?

Donald Trump and I grew up with a very different view of the military than General Mattis.  We saw the venality, the self-serving nature of 1970s politicians.  War had none of the glory or purpose for us that veterans of WWII had.  Our returning soldiers were jeered as "babykillers."

Wars since Vietnam haven't been any more noble. When the US had terrorism in 2001 we didn't attack the country who sponsored the attacks -- we used it as an excuse to commandeer oil fields elsewhere. When terrible things happened overseas, we mostly turned our back unless our oil supply was threatened. Our bumbling leaders have gotten us into endless ethnic wars with no endgame, no resolution. Religious hatred is just an excuse to sell arms to both sides.

And the chief exporter of terrorism? He's being invited back into the G8 by his appointed puppet president.

Where did we go wrong.

NoCoPilot wrote:

Where did we go wrong.

If you ask me, Johnson. Kennedy was gonna get us out of Nam. He prevented us going into Cuba and the generals hated him for it. But something turned. He was killed and we haven't had the same kind of ability to resist the military industrial complex since. I honestly think no Pres since Kennedy has had a full account of all the unacknowledged special access programs and thus we have no real control. The Pres is just a temp gov worker. As are Congress people.

Gawd I don't know what you're on about but you're dead wrong.

Those who served in Viet Nam were disproportionately black. Disproportionally poor. Disproportionally uneducated.

I believe I posted something recently here about "McNamara's Idiots" where the administration, like a serial killer who preys on prostitutes, targeted victims they thought they could get away with targeting. People society wouldn't miss. Young men who would lower the unemployment rate by dying, without causing any congressmen's sons to be among them.

When I said "college boys" I meant "college-age boys." Boys who would otherwise go off to college -- or sit around and fuck up the unemployment stats for the election.

If you will be kind enough to pardon my previous posts, I realize there are some threads in which I should not participate.

Good heavens, don't worry about your reputation HERE.