"Love The Warrior, Hate The War"

This post originated as a comment on Mimi's blog.  It got too long, however, and so I place my thoughts here instead.  I can't remember how to make that link so just look over to the left there on the blog page.

Love the Warrior, Hate the War?  Make me wince as much as the phrase it is playing with.  With the exception, perhaps, of the marine corps...I wonder how many kids (and I DO mean kids) in the military would define themselves as a warrior.  Soldier, sailor, zoomie (sorry I never could figure out what Air Force enlisted call themselves)but warrior I suspect would not be top of the list.

I responded to a comment thread on FB about saying "Thanks" to vets.  I often forget that I am a veteran.  I joined the Navy at 18 as a way to get out of the house on my own terms.  It was peace time.  It was the Navy.  It was a big adventure.  It also felt very normal and average.  When folks have said "thanks" it reminds me that what I did at 18 was not normal and average.  It was exceptional and I did it by choice.  Not once in making my decision did I think "Yeah, Baby, I'm gonna be a Warrior!"

Which brings me back to that phrase.  Yes, we continue to carry cultural guilt over how we treated our Vietnam Vets.  The anti-war  crowd, angry at the pro-war crowd forgot that most of the little guys were drafted.  Further, they ignored the fact that many of the gung ho "Warriors" rapidly changed their minds after some time on the ground in Nam.  Beyond that the pro-war folks had to deal with the fact that we lost.  We went from the glory of WW II victory to the stale mate of Korea to the evacuation of Saigon.

Somewhere along the way, we decided that we shouldn't punish the kids who sign up - even in an alleged "volunteer" military.  Yet, the power brokers seem to have turned Support the Troops into a modern version of America, Love It or Leave It.  There is a strong sense among many that supporting our troops means shutting up and not criticizing the war effort.

I understand the spirit of "Love the Warriors" even if I don't exactly agree with it.  For starters I would begin by  eliminating the use of "Troops."  Troops is too close to describing the human beings involved as if they were military hardware.  In a way it is how we have sanitized the casualty reports.  We say that so many troops were killed, rather than identifying them as so many marines, so many sailors, so many soldiers, etc.  I believe part of how we got here has to do with the fact that the Pentagon didn't want us reminded of the fact that they placed sailors on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan...we might question why Navy personnel were being used in that capacity.  Yet, the 3,000th casualty in Afghanistan was a sailor.  Folks have argued that "Troops" just makes it simpler reporting the casualties.  Why should it be simpler? Other than we don't want to look to closely at death.  It makes the war go down easier.

After eliminating the euphemistic use of Troops, I would force the government to go back to calling it The War Department...who are we kidding but ourselves calling it the Defense Department?  Iraq and Afghanistan were both scams as war.  Need I remind you that Osama was found in Pakistan?  One of our alleged allies.  Need I remind you that 18 of the 19 terrorists on 9/11 were Saudis, another one of our allies.

Maybe if we could initiate changes like these, stop the spin and marketing of bloody, destructive war, we could bring an end to the need for a Memorial Day holiday.