Strong views, and in reality, the strongest kind of support for our troops — respect for what we ask of them, and respect for the position we put them in, and respect for their responding with integrity {which we also ask of them!}.
Jingoism and hagiography are not support. They massage the ego of the jingoist, and the troops are mere props in their show.
Most people in the US are largely ignorant of all the places our military are involved around the world. They have no idea about what is asked of our troops, and how that leads to extreme levels of PTSD. I was talking to some neighbors about the situation in Sudan and they looked at me and said what does that have to do with us? https://www.africom.mil/about-the-command
Jean, what's as depressing is to mention a country and the respondent has no idea where it is, even to the extent on which continent. When did geography stop being taught in schools?
I've had "thank you for your service" directed at me a number of times; I can't recall a single instance when someone actually asked me about what that service was (beyond asking what branch) or what I thought about it. No one actually seemed interested in wanting to know; they discharged their "duty" - as directed by the MSM and politicians - by just spouting it.
Before Tom Brokaw defined the WWII generation as "the greatest generation" in his book, which became a meme, Steven Ambrose had a book about the European campaign called "Citizen Soldiers". The war was fought by draftees - to be sure - but they represented all regions and classes of society.
Now, military members and veterans - due to the All Volunteer Military - are a separate class of people, separate from the citizenry they are supposed to represent and defend. It has become easy for the owners to deploy them to wars and other missions that have no clear goals.
Here's a suggestion. Next time someone meets a vet, don't thank them for their service - ask them about it and then just listen.
Hello TomR... Military Service is becoming a Caste... Those that chose to Serve within the Caste do so because it runs in the Family... In my Case, we Rode with Geronimo...
Even during my time in Army olive drab (lovely color!)--I exited the military just as Nixon was morphing the military into a "volunteer" organization--LIFERS were a caste of sorts, despised by us peon soldiers. (Though some were decent human beings, I must note.) The attitude that they were, by dint of donning the uniform, SUPERIOR to mere civilians was already present. I can only imagine the extent to which that attitude has grown by now, with morons like Crusader Rabbit Hegseth running the show. :-(
Ha! Thanks for the compliment (!). Army recruiter was easiest to "access" (time was of the essence!); Navy has medical corpsmen, true; Air Force I think uses Army medical services, actually. I have never promoted my self-published memoir here on Bracing Views, but it seems appropriate to do so now. I lose money on every sale (great deal, self-publishing!). Published 2021, may only be avail. now as an e-book via Amazon (yeah, I know, boooo!!) or paperback used copy. "TAKE THIS WAR AND SHOVE IT! A Most Unwilling Soldier 1967-1971" is the title or search for it by author name.
I caught myself smiling warmly, seeing your comment about Geronimo, because I liked it. I found it kind of sweet (whether you meant it that way, or not).
But you asked - and gave him the chance to talk about it if he wanted. It takes a while. Even among vets - I had a co worker who did three tours in Vietnam with Special Forces open up to me, only a bit - after knowing me for three years.
Your comment triggered my memory. The book “Thank You for Your Service” by David Finkel is the basis for a movie and a documentary (“An investigation into the failed mental health policies within the US military and the deadly consequences to the troops”) with the same title. There is also Mark Leibovich’ takeoff “Thank You for Your Servitude.” Somewhere along the line I’ve also come across some very trenchant dissection and commentary on the near-obligatory phrase, can’t recall where or by whom offhand. “’[D]uty’ - as directed by the MSM and politicians” pithily sums it up.
As an anti-war veteran, I do not "advertise" my veteran status to the general public, but I do take advantage of discounts available from some major retailers. I get thanked for my service in writing on sales receipts from Lowe's, for instance, and sometimes it's spoken by a cashier. I keep my lips zipped in those situations. They wouldn't want to hear about my time in uniform, and it would take a while to recount my story anyway!
Very well said. I think we should keep in mind that whenever we think of those who serve there is a great divide between the person that gave himself up to be a tool of government and the government that uses him or her for dubious purpose.
They are not the same thing. Why they serve and how they do it is a very personal thing. Whereas, the mission they are sent on is another matter. Unfortunately, how the public views that service is often fickle and ignorant. Without much consciousness or empathy for what the real personal individual motives were and how that service was carried out. Only a veteran can understand this because he/she is the victim. That's why the first thing I did after I was discharged was connect with my fellow veterans and listen to their stories. I was part of a group of guys that started the first chapter of Veterans for Peace at Valley College Los Angeles in 1970. For two years all my friends were vets. It was a form of rehabilitation that served me greatly.
"Why they serve." Until 1973, of course, why we served was largely because we were conscripted. With consequences for saying "Hell no!" I was one of many who actually enlisted, but only because the draft was about to grab me. And the Army did, in fact, respect my request to serve as a medic. But only because we were desperately needed!
Same here. At age 17 I enlisted in USAF because I had an older cousin who prep me to know that USAF was twice as long but I would get better training. Ironically, I hated it but still consider it the first smart decision I ever made. Funny, my last day at Andersen AFB in Guam at the terminal waiting for my flight out, after turning down another stripe, base of choice and about $4000 to reenlist some asshole yelled at me for not having my jacket buttoned.
Same here wilrodx. I could've bought a new Firebird Formula like my Sky-cop friend Jay Gardner did from New York w/ my Reenlistment Bonus check, but chose not to. I knew there was more money to be had in the Civilian sector, and punched out!! Took Civil Service exams for City-Cop & State Trooper also Firefighter 3x's. Third time was the charm got Appointed, Fire academy, and I became a "Smoke-eater" like my dad (2nd. Gen.) Best decisions I ever made too.
BTW: You said you were an AP guarding B-52's in North Dakota? In upstate NY at Grifiss it got really cold. The AP's were our friends because we kept those personnel heaters running when they dragged them into the hanger busted.
I never worked in them Base Police mostly, but I do rem. them on the Flightlines. I had one of my 2- Way Motorola Radios portable fall out of my Wooly Parka in N.D. on the Flightline patrolling long story short it got run over by a Flightline APR Airport Straight Plow it wasn't pretty!! I thought I would have to pay for it, but SAC gave me a Pass...:/ :o)
Not that other “Bracing Views” entries weren’t sufficient reason to call for it, but this one really says that a compendium of them, plus earlier “Tom Dispatch” ones, need to be put in book form. Certainly for the topics covered, but also for the refined, sophisticated thought; the nuance; the perception; the deftness in expression; the sensitivity. For certain, a picture is worth a thousand words, a pithy cartoon perhaps even more so. Here, about 1,000 speak tens of thousands lying behind those too familiar, too unexamined ones, “Support Our Troops.”
Oh, the cartoon! Thanks for reminding me I meant to comment on that, re: a different cartoon. During WW I, a cartoonist for a Socialist publication called "The Masses" drew an illustration that showed a doctor examining a candidate for conscription, or perhaps he'd enlisted. Huge, muscular body, topped by...no head at all!! The caption read: "Medical Examiner: 'At last, the perfect soldier!'" Here in the land of the free, that cartoonist was jailed until the war was over. God bless America!!
Was not aware of that cartoon, maybe some online sleuthing will come up with it. What you relate here does lead to the crackdown on dissent under Woodrow Wilson: a few years ago a book came out on the women's movement in opposition to the war and their imprisonment, can't recall title but should pop up given a sufficiently worded search; the Alien and Sedition Act; the Creel Commission; the imprisonment of Eugene V. Debs; a few other such democracy-affirming measures.
Of course the insidiousness hasn't abated since, even worse under the national security surveillance state, multiplied exponentially with the Zionists both under their fanaticism and their tech obsessions.
Yes, in the wake of WW I, US AG Palmer launched the first real "Red Scare" (hunt!!). Not that suspected socialists and anarchists were beloved prior to that! This led to execution of Sacco and Vanzetti and launched a guy named John Edgar Hoover on his illustrious (hardy-har-har) career.
Wow! So was the firehouse formerly a jail? Or were the boys being held in a secret location so a "mob of anarchists" couldn't bust them out of captivity??
No Greg it was a Police Substation from the late 1800's. to early 20th. Century connected to the Firehouse, "Police Sta.2" basically an Office and 2 Jail Cells in the South Side of Town "Campello" Section of the City. Obsolete now the City Center has a new combined Police & Fire Station plus the other 7 Firehouses/ and one other Police station.
And the propaganda continued with "The FBI" t.v. series in the '60s-'70s with Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. (you must remember) which delighted J. Edgar, if he didn't have a hand in seeing it come to fruition itself. And the naming of the FBI building after him rivals that of Dulles International Airport the "Most Boneheaded, Obtuse Award" in naming public structures after borderline - if not de facto - sociopaths.
Yes, I watched that stuff on TV. I was raised in the heart of the "Cold War" environment after all. Zimbalist's dad was a rather well known concert violinist. Zimbalist Jr. was a flaming right-winger, I read somewhere years later. So "acting out his beliefs" on the telly and getting paid for it, I guess. "Nice work if you can get it," wrote lyricist Ira Gershwin!
What was it Carl Sagan said "If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another." Carl Sagan "Cosmos" (1980) In Pale Blue Dot he says "Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious!"
We certainly don't need to kill over issues in this country we disagree on, The only time killing someone is justified is when your life is at stake! If everyone only took Sagan's message to heart-- its an end game win for humanity....
I actually joined the FBI to become a Special Agent because I thought the FBI opposed and was committed to reducing the crime of murder. Like many others, I was influenced by watching too much TV, i.e. "Dragnet", Efram Zimbalist Jr. and Jimmy Stewart's simplistic "FBI Story" of "good guys vs bad guys." But when I came to teach "law enforcement ethics" in schools and academic venues and used the example of how cheating on can so easily proliferate in a classroom if unchecked beyond the kids who actually need to cheat to the point where the smartest kids, who already know all the answers, will also tend to succumb, not wanting to take the risk of getting one wrong, unlike everyone else in the class who have the answers ahead of time. I think the desensitization to cheating is a lot like the desensitization to murder that happens when everyone around you is doing it and there is no accountability.
Hello Coleen... The DJT Regime is Desensitizing Corruption.... It is Making Corruption Great Again ;-)... What do you think of Ka$h Patel... Ka$h Patel is Proof that the Bad Will Drive Out The Good...
Ha ha! Kash (Cash?) Patel is proof that Trump sets aside his gross racism if a candidate for office is sufficiently ass-kissing toward the Godfather-in-Chief! My old Army buddy in Ohio now refers to "the Trump Crime Family." Yep, he's on to something there!
I think that's a great image, also. I'm looking at the overly developed muscular bodies underneath those small heads. Says to me that small brains supported by, and encouraging the use of, brawn and power (war) result in caskets draped in the flag.
Agreed, Bill. The best way to support our troops is to keep them out of harm's way. With regard to speaking truth to power, the US is now 64th in Press Freedom and the trend is not good. More than ever, we must continue to speak the truth. https://youtu.be/i9KEQM7seSs?si=CXPW8gLTa50EB-6B
Excerpt from my substack attempt to point out a root cause of the epidemic of mass shootings and other suicidal-homicidal violence inside the U.S. which I think is a regenerative desire to rise above one's lower socio-economic dreariness and be seen as a "war hero."
"In a myriad of ways, Americans as a whole — far more than the small percentage who go on to join the actual military — have now been indoctrinated to believe in “regenerative violence.” The suspect in the shootings in Minnesota had long been, as his childhood friend said: “into military stuff,” playing “army men,” always fantasizing about running a security business. Incessant cultural lionizing of “American snipers” and warrior heroes is effectively employed by the powerful Military Industrial Propaganda Complex in its attempt to maintain a level of public “war fever” to sustain our continued violent aggression and moves on the “global chessboard.” But by the same token, it should come as no surprise that, having been surrounded for decades with this form of death culture, more and more of our fellow citizens, including warrior wannabes who become unhinged or who just eventually fall into the pit of despair/depression, come to think that war IS THEIR answer. Can it be any more painfully clear when a “Dad went to war last night”?" https://eisenhowermedianetwork.substack.com/p/dad-went-to-war-last-night-exponential
A personal experience - about 20 years ago, I took a few handgun courses taught by ex-SF guys and cops. They also had a number of home and vehicle safety courses, and a few long-gun courses. All were well taught and emphasized defensive use.
Then I started observing - particularly in the long gun courses, students (mostly middle aged guys) were showing up with load bearing vests and cargo pants - they all looked like military contractors on patrol in Iraq. Then the company started offering military training courses where students would plan real world type missions in the woods against an aggressor force of instructors (all weapons verified safe and empty). I lost all interest about that time.
I knew when we had 'adults' playing army with real weapons we were headed to a very bad place.
It's very likely some of those bozos considered themselves in training to be Trump "shock troops"! How I wish I was kidding. Or if that was still pre-Trump, perhaps they idolized Tim McVeigh! :-(
That would have been near the end of the Little Bush and start of the Bronco Bama administrations. Given the cost of those military-style courses (in the several thousand dollar range), and the school's location, I think many were bored tech workers who never served. But some could have drifted into the militia movement that was getting bigger then.
Just look at the knuckleheads (oh, I'm so unkind!) who walk around in pseudo-military camouflage clothing!! How terribly fashionable!! Hell, back in my day, olive drab was where it was at! Not a lot of desert in Viet Nam, no need for desert-themed camo!
Hello Coleen.. Military Service is also becoming a Caste... Those that chose to Serve in the Caste do so because it runs in the Family, and in cases marry within the Caste... In my Case, we Rode with Geronimo...
Reading this and listening to Andy Rooney (there are none like him anymore in the media) one word popped into my old mind: bankruptcy. In a normal world people and even institutions have to declare bankruptcy because their obligations are so big that their assessts won‘t be enough to get out of the hole. B u t as in the housing crisisof 2008 when the government decided those bankrupt Wall Street banks were too big to fail and poured money into them to save them and rewarded the individuals responsible for the financial catastrophe with mouthwatering salaries while indebted Americans went insolvent. The American government has been bailing out and rewarding similarly the utterly incompetent millitary establishment whose success rate since 1945 is zero. They certainly provided Americans with enough dead heroes to celebrate on Memorial Day! What did they die for? Old and largely forgotten Smedley Butler won’t be featured on the PBS NEWSHOUR but David Petraeus and associates are pontificating on these news shows and confirm their moral bankruptcy which British poet Wilfred Owen in 1918, days before he was killed, immortalized in his poem DULCE ET DECORUM EST … The old lie: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. Might make for a more somber day if Owen‘s poem would be recited during Memorial Day celebrations.
In his book Endless Holocausts: Mass Death in the History of the United States Empire, the political scientist David Michael Smith calculates that the US has been responsible or shared responsibility for the death of 54 million people between 1945 and 2020. Add in domestic social killing and move the time back to the founding of the American Empire in 1776 and the body count climbs to 300 million. In his 2013 book America’s Deadliest Export, William Blum reported that the United States after World War II: worked to overthrow more than 50 foreign governments; interfered in elections held by 30 sovereign nations; tried to assassinate more than 50 foreign leaders; bombed more than 30 nations; and tried to suppress nationalist, leftist, and populist movements in at least 20 nations. (These numbers need to be updated for the last three years of the Obama administration and the Trump and Biden presidencies to include, among other things, US funding and protection of Israel’s 2023-20?? genocide in Gaza, Trump’s boat strikes in the Caribbean and Pacific, Trump’s kidnapping of Venezuela’s sovereign elected president, and Trump’s reckless and failing fiasco of a war on Iran.)
The United States is the only country to have attacked human beings (unnecessarily) with nuclear weapons (twice) and has brought the world remarkably close to nuclear annihilation on multiple occasions. It is the clear leader in the global march to societal collapse if not human extinction via climate collapse, ecocide (broadly understood), nuclear proliferation, pandemicide, and artificial intelligence.
Since 1945 the most morally correct military to join was one that fought against the American military- the most immoral-evil one. Only an American filled with propaganda would ever join the American military unless he joined that for a security-a status not readily available outside of the military or forced by conscription. Joining the American military requires insecure American young people who have lived unexamined lives with very low critical thinking skills.
I would agree with nearly all of what you write and especially appreciative of Blum's accurate work which substantiate Chalmer's "Sorrow of Empire." But your last paragraph seems to make light of the potency of the national propaganda machine (key part of MICIMATT, i.e. Military Industrial Congressional Intelligence MEDIA Academic Think Tank complex) continually pushing the main emotional buttons, the all-too-human vulnerabilities of a large percentage of people to fear, hate, greed, false pride, and blind loyalty. Which emotional vulnerabilities are what make war propaganda so powerful!
You can't say everything on a substack posting I have written muxh about MICIMATT...that's why I wrote propaganda in capital letters. I am a Canadian what can you tell me about Canada? I can tell you that the fact America never enacted Lincolns' Reconstruction has meant the civil war has never ended in America and never will until your recontruct just about everything including your text books about America. This Canadian just gave Americans facts they should know. Today John Mearsheimer was speculating on the number of deaths America has inflicted on the world. He told the interviewer that he should really know. So I forwarded the numbers to John, one of my very favorite American thinkers.
The current US admin. and, alarmingly, the Chief Justice of SCOTUS, are absolutely dedicated to ensuring that black folk especially, and other racial minorities, will NEVER achieve equality with the Caucasian majority.
The American military was built on social insecurity and offered a notion of security that made the world and Americans more insecure. Invest in war and you get war. Invest in social security and you get a society that is more secure and less divisive/polarized, far less inclined to feel so insecure that they need to other people and need enemies to compete against.
It's rudimentary logic that escapes Americans just like most Americans are ignorant of the real history of the American military I just provided you with. Twain said war was how Americans learned geography. Although funny, that is wrong. Americans are the most unworldly people of the West. Statistics show this-you have not invested in education like Canada or Norway....Investment in warring has left you a surplus of ignorance from a lack of investment in education.
Ha! Most Americans can't identify a given member state of this nation on a map!! Mark Twain wrote that he would not march off to war under the flag of this nation or any other if he was convinced the cause was NOT JUST. I adopted that attitude toward the US Military re: Viet Nam before I even entered said military, but only discovered Twain's stance many years later.
So true stats show Americans can name all the branches of their government is high...the more ignorant of other nations other people the easier it is to other them and kill them
But you excel at-are exceptional at flag waving nationalism-PROPAGANDA. God bless America and anyone that doesn't should be bombed to hell...bombs bursting is right in your national anthem sung as your bomb dropping the war jets fly over.
Just the facts ma'am- the uncomfortable truths Americans need to hear Yes, I am prejudice against violence like MLK. Bills's notion of bracing truths is like drinking Kool-Aid e. MLK would agree 100 percent with what I wrote-because he said very similar things-read him! Rather than give more evidence of American ignorance and lack of thinking skills.
Alexis de Tocqueville famously stated, "As one digs deeper into the national character of the Americans, one sees that they have sought the value of everything in this world only in the answer to this single question: how much money will it bring in?" But few know he also said that you don't have to dig at all to discover a preponderance of American ignorance.
The absolutism about what “Americans” do and what they’re like is just so overwhelmingly bigoted bullshit. YES, there’s a lot of that. And YES, sometimes it is ascendant. But it negates all of us who are not what you paint. I dislike bigotry in any guise. So….there.
With your low intellect if you read MLK you probably would have concluded that he should have been shot for what he said about America. You are an incredibly stupid...
Generalizing is perfectly legit, Pat! If our country's reality didn't manifest as Glen describes it, would we tolerate one WAR OF CHOICE after another after another after another?? Think on that!
Jhe facts ma'am- the uncomfortable truths Americans need to hear Yes I am prejudice agains violence like MLK. Bills's notion of bracing truths is like drinking Kool-Aid e. MLK would agree 100 percent with what I wrote-because he said very similar things-read him!
I was once a pacifist, but not any more, though I am still NOT a militarist.
What you say this country did militarily is mostly true... we have had some VERY intrusive and deadly policies vis-a-vis other less powerful, and more socialist, countries. Especially under the cover of anti-Soviet action in The Cold War. Not something I ever endorsed! We were almost never measured and careful at that time. And I take exception to our use of nukes in Japan and want us to repudiate that action, but I don't expect that apology any time soon.
And still this country has also been at the helm of very many great and broad good works the world over, that you choose to put in a separate box, and ignore.
That is what I disagree with.
We have a potential that we could energize... we have done GOOD works!
And we should repudiate Empire Building.
And build instead on what the world needs from a strong and prosperous country. .
Any "good" done abroad by US Government, militarily or via agencies like AID, even the Peace Corps, has been basically accidental or incidental. The motivation has always been to increase the power of the US to rule the world. The impossible dream!
What about the veterans? If Americans are “patriotic”, why do they allow their government to dump troops once they are broken?
Admit it, Americans worship power. That’s all to it. So long as the troops are strong and capable of inflicting pain on others, they are worthy of support. Once they are broken, they are cast aside with the approval of the American people.
What about the veterans? If Americans are “patriotic”, why do they allow their government to dump troops once they are broken?
Admit it, Americans worship power. So long as the troops are strong and capable of inflicting pain on others, they are worthy of support. Once they are broken, they are cast aside with the approval of the American people.
"US Warplane Attacked Iranian Commercial Ship in Gulf of Oman"
A US F-18 attacked and disabled an Iranian-flagged civilian ship in the Gulf of Oman. U.S. forces disabled the tanker’s rudder by firing several rounds from the 20mm cannon gun of a U.S. Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet launched from USS Abraham Lincoln.”
'Another aspect of “support our troops” is communal ritual to mark the passing of local “heroes.”' Bill, you are on to something here. "Dr." Josef Goebbels understood this thoroughly. The power of the massed troops, the civilian auxiliary forces, the flags and banners, at the Nuremberg rallies was PALPABLE. And an ordinary veteran of WW I was accorded the honor to always carry the lead Nazi emblem in the parades feeding into the stadium. For God's sake, readers, if you have never seen "Triumph of the Will," I implore you to watch it. And study it! Preferably with a learned commentary track that identifies the Nazi personalities on view, their origins and their ultimate destinies.
Further: Look at the huge success the Dick Cheney presidency (really, that was the reality) had in persuading Americans, and not just Republicans, to drive around with "Support Our Troops" magnets, bumper stickers, etc. on their vehicles. A smashing success in selling a really shoddy product. Historical note for young whipper-snappers like Col. Astore: We used that slogan, modified, in opposing the war against Viet Nam: "Support Our Troops--Bring Them Home NOW!!"
Strong views, and in reality, the strongest kind of support for our troops — respect for what we ask of them, and respect for the position we put them in, and respect for their responding with integrity {which we also ask of them!}.
Jingoism and hagiography are not support. They massage the ego of the jingoist, and the troops are mere props in their show.
Hear, hear, Mr. Astore.
Ha! If the current Jingoist-in-Chief had his EGO massaged any farther he would literally explode! Which wouldn't be a bad thing to see happen! :-)
No argument there.
Most people in the US are largely ignorant of all the places our military are involved around the world. They have no idea about what is asked of our troops, and how that leads to extreme levels of PTSD. I was talking to some neighbors about the situation in Sudan and they looked at me and said what does that have to do with us? https://www.africom.mil/about-the-command
Jean, what's as depressing is to mention a country and the respondent has no idea where it is, even to the extent on which continent. When did geography stop being taught in schools?
I've had "thank you for your service" directed at me a number of times; I can't recall a single instance when someone actually asked me about what that service was (beyond asking what branch) or what I thought about it. No one actually seemed interested in wanting to know; they discharged their "duty" - as directed by the MSM and politicians - by just spouting it.
Before Tom Brokaw defined the WWII generation as "the greatest generation" in his book, which became a meme, Steven Ambrose had a book about the European campaign called "Citizen Soldiers". The war was fought by draftees - to be sure - but they represented all regions and classes of society.
Now, military members and veterans - due to the All Volunteer Military - are a separate class of people, separate from the citizenry they are supposed to represent and defend. It has become easy for the owners to deploy them to wars and other missions that have no clear goals.
Here's a suggestion. Next time someone meets a vet, don't thank them for their service - ask them about it and then just listen.
Hello TomR... Military Service is becoming a Caste... Those that chose to Serve within the Caste do so because it runs in the Family... In my Case, we Rode with Geronimo...
Your family can take pride in that it was fighting for its land and its people. So many others have only a tradition of fighting for empire.
Even during my time in Army olive drab (lovely color!)--I exited the military just as Nixon was morphing the military into a "volunteer" organization--LIFERS were a caste of sorts, despised by us peon soldiers. (Though some were decent human beings, I must note.) The attitude that they were, by dint of donning the uniform, SUPERIOR to mere civilians was already present. I can only imagine the extent to which that attitude has grown by now, with morons like Crusader Rabbit Hegseth running the show. :-(
Hello Greg... You were Drafted?...
No. Like many, I ENLISTED in order to "beat the draft"!! Really, it was "a thing" back then.
Hello Gregory... That is perverse logic... Why didn't you chose the Air Force, or Navy?...
Ha! Thanks for the compliment (!). Army recruiter was easiest to "access" (time was of the essence!); Navy has medical corpsmen, true; Air Force I think uses Army medical services, actually. I have never promoted my self-published memoir here on Bracing Views, but it seems appropriate to do so now. I lose money on every sale (great deal, self-publishing!). Published 2021, may only be avail. now as an e-book via Amazon (yeah, I know, boooo!!) or paperback used copy. "TAKE THIS WAR AND SHOVE IT! A Most Unwilling Soldier 1967-1971" is the title or search for it by author name.
I had to smile at this one.
Hello RobinB.... Why?...
I caught myself smiling warmly, seeing your comment about Geronimo, because I liked it. I found it kind of sweet (whether you meant it that way, or not).
Thank You RobinB....
I once asked a vet about their service, after he told me he was in Iraq. He declined, saying he didn't like to talk about it. I understood.
But you asked - and gave him the chance to talk about it if he wanted. It takes a while. Even among vets - I had a co worker who did three tours in Vietnam with Special Forces open up to me, only a bit - after knowing me for three years.
Your comment triggered my memory. The book “Thank You for Your Service” by David Finkel is the basis for a movie and a documentary (“An investigation into the failed mental health policies within the US military and the deadly consequences to the troops”) with the same title. There is also Mark Leibovich’ takeoff “Thank You for Your Servitude.” Somewhere along the line I’ve also come across some very trenchant dissection and commentary on the near-obligatory phrase, can’t recall where or by whom offhand. “’[D]uty’ - as directed by the MSM and politicians” pithily sums it up.
As an anti-war veteran, I do not "advertise" my veteran status to the general public, but I do take advantage of discounts available from some major retailers. I get thanked for my service in writing on sales receipts from Lowe's, for instance, and sometimes it's spoken by a cashier. I keep my lips zipped in those situations. They wouldn't want to hear about my time in uniform, and it would take a while to recount my story anyway!
WHY THEY SERVE
Very well said. I think we should keep in mind that whenever we think of those who serve there is a great divide between the person that gave himself up to be a tool of government and the government that uses him or her for dubious purpose.
They are not the same thing. Why they serve and how they do it is a very personal thing. Whereas, the mission they are sent on is another matter. Unfortunately, how the public views that service is often fickle and ignorant. Without much consciousness or empathy for what the real personal individual motives were and how that service was carried out. Only a veteran can understand this because he/she is the victim. That's why the first thing I did after I was discharged was connect with my fellow veterans and listen to their stories. I was part of a group of guys that started the first chapter of Veterans for Peace at Valley College Los Angeles in 1970. For two years all my friends were vets. It was a form of rehabilitation that served me greatly.
"Why they serve." Until 1973, of course, why we served was largely because we were conscripted. With consequences for saying "Hell no!" I was one of many who actually enlisted, but only because the draft was about to grab me. And the Army did, in fact, respect my request to serve as a medic. But only because we were desperately needed!
Same here. At age 17 I enlisted in USAF because I had an older cousin who prep me to know that USAF was twice as long but I would get better training. Ironically, I hated it but still consider it the first smart decision I ever made. Funny, my last day at Andersen AFB in Guam at the terminal waiting for my flight out, after turning down another stripe, base of choice and about $4000 to reenlist some asshole yelled at me for not having my jacket buttoned.
Same here wilrodx. I could've bought a new Firebird Formula like my Sky-cop friend Jay Gardner did from New York w/ my Reenlistment Bonus check, but chose not to. I knew there was more money to be had in the Civilian sector, and punched out!! Took Civil Service exams for City-Cop & State Trooper also Firefighter 3x's. Third time was the charm got Appointed, Fire academy, and I became a "Smoke-eater" like my dad (2nd. Gen.) Best decisions I ever made too.
BTW: You said you were an AP guarding B-52's in North Dakota? In upstate NY at Grifiss it got really cold. The AP's were our friends because we kept those personnel heaters running when they dragged them into the hanger busted.
I never worked in them Base Police mostly, but I do rem. them on the Flightlines. I had one of my 2- Way Motorola Radios portable fall out of my Wooly Parka in N.D. on the Flightline patrolling long story short it got run over by a Flightline APR Airport Straight Plow it wasn't pretty!! I thought I would have to pay for it, but SAC gave me a Pass...:/ :o)
Not that other “Bracing Views” entries weren’t sufficient reason to call for it, but this one really says that a compendium of them, plus earlier “Tom Dispatch” ones, need to be put in book form. Certainly for the topics covered, but also for the refined, sophisticated thought; the nuance; the perception; the deftness in expression; the sensitivity. For certain, a picture is worth a thousand words, a pithy cartoon perhaps even more so. Here, about 1,000 speak tens of thousands lying behind those too familiar, too unexamined ones, “Support Our Troops.”
Thanks, XK. Appreciate it.
You write good, WJA. ;-)
Oh, the cartoon! Thanks for reminding me I meant to comment on that, re: a different cartoon. During WW I, a cartoonist for a Socialist publication called "The Masses" drew an illustration that showed a doctor examining a candidate for conscription, or perhaps he'd enlisted. Huge, muscular body, topped by...no head at all!! The caption read: "Medical Examiner: 'At last, the perfect soldier!'" Here in the land of the free, that cartoonist was jailed until the war was over. God bless America!!
LOL (at your describing the cartoon). To the cartoonist, "Thank you for your service."
I hope your appreciation reaches the cartoonist's ghost somehow! :-)
Was not aware of that cartoon, maybe some online sleuthing will come up with it. What you relate here does lead to the crackdown on dissent under Woodrow Wilson: a few years ago a book came out on the women's movement in opposition to the war and their imprisonment, can't recall title but should pop up given a sufficiently worded search; the Alien and Sedition Act; the Creel Commission; the imprisonment of Eugene V. Debs; a few other such democracy-affirming measures.
Of course the insidiousness hasn't abated since, even worse under the national security surveillance state, multiplied exponentially with the Zionists both under their fanaticism and their tech obsessions.
Yes, in the wake of WW I, US AG Palmer launched the first real "Red Scare" (hunt!!). Not that suspected socialists and anarchists were beloved prior to that! This led to execution of Sacco and Vanzetti and launched a guy named John Edgar Hoover on his illustrious (hardy-har-har) career.
Sacco & Vanzetti were incarcerated in Cells in the basement under our Apparatus floor at a Firehouse I Served at in Brockton, Ma. Greg. lols
Wow! So was the firehouse formerly a jail? Or were the boys being held in a secret location so a "mob of anarchists" couldn't bust them out of captivity??
No Greg it was a Police Substation from the late 1800's. to early 20th. Century connected to the Firehouse, "Police Sta.2" basically an Office and 2 Jail Cells in the South Side of Town "Campello" Section of the City. Obsolete now the City Center has a new combined Police & Fire Station plus the other 7 Firehouses/ and one other Police station.
And the propaganda continued with "The FBI" t.v. series in the '60s-'70s with Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. (you must remember) which delighted J. Edgar, if he didn't have a hand in seeing it come to fruition itself. And the naming of the FBI building after him rivals that of Dulles International Airport the "Most Boneheaded, Obtuse Award" in naming public structures after borderline - if not de facto - sociopaths.
Yes, I watched that stuff on TV. I was raised in the heart of the "Cold War" environment after all. Zimbalist's dad was a rather well known concert violinist. Zimbalist Jr. was a flaming right-winger, I read somewhere years later. So "acting out his beliefs" on the telly and getting paid for it, I guess. "Nice work if you can get it," wrote lyricist Ira Gershwin!
Efrem Zimbalist Jr. great head of hair as I rem. lived well into his nineties-- also a good looking head for a Daughter too "Stephanie Zimbalist."
What was it Carl Sagan said "If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another." Carl Sagan "Cosmos" (1980) In Pale Blue Dot he says "Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious!"
We certainly don't need to kill over issues in this country we disagree on, The only time killing someone is justified is when your life is at stake! If everyone only took Sagan's message to heart-- its an end game win for humanity....
I actually joined the FBI to become a Special Agent because I thought the FBI opposed and was committed to reducing the crime of murder. Like many others, I was influenced by watching too much TV, i.e. "Dragnet", Efram Zimbalist Jr. and Jimmy Stewart's simplistic "FBI Story" of "good guys vs bad guys." But when I came to teach "law enforcement ethics" in schools and academic venues and used the example of how cheating on can so easily proliferate in a classroom if unchecked beyond the kids who actually need to cheat to the point where the smartest kids, who already know all the answers, will also tend to succumb, not wanting to take the risk of getting one wrong, unlike everyone else in the class who have the answers ahead of time. I think the desensitization to cheating is a lot like the desensitization to murder that happens when everyone around you is doing it and there is no accountability.
Hello Coleen... The DJT Regime is Desensitizing Corruption.... It is Making Corruption Great Again ;-)... What do you think of Ka$h Patel... Ka$h Patel is Proof that the Bad Will Drive Out The Good...
Ha ha! Kash (Cash?) Patel is proof that Trump sets aside his gross racism if a candidate for office is sufficiently ass-kissing toward the Godfather-in-Chief! My old Army buddy in Ohio now refers to "the Trump Crime Family." Yep, he's on to something there!
Unfortunately it's way too late to conscript Dr. Sagan into the presidency of this now benighted nation. :-(
I think that's a great image, also. I'm looking at the overly developed muscular bodies underneath those small heads. Says to me that small brains supported by, and encouraging the use of, brawn and power (war) result in caskets draped in the flag.
Please see my own comment about the cartoon!
Agreed, Bill. The best way to support our troops is to keep them out of harm's way. With regard to speaking truth to power, the US is now 64th in Press Freedom and the trend is not good. More than ever, we must continue to speak the truth. https://youtu.be/i9KEQM7seSs?si=CXPW8gLTa50EB-6B
Excerpt from my substack attempt to point out a root cause of the epidemic of mass shootings and other suicidal-homicidal violence inside the U.S. which I think is a regenerative desire to rise above one's lower socio-economic dreariness and be seen as a "war hero."
"In a myriad of ways, Americans as a whole — far more than the small percentage who go on to join the actual military — have now been indoctrinated to believe in “regenerative violence.” The suspect in the shootings in Minnesota had long been, as his childhood friend said: “into military stuff,” playing “army men,” always fantasizing about running a security business. Incessant cultural lionizing of “American snipers” and warrior heroes is effectively employed by the powerful Military Industrial Propaganda Complex in its attempt to maintain a level of public “war fever” to sustain our continued violent aggression and moves on the “global chessboard.” But by the same token, it should come as no surprise that, having been surrounded for decades with this form of death culture, more and more of our fellow citizens, including warrior wannabes who become unhinged or who just eventually fall into the pit of despair/depression, come to think that war IS THEIR answer. Can it be any more painfully clear when a “Dad went to war last night”?" https://eisenhowermedianetwork.substack.com/p/dad-went-to-war-last-night-exponential
Thank you. That's very insightful.
A personal experience - about 20 years ago, I took a few handgun courses taught by ex-SF guys and cops. They also had a number of home and vehicle safety courses, and a few long-gun courses. All were well taught and emphasized defensive use.
Then I started observing - particularly in the long gun courses, students (mostly middle aged guys) were showing up with load bearing vests and cargo pants - they all looked like military contractors on patrol in Iraq. Then the company started offering military training courses where students would plan real world type missions in the woods against an aggressor force of instructors (all weapons verified safe and empty). I lost all interest about that time.
I knew when we had 'adults' playing army with real weapons we were headed to a very bad place.
It's very likely some of those bozos considered themselves in training to be Trump "shock troops"! How I wish I was kidding. Or if that was still pre-Trump, perhaps they idolized Tim McVeigh! :-(
That would have been near the end of the Little Bush and start of the Bronco Bama administrations. Given the cost of those military-style courses (in the several thousand dollar range), and the school's location, I think many were bored tech workers who never served. But some could have drifted into the militia movement that was getting bigger then.
Just look at the knuckleheads (oh, I'm so unkind!) who walk around in pseudo-military camouflage clothing!! How terribly fashionable!! Hell, back in my day, olive drab was where it was at! Not a lot of desert in Viet Nam, no need for desert-themed camo!
Hello Coleen.. Military Service is also becoming a Caste... Those that chose to Serve in the Caste do so because it runs in the Family, and in cases marry within the Caste... In my Case, we Rode with Geronimo...
Actually, our military servicemen are mercenaries. Or, as Marine Major General Smedley Butler described himself, high class thugs for Big Business.
Hello Wrknight... Don't agree with this comment... I've known too many fine People in Uniform...
Reading this and listening to Andy Rooney (there are none like him anymore in the media) one word popped into my old mind: bankruptcy. In a normal world people and even institutions have to declare bankruptcy because their obligations are so big that their assessts won‘t be enough to get out of the hole. B u t as in the housing crisisof 2008 when the government decided those bankrupt Wall Street banks were too big to fail and poured money into them to save them and rewarded the individuals responsible for the financial catastrophe with mouthwatering salaries while indebted Americans went insolvent. The American government has been bailing out and rewarding similarly the utterly incompetent millitary establishment whose success rate since 1945 is zero. They certainly provided Americans with enough dead heroes to celebrate on Memorial Day! What did they die for? Old and largely forgotten Smedley Butler won’t be featured on the PBS NEWSHOUR but David Petraeus and associates are pontificating on these news shows and confirm their moral bankruptcy which British poet Wilfred Owen in 1918, days before he was killed, immortalized in his poem DULCE ET DECORUM EST … The old lie: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. Might make for a more somber day if Owen‘s poem would be recited during Memorial Day celebrations.
Memorial Day has been totally hijacked by the jingoists!! I will not participate in any activities related to that "holiday."
In his book Endless Holocausts: Mass Death in the History of the United States Empire, the political scientist David Michael Smith calculates that the US has been responsible or shared responsibility for the death of 54 million people between 1945 and 2020. Add in domestic social killing and move the time back to the founding of the American Empire in 1776 and the body count climbs to 300 million. In his 2013 book America’s Deadliest Export, William Blum reported that the United States after World War II: worked to overthrow more than 50 foreign governments; interfered in elections held by 30 sovereign nations; tried to assassinate more than 50 foreign leaders; bombed more than 30 nations; and tried to suppress nationalist, leftist, and populist movements in at least 20 nations. (These numbers need to be updated for the last three years of the Obama administration and the Trump and Biden presidencies to include, among other things, US funding and protection of Israel’s 2023-20?? genocide in Gaza, Trump’s boat strikes in the Caribbean and Pacific, Trump’s kidnapping of Venezuela’s sovereign elected president, and Trump’s reckless and failing fiasco of a war on Iran.)
The United States is the only country to have attacked human beings (unnecessarily) with nuclear weapons (twice) and has brought the world remarkably close to nuclear annihilation on multiple occasions. It is the clear leader in the global march to societal collapse if not human extinction via climate collapse, ecocide (broadly understood), nuclear proliferation, pandemicide, and artificial intelligence.
Since 1945 the most morally correct military to join was one that fought against the American military- the most immoral-evil one. Only an American filled with propaganda would ever join the American military unless he joined that for a security-a status not readily available outside of the military or forced by conscription. Joining the American military requires insecure American young people who have lived unexamined lives with very low critical thinking skills.
I would agree with nearly all of what you write and especially appreciative of Blum's accurate work which substantiate Chalmer's "Sorrow of Empire." But your last paragraph seems to make light of the potency of the national propaganda machine (key part of MICIMATT, i.e. Military Industrial Congressional Intelligence MEDIA Academic Think Tank complex) continually pushing the main emotional buttons, the all-too-human vulnerabilities of a large percentage of people to fear, hate, greed, false pride, and blind loyalty. Which emotional vulnerabilities are what make war propaganda so powerful!
You can't say everything on a substack posting I have written muxh about MICIMATT...that's why I wrote propaganda in capital letters. I am a Canadian what can you tell me about Canada? I can tell you that the fact America never enacted Lincolns' Reconstruction has meant the civil war has never ended in America and never will until your recontruct just about everything including your text books about America. This Canadian just gave Americans facts they should know. Today John Mearsheimer was speculating on the number of deaths America has inflicted on the world. He told the interviewer that he should really know. So I forwarded the numbers to John, one of my very favorite American thinkers.
The current US admin. and, alarmingly, the Chief Justice of SCOTUS, are absolutely dedicated to ensuring that black folk especially, and other racial minorities, will NEVER achieve equality with the Caucasian majority.
So sad, so socially unevolved
I again urge viewing and studying "Triumph of the Will"!!!
The American military was built on social insecurity and offered a notion of security that made the world and Americans more insecure. Invest in war and you get war. Invest in social security and you get a society that is more secure and less divisive/polarized, far less inclined to feel so insecure that they need to other people and need enemies to compete against.
It's rudimentary logic that escapes Americans just like most Americans are ignorant of the real history of the American military I just provided you with. Twain said war was how Americans learned geography. Although funny, that is wrong. Americans are the most unworldly people of the West. Statistics show this-you have not invested in education like Canada or Norway....Investment in warring has left you a surplus of ignorance from a lack of investment in education.
Ha! Most Americans can't identify a given member state of this nation on a map!! Mark Twain wrote that he would not march off to war under the flag of this nation or any other if he was convinced the cause was NOT JUST. I adopted that attitude toward the US Military re: Viet Nam before I even entered said military, but only discovered Twain's stance many years later.
So true stats show Americans can name all the branches of their government is high...the more ignorant of other nations other people the easier it is to other them and kill them
But you excel at-are exceptional at flag waving nationalism-PROPAGANDA. God bless America and anyone that doesn't should be bombed to hell...bombs bursting is right in your national anthem sung as your bomb dropping the war jets fly over.
And you excel at painting all with one broad brush. A hallmark of prejudice.
Pat, that nicely sums it up.
Just the facts ma'am- the uncomfortable truths Americans need to hear Yes, I am prejudice against violence like MLK. Bills's notion of bracing truths is like drinking Kool-Aid e. MLK would agree 100 percent with what I wrote-because he said very similar things-read him! Rather than give more evidence of American ignorance and lack of thinking skills.
Alexis de Tocqueville famously stated, "As one digs deeper into the national character of the Americans, one sees that they have sought the value of everything in this world only in the answer to this single question: how much money will it bring in?" But few know he also said that you don't have to dig at all to discover a preponderance of American ignorance.
I like the concept of "They know the price of everything, but the VALUE of nothing." Sorry to say I don't recall the origin of that wisdom.
Oscar Wilde
The absolutism about what “Americans” do and what they’re like is just so overwhelmingly bigoted bullshit. YES, there’s a lot of that. And YES, sometimes it is ascendant. But it negates all of us who are not what you paint. I dislike bigotry in any guise. So….there.
With your low intellect if you read MLK you probably would have concluded that he should have been shot for what he said about America. You are an incredibly stupid...
Generalizing is perfectly legit, Pat! If our country's reality didn't manifest as Glen describes it, would we tolerate one WAR OF CHOICE after another after another after another?? Think on that!
Jhe facts ma'am- the uncomfortable truths Americans need to hear Yes I am prejudice agains violence like MLK. Bills's notion of bracing truths is like drinking Kool-Aid e. MLK would agree 100 percent with what I wrote-because he said very similar things-read him!
I was once a pacifist, but not any more, though I am still NOT a militarist.
What you say this country did militarily is mostly true... we have had some VERY intrusive and deadly policies vis-a-vis other less powerful, and more socialist, countries. Especially under the cover of anti-Soviet action in The Cold War. Not something I ever endorsed! We were almost never measured and careful at that time. And I take exception to our use of nukes in Japan and want us to repudiate that action, but I don't expect that apology any time soon.
And still this country has also been at the helm of very many great and broad good works the world over, that you choose to put in a separate box, and ignore.
That is what I disagree with.
We have a potential that we could energize... we have done GOOD works!
And we should repudiate Empire Building.
And build instead on what the world needs from a strong and prosperous country. .
Any "good" done abroad by US Government, militarily or via agencies like AID, even the Peace Corps, has been basically accidental or incidental. The motivation has always been to increase the power of the US to rule the world. The impossible dream!
What about the veterans? If Americans are “patriotic”, why do they allow their government to dump troops once they are broken?
Admit it, Americans worship power. That’s all to it. So long as the troops are strong and capable of inflicting pain on others, they are worthy of support. Once they are broken, they are cast aside with the approval of the American people.
What about the veterans? If Americans are “patriotic”, why do they allow their government to dump troops once they are broken?
Admit it, Americans worship power. So long as the troops are strong and capable of inflicting pain on others, they are worthy of support. Once they are broken, they are cast aside with the approval of the American people.
The best way to support our troops is to impeach our president.
SPEAKING OF THOSE WHO SERVE
"US Warplane Attacked Iranian Commercial Ship in Gulf of Oman"
A US F-18 attacked and disabled an Iranian-flagged civilian ship in the Gulf of Oman. U.S. forces disabled the tanker’s rudder by firing several rounds from the 20mm cannon gun of a U.S. Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet launched from USS Abraham Lincoln.”
https://libertarianinst.substack.com/p/us-warplane-attacked-iranian-commercial?publication_id=1008476&post_id=196705870&isFreemail=true&r=r6mi&triedRedirect=true
I wonder how those Navy and USAF pilots feel about attacking civilian targets. Don't they know they're committing war crimes and should refuse?
What about the sinking of all the boats in the Caribbean and then killing the survivors? What f'kg heroes!
'Another aspect of “support our troops” is communal ritual to mark the passing of local “heroes.”' Bill, you are on to something here. "Dr." Josef Goebbels understood this thoroughly. The power of the massed troops, the civilian auxiliary forces, the flags and banners, at the Nuremberg rallies was PALPABLE. And an ordinary veteran of WW I was accorded the honor to always carry the lead Nazi emblem in the parades feeding into the stadium. For God's sake, readers, if you have never seen "Triumph of the Will," I implore you to watch it. And study it! Preferably with a learned commentary track that identifies the Nazi personalities on view, their origins and their ultimate destinies.
Further: Look at the huge success the Dick Cheney presidency (really, that was the reality) had in persuading Americans, and not just Republicans, to drive around with "Support Our Troops" magnets, bumper stickers, etc. on their vehicles. A smashing success in selling a really shoddy product. Historical note for young whipper-snappers like Col. Astore: We used that slogan, modified, in opposing the war against Viet Nam: "Support Our Troops--Bring Them Home NOW!!"