Two Articles Well Worth Your Time
If this doesn’t blow your mind, then this will break your heart. I’m not one to espouse the glory of war at all but the nobility of the people in these two stories is very, very affecting. When I think of all we’re losing and risking every day in terms of extraordinary human beings it brings me low. The waste could make you weep and then it could make you very angry.
I hardly ever do “serious” here on PCB because many other people are already doing it better than I could, but I really want to give whatever readers I have a chance to read these stories if they haven’t already seen them. They deserve to be seen by as many people as possible. Thanks to Randall for the first link above.
October 26th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Thank you for the link and for pointing us to the Hitchen’s piece. I’ve been struggling with posting some thoughts on the sacrifice of our soldiers/sailors/airmen/marines for some time now. I know several personally and I think we do them a disservice in not trumpeting these sorts of stories because of our fear that somehow we will glamorize warfare. Yet in succumbing to our fears in that regard, people like the young Lieutenant Hitchens mentions or the surgical team in Afghanistan continue to serve in anonymity, know only to their friends and perhaps to God.
October 26th, 2007 at 8:06 pm
I hope their sacrifice will not be in vain.
October 26th, 2007 at 8:32 pm
Rand, I think all these Brian Williams-in-a-tank pieces of “insight” fluff they do for the news (“Wow, it sure is cramped in here, folks. This is what it must be like for a real soldier. Our soldiers are very cramped”) are a waste of everyone’s time but I do think that we need to hear stories like the ones linked, and see the human faces involved in the conflict to keep from the war becoming just an intellectual exercise, and to hammer it home just what we’re losing every day. We’re not being asked by our government to sacrifice a damn thing in this time of war – not even to buy less gas, or conserve energy – and it is so, so easy to get preoccupied with abstract arguments about Iraq which remove us from the real meat-grinder it is. I do it myself but it’s a luxury we shouldn’t indulge too much, I think. I need to hear this stuff in order to make the sacrifices of these soldiers and the loss of all these innocent civilians’ lives mean something, so that its impressed at the forefront of my brain and I don’t ever forget them.
Nanas, me too. Your comment reminded me that I shouldn’t have said “waste” in the post, perhaps. People have got into trouble over here for saying our soldiers lives are being “wasted” – most memorably John McCain. But quibbling about semantics when all that horror is going on in a far-off land is probably one of these luxuries the press and pundits shouldn’t indulge in too much. Leave that to history. The talk now should be all knuckles and know-how. Politicians and talking heads and columnists and the rest shouldn’t be distracting themselves with these nebulous questions. They should all be talking about ways to minimize our losses and make the best of the mess we’ve got while not betraying our own principles in the name of security. If this is a war of ideals and cultures, then we’d better make damn sure we stick to what’s best in our own.
Hmm. Maybe this post wasn’t the best idea. I seem to go off on one every time I put fingertip to key in the comment box.
October 26th, 2007 at 10:06 pm
I don’t believe in the war, but I certainly believe in the soldiers.
I’ve been writing and doing research about World War II. Not long ago someone sent me a picture of the Manila American Cemetery and its rows upon rows of white crosses that just go on and on as far as the eye can see — you keep moving the right arrow on your screen and still they just keep coming. It is mind-boggling to think that that each of those crosses represents a man with his own face, personality, family — all gone for what? I want to believe that their deaths were not in vain, but so many of the men who were dispatched to the Philippines were from the poorest communities, ill-equipped, and badly trained. A lot of them died of starvation or diseases like malaria. And after the war, the army would not ship their remains home unless the families paid.
I agree with you: figure out ways to minimize our losses — but get the boys home.
October 26th, 2007 at 10:46 pm
thank you, sugar, none of us can afford to not be political anymore. we have to speak out and to each other. perhaps, soon our government(s) will listen to the people they say they represent.
October 26th, 2007 at 11:48 pm
Mary, have you seen the Ken Burns documentary “The War”? It’s very long – about 10 hours – but is organised into episodes and well worth a look. I didn’t know that about families having to pay for their loved ones’ remains. What a kick in the teeth. The Burns documentary has a bit about the 12 day march north in the Philippines that the American soldiers had to undergo as Japanese prisoners. They have a survivor of it on the program and the conditions he describes are hellish.
Savannah, when I think of the mess George Bush has created with his arrogance and complete lack of planning, and all the lives that have and will be lost as a result, it just makes me want to rage at him. Unfortunately for me, us and democracy he only rarely ever puts himself in a position where we have the chance. Forget rage at, I want to slap the man, sit him down and make him read these articles and the newspapers about dead young men and women by himself – for once could he not just read a fricking paper? – until the hubris of his clan and class shrivels up inside him and crawls out of his ear to live under a rock someplace.
October 27th, 2007 at 12:12 am
I have that copy of VF, and it was a staggering read. Staggering and rage making, for he’s not even my country man.
October 27th, 2007 at 5:54 am
Ugh, this is not the night to be commenting on this, but here I go…
This war fucking sucks. All the grey areas and arguments for and against aside, this specific war, knowing it never needed to be…fucking sucks.
How’s that for late night eloquence.
As you were.
October 27th, 2007 at 10:41 am
We don’t have a TV, so have not yet seen this documentary. But I have heard mixed reviews of it from a handful of people, one WWII veteran and another expert on the subject in particular. I know that Burns touched on the Bataan Death March. The BDM was horrific, but many men lived through that only to spend the next three and a half years as POWs, enduring even worse conditions. The mortality rate of POWs of the Japanese was many times greater than for POWs of the Germans.
I know that it has become popular to take potshots at GWB — and how could anyone help wanting to? — but honestly, just the sight of his smug, stupid, smiling face is enough to turn my stomach. And the way he proudly reminds people that he was a C student — dear God, as if he needed to tell us! It’s bad enough that his own mediocrity whacks us in the face every time we go through the agony of listening to him garble a speech; does he really think he can turn such an embarrassing deficit into a virtue and BRAG about it?
October 27th, 2007 at 4:02 pm
In 1939 it was straight forward. We were fighting evil. Now I don’t know. what I do feel passionately about is that our men should be treated with respect and honour and be given every support both in their fighting lives and afterwards and especially the sick and injured. I am ashamed that that isn’t
necessarily so here in the UK.
October 29th, 2007 at 6:31 am
Very apt as we approach Armistice Day. Last night I watched a BBC documentary about Iraq’s descent into chaos, and the advice that was ignored by American and British powers that be prior to going in. It was shocking, and puts this war on a par with WW1 in terms of pointlessless, if nowhere near it in terms of fatalities.
Troops Out.
October 29th, 2007 at 6:50 am
It was called “No plan, no peace” and part II is on tonight. Gripping stuff.
October 29th, 2007 at 12:39 pm
I watched that NO PLAN NO PEACE last night. They really didn’t/don’t have a fucking clue what they were doing, the politicians that is. Blair should have grown a set of balls and stood up to bush, but he didn’t and here we are. The gates of hell are well and truly open……
October 30th, 2007 at 12:07 am
War. What is it good for? Huh?
Blowing the fuck out of cunts, that’s what.
October 30th, 2007 at 8:11 am
Well done 20 Major I heartily enjoyed serving during the troubles.
I pay tribute to such heroes as these on my serious blogs, thanks for doing the same, its too trendy to knock the wars and forget the human cost.
October 31st, 2007 at 12:32 pm
I think all the stuff about the troops – “our troops” “our boys” etc – fighting in Iraq is absolute propagandist cant. Does anybody really think the Nazis or the Japanese didn’t have the same tripe about their noble fighters during WW2? And weren’t many of those same troops war criminals “following orders”? An unjust or immoral war fought for national/corporate interests is just that and requires soldiers of all ranks to resist and reject their orders.
For the record, I had one very close relative just about survive WW2 (four years) in a Jap pow camp, and another a fighter pilot shot down in December 1944.
October 31st, 2007 at 9:52 pm
Hi Sam, think my comment got lost in moderation purgatory.
Why didn?t Mark go visit the place with a back-pack instead of a uniform? Ramble around, talk, sit and drink tea? Surely Hutchings is justifying the impossible, immortalising the implausible. Is this a story to point at, for another generation of shivering soldiers, in another time?
November 1st, 2007 at 9:31 am
Hope you are introducing your customers to kir.
November 1st, 2007 at 1:28 pm
Go see the Black Watch play. It is chilling too, particularly in how tradition can be sold to the young as a sense of belonging.
Recruitment is in crisis here, down by a third, we used to be disproportionately represented in the
Armed Services, no more – Iraq has seen to that. I’m not sure how I feel about that -I hope it means these young men now feel there are other options.
It all makes me unspeakably sad
November 1st, 2007 at 2:50 pm
Sorry for being so tardy in responding, chaps. I’ll do it once my sprogs are off to school.
November 1st, 2007 at 4:23 pm
fmc, it really made an impact on me. Staggering indeed.
Kara, that’s the tragedy – this is a spurious war run by incompetents who cherry-picked their intelligence to their own ends. I hate this sneaky, under-handed administration with all my might for what they’ve done.
Mary – the man has not enough of a sophisticated brain to run a lemonade stand. I don’t believe he is evil – I believe he’s a zealous stupid man with schoolboy-type loyalties and a streak of ruthless stubborness. That might make him more dangerous than if he were evil. Cheney on the other hand – he is a truly bad, greedy man.
Pat, did you read about the Walter Reed veterans scandal over here? The hospital itself is fine but the conditions the soldiers had to endure in their accomodations were abominable considering the mangled mess the war has made of many of their minds and bodies. The Dept. of Veterans’ Affairs is woefully underfunded to the point it is a national scandal. All politicians pay to returning soldiers is lip service for their trouble. Lip-service doesn’t cost hard lucre.
Daphne, plus the Haliburton documents for the rebuilding of Iraq had already been signed before the country was even told we were going to war. If that isn’t the worst kind of cynicism in the history of the country, I don’t know what is.
Manuel, Blair is the most baffling disappointment of them all. Where was the judgment and caution? It was just a rush to war. He is his own kind of zealot.
Twenty, yeah but getting the right cunts is usually seen as key.
Knudsen – that was all I meant to highlight here, really – the human cost.
Conan – but we break these kids down in order to build them back up as killing machines – somewhere in that process resistance to following orders is weakened. All wars are lies to some degree but soldiers are actively discouraged from questioning to what degree exactly, and adjusting their response accordingly. Brainwashing isn’t too strong a word for turning young men and women into killing soldiers, in my opinion. I don’t think war is ennobling; I think these young men and women somehow kept their nobility intact despite the war and that’s what I wanted to highlight. I think war is hell, full stop, and ought never be glamourised. The people in these stories were extraordinary people before the war – what I wanted to emphasize was the horrific human loss this pointless war has caused – rather than lionize them as war-heroes. They would have been heroes had they been bank managers – it was clearly in them to begin with.
Sniffle – sorry! You got lost in me moderation queue – I got a whole glut of spam and didn’t look through it properly to weed out the legit ones right away. To your point, it’s much as I was saying to Conan. I learnt my Wilf Owen lessons well and loathe the practice of celebrating any war. I hate that old men send young men off to die and don’t believe war somehow ennobles anyone. I think the people in these stories were incredibly lion-hearted people anyway and my point was to lament the stupidity of the loss of such humanity. Reading it back – I guess I didn’t do such a hot job of that.
Pat, the kir revolution will soon be swishing through Ojai in such a way that even a hot wash and Stain Devils of every whisker will not be able to remove the resultant purple staining.
Apprentice, I’ve heard good things about that Black Watch. “Tradition being sold to the young as a sense of belonging”, eh? It’s cynical, immoral and despicable. I wish Bush could be impeached. Alas, the Democrats have no spine and couldn’t lead their way out of a poly bag. We are well and truly messed up in this country. I have hopes for Gordon Brown though. He seems altogether more measured and prudent a man.