From The Gals And Guys Who Know The Face Of War Up Close And Personal-The Iraq And Afghan War Veterans Against The War (IVAW)

From The Gals And Guys Who Know The Face Of War Up Close And Personal-The Iraq And Afghan War Veterans Against The War (IVAW)

Frank Jackman comment:

On more than one occasion I have noted there is an overweening respect for the military, for military officers mainly, the guys and gals who have led and lead the bloody endless wars of this century. (Although the most recent example is more than fifty years old with General Eisenhower this has been at certain points reflected in elevating such personages to the American presidency starting with General Washington. The decline in military service among the political and social elites and their offspring over the past couple of generations leaving it to marginal lower middle class and working class cadre probably signals the demise of the that trend. That and the indecisive nature of the endless wars which produce no certifiably mass leader-heroes.) Nevertheless these specimens look good on camera, all austere and all business as they lead the general population by the nose into the next ambush with the acquiescence of civil authority including non-veteran “chicken-hawk” presidents and their associated.

But starting back in Vietnam, starting back in the war of my generation soldiers, sailors, air personnel, regular rank and file guys (almost all guys then) started balking at their fate in a very public manner out on the streets. (All wars, all military service produces a certain among of grousing, a very definite questioning of command decisions down in the trenches even in popular wars like World War II but that is far removed from opposition in the streets, sometimes in uniform, that became somewhat epidemic in Vietnam times when the Army at least was half in mutiny and in any case unreliable as a military force against a determined foe). Like I say these guys (and later when the female military population increased gals) started to talk back, to say stop the madness. And if they could not do so when they were service-bound for obvious and mainly understandable reasons concerning hard time in stockades and prisons they certainly did so in their thousands after they got out of the service. (Many Army recruits during basic training probably had “do this, do that unless you want to wind up in Fort Leavenworth”-the bad ass Army facility thrown at them by worrisome drill sergeants which surely caused to pause over that possibility.)

That “could not do when they were service-bound” no mean hurtle since a lot of the constitutional rights we take for granted out in the civilian world wind up in the latrine once you take the oath. Even more so then than now since there have been some court decisions reining in the military brass as they try to trash a soldier’s will. Let me tell you though many a soldier who couldn’t speak out because he was in Vietnam and under fire or stateside trying to keep out of the line of fire spent many a tortuous night trying to figure out whether to just say “fuck it,” to refuse to go along, to fight. (The more I investigate this issue among the remaining male brethren from the “Generation of ’68 I find that even among those who served without question, who volunteered in order to get a trade or profession rather than be left in that same latrine as the infantrymen almost all draftees the question of what to do hung over their heads just as much as Boston college guys who refused induction, who burned their draft cards, who hit the road for Canada and other foreign shores, or who tried every diversion from physically harming themselves to claiming mental disorders to declaring themselves, falsely declaring themselves let’s be clear homosexuals. Yes, it was that kind of time-another time to try men’s souls.]     

Those irate and lied to military personnel formed an organization Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) that did a hell of a lot to bring the anti-war message home. See they had “street cred”,’ they had been in the hellholes and beyond, had come back to the “real world” a lot wiser than the kids they were who went in with dreams of glory and fistfuls of medals. The guys and gals who fought, and continue to fight don’t forget, the damn Iraq and Afghan wars, the latter in it endless sixteen years ready to turn seventeen come next frost  have that same “street cred.” They our sons and daughters have been through as much hell as those guys from my time, from me in my own experience. Have many mental and physical problems. Have a horrendous daily suicide rate. Are living proof that there are no “walk-over” wars-not in this century. So when they with their well-deserved street “cred” say stop the madness that for this generation means something. Listen up, please.