I was asked by my best friend and hopefully more to address these “questions”. Obviously they were from a liberal who only knew the talking points. Which is typical, liberals will throw the emotion at you and have no logical reasoning behind these arguments. Well this was easy for me to address… Hell I lived there for the past five years!
Post your views and/or additions to either side of the argument.
The easiest thing to do is address each of these “points”…
“I understand the many difficult reasons people find themselves serving in the military, under the Nuremberg Laws, saying you were “just following orders” is not an excuse for committing war crimes. Keep in mind that the U. S. military has brought destruction, extreme suffering and humiliation most everywhere it has gone. In Iraq we know of the horrors of Abu Ghrab, the bombing of wedding parties, the targeting of civilians (war crimes all under the Geneva Conventions) and, in sum, the wholesale destruction of an entire society.“
First of all what the hell are the “Nuremburg Laws”? He obviously is referring to the trials after WW2 and equated the US military to Nazis. Well the US military is governed in all conduct by the UCMJ, and one of the few militaries on the planet that has “rules of engagement”!
Second he has not been to Iraq and seen the consumer goods, cars, rebuilding of homes and investments into the country. Back in 2003, the Iraq’s wanted more controls, i.e., what the surge accomplished, military units spread throughout Baghdad and other parts of Iraq. Similar to putting a police station right on the drug dealers corner. The locals now see and can go the good guys, US and the Iraqi military/police because they live and work in the area.
Abu Ghrab…please! Was it embarrassing and wrong yes! Did we cut off the heads of any the prisoners-NO! The Law of War and the UCMJ clearly lay out how to handle prisoners or war. And by those same rules, these guys were not in uniform and not from a recognized military organization and technically not subject to the Geneva Convention. But we still observe it for these “people”. Those that were involved with the “incident” at the prison have been prosecuted and now are in prison! Other countries, like the Gulf States-(Emirates, Qatar…) actually laughed about it—“you mean you are prosecuting those guys?” Yes we take violations of the Geneva Convention and UCMJ seriously!
As to targeting anything! Would you believe that all strikes have to be run through the JAG officer in the area!!! JAG is the lawyers, and they have final YES/NO as to all strikes and missions. Again as to civilians, the “bad guys” are civilians! They wear civilian clothes, no recognized uniform, and use civilians as cover for their missions.
Final point for this section, if this society is destroyed why does it still have a government, why did it have 70+% turn out for their elections, and why is money pouring in and Iraqis exiled from the Saddam era returning home? Per capita murders for a city similar in size is low compared to say Chicago!!! We “kill 50,000 people on the highways alone! Bottom line, you have to see the city and country, observe it see that the people whether they are Shia, Sunni, or Kurd just want freedom and safety. That they have. We could not have had this surge and the results in the positive way without the support of population.
How about the rapes by U. S. military personnel in Okinawa, Japan? It is for outsized crimes such as these that the Iraqi journalist flung his shoes, a terrible insult in Arab culture, during a press conference in Iraq at W. For the victims, which whom I empathize with, any weakening of the imperial or occupation forces is seen as positive and highly desireable.
So the rapes… All we have to say about that is the persons responsible will be spending a lot of time in prison for those crimes. All I have to say about the journalist is that he was “FREE” to do this act. Something prior to 2003 he could have never even thought of committing during Saddam’s reign. He would be dead, probably immediately. Now he will go to court and be charged. And he did go in front an Iraqi judge—let’s say that again and Iraqi Judge and he is being charged with all I can say is a minor crime. Probably will get NO jail time.
As to the imperialist/occupation forces, the Iraqi government and the US have come to an agreement called the SOFA-or Status of Forces Agreement. We will pull most of our forces out of the country in 2011. If the Iraqi government wanted it sooner they could have stated such, but they know they need us there to help with there security. The US military only stays on foreign soil with the agreement of the host government! PERIOD! The only land we have taken for our own is the land we use to bury our dead helping defend freedom and freeing people from oppression.
Take the Philippines for example. We had two very large and very important bases there. Strategically very important to protecting our interests and those of our allies in the region-(ASEAN, similar to NATO). The government wanted us out, we left…
Imperial aims and power projection have almost always been at the heart of the U. S. military’s designs (see Moroe Doctrine [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monroe_Doctorine] and Smedley Butler [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler%5d). Of course the U. S. is not alone guilty of this (this is the way Empire works) but I feel the same way about other imperialist powers’ militaries.
Finally, on the positive side, if the U.S. military is weakened enough so that it cannot fight these wars abroad, the world will breeze a sigh of relief, U. S. soldiers will cease coming back in coffins in the dead of night and further on these soldiers will not have swallow the bitter pill of abandonment by their own goverment as is already happening and as has happened in the past (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonus_Army),
Finally, all these trillions of dollars spent on the military can be redirected to badly needed programs of “social uplift” as MLK would put it.
OK, history lesson. The Monroe Doctrine was implemented by President Monroe to KEEP THE EUROPEAN IMPERIAL POWERS out of Central and South America. I do not think we have taken any of these areas for our own. Before you say PR… we gave them the opportunity by vote to either go independent, become a state, or stay the same. Well that vote was to remain the same! Why, all the benefits of citizenship without taxes and other “negative” things you and I have to deal with.
Ok, a weakened US Military. September 11, 2001 was done because the “bad guys” thought we would not “do anything, or treat it as a criminal act v. act of war”. Weakened military is never a good thing. Think of France prior to WW2, the military in that country was held in contempt by the government and Hitler knew this and thus destroyed the country in short order! Countries fall by decay from within, that is how the US will fall if it does…
As to government not supporting the troops, I agree! Most veteran programs are run by Government Bureaucrats and they do not care. I have traveled this world and MOST and I do most of the world prefers that the US Military comes to help.
1. Any natural disaster—planes and equipment from our military is there bringing help
2. Do we have to list them. Well I will address one in particular… The earthquake in Pakistan, a 9.1 huge one near Kashmir. We pulled planes and men from the war in Afghanistan to help them. Heck, I had wait two weeks to accomplish an important interview because I could not get to Heart because there were no planes to get me there!
I hope this helps…
Bob
