[NYTr] Ted Rall: Hey Soldiers!Quit Whining!

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

Yahoo - Oct 24, 2007
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ucru/20071024/cm_ucru/heysoldiersquitwhining

HEY, SOLDIERS: QUIT WHINING!

Troops Suck Up to Bush, Ask for Support

COLUMBUS, OHIO--Over a year ago, in March 2006, the military newspaper
Stars and Stripes published the results of a Zogby poll of troops
serving in Iraq. 72 percent said U.S. forces should withdraw within a
year. Twenty-five percent thought we should pull out right away. But 85
percent said a major reason they were there was "to retaliate for
Saddam's role in the September 11 attacks." These people are confused,
to say the least.

Even more confusing is the persistent flow of complaints by Iraq War
veterans that Americans on the home front are partying like it's 2009
while their comrades back in Vichy Mesopotamia are getting blown up.

Army infantry officer Will Bardenwerper gave voice to this oft-stated
sentiment in an October 20th New York Times op/ed. "As I began my
13-month deployment (in Tal Afar, Iraq)," wrote a dispirited
Bardenwerper, "I imagined an American public following our progress
with the same concern as my family and friends. But since returning
home, I have seen that America has changed the channel." He was struck
by "the disparity between the lives of the few who are fighting and
being killed, and the many who have been asked for nothing more than to
continue shopping."

Typical suggestions for fairer distribution of sacrifice and a military
draft--the latter to obtain additional manpower and inspire antiwar
marchers to fill the streets like they did during Vietnam--follow. At
least he left out the usual calls for victory gardens and gas rationing.

The war sucks. On that point, the millions of Americans who were
against it from the start (and the many millions more who've come
around to agreeing with us) agree with the soldiers serving in it.
Forced reenlistment through the "stop-loss" loophole is placing
thousands of lives in suspended animation, destroying marriages and
small businesses. Troops aren't getting enough protective gear.

It's also true that Americans have stopped paying attention. I'm a news
junkie. And even I flip the page past the same old "2 Dead, 7 Wounded
in IED Blast" headline.

But hey, soldier, you volunteered. If not for you, there wouldn't be a
war in the first place.

"Supporting the troops means supporting their mission." That's been the
mantra of the pro-war right. It's been hard for those of us who oppose
the war to argue with them because so many of the troops have
repeatedly allowed themselves to be used as propaganda shills for Bush
Administration officials and the Republican Party in general.

It's bad enough that a majority of soldiers voted for Bush in 2004.
Over and over since the war began, American troops have been seen on
television applauding Bush, Rumsfeld, Rice and others whose cynical
recklessness have sent their buddies to their graves. Sailors cheered
wildly when Bush staged his notorious "Mission Accomplished" photo op
on an aircraft carrier. They swooned when he joined them for
Thanksgiving dinner in Baghdad.

"The shocked and elated soldiers jumped to their feet, pumped their
fists in the air, roared with delight, and grabbed their cameras to
snap photographs," reported CNN about Bush's visit. A "standing
ovation" followed. "It gave us a little extra oomph," said a member of
the 1st Armored Division. "It really boosted my morale," said another.
No one heckled or booed the imposter president. No one threw tomatoes.
No one told him where he could stick his plastic turkey.

Even after soldiers get killed, their parents promote the war so their
dead kids won't be lonely in heaven. At Fort Benning, Georgia met Deb
Tainsh, whose son was killed by a roadside bomb near the Baghdad
Airport. She presented Bush with more than 100 e-mails from parents of
soldiers who have died or are presently serving in Iraq. "Every one of
these letters says, 'Mr. President, we support you,'" she said. "The
consensus is that they...want him to do everything he can to win this
war and that our prayers are with him."

"Bush, 61, has so far met with more than 1,500 relatives of the 4,255
American troops who have lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan," the
Bloomberg News wire service reported last week. "In most of the
meetings, [Bush's] aides say, he hears support for his policies,
hardening his resolve to stay the course in Afghanistan and Iraq." Few
Gold Star mothers tell him off. Those who do are polite to the man who
murdered their children as surely and as viciously as if he'd shot them
himself. Why don't they spit at him?

Four years after the WMDs and liberation flora failed to turn up,
people still enlist. After soldiers die, their parents insist that
theirs was a noble sacrifice. Tell me again: Why should I care about
the war? Why shouldn't I go shopping?

Soldiers who want antiwar Americans to march to demand that they be
brought home should take a cue from Vietnam veterans. They marched with
peace protesters and threw their medals at the Capitol. Soldiers
serving on the front refused orders. Some fragged their officers.
Vietnam Veterans Against the War claimed more than 50,000 members by
1971. That year saw numerous dramatic acts of dissent by U.S. troops,
including 50 veterans who marched to the Pentagon and demanded that
they be arrested as war criminals. Fifteen vets took over and
barricaded the Statue of Liberty for two days. These acts swayed
opinions and helped convince lawmakers it was time to withdraw.

Some soldiers in Iraq have offered resistance. After being denied
conscientious objector status, Petty Officer Third Class Pablo Paredes
went AWOL in 2004. He was sentenced to two months in the brig and three
months hard labor. Army First Lieutenant Ehren Watada refused to be
sent to Iraq in 2006, telling the media that the war's illegality would
make him a party to war crimes. Army Specialist Darrell Anderson, faced
with a second tour of duty after being wounded by a roadside bomb,
deserted and fled to Canada. "I went to Iraq willingly," said Anderson.
"I wanted to die for my country. I thought I was going to go there and
protect my family back home. All I was doing was killing other families
there." The Army decided not to prosecute him. Several other deserters
have applied for political asylum in Canada, but they're only a
fraction of the thousands who went there during the 1960s and 1970s.

When Bill Clinton was president, Republicans said he should be afraid
to speak at military bases. That should go double for Bush. The next he
shows up to use you as a TV prop, soldiers and fellow Americans, boo
the crap out of him. What's the worst he can do? Kill you?

(Ted Rall is the author of the new book "Silk Road to Ruin: Is Central
Asia the New Middle East?," an in-depth prose and graphic novel
analysis of America's next big foreign policy challenge.)