However, I ran into this article on Yahoo! news, and thought it might be of interest to anyone who wants a bit of a different reality than that usually shown on mainstream media. It is a public letter to President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney, who aggressively pined for the war in Iraq, not directly linking it to the September 11th attacks, yet mentioning it so often, usually putting "Saddam" in the same sentence and paragraph as "9/11" and "Al Qaeda" and numerous other references to the "Global War on Terror", that many Americans automatically made the connection that was implied.
A little more clear thinking at the time might have prevented the whole thing, if more Americans had vehemently resisted the war that almost everyone now agrees was a horrible idea, a waste of enormous resources, not to mention lives (well over 4,000 American lives, and it has been estimated over 100,000 Iraqi lives!).
Officially, the United States has, in effect, taken the stance of exempting itself and it's citizens of war crimes. But this war vet does not mince his words, he calls it as he sees it, and used the words "war crimes" outright.
Read this article. When the next "inevitable" war to avert the terrifying prospect of some terrorist state with enormous technological capabilities that pose an "immediate threat" to world peace, let us remember the consequences of the last time Americans were made to believe in such things (although perhaps too many Americans wanted to believe it, to take it at face value, rather than actually thinking, which was a far too often neglected patriotic duty back then, and probably still is now). Back then, other catch phrases included the infamous "Weapons of Mass Destruction", and "45 minute response time", as well as allegations of Saddam's attempt to obtain "yellowcake uranium" from Africa, an integral part of Bush's case for the Iraq war, and a claim that he made during the State of the Union Address before Congress, the American people that he represented, and the entire world, but which was proven to be completely false and without any merit - a fact that became clear only after the war.
Whatever the catch phrases will be next time, and whichever nation it might be (Iran? North Korea? Perhaps even Syria? Or some other country that is not as clear at this time?), let us at the very least approach the seriousness of war with a bit more of a healthy dose of skepticism and scrutiny, before sending troops and missiles and putting our yellow ribbons all over the place (as that was, often times, the only signs of support the veterans that we collectively sent off to war got, either during the war, or after their return home, when many remained neglected in their hour of need).
Let us listen to the voice of our veterans, many of whom feel betrayed, and with some justification. Here is one such voice, from a veteran who's life was changed almost instantly after being sent to Iraq, for a war that he never wanted or expected to be a part of. His name is Tomas Young, and like Pat Tillman (I would strongly recommend the book about him by Jon Krakauer, by the way), he joined the Army following the 9/11 attacks, expressing an interest in fighting in Afghanistan, where Al Qaeda and terrorist training camps were situated and sheltered, rather than in Iraq, which had absolutely nothing to do with September 11th. Much of the contents of the letter can be found in the article (link can be found below), or on Truthdig.com. Here is some of it:
I write this letter, my last letter, to you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney,
I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans—my fellow veterans—whose future you stole.
I joined the Army two days after the 9/11 attacks. I joined the Army because our country had been attacked. I wanted to strike back at those who had killed some 3,000 of my fellow citizens. I did not join the Army to go to Iraq, a country that had no part in the September 2001 attacks and did not pose a threat to its neighbors, much less to the United States. I did not join the Army to “liberate” Iraqis or to shut down mythical weapons-of-mass-destruction facilities or to implant what you cynically called “democracy” in Baghdad and the Middle East. I did not join the Army to rebuild Iraq, which at the time you told us could be paid for by Iraq’s oil revenues.
I would not be writing this letter if I had been wounded fighting in Afghanistan against those forces that carried out the attacks of 9/11. Had I been wounded there I would still be miserable because of my physical deterioration and imminent death, but I would at least have the comfort of knowing that my injuries were a consequence of my own decision to defend the country I love. I would not have to lie in my bed, my body filled with painkillers, my life ebbing away, and deal with the fact that hundreds of thousands of human beings, including children, including myself, were sacrificed by you for little more than the greed of oil companies, for your alliance with the oil sheiks in Saudi Arabia, and your insane visions of empire.
Here is the link to the article by Dylan Stableford of Yahoo! news, "Iraq war vet pens 'last letter' to Bush and Cheney":
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/iraq-war-vet-letter-bush-cheney-tomas-young-154541674.html
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