Right now, we have a horrific military invasion going on. There have been 4,279 coalition deaths -- 3,973 Americans, two Australians, 174 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, one Czech, seven Danes, two Dutch, two Estonians, one Fijian, one Hungarian, 33 Italians, one Kazakh, one Korean, three Latvian, 22 Poles, three Romanians, five Salvadoran, four Slovaks, 11 Spaniards, two Thai and 18 Ukrainians -- in the war in Iraq as of February 29, 2008, according to a CNN count. (Source) The number of dead Iraqis? There is no way of knowing. One estimate is over 80,000, another stands at 40,000. I could go on and on searching and calculating all the dead. But I want to stick to one point, at least: it is my belief that these men, women, mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, aunts, uncles, girlfriends, boyfriends, sisters and brothers are not dying as heroes. They are dying as pawns...Bush's Pawns.
Albeit, there are some who are doing heroic things. The closest I could get to a concise report of this was this CNN piece from 2003. I'm not really sure why this record keeping was done for only one year, but it at least lists examples of heroic actions.
To the rest of the thousands who have died as a result of "friendly - fire", road side bombs while in military issued vehicles with nothing more than a tarp as protection, drowning because their vehicles went off the road into a body of water, and "insurgents" (wouldn't we protect our lands against invaders too?).
But isn't that a fundamental truth of war? An insecure, self righteous man (historically) sits atop a thrown and commands that the lesser people of his land blindly follow orders while putting their lives at risk? Leaving home pregnant wives and small children to attack other villages and kill other men who have pregnant wives and small children at home?
And for what? More land? A stolen treasure? Oil fields? To make daddy proud?
I can justify the fighting if it was a matter of defending one's own land, people, family, or home. But to be forced to take other people's land and lives because someone told you to... That, to me, violates everything about the intrinsic rights we are born with.
I hear over and over the dead soldiers referred to as heroes. I beg to differ. The label "hero", I believe, is a tool used by our government, the media (run by corporations who help run the government), and possibly well-meaning associates to comfort and placate the bereaved families. It is used to give the family a reason. "Why did my son die?"
"Don't worry about the details ma'am. Just know he died a hero defending our country."
I will continue to ask the question: How is our country at risk? How are we in danger? Who is threatening us? What is being defended?
Our own government is more of a threat to our security and rights than any other country. With this war, and every other invasion going on around the world by the US, we are asking for it. Yes, I said it. We are asking for another 9/11-type disaster that is supposed to be a warning; an attention-grabber. But the media led our questioning in the wrong direction. Instead of asking who did it and who is responsible. We should have been asking, how did we let this happen, how are WE responsible? What can we do to change the course of our actions to prevent this from happening again?
There was an unprecedented display of heroism at Ground Zero that day. Was their not? Fire Crews, Policemen, EMT's, Coast Guard, nurses, doctors, and people who were already in the Towers when they were bombed and either went out of their way to help - or attempt to help - other people escape the building. And we cannot mention 9/11 heroes without mentioning United Flight 93 in which alerted passengers attempted to overthrow the terrorist hijackers.
And what about everyone else who died in the Towers or on one of the planes? Are they heroes? No. They are victims.
Just as the soldiers - from every country involved, and all the innocent women, children, men, and elderly dying because of Bush and his terroristic acts, are victims.
Call them whatever you want; whatever helps you sleep at night and find peace with your lost loved-one.
But channel your anger to the man who put them there, not the people who are trying to get them home and trying to get you and every other war-supporter to see the truth.
No, I don't support the war, but I do support the troops. Bring them home now.
Monday, March 3, 2008
Monday, February 25, 2008
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