Wednesday, July 4, 2007

Troops fight for survival, not Bush ideas


By PAT MURPHY

In 1950, planeloads of us were rushed from Fort Benning, Ga., on four-engine prop transports via-California-Alaska-Japan, then by cargo ship to the bloody, besieged Pusan Perimeter in South Korea to join the First Cavalry Division. At 21, I had no earthly idea where South Korea was and utterly no sense of embarking on a patriotic mission.

As we arrived, I was numb with foreboding. Seeing bodies and wounded stacked in freight cars on a railroad siding added fears. A coarse old sergeant heightened the dread when he told the new arrivals with overripe gusto, "Most of you will be dead in 48 hours." In my 13 months, I eventually became a sergeant first class, but never developed a ghoulish taste for scaring the wits out of newcomer GIs.

Now, 57 years later, I wonder if U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan—a better educated and a better led military generation—altruistically believe they're spreading democracy and saving a country from tyranny? Or to them is this another dirty war in a dirty place that isn't worth spit to save, much less die for?

In Korea, we understood that North Koreans invaded South Korea and needed to be kicked out.

But what do GIs understand about Afghanistan, a Hell-hole for defeated foreign armies for centuries? And what of Iraq, where Iraqis are unwilling and unable to protect their own nation, where politicians are corrupt, where tribes slaughter each other, whence millions of Iraqis have fled rather than fight, and continued killing is an indefensible, pointless waste of GI lives?

Unlike past wars, U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan have live TV, instant Internet news and family e-mails. They're savvy, informed and know a con.

They read of politicians arguing over a stay-the-course policy that guarantees more deaths and a generation of pathetic, crippled ex-warriors.

They know about the fraud and corruption in no-bid U.S. military contracts by corporate cronies of the White House.

Revelations that higher-ups encouraged torture of Iraqi prisoners reach them.

Disclosures that their president (who avoided Vietnam service in a champagne Air Force unit for scions of wealthy families) and their vice president (a five-time draft dodger) lied about grounds for the war, lawlessly spied on homefolks, bungled care of severely wounded GIs and used the government to punish political enemies.

U.S. troops aren't fools. They're disgusted with phony Washington photo-op "Support the Troops" politicians who deploy them three and four times into harm's way to keep their war-hungry "base" happy.

GIs aren't fighting for George Bush. They're fighting to survive a war they know can't be won so they can finally go home.




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