This is a weird thread. I’m not quite sure what the OP is getting at.
If it’s the implication that people will be less inclined to want to start a war if they’ve participated in one, I don’t think that that is necessarily true. I also don’t think that military service is a prerequisite for the office of President. I think that everything should be judged on its own merits, certainly not on the basis of who’s saying it. I admit that that is a reversal of my pre-war position, but I’ve reversed a lot of my pre-war positions.
I think the logic of it is that, all other things being equal, people who advocate that “we” get into a war should be those who are willing to put their ass where their mouth is, metaphorically speaking, and fight said war – or, given age expectations, those who were willing to fight in wars when they were of military age (say 18-30, to define that a bit more clearly).
IMO, it’s a slightly veiled potshot at GWB and his supporters, questioning whether they actually serve or served in the military. You might note that you yourself, Airman, were explicitly excluded from those targeted, by one previous poster; if you feel that a war is proper, you have every right to, since you’re likely to be actively involved in it.
I’m not sure what the OP is getting at either, Airman-I fear we’re a trio. :dubious:
My age is such that although registered for the draft in Vietnam (status 1-A), I wasn’t called to serve, and am too old for callup at present. I believe we should have taken out Sadaam during Desert Storm, not a decade later. Does that make me a chickenhawk?
Remember Merijeek that there has always been a relatively small percentage of the population called upon to serve in the armed forces to preserve freedom and your right to free expression. You’d do well to adopt John Corrado’s comment as your sigline-the shoe fits.
Hiring freeze right now, increasing revenue from last year by over 8% isn’t enough, so we have to cut all the little things possible. However come next summer, if you don’t mind gamma radiation and a commute to Illinois…maybe.
Let me suggest that what the OP is getting at, and what a fair number of people are running way from, is the speech that at one time or another was given by every section leader, rifle or gun team leader, squad leader, platoon leader, company commander and battery commander: “Boys, I’ll never ask you to do something I’m not willing and prepared to do my self. If ever we are in a tough spot and you are looking for me you will find me at the front.”
Some think it is disingenuous and not a little hypocritical for the nation’s leaders to send the nation’s youth into dubious combat when they them selves affirmatively avoided exposing themselves to the risk of combat when they were themselves youthful and eligible. Reasonable minds may differ. To be a fire eater on this war, the war in Iraq, when you found other interests more compelling some 30 or 35 years ago does leave a bad taste in some people’s mouth.
In the course of looking up Franklin Roosevelt, whose policies helped ensure that we’d be drawn into WWII against the Axis Powers (and who never served in the armed services), I came across this interesting compilation of “chickenhawks” and others. Make of it what you will.*
*What is especially noteworthy is the percentage of pundits and commentators who served in the armed forces.
My family has been ‘traditional military’ for the past 300 odd years on this continent, and in different parts of Europe depending on that branch’s origin [british mainly, a touch of germany, french and dutch as well.]
This is defined as pretty much every male enters the military at age, then goes into some branch of the family business when they retire, if they survive.
Being female, I married into the military…husband retired last year after 20 years service. In the past 20 years I have lost 7 direct family members [defined as being within direct cousins, children of my direct parents or their siblings] and 29 direct friends. In those friends I number 4 ex-lovers. Wounded and alive, 4 more family members and 9 friends. [I have no way to total up the number of mrAru’s family or friends have died, nor friends of my brother, or any of my family members.]
Our only fuck up was in not deposing and dealing with Iraq the first time around. If we had dealt with it then, we wouldn’t have all the discussion that is going on right now…people’s ‘blood was running hot’ over the whole cause of the conflict…now people arent as upset as he wasnt invading anybody…so we are getting shafted in world press. Think of what would have hapened if we didnt ‘win’ WW2 decisively, just let Hitler [NOT implementing a threadkill tactic…not calling anybody or anything hitler or nazi…] apologize for Poland and France, and the concentration camps, make him pull back to just Germany then instead of Korea march back into Germany and start shooting it up again because we think that he is still working on the nuclear program…
There is a lot to say for “the old ways”. By that I mean, any leader or king who was eager for war would lead his army into battle, and if he lost, he died with them. Let GWB and Cheney do that. Not likely. We already know their histories - champagne unit, other priorities, blah.
When the board went pay-to-post, he decided to redirect his energies elsewhere.
I will not otherwise speak for him or characterize his opinions about the war. However, I will point out that there is a huge variety of possible distinctions between being an absolute pacifist and thinking the way this war has been conducted is utterly stupid and short-sighted.
I am quite willing to respond to whathiznutz, just as soon as I figure out that the hell he is going on about. Does said service need to have been in the US Armed Forces? Does the logic extend to other topics as well? (If you are unemployed, shutup about tax policy, for instance?)
Whoosh, I think. NI was a Soviet citizen who dodged the Soviet draft for Afghanistan back in the 1980s. Are you aware of this, and if so do you still classify his desire not to serve in the Soviet Army trieg to conquer Afghanistan the same way?
Without getting into the specifics of the people in question here and the specific wars involved because I am not eager to beat that ghost of a horse any further into the ground, do you or do you not think that people’s reactions might differ to different wars, and that these different feelings on different wars might be valid? Or do you hold that if one is in favor of one war, one must be in favor of all wars?
Your source was the BBC. In the States, the draft ended the same month as the war and protests continued as long as we continued to engage, especially with the bombing of North Vietnam during the peace talks.
