Then what is it when they give up their lives for something wrong?
There was a huge mass of people who hated the war in Vietnam. It is difficult to love the soldier who fights in a war you do not believe in.
The military figured out the problem and no longer draft. They control the dissemination of battle news and the message given to the people. In Iraq we were treated to the Secty of State and various generals showing all the successful missions, in front of press conferences. The reporters were embedded so they were less likely to see what the brass did not want seen. The military learned and fixed the problem.
You have just offered a perfect example of what the OP is referring to. The very fact that people in the US (and the UK) express these kind of ridiculous sentiments means that our leaders are able to launch illegal and costly wars and a majority of people will slavishly follow. Don’t you think that in a putative democracy there should be space for debate and dissent on all issues, particularly one as important as the military and its role in American life? I’m curious as to how you think that really any of the wars that the US has launched since WW2 (you could even argue persuasively that the US even only got involved in that one for economic reasons, in Europe anyway) have been about ‘freedom’, unless you’re talking about freedom to be the richest country in the world, the freedom to live a particular kind of lifestyle etc etc.
It’s not the job of a soldier to question the sometimes idiotic reasons for war, it’s their job to follow orders, that’s one of the fundamental rules of discipline as a soldier. The problem does not lie with the soldiers, it lies with our leaders.
The “spit upon” Vietnam era soldier thing is untrue. Soldiers were not despised during the era, and this myth was made up to slander opponents of the war. If it had been true, there would have been reporters’ accounts in newspapers where reporters personally witnessed such a thing. There are “soldiers” who claim they were spit on, but interestingly, no prosecutions for an assault and battery. It is illegal and a crime to spit on someone.
So the next time a supposed Vietnam era veteran says he was spit on, ask to see the police report and the civil lawsuit papers.
“Freedom” has various definitions. Those for whom it means “low taxes and limited government,” have often advocated that restrictions be placed on those who favor a large public sector of the economy payed for by steeply progressive taxation in order to keep them from propagating their opinions. They seem to believe that protecting the economic freedom of businessmen is worth restraining the intellectual freedom of social democrats.
Nevertheless, when we consider the differences between North Korea and South Korea I do not see how it can be argued that the war was not worth the cost.
Also, we try to leave a lot of the soldier-hating to the Westboro Baptist Church, so that they keep vilifying themselves, while we laugh and laugh and laugh…
There are penalties for breaching it the stupid way, i.e. going AWOL.
And of course if you try and do it the right way, file all the paperwork etc… the army is going to do its level best to fuck with you, apply untold levels of peer pressure, give you a ton of crap work while you’re still under arms to try and break your resolve, plain bullshit you and tell you that you have to deploy first then your application can be processed when you’re there etc…
But they can not force you to go, nor throw you in jail for trying to get out of the military.
If you are going to direct hate at soldiers, you might have better luck going after people who have not yet joined but are considering it. Hit 'em with, “You are not a hero, you are a burden! We can’t afford you! You’ll do us more good begging for change than marching around Iraq costing us $10,000 a day!”.
Except… I don’t really think that is a good idea either. The wars we have today may not be worth fighting (though I think Afghanistan seemed to make sense at the time), but that doesn’t mean there won’t be a necessary war tomorrow. Seeking to deprive soldiers of their due honor isn’t going to help. By joining they are risking their own lives, and also risking having a hellish experience at the hands of a W who sends them around willy-nilly to fight and kill and die for nothing- for the sake of their country (and also maybe a little economic coercion as has been mentioned, but still). They could have a hellish experience even if they fulfill a perfect mission. I see enlisting as an honorable gamble since you never know when the country may genuinely need defense through force of arms.
It is the politicians who deserve all the blame. They have the keys to the best ways of shrinking the military to sane levels, and also of choosing sane deployments. Soldiers follow orders and deserve respect.
Because “hating on US Soldiers” is childish and unproductive. It’s like hating on some back office IT workers at Lehman Brothers for the 2008 recession.
I think you’re a little confused about what “all volunteer” means. It means that everyone has volunteered to join the military rather than having been drafted or given the choice of military duty or jail. Once you’re in the military, you’re subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice which means you can be prosecuted for things like not following lawful orders. There have been people convicted of desertion during the Iraq War and along with serving time they were dishonorably discharged from service and now have a criminal record.
sigh of course you can not drop out overnight or however you like. As in everything in the army up to and including wiping your own arse, there are regs. I didn’t think I had to specify this.
You can, however, initiate the proceedings to get out whenever you want, and I don’t believe the army can plain refuse to let you go. It may jerk you around, it may drag its feet, but it can’t keep you against your will.
That the Russians (where you supposedly come from) similarly have celebrations of their soldiers, especially during the Soviet period, despite the fact that Soviet soldiers did a lot of fairly heinous things? Were you thinking something along those lines and perhaps about dual standards and hypocrisy?
Which was fairly stupid of the US citizens decrying their military during the Vietnam war, considering that the soldiers were conscripts and had exactly zero choice in where they were deployed to fight. Those citizens who were railing against the military should have perhaps considered that THEY were the ones who voted in the people who sent our military to Vietnam. See, that’s how it works here…the military is under civilian leadership, which is ultimately responsible to the electorate…so, when our military goes to war it’s not the military’s fault, but ultimately it’s OUR fault. Just like Afghanistan and Iraq were ultimately our collective faults.
I don’t believe the public spitting on our soldiers was what caused the war to end, however. The war in Vietnam ended simply due to how unpopular the war became. What one has to ask is…why did it go on so long? I have nothing but contempt for people who spit on or decried the military during the Vietnam war, since ultimately it was OUR fault those soldiers were there, and the folks to blame were the politicians WE elected who kept the war going.
Possibly because we aren’t as batshit crazy as the generation that spit on the soldiers during the Vietnam war. Possibly we understand something that the clueless folks who were doing such things during the Vietnam war failed to grasp…which is that the military doesn’t get to decide where they are deployed or where they fight. The politicians decide such things.
The people who are strongly opposed to war (or were strongly opposed to getting us into the current messes in the first place) are a hell of a lot smarter and better educated than the idiots who were spitting on the military during the Vietnam war, basically. They turned out to be much smarter than the majority of us, in fact, since it WAS a huge mistake for us to get involved in Iraq for sure and probably Afghanistan as well. What the folks who strongly oppose(d) the wars understand that you and those idiots during the Vietnam era didn’t was that the military doesn’t decide what they do, and they have no real choice but to do what the legitimate civilian government who is elected by the people (that’s all of us voting Americans) TELL them to do.
As for the wars going on, you do realize that Vietnam went on years longer than Iraq did (and we are nearly out of there now, thank the gods) and Afghanistan (where we are drawing down our forces)? So…how did spitting on the military help get folks out of Vietnam faster than, you know, using the fucking system to vote out the idiots who sent the military to fight? Again, I have nothing but contempt for the folks during the Vietnam era who spit on the military and put them down WHILE DOING NOTHING SUBSTANTIAL TO CHANGE TO ATTITUDES OF THE VOTING PUBLIC AND VOTE OUT THE ASSHOLES WHO SENT OUR MILITARY THERE IN THE FIRST FUCKING PLACE AND WHO WERE ULTIMATELY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE WHOLE FUCKING MESS. :mad:
I think your entire OP is designed to elicit a response from the 'doper community and spark a huge heated debate, and the entire thing is a huge strawman. We haven’t been in Iraq or Afghanistan as long as we were in Vietnam, and we are ALREADY mostly drawn down in Iraq and drawing down in Afghanistan. So, no…spitting on the military when it wasn’t there decision isn’t going to get us out of either place any faster than we are already leaving, and this was done through the actual system instead of meaningless rage against folks who had no say in the decision to deploy them overseas. Hating the troops is stupid. If you are going to hate, feel free to hate the politicians, both US and foreign who created the situations, not the pawns who were just doing their jobs…and save a bit of hate for the voting public in the US who elected the folks who represented us and decided to go to war in those places.
-XT
I chose this statement as a representative expression of a common thread that has now been expressed by numerous posters in this thread: that the rank-and-file soldiers do not deserve to be hated.
As I mentioned in the original post, I am not convinced by this argument. Sure, these people do not set policy, but they do implement it. A low-level mobster that breaks your kneecaps on orders from above is not absolved of guilt through the process of command responsibility. This is doubly true where both the mobster and the soldier voluntarily choose to participate in an organization carrying out nefarious acts.
Also, I direct you to the popular media. Movies, TV series, video games, all of it still continues to celebrate and revel in the slaughter of average rank-and-file German soldiers 70 years after they lost the war. Obviously, they didn’t set the Third Reich policy either, yet there seems to be no hesitation about actively hating them nonetheless. Is there a rational reason to hold US soldiers to a lower standard, or is this nothing more than pure tribalism?
Huh. Thanks for pointing this out; it looks like I too was misled by this characterization of the Vietnam era. Nevertheless, I still maintain that we should consider the utility of hate in responding to current wars of aggression, at least.
This is precisely the kind of sentiment that convinced me to start this thread in the first place. You hear it said a lot, usually followed by a lot of knowing nodding and solemn words of affirmation from the audience members…
Enough is enough. The last time your military fought for anything approaching affirmative rights was during the 18th century. Saddam Hussein never threatened my First Amendment rights. At all. Nor did Colonel Qadaffi, nor Ho Chi Minh, nor any of the other people you’ve fought in centuries. I’m going to have the same speech rights whether or not you slaughter millions of civilians abroad. All that’s going to change is that I’ll end up a lot poorer, in a lot more danger from foreign terrorists seeking vengeance, and with the blood of millions on my hands via collective responsibility. I do not want that; I would much rather fight for structural change by hating the soldiers.
So, you make an analogy between soldiers carrying out the lawful orders of the civilian government, as is their duty, and a mobster following the orders of his capo to kneecap someone…and you REALLY, TRULY think this analogy holds? :dubious: I’m supposed to believe that this ridiculous analogy you are spewing out here is for real? That it’s not intended to elicit a heated response?? :dubious:
The average German soldier didn’t come in for any kind of collective hatred in Germany after the war…it was more shame and guilt. The SS is who got most of the collective hatred, as well as certain officers.
Again, I’m supposed to believe that this analogy you are making here (now between the Nazi’s of WWII era and the US soldiers) is on the level from you?? :dubious:
-XT
There was another difference during Vietnam. There were people drafted who refused to go. There were lots on C.Os and people who left for Canada to avoid the war. So there was an attitude that if the soldiers just refused to go or refused to fight, it would end. Those who submitted to the military were allowing a bad war to go on and on.
Knock yourself out.
I’m still waiting to hear what “illegal orders” the US soldiers are following.
What I was going to say. That the “peace and love” generation considered those of their age who fought in Vietnam to be traitors to the movement, and collaborators with the militarists…
Probably the same ones the Russian soldiers were following when they were in Afghanistan. But they were Communist so it was OK.
I can only interpret your messages based on what you write. I cannot interpret your messages based on what you meant to write.
This is what you originally wrote which is very different from what you write below.
Being able to initiate proceedings whenever you want isn’t anywhere close to being able to get out any time you want or refusing to go where ordered. You can’t just stand up say “I quit, I don’t want to go” when ordered to Iraq. There is a penalty for breaching the contract and it can include serving time in prison and having a dishonorable discharge (not a nice thing to have on a job application).