I was an easy opportunity for my recruiter. The only arms that needed twisting were those of my folks. I thought they'd be glad to get rid of me! Ten kids--who the hell cares about number seven? But they did care, though I didn't recognize it then as anything but an embarrassment in front of my recruiter. I enlisted at 17 in the Delayed Entry Program--a part of recruiting that locks in a youngster before they reach the age of majority (when a contract would be binding) by getting the parents to co-sign the agreement to enlist. Over the next year we "poolies" from the hinterlands were occasionally picked up and brought in for barbeques (and illicit booze consumption) at the Marines recruiting office on Lyndale Avenue in Minneapolis. We were spoiled by the attention--unable to see it for what it was: grooming. But we loved to hang out with the kind of men we hoped to become.
My initial enlistment was for four years, which I later extended for another 18 months to go overseas as a Marine Security Guard, the part of the Marine Corps that guards embassies and consulates. I was 20 and eager for adventure, and I found it.
After three years in Africa, I returned stateside increasingly disenchanted with military life. Through my 24-year-old eyes and experience, I looked back on what I had done and where I had been since 18. I had--and have now--no regrets for joining. Two of my brothers who were also Marines, and another in the Army, may have other opinions. Yet, I can't in good conscience tell others to join today. A person sees through a lot of bullshit after six years of service. I slowly came to this realization: The poor among us--poor in opportunity, poor in money, poor in education--are the fodder for today's enlisted ranks. It has always been this way.
My metamorphosis from a goose-stepping, right-wing, Reagan-loving Republican began in college, where another former Marine, as the chair of the Political Science department, became my academic adviser. Later, I heard Paul Wellstone speak on campus during his first (and I thought Quixotic) run for senator. What passion! I shook his hand and slapped him on the back and wished him luck, and his sincerity and conviction moved me. All these post-Marine Corps experiences coalesced into a sort of epiphany for me. I started questioning things. By the time I found myself among the thousands of pissed-off citizens--including many other veterans--marching against the Iraq invasion in February 2003 on Hennepin Avenue, I had completed a 180-degree ideological turn.
What can I say that hasn't already been said about the situation in which our nation finds itself? Our military teeters on the brink of destruction, while Iraq has long since passed over. Our nation's coffers are empty as we hemorrhage billions yearly in Iraq and Afghanistan, while private military contractors suck savagely from the public teat--all the while bemoaning attempts to rein in their destructive activities. And returning veterans are treated like shit. The once-famous medical facility of Walter Reed is now infamous for its putrid conditions and substandard medical care for a host of wounded veterans. Even the VA hospital in Minneapolis is under renewed scrutiny involving issues of inadequate or substandard care. As always, it is the lower ranks, the enlisted men and women, who bear the brunt of these developments.
Politicians either run for cover or cover their asses by forming yet another bipartisan commission to investigate, but they're pursuing a red herring. The commission that should have been formed long ago is one with the sole purpose of impeaching this president. The words "every life is precious and we mourn every life lost" is a mechanical answer that he and his minions respond with whenever a question regarding casualties is raised. This is just a by-rote reply designed to impede anyone from seeing the bullshit this president and his lackeys continue to shovel into the face of returning veterans and their families.
So, what can I say that hasn't already been said? Perhaps if I can't help current, former and future members of the military from seeing this bullshit, maybe I can help them smell it.
When politicians say "Thank you," they're really saying "Better you than me." It's not them leaving their families, losing jobs, wives and homes--or worse. They may get tears in their eyes, they may get chills down their spine, but they still know the military is for "those others" and not for them. They may say that they themselves are unworthy of such a noble sacrifice, but what they really mean is that such a sacrifice is beneath them. Like Dick Cheney, they have other interests, and swapping the green of money for the brown of desert sand is not one of them.
In boot camp we're taught to venerate many people--ranging from the absurd (John Wayne, who never wore the uniform) to the spectacular, like General Smedley D. Butler. To call this man courageous is a huge understatement: he won two --yes, two--Medals of Honor. More importantly, he lived to tell about how, for decades, he and his fellow Marines were pawns for global imperialism. Destinations may have changed, but American imperialism is still buttressed by boots on the ground. Here is a quote from General Butler:
"I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902–1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested." (Read the entire essay "War is a Racket.")The credibility of what I say shouldn't depend on my service in the Marines. I understand that just as I rage against the military machine--the machine, not the malleable young minds that enlist--others will rage for it. But the proof is in front of us day after day: to the rich, to those roaming the corridors of power in the Pentagon, the White House and Congress, our service members are less than pawns. They are expendable. And if you are among the wounded, you are an inconvenience. If you are among those tortured mentally by your experiences in war, pleading for help and relief from the anguish, knowing you are on the edge of a breakdown, you are put on a waiting list. Yet, people will continue to sign on the dotted line and fill the ranks left vacant by the wounded, dead and dying, seduced by the motto "Semper Fidelis," ("Always Faithful") not knowing, or not willing to believe, it will later turn into "Simply Forgot Us."
The oath of enlistment is an oath to uphold the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. The oath isn't to the president, it isn't to senior ranks: it is to the Constitution. When the leadership of our country has morphed into the enemy, a service member's oath does not bind him to follow; on the contrary, the oath demands the opposite. Those in our military petitioning Congress for redress regarding the Iraq war are a real-time example of this principle.
When Bush leaves office, he will live the good life, content in the knowledge that he knows he did the right thing in Iraq because he only does right things. The thousands of legless, armless and brain-damaged casualties that resulted, the tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis and Afghanis who died, the totality of the destruction for which he is responsible, will not haunt his dreams: There are no dreams in an empty head.
(Copyright 2007 by Joe Lake. Originally published in Pulse of the Twin Cities weekly, March 2007)
No comments:
Post a Comment