The holidays are a time to remember what things are all about, why we are who we are, why we fight wars and why so many have sacrificed so much. It isn’t a time for blame, for envy, for recriminations.
We would bring every American home, every soldier, sailor or Marine, back to a life we can no longer guarantee even exists to a country we haven’t looked after too well. This isn’t a time to talk about whether wars are right or wrong. History will do that for us and, as usual, the blame always lands on the blameless, the lame, the wounded, the damaged. We have all been down that road.
Veterans Today exists to end that cycle.
In 1914, a war America had not yet joined, two great armies faced one another on the Western Front, extending from the English Channel to the border of Switzerland, hundreds of miles of trenches, mud, a stench of death stifled only by falling snow and freezing temperatures.
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That war would know three more Christmases, almost a fourth. Two decades later, another war, horrors untold but no Christmas truce.
I have my own memories of spending Christmas eve, now many decades ago, crouched along a trail in South Vietnam, waiting, not so innocently, for “insurgents” seeking warmth and shelter. They would find us instead.
Christmas day for Marines was spent trekking the mountains, the meal of the day a can of 20 year old lima beans (with ham) and a canteen of water collected from rainfall on a poncho.
That story continues, nearly a decade of wars, Americans on every continent, every ocean.
For the first time in our history, thousands of Americans, serving as private contractors, almost all veterans, serve also. We will remember them too.
Before we talk about our veterans, the 20 million families representing over 50 million Americans, we will take a moment to remember, as was done in 1914, that the enemy may not really be an enemy. We learned, in Vietnam, that America was capable of going to war against decent people, people defending their homes and that politics, deceit and evil infects our own land, sometimes even more than the nations deemed foes.
After nearly a decade of war, we all see that coming, the blame, the finger pointing, the excuses. Our troops are always blamed, our veterans are always at fault, this process started early in our current wars. Our veterans are not only forgotten but even being reviled long before the wars are over.
Our reasons for war this time are, it seems, even more ethereal than those that pushed us into the debacle of Vietnam. The tales of terror attacks and fiendish masterminds have unraveled revealing a darkness of heart closer to home, something that reminds the soldiers among us of our sacred oath, “enemies foreign and domestic.” Yes, domestic. We have them. They are among us.
Whatever we feel, whatever we believe, yes, believe as no one can ever say they know anything, not anymore. Certainty was sacrificed long ago when war and mythology, governance and deception became one.
All that is left, all that is real is the suffering and the loyalty and honor that has always been a part of those that serve and those who served and remember.
It is a time to end war and revile politicians and war profiteers, those who have created so much suffering and stripped America bare. It is also a time to make distinctions and to restore humanity. It is a time to honor those who serve, no matter the war, no matter the reason, to remember they are our comrades, our children, our brothers and sisters.
It is also time to remember that all people everywhere are our brothers and sisters and all are our children as well. This is why the wars have to end. War demands we sacrifice, not only our humanity but our honor as well. That is asking too much and too many have paid that price.
Long ago, looking back at World War I, the Christmas truce of 1914 and the promise and purity of soul it displayed, we failed to learn a lesson. Those who laid down their weapons were crushed and herded back to the slaughterhouse that would go on for years. That war was one of greed and manipulation, one that would soon breed another. It should have ended that night in 1914 as our current wars should end tonight.
We know better.
Marine General Smedley Butler told us, not long after that war, the 1914 war, that all war is a racket.
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Butler reminds us we have real enemies. I will remind you that they are not us, they are not the veterans sleeping in the streets of Los Angeles because the a wealthy homeowners group in Brentwood want to use the National Veterans Home for their own recreation.
Another great American, Colonel David Hackworth, once spoke of those who love war but hate fighting, love the sound of gunfire, but mostly on television. These are what David Hackworth, “Hack” to his friends, called the “Perfumed Princes of the Pentagon.” This pack of degenerate popinjays and their retired “pundit” friends, those who leave service bespeckled with honors earned on the golf course or parade ground, have been and continue to be the greatest enemy real American soldiers and veterans have ever had and ever will.
No insurgent, no terrorist can ever harm America as they have.
You know who you are, we know who you are. We will never forget.
Forget.
This is the problem in itself. We do forget. We trust the untrustworthy and forget those we owe everything to. Up to 1 million veterans are in need, homeless, stuck in eternal processing, pushed away, abandoned, many not able to live productively as they once did. Those that now serve will eventually join these ranks.
In a time when the few have benefited so much at the hands of the many, we all sit up night worrying about their special tax breaks for private planes and country club memberships, its time we stopped and remembered the many, the forgotten.
Our veterans are forgotten as much as our troops. America is sick of war, sick of hearing about suffering but more than happy to talk about new wars. We cheer them on, “let’s invade Iran,” but please, not my kids, no, let’s borrow the money from our grandchildren.”
The time is now. We stop. We clean up our mess, we pay our bills and we grow up. We have veterans strewn from one end of America to another, forgotten and abused. This Christmas is a time to dedicate ourselves to ending this national shame.
It may be time we listen to Jesus and “go and sin no more” (John 8:11)
River to Sea
Uprooted Palestinian
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