On the Matter of War Fatigue
The war drums continue to beat louder once again, though they have been beating for a long time now, just a little quieter. The question now is will it be Iran, North Korea or even China? Or it is a Middle Eastern country with oil reserves and a government who is “defiant” against the US? War is sown in the fabric of our conscience since our nation’s birth. We were born from war, we expanded by slaughtering our indigenous, enslaving generation after generation, then fought a civil war to end the enslavement of human beings. Since World War II, we have considered ourselves to be justified for every bomb we drop. One of my undergraduate Political Science professors asked one time, “Why is everything a war? A war of poverty, a war on drugs, always a war?” After the September 2001 attacks, predictably it was a “war on terror”.
At that time, I thought maybe it was one of those “war” phrases, but this time the George W. Bush administration meant it. And we been tied to Afghanistan since. We’ve been deep with Iraq. A generation has grown up with our heavy involvement in the Middle East, and only has been amplified over the last two administrations. Under the Obama administration, we expanded our “war on terrorism” into more countries like Yemen, Syria and Libya. At least seven countries, we spent many lives, years and money, and recently, the media announced they dropped the “largest non-nuclear bomb” ever in combat, supposedly on a tunnel that shielded ISIL. And the ironic part of this whole situation is that the current administration, now, his approval rating went up? What?! I am asking the question now: are we tired of war yet? To explore this question, we need to examine our society, the true cost of war, when is war the only answer, and other solutions to stop violence.
The endless wars or military conflicts that we have been involved with over the years have taken their toll on our nation. If our government’s answer to problems facing our world is violence, then wouldn’t it stand to reason that the younger generations learn that must be the solution to personal conflicts? Angry with someone? Shoot them. Angry with the world? Random mass shootings. Our police officers killing unarmed Americans, for what? Maybe we need to admit to ourselves that we are just a violent society. Endless wars affect our society even more and only worsen with every generation. Already a generation has grown up with our troops in Afghanistan. As simple as a quote from my best friend sort of captures and simplies my point, “the United States is the biggest gangbanger.” We drone/airstrike our “enemies”, which just creates more enemies. Isn’t this the same kind of violence we complain about in our inner cities or in general? This point belongs to my best friend more than me, but I agree with the sentiment. If our government (the adults in the room) do not seek diplomatic, peaceful solutions to their disagreements, why would our society? Endless war not only affects our veterans, the civilians of the nation’s we attack, but also those of us not directly involved. Sometimes the effects create anxiety, depression or a feeling of hopelessness. And even more alarming, there are people who are overly nationalistic, even happy and excited when we initiate acts of war. Those are the people in our society that I do not understand. Either those Americans have nothing to lose or they know they will not be asked to sacrifice anything. Our national identity seems to thrive and depend on our military and what violence we can bestow on others in this world.
On April 13, we dropped the GBU-43 nicknamed “The Mother of All Bombs”, an 11-ton bomb, on ISIL members in Afghanistan. A great deal of Americans, including mainstream media outlets, like CNN, seemed proud. For some Americans, the reaction was horror as this seemed to be an excessive show of force than a reasonable military solution. Even from a military viewpoint, the use of this weapon of war did not seem efficient both in lives and costs. Again, this bombing is a part of who we are as a nation. One cannot understand those who are excited or happy when we attack other nations. Trump, for performance reasons, attacked a Syrian airbase, claiming it was in retaliation for the gas attacks allegedly by the Assad regime. CNN was airing this bombing as if it were Trump’s greatest reality show. Little does the American public realize that we’ve been bombing ISIL targets in Syria since 2012. President Obama constantly bombed these targets, but no “show” was televised. Either way, our nation continues to follow policies that continue to create new “terrorist.” We been doing this for over 16 years, are we tired of war yet? What is the goal of the war on terror? To wipe out, exactly who? We have weakened Al Qaeda, now ISIL is next. What group comes after ISIL? The extremist groups are like Hydra's heads, destroy one, another one or two will takes its place, especially if we continue to kill and destroy their nations. Currently, I read that we are possibly going to increase ground troops in Syria. Now, the ISIL fight will not only take the hundreds of civilian lives, by US-led forces and ISIL, but take now more US soldier and contractor lives. (I guess this is why many pro-war Americans call themselves “Pro-life” because our military needs more bodies to join.) If the US government continues these wars in the Middle East, it is possible that my nine and ten year-old sons will be fighting these same wars/conflicts. So far it still continues to be What if we did start the draft once again? Made it mandatory for EVERYONE at 18 years of age to serve either in Civil or Military service? Would the American people be more hesitant to participate in war? I am realistic that at times war can be unavoidable, but it can’t be the answer to everything that troubles our world.
Since September 2001, the United States has spent $4.79 TRILLION on wars in the Middle East, according to the recent Cost of War Project at the Watson Institute at Brown University. Also, according to the project, 370,000 lives have been lost in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq as result of direct war. (http://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/). Since 2014, we have been dropping airstrikes in Iraq, Syria and other nations to defeat ISIS. US military leaders have claimed we have had a small successes in “pushing them back.” US politicians, like President Obama, have so far, fought the urge to send in group troops. As recently as March 9, 2017, we have sent ground troops to Syria, risking our soldiers life. (As no one thinks if we never destroyed these nations directly or indirectly, maybe there would have been no ISIS). As for American troops, so far 6,800 have lost their lives, and 6,900 American contractors have been killed, 13,700 Americans that are serving our nation in some capacity have lost their lives. (Cost of War Project, Watson Institute at Brown University, http://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar). We could do so much more with this money: build schools (which will create jobs), provide higher education for everyone (whether vocational or college), healthcare for everyone, senior programs, veteran programs, refugee programs, cleaning water, food and shelter programs and infrastructure programs. (All these will also create jobs!) We probably could even reduce taxes while providing all of these programs.
We need to decide if we are tired of war yet. The new administration does not seem interested in ending these wars, even the previous one failed to do so. As we are discovering, the current President, only thinks of our military as a form of entertainment. Most recently Wilbur Ross, the current U.S. Commerce Secretary, (worth $2.5 billion according to Forbes), stated that the Syrian airstrike was “in lieu of after-dinner entertainment.” I am sure the whole Cabinet of billionaires thought wasting our tax money and our military resources, risking our soldiers lives were worth “after-dinner” entertainment. The media’s response presented the bombing of the Syrian airbase and reporting of the MOAB was no better. So now our wars will be likened to Gladiator fights, starring a former reality star. Americans are the audience in the Colosseum, while we send our gladiators to fight and pay the price. The civilians in these other nations are just part of the entertainment being torn apart by lions. We can either make changes now or keep going down this same bath. Eventually our "Roman" empire will fall. We, Americans, have choices to make. Or we can keep creating veterans with physical and mental injuries/illnesses. And we can keep creating refugees that we refuse to help. Or our schools can fail, which can keep the populace less educated and more willing to deny because we will have nothing left to lose. We can keep denying taking care of our own or others around the world. Americans need to decide if we, the common people, are entertainment for the wealthy, while they want tax breaks. Since it's most likely our young, (poor, working and middle classes) that will fight these wars, we are the ones who needs to decide where our nation takes us and the world.
