Sunday, May 06, 2007

Supporting the Troops???


How about a moment of critical thinking?
Peter N. Kirstein is professor of history at Saint Xavier University and a member of Historians Against the War. Two months ago, few noticed that Kirstein blew a hole in the fog of Bush's war occupation when he wrote on the History News Network,
It would appear that if the 110th Congress wishes to end the carnage and the crime that is Iraq, it would have to cease funding future military operations. This would take political courage because of the never ending myth that supporting the war is required in order to support the troops. Of course, military conflicts are not fought for the troops but for alleged war aims that purportedly serve the national interest. Whether those war aims are just or not, wars are never fought to benefit the combatants, who suffer and sacrifice greatly in a conflict, but for some other constituency.

. . . . Engaged citizens would do well to remember Vietnam, when a Congress decided that the national interest and the international community would benefit from an end to the war. Such is the time now, when militarists need to be challenged, super-patriots need to be confronted and a president needs to be stopped in the prosecution of the Iraq War Occupation.
Supporting the troops has come to mean relieving the Commander-Guy of his command.