So why do we do this as a Country? I walked around to the Korean monument where they had life-size statues of a platoon on patrol, and faces carved into another granite wall hailing the suffering and sacrifice of those soldiers. For what, I asked myself. I saw bus loads of visitors from all over the Country taking pictures with the statues, wreaths in the background, and against the granite walls, smiling and awestruck at our “heroes.” A guide was touting how freedom isn’t free and how our military is the most honorable and the best in the world. We should be proud of them. Small children with their own cameras were taking photos and looking in wonder at the soldiers standing in formation, battle hardened faces carved into metal.
I asked myself, why are these kids here? How could this be such an attraction? So this is where it starts, taking them on bus trips to the nation’s capitol and looking at war monuments. They are being indoctrinated from the inception of their lives that America is brave and wonderful because of its military.
I started thinking what wars we had fought that actually preserved our Country. That actually preserved our “way of life” here in the United States. None. We were attacked in Pearl Harbor, that is why my father at the age of 27 was drafted who had a small son, but then we dropped 2 atomic weapons on innocent people. Was that heroic? No, it was malicious and vengeful, and meant nothing to the security of our shores. The damage was done, people died, so now it was time to pay back the Japanese, a million times over.
Then I thought about Hitler, and the Jewish camps, where he was ultimately responsible for murdering 6 million Jews from all over Europe. It took this country a while to get into that war, but we were able to liberate Europe from the death grip of a madman. I might be able to get my mind around that, and maybe that is why we should have a military. But I am not sure anymore. I know that Americans were rude and vicious during that war also. They were responsible for raping and pillaging many towns on the countryside in France and England.Our military might equals imperialism. We train our soldiers and marines to kill and to be merciless, while we train our sons and daughters to be God fearing and loving. They have the best weapons that our money can buy, and are trained to use them on the enemy, whether they are an innocent civilian or someone who is threatening their lives directly. It is indiscriminate killing at the behest of a government that has its own agenda.
So how can you throw your medals away, tear up a commendation given to you by the highest General in the military, and not hate the military? I guess as my son would tell me, they do it for their battle buddies. And as long as this government, and we the people give this government the power to kill millions, destroy generations and then build monuments, this will never end. Those brave new breed of resisters must now stand up and throw off their military bonds forever to say they were not proud to serve in this Country’s armed services.
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