I gave up looking for all of my comments that I have made in the past. There are more then these 10 out there, I just don’t know where exactly. I believe that all of these are still awaiting moderation the last time I checked, so I apologize if they don’t show up.
Cheers!
“But nothing happens. I just scan. And think. And think. And think. Too much time to think.”*
What is happening to our war, our culture clash, and our gung-ho Americana kick-ass attitude?? Where are the headlines? Where are the victories, where are the defeats? Hell, where are the battles?
Battles are not suicide bombers blowing the crap out of pedestrian places. Battles are not roadside bombs exploding on 1 out of every 15 hummers that passes by. Battles are not soldiers sitting in guard towers with nothing to do except pray that nothing bad happens to them.
The major difference I see between the books of war we have been reading and the war right now, is that there is no war! Why does it seem that all of the books, The Things We Carried, Fallen Angels, Vera Britain, they all are moving for an accomplishment of something. They have protagonists and antagonists, they know who the enemy is, there is a PURPOSE even if it is wrong, and they still know what they are there to do.
So what are we in Iraq for? “To liberate a nation from the tyranny of a dictator, and promote freedom and democracy around the world.” Come on! There are sooo many horrible dictators around the world, why did we choose Iraq? What are our boys dying everyday over there for?
ASSUMING that this war will be over in 10 years, and so far that’s a hefty assumption to make, what books will be written about the Iraq war? What will future generations say about our military operations? We have books about World War II, which was the allied forces against the Nazi’s. We have books about Vietnam, which was a huge American tragedy where far too many young soldiers died. What will our story be? Will we have an Iraq War memorial in Washington D.C.? Will this be the forgotten war, the war that no one wants to talk about? How will this war be remembered?
Perhaps another question will be, how should this war be reflected upon? Do we take all of the soldier’s blogs we have been reading and compile them into one giant database? Do we make movies based on the stories, or are we going to have thousands of books written about the Iraq war?
This is my final post, so it’s mostly an analysis of everything I have read and written about. The symbolism, the heroisms, the death and destruction, somehow, it all seems so familiar. The human race will inevitably find itself in conflict with itself, and people will express themselves through literature, film, and other mediums. I can only hope we learn from the past, instead of repeating it.
***I have to send a shout out to The Usual Suspect. You keep it real, you tell it like it is, and I have the utmost respect for you. I greatly enjoyed reading your posts, and will continue to do so. Stay safe Suspect…
Written April 6th
Oh, the things we take for granted here in America. Or any other place that’s not a war zone.
I was just chilling out outside, its beautiful weather, a tad chilly, and decide its time to take my little Civic out for a drive. I pull out onto Lake Michigan drive and decide to head West, away from the city. Everyone is driving really nicely, letting me pass them in a lazy sort of way, and even one of them decided to race me on a long stretch of open road. I laughed as I beat him, and decided it was time to turn around and head home, this time, driving a bit more slowly. 10 minutes and 2 fire trucks later, I was home.
“A ridiculous traffic jam gums up the works, and we’re having none of it. Can’t let these crazy revolutionaries, extremists, and commuters get too close. Standard procedure, stay the fuck away. I’m on the 240 (that beautiful belt fed fully automatic bastard of all bastards), so my friend takes advantage of the situation and sticks his rifle out the back.”*
I can’t even imagine being in a war zone. These kids (no offense Suspect, but you are still in your 20’s) are dropped off in the middle of a foreign country and are expected to know the rules and regulations about everything. Not only that, but they are fighting, so everyone could be a possible enemy.
When I am on the road, I consider myself courteous to others. I don’t tailgate, I let people merge, and I generally take things nice and easy. I expect people to do the same for me, and if they don’t I consider they very very rude and usually have some not so courteous things to say about them under my breath.
“You drive, completely cognizant of the fact that you are driving in IED Central, and looking this way and that for anything suspicious. Intel, for instance, tells us to look out for a Toyota Corolla in black, white, red, blue…. Heck that is about EVERY car out there! They also say to look for particular trucks… SUV’s… and even an Afghan National Army vehicle that was stolen…. Ugh! So you get the picture, you basically can’t trust ANY vehicle out there because they are potential VBIED’s. Then you’ve got to navigate through a city that has no traffic laws, with people crossing the street everywhere … we have only one rule to driving here in Afghanistan: “Drive it like you stole it”, and TRY not to hurt anyone in the process. Ha! …. For instance, we don’t stop at most stop signs… we drive WAY faster than the rest of traffic, weaving in and out of lanes, nearly missing the corner of every vehicle we pass. We honk like we own the road, we have to swerve into oncoming one-way traffic to get around a slow vehicle that could make us vulnerable to attack; we’ve played “chicken” with oncoming cars, trucks, busses, and large jingle trucks more times that I can count. We’re not exactly winning the hearts and minds of the Afghan people here with our highway habits!”**
Now I am not and expert on people, and I don’t pretend to be, but doesn’t that kind of inconsiderateness piss everyone off? I understand that our soldiers have to watch out for everyone, and be on the lookout, but does that mean that they can be rude to everyone in their host country?
If I lived in Afghanistan, and I saw a huge American truck barreling down at me, I would automatically not like them, and think they were a bunch of stuck-up jerks that didn’t belong in my country.
We watched a movie in class a couple weeks ago, called “Born on the Fourth of July”, about a kid who goes to Vietnam, and has to cope with what happened after he returns home. The main scene in the movie that sticks out in my mind is when they shoot up an entire village of innocent civilians, thinking that there were hidden Vietcong hiding in the houses. I keep trying to put myself in the shoes of someone from that country hearing about the news of that happening. That would infuriate me, even though I know they are supposedly helping, mistakes like that shouldn’t happen!.
That’s an extreme example, and I am just trying to get my point across. Perhaps we need to focus on the little things to make the countries we are supposed to be “helping” appreciate us a little more. Whether that be driving more considerately, doing more missions to bring fresh water and medical supplies to the outlying villages, or even just being friendly to as many locals as you can be without letting your guard down.
Maybe its not possible in a time of war, but I think it might be worth an effort. Who knows, perhaps more cooperation would come from it.
I’m just spitballin’ here………
Written April 1st.
I’ve come to realize more and more that what I write about in this blog actually usually stems from my childhood, and how I glorified war. Does any one else remember running through their backyard with a bunch of friends; toy pistols (or twigs shaped like guns, whatever you had handy) at the ready, and your stealth shoes on, getting ready to kick some bad guy butt? I remember how good it felt to pretend like I was shooting some evil guy, and rescuing the world and all the pretty ladies from whatever death machine or evil mastermind happened to be attacking that day.
This fascination with war only grew after watching movies where the good guys always win, the bad guys always lose, and there is ALWAYS a happy ending. Lets see, how about Star Wars? I know its science fiction, but its still war nonetheless, and at that impressionable age, that meant a lot. Now what about the Rambo movies? I’m talking about the early ones, the ones I watched without telling my parents. Where he walks into a place with guns blazing and looks like the coolest person ever! Oh, and he never gets shot anywhere vital and always wins.
The YA book that we have to read for class next week is called Fallen Angels, by Walter Dean Myers. In that book is a character named Lobel. Lobel is Jewish, and throughout the book gets quite a bit of harassment from that. From what I can tell is possibly homosexual, and is basically downright scared. Lobel is obsessed with movies, and is always talking about them.
Lobel escapes from the world and reality in which he lives, and pretends everything’s a movie. He tries to convince Richie that movies are the only real thing in life. Every time Lobel goes out on patrol, he becomes Lee Marvin, the hero, and the guy who can’t be killed, because then the movie will be over.
*whew* Talk about not confronting reality. Lobel tries to explain to Richie that he should not play the part of the good black guy, because everyone will think he is a coward and at the end he will die saving everybody.
When I read this part, I actually laughed. Lobel decided that the world they were living in needed to become a musical, because nobody good ever dies in a musical. This seemed ridiculous to me, a little outlandish even. Who goes to war and pretends that they are someone else, believing they won’t be killed if they play a part like a movie?
Isn’t that exactly what I did when I was a kid? Didn’t I always choose the part of the guy who never died? Lobel is taking his fear and transforming it in the only way he knows how.
Suddenly I wasn’t laughing anymore. What else can you do??? What would I do? There are millions upon millions of soldiers around the globe, not just ours, but every countries soldiers. People who have fear, and need to escape from it.
If I ever get drafted, I’m gonna be like Lobel. Except, I think I want to play the part of Jack Conrad, from the movie “The Condemned”. He was so cool, plus, he didn’t die….
