[Vision2020] Give Devoted Military a Worthwhile War to Fight

[Tom Hansen]

>From today's (December 27, 2006) Spokesman Review -

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Give devoted military a worthwhile war to fight
By Emily Miller
Washington Post
December 27, 2006

Here is what my brother, a member of the Army National Guard, told me as he
prepared to serve in Iraq this year:

The difference between a democracy and a dictatorship is who controls the
armed forces. Civilian command of the Army is a cornerstone of our
democratic system.

My brother told me that he takes his oath to defend the Constitution
seriously and that he will fight and die if necessary to honor his
commitment. When I asked him if he would be offended if I participated in
activities opposing the war, he replied that it was not only my right but my
obligation, and the obligation of all civilians opposing this war, to try to
change bad policy. "Give us good wars to fight," he said.
 
While acknowledging that another possible moral option is to refuse to
participate in a bad war, my brother chooses to place his oath to the
Constitution and his belief in our democratic system at the pinnacle of his
moral convictions. That some of us might differ with him is basically
irrelevant - we (most of us) are not faced with his decision.

For the record, he believes that the war on terrorism is necessary to deal
with real threats facing the United States. He is not convinced of what Iraq
has to do with the matter, which puts him fairly well in the mainstream of
American opinion.

So it is terribly upsetting to me to hear that some people despair that
there is "no point" to their soldier's death or wounding in the Iraq war.
America does not have to be right in order for our soldiers' service to have
meaning.

What I find offensive is the idea that we have to "follow through" in order
to give their deaths meaning post hoc. It is dreadfully apparent from the
Iraq Study Group report that Iraq isn't going to have a democracy in any
meaningful time frame. Even if this administration does everything
perfectly, the best-case scenario is that we might maintain the barest
outlines of order.

Victory being out of the question at this point, the only democracy my
brother is fighting for in Iraq is our democracy. The only constitution he
is in Iraq fighting to defend is our Constitution. If my brother dies, it
will not be for a mistake but rather because of his deeply held belief that
the time it takes us as a people to figure out through democratic processes
that we are wrong is more important than his own life.

This places upon us an obligation. My brother and other service members
living and dead have given us the sacred responsibility to use the
democratic means we have at hand to bring judgment to bear on whether any
given war is worth our soldiers' lives.

Despite the clear results in last month's elections and the grim conclusions
of the Iraq Study Group, we are still hearing intransigent rhetoric and
seeing unrealistic posturing from some of our leaders. This is unacceptable.

It's not too late for us to honor the almost 3,000 U.S. service members who
have died defending the principles of our democracy. 

It is morally imperative for us to honor our living service members and to
do what is demanded of us by our democracy and by common decency. We have
taken a small step by changing some of our leadership in Washington, but now
it is incumbent upon us to follow through at home and demand accountability
from our leaders.

What are you, fellow citizens, willing to do to defend our Constitution?
Will you dignify the sacrifices of our soldiers? Will you honor my brother's
faith in our system? Will you let my brother or others die to eke out a
slightly smaller disaster in Iraq? These are the questions we face in the
wake of the Baker-Hamilton report.

My brother is betting his life that you are not going to ask this of him. He
has placed his trust in the idea that we will not ask him to die for
anything less than the necessary defense of our democracy. Reasonable people
may have at one time disagreed about the necessity of the Iraq war, but now
that it has become abundantly clear from every quarter that we cannot win,
will you be responsible for asking my brother to stay?

My family begs of you: Do not ask this of him. Do not ask this of us. My
brother is doing his constitutional duty. Now it is time for us to do ours.

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho


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"Seldom, if ever, has a war ended leaving the victors with such a sense of
uncertainty and fear -- with such a realization that the future is obscure
and that survival is not assured."

- Edward R. Murrow

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