The accidental death of my
mother’s oldest brother tore her family apart, and, one way or another colored
their lives thereafter. Another of her brothers decided to run for the state
legislature when he was barely old enough to vote, and became a prominent
politician for the next 20 years, helping our family with jobs and inspiration
during the Great Depression.
You never know how someone,
no matter how seemingly insignificant, will affect your life. We have some
friends whose daughter has severe cerebral palsy. Her doctors told them she
wouldn’t live beyond infancy, but she’s in her 50’s now and is an important
part of their lives. She goes everywhere with them. All their friends accept
her as part of the family. It would be devastating if they lost her.
One of the lessons I learned in
Vietnam is that war turns reverence for life on its head, especially the lives
of “the enemy,” which in Vietnam was practically everyone. I was shocked when I
first heard the Vietnamese referred to as “gooks,” or “dinks.” Vietnamese taken
to the hospital were sometimes dropped off their stretchers “accidentally,” and
even dropped out of helicopters to avoid taking them to the hospital. There was
one ward at the main hospital reserved for Vietnamese. I went there one night
and mentioned to the nurse that many of them were groaning in pain. Her
response was “They just want attention. They don’t feel pain like we do.”
I used to attend the
commanding general’s briefing every Friday morning. Every unit in the division,
battalion and above, was represented by an officer. There were several
generals, but mostly colonels and lieutenant colonels, the men responsible for
the strategy of the war, and the lives of the thousands of men under their
command. I was responsible for reporting the health statistics: how many cases
of malaria, hepatitis, plague, trench foot. How many amputations. How many men had
to be evacuated for higher level care, or sent home.
What shocked me was the atmosphere of the meetings. What everyone was interested in was the “body count.” It was like they were discussing a ball game. “How many gooks did you kill this week? We got 20 but lost 5.” To these men, lives were just statistics, even the lives of their own men.
It strikes me that our
leaders view the current wars the same. Hamas killed 1400 Israelis, and the
Palestinian body count is currently estimated at 8500. I don’t know what the latest numbers are for Ukrainians and Russians. What justifies this
slaughter, this total disregard for the value of life? Netanyahu says his aim is
revenge, and Putin wants to be another Peter the Great. I guess Peter the Great
killed a lot of people too. As for Hamas, I’ve never understood terrorists, but
they share the same disregard for life. It’s worth sacrificing thousands for
what? Independence for Gaza? Destruction of Israel? Glory?
In Vietnam the goal was
“attrition,” which, I have learned, means destroying the enemy’s resources so
they can no longer fight. Vietnam’s resources were their rice fields, and their
people, because their people supported the revolution. So winning meant killing all the people, so there’s no one left to fight. I’ve heard Putin’s
strategy also described as attrition, and from the sound of Netanyahu’s
statements, he’s aiming for the same thing.
Where’s the reverence for
life in all this? How would the fatalities vote if they could be resurrected
for a referendum? When I was in Vietnam I listened to a speech by the
president, in which he said, “I don’t want to be the first president to lose a
war.” We were fighting and dying so he could save face?
Somehow those who have died
and are about to die should have a say in the decisions our leaders make about
war.
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