Straight Talk

I've read a lot of stuff on Iraq; I've contributed to the discussion myself, a number of times, most recently the other day. But in the thicket of yammering talk radio hosts, televised talking heads, pontificating buffoons of politicians, lying leaders, outraged (or defiant) bloggists, spouses of National Guard members, and the like, there's one demographic I haven't heard a whole lot from. That's the most affected group, other than the people of Iraq: the soldiers, current and former, that have participated in this war and in other wars.

I just read a rather blunt open letter to current participants in the mess that we call Iraq from a long-time vet, someone who knows exactly what he's talking about. I encourage you to go ahead and read this offering, if just for the alternate perspective it provides. I agree with him: the loyalty of an army should be to the country and its principles, not loyalty to a bunch of lying self-centered sacks of $#&*, the majority of whom have never seen any military service at all (and some who have just pretended to; I understand the skies of Texas were rather dangerous some thirty-odd years ago). It certainly undermines the purpose of an army and what it's fighting for when platoon sergeants wrongly state that the "Geneva Convention doesn't exist in Iraq." Oh? Then where does it exist? This is the kind of thinking that gets us in trouble every time.