Monday, January 14, 2008
Historical Perspective non Grata
Bird-Brain Flu piece by
Ari Kaufman
In the elevator on my way to work the other day, I noticed that the college-aged girl with more piercings than I have dollars in my wallet was reading the local “Social Justice” newspaper. Thankfully, unlike in other cities that have dozens, we only have one of these left wing rags that sponsors weekly anti-war protests at the War Memorial (of all places). Fifty of the 52 weeks per year their headlines are about the local independent rock band, and the other two weeks are saved for bashing religious Christians, and this week, a huge headline about “the cost of war,” with the usual talk of how many children in Africa would have food and not AIDS if we spend the 300 million per day on them, etc. She was shaking her head in anger.
What I felt like asking her---aside from if John Stewart, Michael Moore and Anderson Cooper had made her ilk naive enough to think we can just set up an on-line transfer from President Bush’s savings account to the resident warlords in Zimbabwe or Sudan, “care of Mohammed” of course---is if, for the sake of perspective, she knew how many soldiers had died in the Civil War or the two World Wars so she could attend the comedy show this coming Friday night at a downtown club. Of course, I just smiled and was on my merry way through the “global warming-induced” snowstorm to work.
As a former teacher and current military historian, left and right is almost secondary when debating wartime politics. Ignorance, intellectual curiosity and folks being totally bereft of knowledge are more important factors to consider.
I need not get deep into numbers here, but while the surge of troops into Iraq has been phenomenally successful, the only astute anti-war comments I have heard in recent months come from those with whom I work: conservative military historians who understand history.
They question why President Bush requested just 150,000 troops to invade Iraq early in 2003, rather than the 300 or 400,000 many in the military thought would be necessary to achieve our objectives in a country which is, make no mistake, the geographical and strategic centerpiece of the Global War on Terror. {Fighting on familiar grounds that are less physically demanding, in a country without the endless hills and caves that others (Pakistan, Afghanistan, et al) have, without an insane leader (Iran) or a viciously anti-American military (Syria, Lebanon, Jordan) or huge finances (Saudi Arabia) was the right move}
“Bush lied about WMDs,” “Where is bin Laden?” and “this is why gas prices are so high” are childish arguments that a smart 5th grader could squash. And the ardor displayed by these emotion-filled lunatics truly takes away from their mission, if they have one---other than trying to live out (or re-live) the prior generation’s war....which is of no relevance or worth comparison.
What is worth comparing are the minimal casualties in such a bizarre and “unholy” war as the one taking place since September 11, 2001---a date that half of Americans seem to have forgotten marked a change in the world and rules by which we, and our government, often must abide.
If you want to live and thrive---as the majority of elite anti-war critics do---concessions must be made. Since their families don’t fight and their “civil liberties” are not being tampered with, how about making the “concession” of trying to read, think and thus, perhaps understand war, history, life and death a little better? Since I don’t expect to find Sean Penn at the local library or George Clooney or Barbra Streisand in church or temple this holiday season, here are some numbers:
Since September 2001, over the course of six and one quarter years of fighting against enemies who play by no rules and have committed well over 10,000 terror attacks in Allah’s name during that time, we have lost slightly more than 4,300 brave young men and women from America’s Heartland. They have not died in vain or for oil, and they are heroes, so their deaths should not be minimalized or trivialized via sites like antiwar.com and people’s personal blogs where they update American deaths instantly so they can stick it to the Bush Administration, never publicizing the enemy’s beheadings of schoolchildren, nor our troops heroic deeds. When has Katie Couric ever led with real news like this?
Never before, not even in Vietnam, has a society spent less time, if any at all, praising our military publicly at the Oscars, on the news, internet, in public, etc. Our impatient society quivers when a soldier is killed by a roadside bomb, and is selfish enough to be upset if their computers don’t tell then when the Vice President has a hunting mishap on vacation, but deletes emails showing troops saving children in Baghdad or capturing the enemy----unless they want to know if an Islamic Nazi who has orchestrated thousands (or millions) of deaths was treated “humanely.”
“Well, he was a really bad guy...But the Bush Administration’s...” Stop me if you’ve read that too much from the mainstream media.
A few facts, for those whose eyes care to know. No worries though, my fellow students, dates and numbers will not be on the test, of course. This is not 1957:
--The Civil War, which freed black slaves from Southern Democrats, cost America over 625,000 lives in four years. Nearly two-thirds of the deaths came from the Union, and nearly 25,000 of those were from my home state of Indiana. Three out of every four men between the ages of 18 and 30 from Indiana fought to Preserve the Union, liberty and freedom for generations to come.
---World War 1, freeing Europe from destruction and genocidal wars, killed more than 116,000 Americans and wounded more than 200,000 others over the course of just over one year.
--World War 2, saving the world from Nazi Totalitarianism, Japanese Fascism and perhaps an ultimate Armageddon, cost America more than 400,000 of our “Greatest Generation” over three and a half years. It took a military of nearly 12 million men---in a country of just 140 million---to win the War for America. Nearly 700,000 Americans returned home wounded, and roughly ten million people died worldwide so we can live and prosper in the Greatest Country the World has Ever Known today. {Excuse my patriotism. As a Jewish person, I’m proud to live in America and nowhere else, considering our past}
---Many of the children of these heroes protested against the Vietnam War, which sent nearly 60,000 young men to their graves too early and left 150,000 more wounded over roughly nine years.
But this is not an anti-war treatise; this is to lend perspective to a paroxysmal society.
You can easily do the math to see how many men died per month or per year in these essential wars for democracy, or you can think about the 24,000 that died in one day at Antietam Creek; the 48,000 in three days at Gettysburg; or the 20,000 who gave their lives during the pivotal 1945 battles on Okinawa and Iwo Jima. Was it worth it? Surely.
Now, think about Iraq. With a surge of good news each day that even the war’s most ardent critics cannot ignore, more deaths by murder in American cities like Detroit, Washington and New Orleans each passing month, we are essentially listening to petulant John Stewart-loving Lefties, who know nary a soul in the military, complaining over 25 deaths in November 2007, and fewer than 200 American combat deaths (against an enemy who does not abide by the Geneva Convention nor wear uniforms) since the 4th of July?
Please. Have some perspective. Read a book. Talk to someone other than your local professor or Keith Olbermann.
Heroic Civil War Union General William Tecumseh Sherman once said “War is Hell,” while World War II General and 34th President of the USA Dwight D. Eisenhower said, “I hate War...”
The left (wrongly) loves these quotes, but they forget the rest of Ike’s speech in January 1946, which continued, “...as only a soldier who has lived it can...”
Clearly, with no Draft in sight, the anti-war law school students you’ll see at Starbucks tonight---many nearly a decade older than those who landed on Omaha Beach in June 1944---aren’t soldiers in any sense of the word. Due to post 1960s “Progressive” education, which, when allowed to mention wars, focuses on the “battles” for social impact, rather than the actual battles, these yuppies probably don’t even know where Omaha Beach is. Beachfront property in Nebraska?
You’d think that the folks most at risk for death via the Jihadist sword (Homosexuals, Women, Communists, Artists, liberals, Jews---you know, the same folks the Nazis targeted) would be the most fervent supporters of the war effort. But in this Orwellian world, the exact opposite is true as we fight a war to save Liberalism. These benighted dunderheads, including my Chosen People, are actually the most prominent anti-war “critics” today. The white conservative Christians, least at risk, are the ones supporting the war and doing the fighting.
No one, sans perhaps William Randolph Hearst more than a century ago, truly enjoys the prospect of war. And just as that was a different time and place, for better or worse, so is now versus 1917, 1941 or 1964.
War is often necessary. If 9/11/01 didn’t make that as abundantly evident as 12/7/41 did, nothing ever will.
HowardWasRight 
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