Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. Originally posted for Veterans Day in 2020.
I come from a family of veterans. My father and his two brothers served in the military during World War II. My mother’s brother (Uncle Freddy) fought at Guadalcanal against the Japanese and was awarded the Bronze Star. Later, my eldest brother enlisted in the Air Force at the tail end of the Vietnam War, which my brother-in-law had fought in as a radio operator attached to the artillery. Their service helped to inspire my decision to become an officer in the U.S. Air Force.
Military service is honorable, not because of wars waged or lives taken, but because of its purpose: to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. And this should be the purpose of Veterans Day: to take note of our veterans and their service in upholding the ideals of our Constitution, including freedom of speech and assembly, freedom of the press, a right to privacy, and most of all a government that is responsive to our needs and accountable to our oversight.
Yet since World War II America has fought wars without formal Congressional declarations. The Korean War, the Vietnam War, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and elsewhere, have lacked the wholehearted support of the American people. They were arguably unnecessary wars in the sense these countries and peoples posed no direct threat to America and our Constitution. Indeed, prosecuting these wars often posed more of a threat to that very Constitution.
Naturally, America associates veterans with wars and combat. We say the dead made “the ultimate sacrifice,” which indeed they did. But for what purpose, and to what end? We owe it to veterans to ask these questions: for what purposes are we risking their lives, and to what end are these wars being waged? If we can’t answer these simple questions, in terms intimately associated with our Constitution and the true needs of national defense, we should end these wars immediately.
Unending wars are the worst enemy of freedom and liberty. This isn’t just my sentiment. As James Madison put it, “Of all the enemies of true liberty, war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded… No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” America once knew this; we were once a nation that was slow to anger and with little taste for large military establishments.
A few years ago, I stumbled across old sheet music in a bookstore. Catching my eye was the title of the song: “I Didn’t Raise My Boy to be a Soldier,” respectfully dedicated to “Every Mother – Everywhere.” From 1915, this popular song captured American resistance to the calamitous “Great War” that we now call World War I. Anti-war sentiment was strong that year in America, and indeed Woodrow Wilson would be reelected president in 1916 in large part because he had kept Americans out of the war. The lyrics put it plainly: a mother who’d brought her son up “to be my pride and joy” didn’t want to see that same son having “to shoot some other mother’s darling boy.”
The contrast in these lyrics to recent U.S. military recruitment commercials couldn’t be starker. In a new Department of Defense advertising campaign, featuring the catchphrase “Their success tomorrow begins with your support today,” mothers are shown incongruously in military settings asking their sons why they wanted to sign up. Weapons are featured prominently in these ads but no combat. There’s much talk of teamwork and being part of something larger than yourself but no talk of the U.S. Constitution. At the end of these spots, the young men depicted have convinced their mothers that it’s desirable indeed to have your boy become a soldier.
Recruitment ads, of course, have never been at pains to show the true costs of war. When I was a teen, the Army’s motto was “Be all that you can be.” For the Navy, service was about “adventure.” For the Air Force, it was about “a great way of life.” These ads, by ignoring or eliding war’s costs, have contributed to America’s tighter embrace of war on the world stage and its severe impact not only on our veterans but on our democracy. America’s strategy of “global reach, global power” has embroiled us in wars of choice that we increasingly choose not to end. Surely, it’s time to chart a more pacific path.
Sometimes the best offense is a good defense. On this Veterans Day, let’s remind ourselves that veterans exist to defend our Constitution and our country, but that endless warfare, and intensifying militarism, are in fact among the most pressing dangers to our democracy.
William Astore, a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF) and history professor, is a senior fellow at the Eisenhower Media Network (EMN), an organization of critical veteran military and national security professionals. He writes at Bracing Views.
My husband is a Veteran of wars, both foreign and domestic. He is from several different countries and now thankfully resides here with me and his family. Did a few tours in the Nam. The scars never fully heal….
Weird, fun fact (perhaps brought to mind because I always picture you as an energetic 25-y/o) :
The last Civil War veteran widow, Helen Jackson, died in December of 2020. She was 17 when she married 93-y/o Union Army veteran James Bolin.
We took the Oath to 'protect and defend the Constitution' but that is and never has been the purpose of our military. Our purpose is supposed to be to protect and defend the nation from all enemies foreign and domestic, but that purpose has been subverted and misused arguably ever since the Revolutionary War.
Instead of protecting and defending the nation, we have been used as muscle to conquer peoples in aid of acquiring land to build a nation, we have been used as muscle to establish Empire abroad, we have been used as muscle for civilian corporations, and for a host of other tasks having nothing to do with the security of our nation. Many of the tasks the military has been used for have, in fact, weakened our security by creating enemies where there were none.
Many years ago I served on the frontiers of the Empire as both a Marine and soldier, and did so honorably. It was only in the last few years of my service that my eyes began to open and the true nature of my service became clear- I was not 'standing on that wall, guarding America while she sleeps'. Rather, I was but one small piece of a giant military machine used for anything but guarding America. I am not ashamed of my service, but with time I realize I was one of millions of men and women who were- and continue to be- used for less than honorable pursuits and for political and corporate agendas.
It is honorable to stand ready to defend one's nation and people- but at the same time that nation owes it to those troops to not sell their lives cheaply or for questionable agendas. I often look around me and wonder if the nation we have become is deserving of our veterans' sacrifices past and present.
While serving I did not question my duty to defend the nation. The only thing I asked was that my nation be one worth defending.
What seems most unfortunate to me, as an outsider Canadian, is that your country's National Guard is deployed outside of territorial United States of America. That's madness, no ?
I know you guys have Reservists – because Seattle-area TV stations advertised it on daytime TV, and a Simpsons episode said of the Navy Reserve "Once you complete basic training, you only work one weekend a month, and most of that time you're drunk off your ass."
One would think that someone set on going abroad in search of monsters to destroy have the regular Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and (probably quite literally) the Space Force; or their Reserves.
But for someone who ONLY wants to "protect and defend the nation from all enemies foreign and domestic", I am disappointed the National Guard does not do JUST SPECIFICALLY that – exist in each of the 50 states and provide ONLY domestic defense, with additional para-defense actions like support in natural disasters or significant illegal civil unrest.
What's your take on "Defend The Guard" initiatives in some states ?
You guys do it right by calling it Veteran's Day.
It's still called "Remembrance Day" in Canada (sometimes Armistice Day in other Commonwealth countries) but "remembering" the horrors of war, the dangers of entangling alliances and wars between (within) royal bloodlines, is entirely NOT what Nov. 11th is in Canada, any more. Not since 9/11 and our Afghanistan misadventuring.
It is become soldier-hero worship; and a time leading up to the 11th of November when any talk of why wars happened and what the justifications truly were, is met with hostility and rebuke. "That's not appropriate to discuss right now !" people will say in anger, unaware the deep irony of the statement. Yet approach the same person from Nov 12th thru around to Oct 31st and their answer to the same questions will be, "Oh, I'm not interested in history or all that political stuff."
The right time to have the conversations, to them, isn't. And at no other time, do they care.
I long for the day when we end Remembrance Day, Veteran's Day, Memorial Day, as we no longer HAVE any veterans from any wars – because we paid attention and stopped CREATING new veterans.