Author: Laurence Vance

Documented in a series of in-depth interviews by The Nation with 50 combat veterans of the Iraq war from across the US.

I recently came across an excellent letter to the editor published in Liberty magazine back in 1990. The writer was criticizing a Liberty article which argued that “lesser interactions” like the invasion of Grenada do not add to the domestic power of the government. He gave four effects to consider:

1. Increases in the popularity of the President, making it more likely that he will get his way in elections and on Capitol Hill.
2. Building a core of flag-waving, my-country-right-or-wrong “super-patriots” that make a flag burning amendment and other liberty restrictions more likely.
3. Hardening the citizens to such actions by the government, whether in foreign lands or here at home.
4. Diverting public scrutiny from other situations, which the government can then handle outside the public eye.

What was true in 1990 is still true in 2007.

“And I think that withdrawal would be totally unrealistic and would a catastrophe.”

Sound familiar? It is Hubert Humphrey at the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago speaking in defense of the Vietnam War.

for women. Not only are military sexual assaults on the rise (there were about 3,000 assaults reported last year–up 24%), at the Department of Veteran’s Affairs woman’s trauma recovery program in Palo Alto, Calif., 78 percent of women being treated for PTSD were admitted with military sexual trauma. It is time to quit sending women to Iraq. It is also time to quit sending men to Iraq. Let’s bring the troops home to their families now.

Three more names have just been added to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington DC—thirty-two years after the war ended. One was actually killed by “friendly fire” in 1966. The other two died recently from wounds they received during the Vietnam War. There are probably hundreds of additional  names that could be added, but Victims of Agent Orange and suicides from PTSD are not eligible. The total number of names inscribed on “The Wall” is now 58,256. And what did they die for? They died for the same thing that U.S. soldiers are currently dying for in Iraq—a lie.

Will U.S. soldiers still be dying thirty years from now because of the wounds they received in Iraq? Will we still have troops in Iraq in thirty years? Why not? We still have troops in Japan, Germany, and Korea.

I don’t think this is the wedding picture this couple had in mind when they were engaged before the young man was sent to Iraq.

One of the Republican presidential candidates said during the debate that a few thousand U.S. troops have been wounded in Iraq. The official count is actually almost 25,000. How many more young men have to be disfigured like this before this unnecessary war comes to an end?