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Last Generation of Combat Vets?
By:
Adam Kokesh
Having served in Fallujah in 2004 with a Marine Corps Civil Affairs Team and come home with some mixed feelings, I have some thoughts I'd like to share with my active duty brothers and sisters. Although I am dead set against serving for Obama, we share the noble cause of being willing to put our lives on the line for this country. There are some critical lessons to be learned from recent events that directly relate to your life in uniform. Whether you choose to recognize that connection is up to you.
Our foreign policy is one of the primary reasons the government is bankrupt and has to borrow about 40 cents of every dollar spent today. The debt per citizen is almost $50,000. That's a stone around the neck of every child who is supposed to be born free in America today. For the sake of argument, let's accept that the threat of terrorism is as bad as the government claims (which is a pretty ridiculous assertion) and accept that the government might be justified in dropping a few Predator Drone bombs. But the premise of the majority of our military spending is that it's ok for the government to sell future generations into debt slavery so that rich men can get richer while poor men die in wars based on some supposedly well-intentioned notions that we can improve the lives of people in other countries through imposing martial law.
Of course, there's always the reassuring idea that you are serving in the military to protect our freedom. As the size of the military has increased, and the number of troops deployed has gone up under Obama, freedoms have continued to decrease here in America. Obviously, economic freedom is at an all-time low, but the police policies under which we live, have become a constant threat to civil liberties as well. So let me be brutally honest for a second here: if you're defending our freedoms, you fucking suck.
You may have heard of the "Occupy Wall Street" movement, which, although deeply misguided, consists of a diverse group of people attempting to exercise their rights of speech and assembly. While at times, the protestors have provoked confrontations with police, their reactions have shown a frightening disregard for those rights. While random, unprovoked punches in the face, (as made famous by YouTube) are the exception, is the rule any better? Any objective observation of recent protests, (not just "Occupy Wall Street") will tell you that it is not.
In Oakland, where the police decided that tear gas canisters, bean bag bullets, and flash-bang grenades are acceptable crowd control policy, you get a near combat zone, with real consequences. For former Marine Scott Olsen, who survived two tours in Iraq without a scratch, the consequence is a two-inch skull fracture from being shot with a tear gas canister at short range. When fellow protestors gathered around him to tend to his wounds, they were hit with a flash-bang grenade and tear gas. And this is nothing new. I was there when Army Iraq veteran Nick Morgan was trampled by a police horse at a protest in New York three years ago. Horses for crowd control are not for crowds. They're for control.
In 1932, the bonus army of 17,000 WWI veterans and tens of thousands of supporters marched on the capitol to demand the bonuses that the government had promised them. They set up an encampment quite similar to Occupy Wall Street, except - well-run, well-organized, with a critical mass of people, and in order to live in the camp, every veteran had to prove their honorable discharge. Back then, they referred to it as a Hooverville, like the thousands shanty towns that sprang up around America due to economics that were blamed on President Hoover. If they weren't still under the propaganda spell of our exploiter in chief, the "Occupation" protestors might refer to their encampments as "Obamavilles." President Hoover ordered the veterans' encampment cleared and sent in Generals MacArthur and Patton. Yes, THAT MacArthur, and THAT Patton. The protestors thought the troops were marching to honor them, until the cavalry charged and the infantry came in with fixed bayonets, and adamsite gas, a vomiting agent. 55 veterans were injured, 135 arrested, and the speech of all effectively silenced.
In New York, former Marine Sgt Shamar Thomas used his NCO voice to shout down 30 cops who were "just doing some crowd control" on Occupy Wall Street protestors by reminding them that this is not a war zone, and that there is no honor in hurting innocent Americans for protesting. Maybe he was wrong about one thing though: This IS a war zone. No modern war was fought for the reasons the troops were told and the police who think they are supporting the rule of law are just as clueless as the troops in Vietnam who thought the Gulf of Tonkin incident was real. As much as there is a war on drugs, and a war on crime and a war on poverty and a war on terrorism, there is a war by the government, against you. War is the health of the state. War is exploitation. And as Marine Major General Smedley Butler said, "WAR IS A RACKET."
The greatest exploitation happens here at home. Wealth flows to the friends of government while the dependent class grows and the people that actually pay taxes get fleeced. So what is YOUR role as one of Obama's imperial foot soldiers? You're just a pawn. Nothing new. But not only are you a good excuse for the government to spend more money on the military, you're also a way to "project power" abroad so that our government can exploit foreigners, AND a way to control the population here at home. Remember the Kent State incident on May 4th 1970 when national guard troops shot and killed four protesting students? While using troops to confiscate firearms during Hurricane Katrina was a rare exception, more troops are now training for domestic operations than ever before, and the police are increasingly militarized.
But of course, if you really want to crack skulls, you don't have to wait for the next mobilization of troops against civilians, you can just join the police. For obvious reasons, many veterans go right into law enforcement, and while this may help you get out of a few speeding tickets if the officer pulling you over is a fellow vet, it doesn't do anything but reinforce the system that has become the greatest threat to the rights that it's supposed to protect.
So finally, back to that noble cause. As much as I'd like every soldier to immediately start disobeying all unconstitutional orders and, you know, live up to our oath of enlistment, I realize that's a bit much to ask. Standing up for what you believe in has consequences after all. But it also has rewards. So I'll just INVITE you to apply the same courage it took to put on that uniform for the first time, to asking yourself WHY you joined the military in the first place and WHETHER OR NOT the system you are a part of serves that cause, or undermines it. While a war can be just on one side if it is truly defensive, war has always represented the greatest failure of humanity, and modern war, has never been about settling legitimate disputes, but rather the most vicious exploitation by government. Whether or not you believe that war has ever been just or necessary, let us share the lessons of our experience, let us not be deceived again, and let's make ours the last generation of combat veterans the world will ever know. Hoorah?
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