Letter to Russ Carnhan to oppose surge

[booley]

You may or may not know that Russ Carnhan has not said whether he would oppose the escalation of the Iraq war. So I wrote him a letter to help get him ot our side of the fence.

I doubt he will read it, much less respond (form letters don't count as a response).

Still , I figured I would put this up here, see what you guys think.

Congressman Carnahan,

I will not mince words. I am sure you know why I am writing you. I am sure you understand that the Surge plan by this administration is opposed by many, especially among those that voted you into office. and I am sure you have heard and will continue hear why the surge will not make the situation in Iraq any better.

But I wanted to address another facet that I think has often been lost in this debate. In short, what does supporting the troops really mean?

Lets be frank. The war and subsequent occupation in Iraq has taken it greatest toll on the people. Not just the Iraqis (who are treated as either the enemy or just a statistic ) but on our troops. We have scores of vets coming home with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. They coming back to find they have lost their jobs, their homes, their families. They are coming back to find they have less and less support to pick up the pieces of their lives they left behind.

I have watched CSPAN’s congressional sessions and I have heard the remaining pro-occupation Republicans continue t use the claim that to support the troops means one must support the war and any plan this administration wants to implement. But this is a fallacious argument. The Democrats do not need to prove if they support our soldiers. This administration and it’s supporters do. And so far they have failed.

They have allowed our troops to go years with insufficient armour. And they have threatened to deny benefits to any soldier that used his own armour.

They have consistently cut funding for the VA.

They have wait ed years to properly armour our military vehicles, only doing so when it became an embarrassment.

They have treated our troops like a disposable resource, using stop loss to put them in a horrific war zone again and again with little to no respite. And now few are even getting the training that may keep them alive in a war zone, thanks to the need to get more feet on the ground.

They have given our troops orders that no leader of any civilised country should give.. and then when discovered dodged all the responsibility by using our soldiers at fall guys.

They not honoured our dead but ignored them. The dead US troops are described as “‘just a number”. President Bush has yet to go to even one funeral. Indeed, if not for photo opportunities, I am not sure president Bush would ever be seen with the human consequences of his actions.

And these examples are just the tip of the iceberg.

Are these the actions of an administration that supports our soldiers on the ground? This is an important question to consider because by allowing President Bush’s surge to proceed, the Congress will be doing two things.

First, it will be sending a message, not to the insurgents but to this administration that it has nothing to fear from Congress. No matter how unpopular it’s actions are or how the politicians on both sides of the aisle grumble, it will still always be able to get what it wants.

And second, at least 20,000 troops and most likely far more people will now added to those that will have to pay for the Bush administrations hubris and mistakes. Why should it be any different? As I noted above,allowence for a surge will be a signal to this administration that it can continue to do whatever it wants and never fear consequences. While others may still give president Bush the benefit of the doubt, I have seen nothing to convince me that he and those who help him run this war see our soldiers as anything but a resource to be used up for whatever goal they want. I wish I could say otherwise. But all the evidence of my eyes and ears tells me that depending on this administration to clean up it’s act on it’ s own is a pipe dream. They only change when they feel they themselves will face true opposition, when they think they will have to personally face consequences.

I should mention that I am a vet. So it is not an abstraction when I say that the military is not a democracy. Soldiers are not asked if and when and where they will be called to fight. We do so because it is our obligation. But it is also with the faith that our leaders will not abuse that power they have over us. They should not lie to us and send us into harm’s way on false premises and for their own aggrandisement.

President Bush and his administration have, for lack fo a better word, betrayed the trust given to them. His actions have proven that and made lies of his rhetoric. And so it now falls to the Congress, to you, to correct this and see that he does not continue. At the least , he should not be given even more leeway to do even more harm. I am sorry but to do nothing to stopping his escalation of this war is akin to supporting his policies that have brought us to this sorry state of affairs.

I am not a politician. So excuse my bluntness and lack of diplomacy. But also understand my anger. I am not only a vet, I still have friends who are in the military, who have been to and may yet still go to Iraq. The troops are not abstractions to me. Their deaths are not “just a number’ . They are the very real human cost of whatever actions this government takes.

To oppose the escalation of this war is not abandoning the troops. On the contrary, when one sees someone needlessly endangering the lives of others, it is a moral imperative to stop that person. Please do not let those that put our troops in harm’s way tell you differently.

Please oppose any escalation of this war.

Thank you for reading this letter,

Richard Whatley
St. Louis, Mo.