How Do You Ask a Man to Be the Last Man to Die for a Mistake in Afghanistan?

[babylonsister]

How Do You Ask a Man to Be the Last Man to Die for a Mistake in Afghanistan?
by: ZP Heller
Thu Apr 23, 2009 at 18:15


What happened today in Washington was, as Senator Russ Feingold called it, "historic." Thirty-eight years nearly to the day when a young John Kerry shocked the nation with his fiery anti-Vietnam war testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Rick Reyes, a former US Marine Corporal, delivered an equally puissant testimony in which he expressed his disenchantment with the war in Afghanistan. How appropriate Kerry should be sitting directly across from Reyes as Committee Chairman, listening attentively as Congress heard one of the first major voices of dissent on this war.

The son of Mexican immigrants who joined the Marines to escape a violent gang life in Los Angeles, Reyes served as an infantry rifleman in Afghanistan and Iraq. He upheld his duty to serve our country honorably, and immediately after 9/11, he was deployed to Afghanistan "with the conviction of fighting for justice and the American way." All of that changed when Reyes realized US military forces faced the impossible task of fighting militant Taliban members who blended in with the local Afghan population, routinely resulting in the injuries or deaths of innocent civilians.

As Reyes told Congress:

"We weren't fulfilling our objective of capturing terrorists, but instead creating enemies out of civilians. As a Marine trying to ensure justice, I began losing sight of why I was there and the conviction began to fade.

"Because our mission was to capture suspected Taliban and had no successful way of being able to distinguish them, we had no other choice but to suspect the entire civilian population, innocent or not.

"One day we stopped at gun point, detaining, beating, and nearly killing an innocent man only to find he was just traveling down a road to deliver milk to his children. Because of us, that day those kids went without a father. There were hundreds of incidents like this one.

"Almost 100 percent of the time we would find that suspected terrorists turned out to be innocent civilians. I began to feel like we were chasing ghosts, fighting an enemy that we could not see or that didn't allow itself to be seen. How can you tell the difference between the Taliban and Afghan civilians? The answer is that you can't. it all stopped making sense."

Reyes is a patriot, but like a young John Kerry, he felt that patriotism exploited when he returned home from these wars. The chaotic violence Reyes experienced, coupled with the lack of clear mission in Afghanistan, led him to question our government's plans for this war publicly today. He cited low troop morale and military forces stretched impossibly thin; soldiers who have already done multiple tours, Reyes claimed, are dying on the ground in Afghanistan and in spirit due to a deeply flawed foreign policy.

more...

http://www.openleft.com/diary/13007/how-do-you-ask-a-man-to-be-the-last-man-to-die-for-a-mistake-in-afghanistan

[gratuitous]

1. Dr. Rice? That's your cue

"I don't think anyone could have foreseen . . ."

And, the question behind the "how do you ask someone to be the last one to die for a mistake" remains unasked, as always. Ah war! We do love it so. {Sigh}

[polichick]

2. What a poignant moment for Senator Kerry - it is a flawed foreign policy...

...and, as much as Obama wants to do the right thing, I have trouble believing our continuing presence there is the way to go.

[babylonsister]

6. I'd like to believe we can be of help over there, but I'm having

and have had major doubts, too. The people the president consults don't sound all that sure either.

But what's to be done? Pakistan has nukes. Can we just walk away from that threat?

I don't know the answer.

[politicasista]

7. I know what you mean n/t

[babylonsister]

9. Pakistan has nuclear weapons.

If the Taliban gets their hands on them, what would they do?

And from Petraeus, though I've read of a lot more military worrying...

Petraeus: 'tough road' for Afghanistan
By DAVID ROGERS | 4/24/09 1:37 PM EDT


Army Gen. David Petraeus warned Congress Friday that the United States faces a “tough road” ahead in Afghanistan and more difficult challenges than in Iraq, where he led American forces before taking charge of the U.S. Central Command.

Appearing before the House Appropriations Committee, Petraeus said the mission set out by President Barack Obama is “vitally important” but will require a “sustained, substantial commitment” complicated further by Pakistan’s failure thus far to do more to address the expanded Taliban insurgency in its own borders.

Afghanistan does not have “a number of the blessings” enjoyed by Iraq, whether measured in oil wealth or human capital and government infrastructure built up over the years, Petraeus told lawmakers. Iraq “had a large number of advantages and extraordinary national blessings in comparison to Afghanistan, obviously land locked, rugged, rural, 70 percent to 80 percent illiteracy rate.”

“You have the challenging situation of policemen who can’t read or comprehend the laws that they are enforcing,” the general said. “These kind of difficulties make Afghanistan very, very hard. We have seen that and we continue to see that. This is why upfront I said this is going to take a sustained, substantial commitment.”

more...

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0409/21673.html

And finally, there's this from VetVoice, railing against the State Dept....

http://www.vetvoice.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=2692

[politicasista]

10. Yikes. That's is a horrible situation

:(




:hi:

[polichick]

8. I don't know the answer either - it's a horrible situation.

[politicasista]

3. Kick

Timeless quote and one that remains valid today. :kick:

[ThomWV]

4. Soldiers are not asked to do anything, they are given orders

And so the real question is who will order the last soldier into combat in Afghanistan?

[notesdev]

5. Probably the same way

that you ask the second-to-last, third-to-last, and so on, right on down the line to the first.


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