Home Wreckers

Well, you may think the world's black and white
And you're dirty or you're clean
You better watch out you don't slip
Through them spaces in between
--Cross My Heart, Bruce Springsteen

I built this house
With my own hands
And she just came
And burnt the plans
-Homewrecker, HelloGoodbye

This blessed plot, this earth, this realm,
this England
--King Richard II, Shakespeare

[in remembrance today of the start of the Blitz, 1940]
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Purple Heart magazine featured a hooah piece generated by Marine Corps HQ on the actions of Navy Cross recipient Gunnery Sergeant Brian M. Blander (not a Purple Heart recipient), a piece that was more befitting Soldier of Fortune's "I Was There" feature than a fraternal magazine (p. 12).

Not to denigrate the brave actions of Gy. Sgt. Blander, but the piece glorified behavior not meet to win hearts and minds, but rather to stand gladiatorially alone on a patch of ground. But unlike King Richard, it is not our ground:

"'When you're not standing on the ground of the enemy at the end of the day, the enemy won. Instead, we took the stand, we drove the enemy out of their homes, and then we left on our own terms when we were ready to.' Blonder said he was happy to be victorious."

As a Vietnam veteran and lifetime MOPH member, I cannot glorify driving the Taliban or anyone else out of their homes. We call the Taliban insurgents, yet drive them from their homes -- does anyone else see the disconnect? If kicking people out their homes is the standard for earning a Navy Cross, my banker should have 50 by now.

If Taliban are insurgents, then what legitimate government are they insurging against? Surely, not the United States. In fact, they ARE at home, and fighting a civil war as there is NO legitimate Afghan government. I resent spending my tax dollars propping up a corrupt Afghan government which does not defend America.

The U.S. is dictating the internal policies in a society we do not understand. Our history shows what happens when another group that didn't understand home feeling (British soldiers) drove colonial people from their homes in our Revolutionary War.

As Gy. Sgt. Garret Dean said speaking of his brother Marines, "Our number one job is to locate, close with and kill the enemy. What we did that day is what we trained for, and that's what we'll always do." Yep, and Dean can't be faulted; that is what Marines do. But it is not a solution in a country that has seen continual fighting for the last 36 years.

Continuing the cycle of violence is in opposition to the concept of reaching a peaceful accord in the midst of a violent civil war. The U.S.'s military presence in the fray just teaches the Aghanis how to become better fighters.