Men Like Us

I wish I could talk to you, you could talk to me
'Cause there very few of us left my friend
From the days that used to be.
--Days That Used to Be, Neil Young

Caught in ambush lay a company of riflemen
Just grenades against machine guns in the gloom
Caught in ambush till this one of twenty riflemen
Volunteered volunteered to meet his doom
--The Ballad of Rodger Young,
Frank Loesser
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The previous piece concerned the detritus of war and the soiled, mangled bodies that have washed up on our beaches. Unlike pelicans, however, many of these soldiers will never be released back into their ecosystems once they reach the apex of their treatment.

This fact led me to reflect upon what separates soldiers from civilians, and what taxpayers and their leaders fail to understand about war. There is one common denominator for soldiers that makes us different. Civilians do not choose where they are going to die, and often carry a sort of magical thinking about staving off that inevitable day. They accept whatever cards fate deals them, though often grudgingly so.

However, soldiers choose every time they pick up their tired bodies and move down the road. When we step off an airplane in a war zone or jump into a hostile DZ or hit a beach or fly over a protected hostile terrain, we are saying that is where we are willing to die.

This is our distinctive designator and it goes beyond tabs, badges or medals. it is what we are and what we do. Some of us make and some of us don't; some of us are wounded and some mangled, but we always had a choice -- we always geared up and moved out. And that is what makes us different until the day that we die.

We didn't talk, we acted, and nothing can change that fact. This is why many people are uncomfortable being around us. We have a purity that is beyond their comprehension.

Fatted Calf

Oh God said to Abraham kill me a son
Well Abe said where d'you want this killin done?
--Highway 61, Bob Dylan

"Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother
when he sins against me? Up to seven times?"
Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee,
Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven
--Matthew 18:22

I came that they may have and enjoy life,
and have it in abundance
--John 10:10

Thou shalt have no graven images
--Exodus 20:4
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Sunday homily: What do you sacrifice?

There is a contradiction in the way avowed Christians value life when it concerns their soldiers. According to the Christian, his leader is a good and loving God who values all of his children, but those who oppose our God-mandated actions are evil, or at least misled.

Christianity offers Jesus, whose message is a supposed deviation from that of the vengeful God of the Old Testament, the God of Abraham who requested sacrifice to appease His anger and to save debased man.

Ranger does not much care about religion, but does care about his Army and the country that supposedly walks in Jesus's sandals.

Yesterday Ranger visited the Special Forces Museum at Ft. Bragg and met a Vietnam veteran Catholic Chaplain, probably a retired officer still working at the Post Hospital. The Chaplain proudly recounted the story of how he received the last confessional an SF Captain shortly before he was wasted in Afghanistan. He said several years hence he received his son's confession, and told him his father was "looking down on him from his place in heaven."

At that moment Ranger knew Catholicism had crossed over and become yet another enabler of our phony wars. Christianity is a supporting arm of our government's newly acquired warrior mentality. Religion has shifted its focus from saving individual souls to propping up national policy.

Ranger was taught to protect the lives of the soldiers entrusted to his leadership and care. Though this stewardship is what we are taught, it is a lie. The Army (military) requires human sacrifice. We drag our soldiers up to the altar, bless them, then sacrifice them to false gods and prophets.

As an Army we worship badges, tabs, medals and all other accouterments, such as battle streamers, service hash marks and especially victory medals. All of this and none of this has any value unless there has been death and serious suffering in the journey to achieve these baubles.

Our system is based upon human sacrifice that we know by the name, "soldier". Until we cease valuing this sacrifice our policy and our badges are pinned to a vengeful god that requires sacrifice.

We have made no progress since either Abraham or Jesus. Worse than al Qaeda who wishes to regress to the 13th century, our sacrifices are rooted in a belief system created several centuries B.C.E. Jesus's death was supposed to mark the end of human sacrifice, yet we still engage in sacrifice.

We sacrifice to a flag now, and we justify it with a love of God, but Jesus was not a Green Beret.