Col. Patrick Lang posted a moving diary today called In Memoriam – CPT Christopher Petty FA regarding the tragic death of young soldier in Iraq who was the son of one of his friends.
The man’s father wrote these words to Col. Lang in explanation of why his son had volunteered to return to Iraq for a second tour of duty.
The key words here as far as I am concerned are “…despite his frustrations with the army and a full awareness of what was right and wrong about Iraq…”
Read on for my response.
May God damn the souls of those who sent this good man there to die in an ignoble cause.
May they rot in hell for all eternity.
We have not fought in a valid war since W.W. II.
How many tens of thousands of American lives will be lost…as Col. Lang says, the best and the bravest of us on some levels, many of them…in service to the absurd idea that we deserve more than the lot that is granted to the “inferior races”?
The “others”.
How many more?
How many literally millions of American lives will be forever shadowed by the vain deaths of their loved ones?
How many millions of MUSLIMS will have been killed in this foolish, short-sighted and criminal war before we come to our senses?
Col. Lang ends his post with the words “Pro Patria“.
Wilfred Owen’s famous poem “Dulce et Decorum Est” (He was a young English poet who fought in the infantry during W.W.I and was killed in battle in 1918.) closes with these lines:
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.
“Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori” – It is sweet and right to die for your country.
He knew.
Too late.
It IS “sweet and right” to die for your country.
For your family, for your real friends and allies.
For the ideas of human evolution and human freedom.
But it is NOT sweet and right to die at the behest of a bunch of hustlers, racists and cowards who are simply out for all they can grab at any cost to anyone but themselves.
And that is precisely why this good man died.
I would die going over the ridge with a smile on my face if it was for the defense my family, and by extension if it was truly for the defense of my country.
But THIS!!!???
Vietnam?
And all the smaller wars of colonial aggression that we have waged over the last 40 years?
So that we can drive gas guzzling SUVs and become the most physically obese nation ever to walk the earth?
Not a CHANCE!!!
I am sorry for this man, for his family and friends, and for ALL of those whose lives have been ended or ruined by this war.
But pro patria uber alles?
I think not.
I really cannot conceive of how the many honorable fighting men and women of this nation can resist the impulse to turn their guns on these criminals and frog march the lot of them out of the White House and onto the gallows.
I cannot.
THAT would be “Pro Patria“.
This is just useless, criminal and vain slaughter.
I do not understand, anymore…
What sustains this kind of evil in the world?
I simply cannot understand.
Let us pray.
AG
about our fighting men and women…
Rec this up.
And get them the fuck OUT of Iraq.
ENOUGH!!!
Impeach this whole racist, imperialist IDEA!!!
And hang the political and economic criminals who caused this man’s death…AND the deaths of literally millions over the last 60 years (AND by extension the deaths of the thousands of 9/11 victims that have been cynically used to support this war)…from the nearest tree.
Let’s start over.
This ain’t working.
I got yer “pro patria” right HERE!!!
AG
My 7-times great grandfather was a general in the Revolutionary War. Our family motto is “Pro patria mori.” The sound you hear on Breeds Hill is my ancestor spinning in his grave.
I am sorry these service people had to die in an illegitmate war based on misinformation campaigns and sustained on propagandistic brainwashing.
I am tired of the military families saying over and over again how their dead victims of this ignoble cause believed in what they were doing. Excuse me, are they deluded by the propaganda? Too much time has passed since March 2003 for anyone to “believe in” the quagmire we’ve created. See exact details below.
I am sick of the military industrial complex that has been successful in linking its greedy selfish ambitions for power and wealth deriving from their adventurism abroad in a twisted way that equates their motives with the motives of defending this country. From what?
And I am unprepared to keep silent any longer, swallowing the painful messages of parents, wives, family, and friends of dead soldiers without blaming those repsonsible for a senseless death. Don’t just send condolences, send hate mail to the president, vice-president, secretaries of state and defense, every congressperson who voted for this war and who continues to maked public statements in its support and who fails to bring about its timely end.
I am sick, I am tired, and I am sorry that people continue to believe some cockamamy fairy tale that this is a “cause.” That we are “bringing democracy” to a benighted land, as if our brand of government were what they needed or were ready for, much less whether it’s a universal blessing.
That we are anything other than crusaders for hegemony, oil, ego, and influence is a lie. That we have rid the world of an Evil Presence by toppling what turned out to be a paper tiger in Iraq is a lie. That we have made America safer and quashed terrorism in this nest of terrorists is a lie. That we are winning is a lie. That it is worth it is a lie.
The products of our misbegotten efforts are a more unstable Mideast; a chaotic mess teetering on the cusp of civil and religio-ethnic war that is the American Colony of Iraq; a more powerful real nuclear Islamic threat in Iran; a cause celebre for bin Laden Wannabes — there will be 10 bin Ladens tomorrow where there were none, 100 next month where there were 10, etc., as long as we occupy Iraq; a bankrupt Iraq unable to exist independently of our colonial adminsitration, supervision, and underwriting; and a nearing bankrupt and corrupt Homeland that is saddling its own people and its future generations with incalculable debt to the detriment of our own peace, prosperity, and common weal.
IT IS TIME FOR AMERICAN SERVICEPERSONS, THEIR FAMILIES, THEIR FRIENDS, THOSE WHO HARDLY KNEW YE, AND ALL OF US WHO EMOTE SYMPATHY AT EVERY DEATH TO STAND UP AND SHOUT, TO INSIST
N O T O N E M O R E!
That would be a true memorium.
Yes, it would.
When?
AG