Between 1979 and 1987, the Unites States armed, trained, and financially backed the military forces of the government of El Salvador, which over the same period carried out a policy of ongoing, systematic murder against the Salvadoran population. … I am speaking of the systematic murder of over seventy thousand men, women, and children who were noncombatants–journalists, priests, nuns, teachers, labor organizers, students, political figures, and others. Roughly one percent of El Salvador’s population was destroyed. Also as a direct result of United States actions, another seventy thousand civilians were similarly murdered during the same period by the military government of Guatemala. Finally, and again during the same period, the United States created a force of counterrevolutionaries (the “contras”) to overthrow the revolutionary Sandinista government in Nicaragua. The contras … deliberately attacked defenseless civilians, including old people, women, and children.It is true that the United States did not itself carry out the systematic murder in any of these countries. Yet it put the bullets and guns in the hands of the murderers, trained the murderers how to use them, and organized them for that end. The United States might just as well have pulled the triggers of the guns itself. What concerns me is that the people of the United States, like the people of Nazi Germany, allowed their government to do such a thing.From How Holocausts Happen: The United States in Central America by Douglas Porpora
Iraq body count has documented the violent deaths of 80,000 noncombatants (read: journalists, priests, nuns, teachers, labor organizers, students, political figures, and others) in Iraq during the U.S. unprovoked invasion and ongoing occupation of that nation since 2003.
So here are my questions:
Retired military policeman Hank Deerfield, having already lost one son as a casualty in the U.S. military, is deeply disturbed when his other son, Mike calls him in the wee hours of the morning from a U.S. army base in Iraq. “Something’s happened, daddy. You gotta get me outta here,” the young man says, weeping. Thus begins a devastating murder mystery/war exposé
In the Valley of Elah was one of the more brilliant movies I’ve seen in the past 5 years. In astoundingly human terms the movie exposes to a wider audience the reality of the Iraq War in a way that slips past intellectual defenses: with story. The story is quintessentially true not only in the sense that it is based on actual events, but also in that deeper, more universal storyish way.
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Next Friday we will be reviewing the new movie In the Valley of Elah. It’s getting 67% over at Rotten Tomatoes, so it’s got to be at least watchable. If you get a chance, see the movie this week and join us to talk about it next Friday.
Posted in Movie Reviews, Videos, War, War Crimes | 5 Comments »On the A Teachable Moment? thread, David H left this comment in reference to the US war in Vietnam:
Yet here we are 30 years after the fact. We lost, yet communism never conquered the world. As for the concept of winning, what would that have meant?
David asks an important and challenging question. What does it really mean to “win” a war?
In the September 2007 issue of Christianity Today, the flagship publication of evangelicalism in the US, long-time columnist David P. Gushee suggests that the Iraq War has become a teachable moment for American Christians.
This month the President will receive reports from commanders in the field about whether the troop surge in Iraq is accomplishing its goals. Until now, he has resisted calls to reconsider his strategy or to begin a withdrawal, despite eroding public support for the war.
Such deep public distress about the war makes this a teachable moment for all of us, as Christians and as Americans. It’s not enough to find a way out of this war honorably and soon. We have an opportunity to learn some deeper lessons so we won’t repeat our mistakes…
For me, the next time I am asked to support a war, my default setting will be no rather than yes. As a follower of Christ, I will have to be persuaded that the particular confluence of circumstances is so grave as to require a military solution. Before Christians sign off on another war, we must do our best to figure out whether the government has done everything possible to make peace…
When the Iraq War is over, we will need a time of national (and Christian) repentance. Whatever one thinks of the origins of the war, or what to do now, its cost in blood and treasure for both Iraq and the United States has been profound. We have seen (once again) the limits of what war can accomplish. Perhaps our sorrow can lead to a renewed commitment to the things that make for peace.
The second (and final ever, so far) atomic bomb used in warfare was dropped by the United States on Nagasaki, Japan on today’s date in 1945. It was detonated at 1800 feet over the city, instantly killing somewhere between 40,000 and 80,000 people, and leading to many thousands of further deaths in the aftermath.
According to wikipedia, there are currently around 20,000 active nuclear weapons in the world, down from a high of 65,000 in 1985. By far the vast majority of these are owned by the United States and Russia.
and a quote from wikipedia: “most international experts conclude that South Africa has completed its nuclear disarmament. South Africa is the first and to date only country to build nuclear weapons and then entirely dismantle its nuclear weapons program.”
What’s up with the South Africans? What did they do right?
Is there a group of people in the United States and Russia who became enormously wealthy from the production of tens of thousands of nuclear weapons, and now they or their heirs are living off the benefits of that welath?
Posted in War | 4 Comments »The Nation (http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070730/hedges) recently published an article in which they interviewed 50 Iraq war veterans about their experience and what things are really like over there. This stuff struck me as obvious, but I still had to force myself to wade through the 12 pages of horrifying description. It occured to me that this used to not strike me as obvious–I used to think that war actually works well and is a great idea.
In Iraq, Specialist Middleton said, “a lot of guys really supported that whole concept that, you know, if they don’t speak English and they have darker skin, they’re not as human as us, so we can do what we want.”
Posted in Death, United States, Violence, War | 11 Comments »
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July the 4th–Empire Day!
Thursday, July 5th, 2007As it turned out, my schedule and my sentiments coincided in such a way that I mostly forgot that yesterday was the 4th of July until the day was almost upon us. I did, however, have some thoughts…
Since it was the 231st anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence of the United States, I did the same thing I do every 4th of July. I read the whole document again. Have you read it recently? It’s actually quite a fascinating read. It includes a long list of the alleged crimes of King George III of England against the American colonies, including the following:
- For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
- For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
- For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
- For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
- He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
- He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
- He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
Posted in United States, War | 6 Comments »
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Dollar Cost of the Iraq War
Wednesday, July 4th, 2007Found this today from wikipedia:
A warmonger is, pejoratively, someone who is anxious to encourage a people or nation to go to war. It is often used to describe militaristic leaders, or mercenaries, commonly with the implication that they either may have selfish motives for encouraging war, or may actually enjoy war.
By etymology a warmonger is literally a seller of war, from monger used as a transitive verb, meaning a peddler.
The etymology bit is fascinating. Fishmongers sell fish, and warmongers sell war. Selling things is partially about dollars. Have you all seen this counter?
Posted in Economics, War | 8 Comments »
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Dehumanising Amnesia: Nicaragua 1979 & Iraq 2007
Wednesday, June 20th, 2007“This morning I saw three children die. Pretty thirteen-year-old girls wearing dresses over their jeans. They were out in a woods near here, picking fruit, and a helicopter came over the trees and strafed them. We heard the shots. Fifteen minutes later an alert defense patrol shot the helicopter down, twenty miles north, and the pilot and another man in the helicopter were killed but one is alive. Codi, they’re American citizens, active-duty National Guards. It’s a helicopter from the US, guns, everything from Washington. Please watch the newspapers and tell me what they say about this. The girls were picking fruit. When they brought them into the town, Oh God. Do you know what it does to a human body to be cut apart from above, from the sky? We’re defenseless from that direction, we aren’t meant to have enemies attack us from above. The girls were alive, barely, and one of the mothers came running out and then turned away saying, “Thank you, Holy Mother, it’s not my Alba.” But is was Alba. Later, when the families took the bodies into the church to wash them, I stayed with Alba’s two younger sisters. They kept saying, “Alba braided our hair this morning. She can’t be dead. See, she fixed our hair.”Read the rest of this news item »
Posted in Activism, War | 4 Comments »