I first crossed the border in February -- February of 1991. I sat aboard a UH-60 Blackhawk that was packed with other soldiers and their gear and slingloading a pallet of supplies destined for Logbase Zebra. Days later, I watched as the Republican Guard retreated in column to Bagdad but we couldn’t open fire. The cease fire was already in effect.
The absolutely horrible things I saw on the way into Kuwait City I cannot describe. I reckon, though, that the feelings that stirred inside me were akin to those of my ancestors when they looked across No-Man’s land in Verdun to see their brothers suffering and dying trapped in the wire, or when they liberated the death camps in Bergin Beltsin or Auschwitz. How can I describe what months of looting, rape, torture, butchery, and murder can do to a population?
The Iraqi army in occupation in tiny Kuwait became as animals. They gang raped children. They tortured women to death and weighted down their dismembered bodies with cinderblocks to be casually tossed into the Persian Gulf. There were so many corpses discarded in that manner that the Seal Team assigned to dive in from a few miles out and secure the US Embassy could not get through them and had to turn back. How can I describe the lives and livelihoods Iraq destroyed in a few short months?
Can you imagine a sky so full of smoke that for nearly half a year one could not make a distinction between night and day? Can you imagine the smell, the terrible sweet nauseating smell of nearly a quarter of a million dead? Can you imagine the disease which ran rampant among the occupied because Iraq would not let them obtain medical attention? They died by the hundreds from infection which became gangrene. They died by the thousands of influenza and malnourishment. They died in staggering numbers of Cholera because dead human beings tossed into the water supply rotted there and contaminated the drinking water.
When people say that Saddam Hussein is not a totalitarian dictator, that he is not a monster, that he is not a truly evil man, they are mistaken. He is quite possibly worse than Adolf Hitler. Hitler never once used chemical or biological weapons even in Stalengrad when they could have made the difference between winning and losing the Eastern Front. Saddam Hussein has used them on Iranians and on his own people. It is very likely that he left chemical weapons disguised in innocuous containers for the Coalition forces to detonate as if they were conventional munitions, thus infecting as many as 350,000 US troops. He has not signed either the Geneva Conventions or the Nuremberg Accords as far as the ethical treatment of prisoners. He is guilty of or responsible for countless, countless millions of human rights violations.
When they say he doesn’t support terrorism, they are mistaken. He has laundered money for upwards of seven terrorist organizations through his state run bank, the bank of Iraq, including Al Jazeera Jihad and Al Quada. He has provided equipment, munitions, and training camps and skilled “advisors” to those same organizations. One training camp has the fuselage of a Boeing 767 and was clearly used to train terrorists in how to take over and hold hostage an airline. And who could forget the fact that he once filled a commercial airliner with convicts -- who he ordered smothered to death -- and then flew it in the direction of a US Carrier Group until we had no alternative but to shoot it down? What if we hadn’t?
Some people ask why we have to go into Iraq? Why did we have to go into Germany?
And, he is quite totally insane. Given time and freedom to accomplish his goals, the leader of Iraq could, quite literally, bring about the destruction of the entire world. Those who didn’t capitulate to his will could find themselves the victims of a dirty bomb, or a man-made deadly disease, or an occupying force of soldiers who are trained in the art of gang-rape, torture, and butchery.
The man is evil. His regime is evil. His purpose is evil.
Saddam Hussein IS a terrorist.
“We will make no distinction between those who committed these horrible acts and those who harbor them.” President George W. Bush
America is more than a nation it is an idea. It is an idea that we as human beings have rights. It is an idea that we must, from time to time, roll up our sleeves and fight and sweat and bleed and possibly even die to preserve those rights when some two-bit so-and-so tries to take them from us. And why is it that some completely wrong-minded Americans feel they need to go to Iraq and become “human shields.” I say we should make no distinction between them and those who committed this horrible act. I say revoke their American citizenship and bar them from reentry onto our sovereign soil. I say, seize their holdings and property and use it to the benefit of those who are fighting for America instead of letting them keep it to be used, quite possibly, for evil deeds.
We see people like Barbara Streisand, Mike Farrell, Martin Sheen, Sean Penn, and Danny Glover saying how wrong our government is. They would say so regardless of whether we, as Americans and we as human beings, were in danger from terrorist despots like Saddam Hussein. They would say so because they are liberals who never uttered a peep when Clinton ordered Serbia and Bosnia bombed back to the stone age. They are hypocrites. They are people who would spit on my uniform and call me a baby-killer while demanding taxpayer funded abortions. They are to be ignored. We see news commentators and organizations like AOL TIME WARNER who seek out the most vociferous liberal minded fool to spout nonsense and propaganda and represents that voice as the voice of the majority. It isn’t. CNN ignores a pro-America rally of 30,000 people one mile from their headquarters to report on a peace rally of 300 “Lesbians against Bush” (and here I thought lesbians liked bush) miles and miles away. I submit to you that the majority of Americans are not lesbians. I further posit that the majority of Americans are not against Bush.
We read the endless debate in our magazines and newspapers about what a terrible precedent it will set if we go to war, how we (and this makes me laugh) will be war criminals if we do, and how harshly history will judge us for our actions. Imagine if we did not act? Would we have a history to render that judgment?
It is terribly easy to sit at home in the comfort of your living room and watch the media tell you that the majority of Americans do not support this war (a blatant lie). It is terribly easy to try to dictate to the military how they need to accomplish their difficult and daunting task, having never served yourself. It is much harder to get off your ass and get on your knees and pray for the leadership of this country, pray for the servicemen who face this terrible thing, and pray to God to, by His grace, grant you
FAITH that this nation will win through -- FAITH that our leaders are slightly more informed than Dan Rather -- FAITH that if we are to have a future, justice demands that we intervene, right now, right here.
I may have to return to those powdery hot sands. I may have to return to that smell and that coppery desert taste. I may have to and I will do so gladly. I will serve. I will do my duty. Don’t dishonor me. Don’t dishonor the memory of the sacrifices made in September of 2001. Don’t dishonor the sacrifices made by my brothers and sisters in arms who have given everything for the idea that is America (65 service members have lost their lives so far in Operation Enduring Freedom). Don’t disgrace yourself by dishonoring their memory.
It is time to make a choice. It is time to draw the line. It is time to stand tall and be proud and do this terrible and costly task that needs doing. It is time to support those who are down in the blood and the mud having a direct or indirect hand in the doing of it. It is time to remember what our ancestors fought and died to create and preserve. ~Author Unknown.
