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Knee Deep In The Big Muddle

And so are we about to embark on yet another big military misadventure? WWIII. We may have to get used to the sound of that. I am referring to World War Three. All wars have unknown consequences. But even us common folk can foretell some of the shit that will most probably hit the fan should the United States government prosecute a war with Iraq at this time and for these currently well-spun, yet questionable reasons. Usually we are afraid for our sons or daughters, relatives, brothers, sisters, coming home in a body bag. There was Pearl Harbor. Indeed, people felt it was a surprise attack. The nation rallied. The country is only somewhat more prepared for this. September 11, 2001 has affected everyone who has been exposed to the media here and abroad with the graphic and horrendous crimes against us. But we are not nearly prepared for the shitstorm that could happen. Think about it. Porous borders allowing thousands of illegal immigrants into the country daily. The relative ease at which nineteen dedicated terrorists were able to disrupt an entire empire with the use of box cutters, some flight training, some easily obtained financing and some stealth. And most of these terrorists were here legally. Hell, a small focus group of U.S. citizens in one night could think up a dozen ways to commit major and minor acts of terrorism with minimal resources.

Do you think that when Iraq is invaded and we have a two-week war that topples the Hussein regime that we can all go back to our SUVs and sit at home and watch reruns of another ‘Gulf War’ victory? The consequences of this next planned step on the part of the Bush II administration (junta) are absolutely frightening. Some would say, well, we weren’t prepared for Pearl Harbor but we won. Do you really believe that this country can muster the discipline necessary to ration materials such as food, clothing, metals, tires, and petroleum? Will we, at a moments notice, be able to: secure our borders, draft a half a million citizens into the military and be able to ‘hunker down’ for the impending terrorist attacks on the United States, its foreign bases and embassies, its business ‘enterprises’, tourist destinations, chemical, biological and nuclear facilities, communications and transportation systems? In so doing we may very well lose what is most precious to us: our freedom and liberty. And for what? If there were no oil in the Middle East would we give a rat’s ass as to how the people in those countries ran their affairs?

Do you think that the Muslim-influenced world will allow for us to ‘take Baghdad’ and just sit back, aghast at our awesomeness? Did you know that the nation of ‘Iraq’ is a Western creation? Did you know that we helped supply Saddam Hussein and the Iraqis with most of their biological and chemical materials? What has been done in our name make some of them insane, yet most of us seem to have collective amnesia.

I watch the televisionaries, the PUNdits, the war criminals like Henry Kissinger, Oliver North, Richard Armitage, the establishmentarians, and the corporate robber barons too numerous to list, on ‘our’ airwaves, all agreeing it’s not “if” but “when” for a war on Iraq. Their disagreements vary only as to strategy. Meanwhile us common folk, who almost invariably have someone in our family or people we are close to, who have joined the armed forces ‘to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States’, are being called upon once again to charge into ‘harm’s way’ to defend our ‘way of life’*.

I am referring to World War III. No rights will be inalienable, no life non-expendable, no liberty irrevocable, no pursuit of happiness redeemable. So on September 11th we must never forget the victims of violence. Or the perpetrators of those and even greater evils.

Our own history shows us that even the powerful tremble and collapse before the might of a people wielding justice and peace as their banner. Will we rally, as we have done before, to the true meaning of the American Revolution to be victorious over tyranny?

* Not to be confused with the consumerist culture of circa A.D. 2000.

- By Mark S. Foley, U.S. Army (retired), Vietnam Service, 1970-71

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