The Lapdogs of Mars (DMW TOP Salvage)

Dear Media,

Shall we start a war? How easily you ask that question.

Do you realize what you are asking? Do you have any idea? No, you do not, because it will not personally affect you. You might get some more ratings out of it. You might get an award for talking about it. You might get paid for your memories of the event that you watched through heavy glass.

Allow me, to explain to you, what you are asking.

You are asking if Thousands of young men should sacrifice their blood, their freedom and their sanity in the hope that it will prevent other people from dying.

You are asking that millions of meals be taken from the mouths of schoolchildren in order to buy weapons that intentionally or not will end the lives of other schoolchildren.

You are asking us to look at our fellow human beings as "the Enemy." To reduce them from human to a faceless mass that can be killed with impunity.

You are asking us to go after ONE bad guy, but to use the tool of war in such a manner is akin to using high explosives to kill roaches.

You are asking currently living children to grieve for parents, and currently living parents to grieve for children, all in the hope that theoretical future children and parents will be spared the pain.

You are asking men to fear the dark, to fear the sun, and to fear the stranger. You are asking for them to live their lives in the memory of their mistakes and fear, and call it glory.

You do these things because you desire to be a patriot. You ask these questions because your master Mars demands it. He has many treats and toys for those that sit at his feet and smile, and he dispenses them to those that serve him well. Mars loves his toys: his implements of destruction, his grand parades, and his fine clothes. He cares not one whit for the men inside them, nor the poor victims sacrificed on his altar.

You are asking us to go to war. You have no fucking idea what that means.

War is death. War is destruction. War is a terrible servant but an even more hideous master. War is the sacrifice of what is, because of the fear of what MAY be. War is tears, and blood, and fear. War is the man who has written a will because he fears that he will not see his child again. War is the child who hangs on to every precious moment of a father, for exactly the same reason. War is evil, done to prevent greater evil.

That is why you cannot ask that question so calmly. That is why "A few Airstrikes" is not a solution. That is why before we go to war we must be totally convinced that what we do is for the future that most likely will happen if we do not act, not on maybes, and the word of those that sit at the feet of the war makers.

And what after? Have you asked that? What happens after the war?

Have we set aside for the thousands of men who will come back forever changed? Have we prepared to deal with what WILL happen, and we KNOW will happen? War is not a game where you get to restart. War will destroy the lives of thousands and we cannot simply write them off with a speech about how the mission was achieved with a minimum of casualties.

But you will not hear this. You will hear only the following soundbite which I provide merely to prove your ignorance.

War sucks.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFCekeoSTwg]

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Martha Pearce-Smith's picture

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Please help the Resilience Resource Library grow by adding your links.

First Nations News

detroitmechworks's picture

One night when I couldn't sleep and nightmares kept plaguing me.
One thing I really appreciate is that I stopped drinking completely about 6 months ago.
It's a slow process, but dammit once in a while you have to reflect on where you were.

I'm in a much better place now, but it's still pretty true.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

and damn near made me cry. I may need to forward this one on. I still may cry.

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

detroitmechworks's picture

I find my writing is more emotional when I'm tired, and more analytical when fully awake.

Don't know what that means as far as the way my brain works.

I really appreciate your kind words on my work. I am also VERY grateful to the people who convinced me that I was wrong when I said I'd never bring my work from TOP over here.

There's a lot worth saving.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

I second that - sounds like you've got a lot more that'd be good to see here! I posted a new diary yesterday, btw and on purpose posted 2/3 of it on TOP, with a link to "a longer version here" - throw out some clickbait Smile
Sadly, it does not have Trump in it, so didn't get any eyeballs. Sad

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Gandalf and Saruman unite, demand to bring back Greywolfe359!

Gerrit's picture

from another vet. Good job on the drink. Hang tough, man. Best wishes,

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Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.

We are Americans. Wars of aggression and imperial occupations are not our style. The U.S. Army used to train against a fictitious enemy called the "Aggressor Army." It was organized similarly to the Russian and Warsaw Pact armies. The name I suppose was intended to represent the opposite of our army. If you excuse various unilateral Western Hemisphere interventions, we just didn't do wars of aggression. Until the Bush administration ordered the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Aggressor uniform

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"We've done the impossible, and that makes us mighty."

detroitmechworks's picture

Our own guys with their uniforms turned inside out.

At least that's what we got prior to being sent to Iraq. Lots of "Trick" scenarios to make us feel bad about not being insanely paranoid.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

RantingRooster's picture

war is the American way! Rah rah rah don't ya know!

OMG, great post!

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C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

detroitmechworks's picture

is to get on an intimate basis with it. Study it, learn it, and experience it.

You'll be a pacifist in no time.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

They aren't people. They are "collateral damage"

US-led coalition airstrikes targeting the Islamic State and other designated terrorist groups in Syria have killed 380 civilians, including 99 children and 67 women, over the past 18 months, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR).

The monitoring group said that it had documented these mortalities among a total of 4,643 deaths resulting from Operation Inherent Resolve, which the coalition launched on September 23, 2014 with a mission to "degrade and defeat" the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.

Among the civilians allegedly killed by airstrikes is a family of seven that died in the village of Dali Hasan and another 64 people in Bir Mahli. The attacks blamed for their deaths both took place in Aleppo Province on April 30, 2015.

The US military has admitted to killing just 21 civilians since Operation Inherent Resolve began.

Chris Davis, director of the website Airwars, which tracks and compiles data about airstrikes in Syria and Iraq, says that the number of deaths documented by SOHR is far too low. Airwars estimates that the US-led coalition has likely killed around 519 civilians in Syria alone.

"More than 1000 civilians have been killed by the coalition in Iraq and Syria, by everybody's count," he said, noting that, as of Wednesday, more than 11,000 bombs had been dropped onto both countries since the start of the operation.

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detroitmechworks's picture

is beyond me. Dead is dead, no matter how its done.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

movie buff's picture

Many of whom will go on to commit atrocities like we saw this week in Brussels. Which will lead to more "targeted airstrikes" (the latest euphemism for killing people.) Which will lead to more subway attacks. Mars is a hungry beast who must be constantly fed.

Great diary, btw.

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"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum." --Noam Chomsky

detroitmechworks's picture

Bombing is just foul, no matter whether it costs a million dollars or a few hours of work.

Of course, bombing, death without risking yourself, is the end result of war. Which even at its most noble is still foul and evil.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

I thought the same exact thing when I heard about Brussels yesterday... It just keeps on and on and on, and we make it so.

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

detroitmechworks's picture

"limited actions" or what have you, it's like trying to pretend that you can make war safe and sanitary.
You can NEVER do that. It's always horrible, and dragging it out just makes the suffering last longer.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

SnappleBC's picture

Among my various stray thoughts...

Just admitting that there is nothing good, nice, or honorable about war and getting rid of the Geneva conventions. They seem an awful lot like the proverbial lipstick on a pig.

Making every politician who votes for a war pick up a gun and head on over to the front line.... or perhaps their children should they have any?

Somehow we must connect the dots for people. War is not a good thing... ever. It may be a necessary thing but it should always be recognized for the perversion that it is.

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A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard

Szaephod's picture

A big bear-hug…

And this, my penultimate post at TOP…

Yes, Madame Secretary, it was a single vote, but it was a fateful one for over 4,000 young Americans

HisSon.jpg
There are no words.

I just read in a story at DKOS a dismissal of the issue of then Sen. Clinton’s vote on AUMF in Iraq: “and no, I don’t view his (Sen. Sanders’) one vote against the AUMF in 2002 as proof of great foreign policy judgment”

I was stupefied by this comment. Yes, it was one vote, but that vote by Sen. Clinton, and the vast majority of that pusillanimous congress - excepting a handful, including Sen. Sanders - was a death sentence for 4,000 of our fine young Americans, whose lives were just beginning. 50,000 more came home without arms, legs, sight, hearing, or with permanent brain injury. Many, many, many more will also live out their lives with PTSD and other permanent emotional trauma. Add to this the (relatively) small cost of $3T in treasure, by the time we’ve paid the full cost of caring for our wounded veterans, and repairing the cost to our military infrastructure.

And for what? Was Iraq threatening our country? There was no demonstrable link between Iraq and the 2001 terrorist attack in New York and Washington DC. Was there anything about Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush that would speak to integrity with regard to making the case of a military intervention? Should a thoughtful, carefully judging person have trusted these men? Most here at DKos knew they were lying through their teeth - we all saw the same information and could see through the veil of fabrication. It took some judgement to see that this was a game of geo-political-military gamesmanship. Bernie Sanders saw though the veil, and if his judgement had prevailed, there would now be 4,000 more youthful Americans, living their lives, raising their families, contributing to America’s growth. There would be 50,000 more whole Americans, not struggling with the dire and fateful mistakes of our “leaders.” There would not be 100,000’s of American families suffering with devastating loss of loved ones and life-changing physical and emotional injuries. And, 1,000,000 (by many estimates) Iraqis would still live, and millions more would still have a functional life - even if under a despot. And I do not for a moment believe that death is always axiomatically preferable to a modest life under a despot. And we as a people would be $3T better off. It takes judgement to know that an authorization for war implies the likely execution of a war, and that implies that our youngest, bravest and best will be sent to their deaths.

Only Sec. Clinton can explain fully why she made this self-admitted “mistake.” Sen. Sanders fully explained his view, in his speech before Congress, and point, by careful horrific point he was correct, the worst of what he anticipated came to pass, and over a million humans perished as a consequence of this “mistake.” It was the worst foreign policy catastrophe of several decades of American history - which had more than a few other bad examples. An error of judgement that to many around the world amounted to an international war crime. To my mind, this single example - and there are more - but this single example is sufficient to show that Sec. Clinton has neither the judgement, nor the temperament, nor the wisdom to hold the lives of our young Americans in her hands, nor the fate of our nation.

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The spirit of party serves to enfeeble the Public Administration,
agitates with Jealousies and false alarms, and opens the door to corruption,
which finds access to the government itself through the channels of party passions.
George Washington

detroitmechworks's picture

It's only a mistake as long as you learn from it.

What did Hillary Learn?

She learned which way the wind was blowing.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAxeLiaHmIg]

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

WindDancer13's picture

political season, but apparently did in 2008. Clinton voted against the 2003 Levin Amendment which would have stalled the US invasion of Iraq and allowed for diplomacy. When questioned about the vote, she lied about the reasons.

Another 2003 amendment, proposed by Durbin, which failed to pass with HRC's No vote was

To amend the authorization for the use of the Armed Forces to cover an imminent threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction rather than the continuing threat posed by Iraq.

If I read this correctly, this would have limited the war.

Sanders was not in the Senate at this time, so he did not have a vote on either of these.

Sorry for this, but HRC brings out the very worst in me:

Clinton_War.jpg

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass

Szaephod's picture

The wind shifted since.

DanzigerWar.png

I have always been impressed by how Danziger captures the zeitgeist of Mars.

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The spirit of party serves to enfeeble the Public Administration,
agitates with Jealousies and false alarms, and opens the door to corruption,
which finds access to the government itself through the channels of party passions.
George Washington

detroitmechworks's picture

Seeing as the MSM fired most of them. All that's left are the jingoists and the worshipful. (Animal News Comes to mind... bleh)

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

lotlizard's picture

* not to be confused with Laurence Lewis (original handle Turkana).

Animal Nuz could have risen to the level of Tom Tomorrow’s This Modern World. But anything that might show official Dem-dom in a less-than-flattering light is off limits.

It’s a shame because I’m sure ericlewis0 could do a devastating sendup of Debbie Wasserman Schultz, were he so inclined.

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kharma's picture

to go against the grain. He's a parrot.

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There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties.. This...is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.--John Adams

Alison Wunderland's picture

cultureoflife.jpg

bushatrocity.jpg

iraqepitaph.jpg

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM2outHh31M]

I tried and tried until that was left were tears.

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Only connect. - E.M. Forster

Alison Wunderland's picture

I've got a computer whisperer friend who's going to help me transfer Photoshop to my laptop so I can get back to work on cartoons.

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I'd like to see a system wherein, if you vote to start a war, or fund a war, or a 'drone strike' or anything else in which innocents are inevitably going to die, you must put someone you love up to be slaughtered. Imagine how eager all the war hawks would be if they knew 'OK, you vote for this, your grandkid dies.' Make 'em have some skin in the game. Sort of a combination of Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" and that episode of Star Trek TOS, A Taste of Armageddon.

They might be a lot less bloodthirsty if they knew it was going to cost *them*. (Then again, depressingly, maybe not.)

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No snowflake in an avalanche feels responsible. -- Voltaire

WindDancer13's picture

to be an equalizer. You see how well that turned out.

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass

in his 1935 "War Is a Racket," which people
today still can't be arsed to read - and it's a
damn pamphlet, not even a book.

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Only connect. - E.M. Forster

A fine rant, Detroitmechworks. One the Mars-worshipers need to hear more often. I was reminded of a similar take on it from an earlier era.

In his book "War is a Racket", former Marine Corp Commandant Major General Smedley Butler suggested that what was needed before ever going to war, was a limited vote by those who would have to actually participate, to see if THEY thought it was necessary. We probably could have avoided most of our poorly-conceived wars with such a system. He also suggested that all those who profit from war should be conscripted for the duration, and paid the same as the soldiers.

BTW, IMHO "War is a Racket" is far too important of a book, and at a mere 14 pages, far too short, for any American to have an excuse not to read it. It's a former head of the Marines, a highly-decorated soldier, laying bare the actual mechanisms behind war. It was a glimpse of the MIC before Eisenhower named it that. If any of you haven't read it, I urge you to do so.

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"Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men for the nastiest of motives will somehow work for the benefit of all."
- John Maynard Keynes

ppnortney's picture

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The smaller the mind the greater the conceit. --Aesop

prfb's picture

“Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth into battle — be Thou near them! With them — in spirit — we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended in the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames in summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it —

For our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet!

We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen."

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