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29. Mar 2006

Irak-veteraner mod krigen

 
"Support our Troops!" lyder det patriotiske, krigstrommende USAs mantra - hvilket betyder: "Støt krigen og håb på sejr - ellers er du en beskidt forræder".

Derfor er store grupper af krigsveteraner, der undsiger krigen, enhver krigsførende regerings værste PR-mæssige mareridt - eller, som det beskrives i en artikel fra dagens Guardian om netop dette: "A publicity nightmare for the US military: an ever-growing number of veterans of the Iraq conflict who are campaigning against the war."

Vi læser bl.a.:
At a press conference in a cavernous Alabama warehouse, banners and posters are rolled out: "Abandon Iraq, not the Gulf coast!" A tall, white soldier steps forward in desert fatigues. "I was in Iraq when Katrina happened and I watched US citizens being washed ashore in New Orleans," he says. "War is oppression: we could be setting up hospitals right here. America is war-addicted. America is neglecting its poor."
(...)
Michael Blake is at the front of the march. The 22-year-old from New York state is not quite sure how he ended up in the military; the child of "a feminist mom and hippy dad", he says he signed up thinking that he would have an adventure, never imagining that he would find himself in Iraq. He served from April 2003 to March 2004, some of that time as a Humvee driver. Deeply disturbed by his experience in Iraq, he filed for conscientious objector status and has been campaigning against the war ever since.

He claims that US soldiers such as him were told little about Iraq, Iraqis or Islam before serving there; other than a book of Arabic phrases, "the message was always: 'Islam is evil' and 'They hate us.' Most of the guys I was with believed it."

Blake says that the turning point for him came one day when his unit spent eight hours guarding a group of Iraqi women and children whose men were being questioned. He recalls: "The men were taken away and the women were screaming and crying, and I just remember thinking: this was exactly what Saddam used to do - and now we're doing it."
Og måske det netop er i den forstand, amerikanerne burde "support their troops": Tage dem ud af det helvede, politikerne har landet dem i, så hurtigt som muligt - og samtidig forbyde rekruttering på skoler og give de laveste samfundsklasser reelle muligheder for en bedre fremtid, så langt færre end det nu er tilfældet må vælge en militær karriere.

Et militært svagere og mindre aktivt USA ville være til klar gavn for hele verden - og ikke mindst for USA selv!

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