Today’s Topic: What the Words Mean
I again find it somewhat problematic that words are bandied about as if they have a number of meanings, or they dilute the meanings in their use.
It appears, as specified by John Mclaughlin on his show Sunday that Senator Webb and Senator Lugar are war heroes by virtue of their medals, but this negates the entire efforts of all those serving their nation in a time of declared or undeclared war.
This is patently false, or at least a false impression. No one in a war zone should be denied the title of hero. Everyone that has served knows who the actual heroes were, but those that haven’t need to understand that numerous acts of courage and self-sacrifice have come from far more never having received an award for courage or valor.
Courage and valor are the prerequisites of combat, and even those that didn’t decide for themselves to go to war, the same characteristics were and are present.
Surprisingly as it may seem Spock, in "Star Trek: The Movie" spoke the truth when asked how his trainee troops would react in battle. He said "Each to the best of their ability."
Which brings me to a point. When those governing and executing policy are not up to the task, then those led will never be able to accomplish the necessary goal.
The truth of this statement can be seen in recent history by many actions taken by both this administration and the subsequent results of actions of a military which simply no longer has a true moral compass.
The denials by this administration that it doesn’t condone torture, countered by it’s use of memos redefining the terms of torture, to the abuse of prisoners by torture authorized by the same government that decries torture give no moral compass to those that serve.
The same can be said for the effort to redefine the Geneva Conventions as if none of the other signatories to the treaty understood exactly what the terms meant.
And there’s the design of lying to Congress, America and the World that circumstances in Iraq required that we go to war. Being patently false (and I suggest that this act alone by the Bush administration should become the definition of "patently false"), the moral ground of America’s endeavors from 9/11 have turned the world on it’s head, giving balance to those normally off-balance, and taking balance away from those that normally did have balance.
All this means is that if you start with a lie, you can’t find any truth that will get you out of the trouble the lies caused. And start with a lie it did. But worse, in the elections of 2004, lies became the norm and those telling the lies did so in quiet whispers running more rampant than the wind driven Santa Anna fires.
John Kerry is a decorated war hero from Viet Nam. His decision to support the end of the Viet Nam war notwithstanding, his actions in Viet Nam earned him several awards for courage and valor. I suppose that John Kerry isn’t quite valorous enough to stand up for his own actions and thus allow some slime-ball 527 organization to present deceitful and malformed information, essentially stealing yet another election.
Even this is not my point, however I take the opportunity to design my posts to this weblog in the manner I choose, so you’ll have to try to follow the thread.
In war the winners write history and it has always been so. History, however, has a habit of catching up to current events when those lessons which history so severely taught are ignored.
History has told us that warfare could no longer be governed by the country invading another, but has to be governed and judged by the world. For without the judgement of the world, another Adolph Hitler could emerge and inflict yet more millions of deaths on unassuming people whose lives were focused around their family, their businesses and their friends. The concept that any people are worthy of subjugating or annihilating is hopefully a thing of the past. However, it doesn’t seem so when the newest approximation of dead Iraqi, not all of whom were ever involved with the war rises to 655,000.
Let’s just take a look at some examples of the dead left in the wake of war.
During the Spanish-American war not only did America take Cuba from the Spanish, but for some reason found it necessary to take the Philippines, too. In the effort to take the Philippines America lost some 4,000 troops, killed some 40,000 Filipino soldiers, and decimated 400,000 Filipino civilians.
In Viet Nam, America lost 58,000 troops and killed 2 million Vietnamese. It is not even possible to discern who was NVRA, Viet Cong, or Vietnamese civilians, but it is very likely that some 80 percent of the dead were simply civilians.
But are any of the American troops who have served honorably in their tours of duty less than those who have received medals and awards? Well, I’d say that probably one-tenth of those deserving ever received medals, and 60 percent of officers have received awards that may not have been earned, but I’d also say that those same officers probably earned awards they weren’t given, whilst their "track record" earned them medals and awards they might not have been in line for.
For instance, receiving a Presidential Unit Citation doesn’t prove anything for those who have received it since the action that caused the citation, but if you are in 101st Airborne, you get the citation. The award, however, goes on your permanent record for purposes of promotion, so those assigned to fast track military units get so assigned to garner promotional awards. A young Major Colin Powell was just such a recipient of awards not earned but devoted to the valor of the original citation unit, and thus end up with permanent points on their personnel records whilst never having performed a heroic act.
So what or whom is a hero?
Well, like I said in the beginning of this piece, all those who serve, and certainly those who die or are maimed are heroes. Even the above mentioned Colin Powell, but the fact is that some are "more" heroic even when they are not recognized as so, and this makes it easy to take potshots at the likes of those whom have served and honestly won their awards such as John Kerry.
But you won’t see the difference on their personnel records because there is no differentiation, with perhaps the designation as a Medal of Honor winner, because here we are talking about both a medal and a lifetime monetary award that is specific to the individual.
Audie Murphy is a good Medal of Honor example. An exemplary soldier during WWII, bound to take out a Japanese pillbox denying his company a foothold on a hill, he risked all to take that pillbox out and did so, saving hundreds of lives.
Did John Kerry deserve the Silver Star for his actions that were called into question by those of the Swiftboat group? Yes. One does not put themselves in for a Silver Star. And a wound in battle is a wound in battle, whether it is a scratch on the shoulder or a piece of shrapnel to the gut. So we have two medals that cannot be disputed. At the least he earned both a Silver Star and a Purple Heart. I do not believe his first Silver Star was in dispute.
Besides, any citation involving courage or valor are reviewed by an independent officer prior to award, so the questions really become whether a group such as the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth ever had any truth on their own side in the first place.
So it becomes problematic as to whether any particular soldier in combat can be denied the label of hero is the most abhorrent of acts by people with a political agenda, and should not be assessed to those with a political legacy. When veterans specifically have a political bent then they themselves become questionable in their intent.
And, for all practical purposes, it matters not whether one has exhibited courage or valor on the battlefield, but rather by their determined course of fighting a war that was impressed upon them without truth underlying the effort, and without the full support of the civilian military component that sent them overseas to die.
Mr. Rumsfeld, you do INDEED go to war with the Army you wish to have if your intentions are to invade another sovereign country. Else, you didn’t help America at all, and you helped this administration perpetuate a generations long war on an idea called "terrorism".
1:36:54 PM 
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