A Place to Talk About War

I would like to hear from soldiers who have been in combat situations, from their families, or from others interested in this conversation. I am a graduate student interested in war rhetoric. I have no preset agenda: I simply want to listen, to learn, and to be supportive.

Name:
Location: Texas, United States

Married, two kids. Worked in the defense industry for 20 years before taking a different path. I'll be starting my dissertation on the rhetoric of war in a few months. This semester I am teaching Freshman Composition. I DON'T CARE ABOUT BLOGGERS' SPELLING, PUNCTUATION, OR ANY OTHER GRAMMAR MATTERS--I JUST WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU.

Tuesday, November 30, 2004

High Court Declines Hitler Art Case

From the Washington Post:

THE Supreme Court let stand Monday a lower court ruling allowing the U.S. Army to keep four watercolors painted by Adolf Hitler that were seized in Germany after World War II.
Without comment, the justices turned aside a challenge by the family of late German photographer Heinrich Hoffmann Sr., which had sought either the return of the paintings as well as 2.5 million photographs -- or millions of dollars in damages.
The watercolors include street scenes and war landscapes painted before and during World War I. U.S. forces discovered them in 1945, not long after Hitler committed suicide, in a German castle where Hoffmann had stored them during the war.
Hoffmann's family contended the photographer was a victim of wartime art pillaging and that the seizure of the paintings as well as 2.5 million photographs violated their constitutional rights. The U.S. government countered that the photos and paintings were Nazi art that was confiscated to "de-Nazify Germany."
The court's action appears to lay to rest a nearly 20-year battle involving the government, Hoffmann relatives and Texas art investor Billy F. Price, who bought rights to the works. The latest challenge involved a technical issue that brought the case back to the high court after justices refused to hear an initial appeal in 2002.
The Army keeps the paintings in government storage in Alexandria, Va.


I can understand why you'd want millions of dollars, but I can't understand why you'd want a piece of Hitler's art.

Monday, November 29, 2004

Great ideas for supporting soldiers

Our great blogging community comes through again. Barb's suggestions for practical ways to support soldiers deserve high visibility; it's the Christmas season, folks, so if you want to say "thank you" to someone serving on your behalf, here are some ways to do so:

A standard caveat: I haven't checked these charities' financial statements--that's not my area. It is up to you to be a wise giver; I am simply passing on what I consider to be good suggestions for concrete ways to make your appreciation known.

Thanks again, Barb!


Cellphones in war

I have been wanting to get to this topic for several weeks, so here goes: what are your thoughts on the members of the supply convoy who refused to deliver the fuel that they believed was tainted?
I am specifically interested in the fact that they called home on their cellphones asking their loved ones to raise a public outcry about their being asked to proceed in unarmored vehicles. One headline read, “Wives Defend Soldiers Who Refused Mission,” and a wife was quoted as saying that her husband “was only doing what he was trained to do—survive.” A female soldier left a message on her mother's answering machine asking, "Mom, what should I do?" Her mother then appeared on a national morning talk show, playing the message for a wide audience.
Letters to the editor on the subject have been mixed--everything from "Military orders are to be obeyed, period" to "Well, the officers shouldn't have ordered them to make an unsafe journey--it's their responsibility to look after their soldiers' welfare."
So please tell me: what do YOU say about this matter?

Sunday, November 28, 2004

You Can Now Post Without Registering!

Finally, I learned how to set up this blog so that anyone can post comments--you no longer need to register or tell anything about yourself if you don't want to. Sorry for the problems before--I was at the bottom of the learning curve. But I'm getting the hang of this now.

So from now on, if you want to comment on a posting, just click the Comment button above my remarks. You can read what others have written, type your own thoughts, then post anonymously OR provide a first name, email address, or homepage. NONE OF THAT INFORMATION IS REQUIRED TO POST, so the choice is yours.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Saturday, November 27, 2004

Ways to Support Our Troops

I have a question for all the military personnel out there: what is the most effective way to "support our troops?" I'm not into magnets on my car, but I do make charitable contributions, and this is the season to be inundated by requests.

So, where should I donate my money? Paralyzed Veterans of America? Veterans of Foreign Wars? USO? Buy socks and candy and drop them off at the local elementary school collection box?

This is not a macro-level political question (e.g., "Vote for [fill in the blank] candidate"). I'm looking for a concrete, non-political suggestion from someone who's been there.

Monday, November 22, 2004

The Reporter Speaks

Kevin Sites, who filmed the shooting in the mosque, tells the story in an open letter to Marines. Read it here. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6556034/

Saturday, November 20, 2004

What we ask of our soldiers

Following are some comments I made on someone else's blog today. Since many of its readers seem to be primarily interested in eradicating Islam and the people who practice it, I decided to bring the conversation here to my blog. Responses welcomed.

"I want the American public to recognize and take responsibility for what we send our soldiers to do. If we think they should be sent to war, fine--send them to war. But don't pretend that war is a glorious, sanitized undertaking done cheerfully by pure-hearted, pie-loving young men and women who regretfully shoot only "bad guys" and come home again healthy, happy, and whole. In some cases that may be true, but we have plenty of evidence that often it's not. Don't misunderstand me--I respect the heck out of soldiers and the jobs they do. But Americans need to fully face what those jobs are, not dwell in a false innocence that shrieks 'Oh, I'm shocked' when they find out that real soldiers pull the trigger that kills real human beings, as opposed to fuzzy statements such as 'we removed 45 enemy combatants today.'" American public, own up to what you are asking soldiers to do on your behalf.

Websites worth looking at

I previously gave you the blog address of a former Seal. As an alternative view, these sites are worth a look:


Thursday, November 18, 2004

My brother wants to talk about the media

My brother thinks that we should discuss the issue of the embedded photographer being allowed to film the shooting of the wounded Iraqi in the mosque in Fallujah. Possible ways to approach this issue include the following:
  • Should reporters and photographers be embedded with troops?
  • Should the military censor what reports or images are transmitted?
  • We know that some news reports from the front lines are censored--did this one slip by, or did the U.S. military find it acceptable to air publicly?
  • If you object to the film being shown, why? Does the violence offend you? Do you not want your children to see it? Are you concerned that it will further inflame anti-U.S. sentiments? Something else?
  • The scope of the two incidents is of course widely divergent--I want to make that point loud and clear. But IF you think the Marine did something wrong, and object to showing the film footage because you don't want American servicemen shown in a bad light, can you make some comments about My Lai?
  • If you have read Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five you are aware of the absurdity in war of sanctioning the killing of thousands of "bad guys"(or the civilians who live in the same country with them), then executing one of your own soldiers for a supposed-breach of good military conduct (in Slaughterhouse Five, stealing a teapot). What do we make of it being laudatory to kill an enemy soldier at 10:44:08, but a barbaric act at 10:52:15? Combat soldiers out there: is it possible to turn on and off the adrenaline and combat mentality that quickly?

Okay, brother, let's hear from you.

Want to hear what a former Seal says about this subject? Check out his blog: http://www.froggyruminations.blogspot.com/


Wednesday, November 17, 2004

Don't know nothing about spelling

A personal word from me today--some of my friends said that perhaps I should not have identified myself as an English student or professor-in-training, because some bloggers would not want to post, thinking that I would notice spelling, punctuation, and all those other things that every scary English teacher ever pounced on you about.

So, here's my stance: I don't care in the slightest if you can't spell at all, if you can spell but choose not to, if you type in all lower case, if you commit every grammatical sin that you can think of. Those things are not important to me; your opinions are.

Monday, November 15, 2004

Shooting Prisoners

I just read the unfortunate account of a Marine in Fallujah shooting a wounded Iraqi prisoner inside a mosque. (He was from the same unit that lost a man the day before from a booby-trapped dead Iraqi.) The incident was recorded by the news crew imbedded with the unit, and parts of the video were aired on CNN.

There are so many topics of discussion around this event--the ability of soldiers to turn on and off their emotions, the extent to which such incidents happen in every war, the obliviousness to the camera crew, the decision to air the footage on T.V., the conduct we expect from our warriors. I will return to this topic, but for now I simply want to open a forum to talk about it.

Saturday, November 13, 2004

The Picture of the Soldier

By now, probably everyone has seen "the picture" I am talking about--headshot of a lance corporal in Iraq, face grimy, eyes faraway, cigarette dangling from his mouth a la Humphrey Bogart. (Update--he's now known as the Marlboro Man.) It's an AP photo, and it's been everywhere. Letters to the Editor in Dallas Morning News were mostly predictable: he's every soldier everywhere, etc. They chose to print one asinine letter, however, that was guaranteed to provoke response: one woman complained that the soldier was a bad role model because he was smoking and youth are impressionable. And of course all the other readers jumped on that like crazy, berating her for her shortsightedness; columnists also weighed in on the matter, so we'll keep hearing about it for several days.

My reaction is somewhat different; of course it's a terrific picture, destined in appear in all the coffeetable books that will one day come out of this war. But because the Dallas Morning News chose to run the silly "smoking" letter, the community is now spending a lot of ink and energy delving into the poor letterwriter's psyche. Do you think we could spend our time on more productive discussions about the war in general or how we are to take care of our soldiers once they're home, and drop the smoking issue?

Wednesday, November 10, 2004

Flight to Jackson, Mississippi

I flew from DFW to Jackson, Mississippi yesterday afternoon on American Eagle. On my flight was a soldier in desert camo fatigues. After the flight attendant made her usual pre-landing announcement, she came back on the P.A. and requested that all passengers remain seated and allow the officer on board, who was returning home, to deplane first. I started a round of applause, which was picked up by most of the passengers. When we reached the gate, she simply called him forward by his seat number: "5A, welcome home." Another round of applause started from those seated near him.

What a difference a few decades make. World War II veterans, to the best of my knowledge, came home to no fanfare; they simply tried to become civilians again and get on with their lives. Since Korea is called the "forgotten war," I feel safe in assuming that its soldiers got little recognition, as well. We've all heard horror stories of Vietnam veterans being harassed and insulted when they came back home, but I truly don't know how widespread such treatment was. Neither was I sure how much recognition the soldier on the plane would want--should we all go shake his hand and thank him for his service, or would he prefer not to have to greet 50 strangers?

In either case, I was glad to be a small part of an impromptou show of appreciation.

Monday, November 08, 2004

Assault on Fallujah

The new assault on Fallujah has begun. I heard a story on NPR late last week about the difficulties American soldiers face in taking Iraqi soldiers into battle with them. Several points were made: one, that since we pulled out of Fallujah earlier this year in response to complaints about civilian deaths, the insurgents have had plenty of time to fortify their positions. Two, that U.S. soldiers don't want to take Iraqi soldiers in with them because they're not trained to U.S. standards, but that they have to do so because politics demands that Iraqis be seen fighting alongside U.S. troops. Three, that Iraqi soldiers are poorly equipped--one machine gun fighter was carrying his ammunition around in a large metal case that was so bulky it would impede mobility on the battlefield.
Question: is this a fair report? Are you satisfied that our method of gaining control of Fallujah is the best military strategy, one that maximizes our chances of success and minimizes the numbers of probable U.S. casualties?

Sunday, November 07, 2004

Welcome to my first post

Welcome to my first blog entry. I am an English doctoral student in Texas who is interested in war rhetoric. I am currently working on a project that examines the different ways that soldiers from combat zones talk about their war experiences. For example, during World War II communication from the frontlines back home came in the form of infrequent letters; today's technology allows soldiers to call home on cellphones, the most visible display being the recent incident in which the unit from North Carolina refused to transport fuel and called their family stateside to publicize the situation.

I would love to hear from anyone who is in combat now, has ever been in combat, or who has a loved one in a combat situation. I will periodically post specific topics of discussion--Fallujah, unarmed vehicles, body armor, stop-loss, etc.--but if you've got something you want to say now, then I welcome you here, and look forward to our conversation!