Category: War

This diary carries a message or two but is also a tribute.  It is not hero worship.  I am well aware of JFK’s flaws and weaknesses as a human being – you needn’t remind me.  But John F. Kennedy was also a gifted orator who inspired and uplifted us with the poetry in his soul and the power in his words – and certain of his words resonate now more than ever.

What do those three words really mean in this ever so Rich, Powerful, and Patriotic Country of Ours, not to mention Supposedly Christian as well?

Is it just the mouthing of?

If a politician, which some call a profession, is it the wearing of a Flag Lapel Pin?

I have one I wear on my Veterans For Peace ballcap Turned Upside Down!!!

Is it little cheap Magnetic Yellow Ribbons that have those words printed on them, and seem to have rapidly disappeared?

We once had a conflict, we have ‘The Wall’ of remembrance of 58,000 lives lost in that conflict.

The one we, as a Nation, stated we should never forget the lessons of, and Quickly Forgot The Lessons Of!

There have been 4,279 coalition deaths — 3,973 Americans, two Australians, 174 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, one Czech, seven Danes, two Dutch, two Estonians, one Fijian, one Hungarian, 33 Italians, one Kazakh, one Korean, three Latvian, 22 Poles, three Romanians, five Salvadoran, four Slovaks, 11 Spaniards, two Thai and 18 Ukrainians — in the war in Iraq as of February 29, 2008, according to a CNN count. { Graphical breakdown of casualties ). The list below is the names of the soldiers, Marines, Airmen, Sailors and Coast Guardsmen whose deaths have been reported by their country’s governments. The list also includes seven employees of the U.S. Defense Department. At least 29,275 U.S. troops have been wounded in action, according to the Pentagon. View casualties in the war in Afghanistan. Febuary 2008 Casulties, in Afganistan,  listed below the Iraq Casulties

Many are aware of the decision handed down on Friday by a Federal Appeals Court in New York. The court ruled that the Vietnamese plaintiffs could not pursue claims against Dow Chemical Company, Monsanto and nearly 30 other companies for ailments caused by the use of herbicides which

the plaintiffs appealed a lower court decision that dismissed a civil suit seeking class-action status on behalf of more than 3 million Vietnamese people against the chemical companies.

The lawsuit contended that agent orange caused ailments, including birth defects and cancer.

The United States has maintained there is no scientifically proved link between the wartime spraying of herbicides and the claims of dioxin poisoning by more than 3 million people in Vietnam.

By 1983, 9170 veterans had filed claims for disabilities that they said were caused by Agent Orange. The VA denied compensation to 7709, saying that a facial rash was the only disease associated with exposure.

Cross posted at Daily KOS

A while back I got the urge to visit Goodwill, I rarely do because the days of bargains are long gone around here. But I also know even if I’m not shopping for anything when I get that urge I will find something I didn’t know I needed until I get there. I also found a parking spot close to the door, another sign I was going home with something. I hit the furniture section and didn’t see anything and then headed down the back wall something I never do, when I spotted it hanging on a hanger amidst some curtains. A flag. Not just any flag mind you, but a special flag, the creases from it’s unmistakable triangular fold still visible. It was a interment flag, used to drape the coffin of a veteran or soldier who died in action.  

The following comes from Jack Dresser, Ph.D., Behavioral Scientist, Co-founder, Lane County Veterans for Peace: Capt., US Army (psychologist, Vietnam era)

Squadron 13 ; Veterans Against Torture via  G.I. Special-Military Project, Volume: 6B Issue: 16 Ft. Dix, you can read it in Word or in PDF for the rest of the News Letter.

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War brings faster promotions to class that give the orders, but you always find the Scum that’ll do any damn thing to get ahead!

The very last place you want to see it is in the Military and when that Military is sent into Wars Of Choice!

But it happened than, all the past than’s, and the present is no differant!

  For rusty1776 in gratitude for his “Writing in the Raw: Valentine Confessions”

I remember when you brought me hyacinths

We walked the path under pepper trees

Laughed our way to the beach

To play in the surf like yearling seals

And when you kissed me, your salt wet curls

Dripped ocean on my face

I was a virgin then, and you a married man

In a country with strange taboos

I remember when you came again

We were older then, and you had tasted

The bite of war on your golden flesh

You brought me only your body then

And took me, coldly unwilling

On the stone cold floor

Eyes wild, body strawberry ripe

Your virgin rape bride

In a country with strange taboos

When you took me over my protests

I heard the voice inside me say

Yes to the Universe

Yes to God

Yes to you

Yes in concentric circles swirling out

Thought forms in an expanding universe

Orgasm of matter in an ocean of space

Meeting each other face to face

 forgetting your wife

Waves from a meteor plunged in the sea

 at her desk a mile away

Rippling into the universe like a psalm

I remember when you brought me your wound

Placing it in the palm of my hand

The night you, dreaming of the war

Took the remington you kept by the bed

And shot your reflection in the mirror

Thinking it a jap

Killing on instinct

In a country with strange taboos

I remember when you said you could not love me

Although you loved me

We played like Hindu deities

Entwined like spiral galaxies

You brought me so many images then

Mother and Priestess

Virgin and Whore

I had ruined your life you said

Because I wasn’t a virgin when we met, you said

In this country with strange taboos

And I remember when you brought me spider mums

Naming me Circe

She of the beautiful hair

Naming me an illusion and your fear

Saying we had to live celibately

That only in god was there ecstacy

You the torero, killer of bulls

You the marine, killer of men

You the man, killer of me

The killer in Circe’s lair

In this country with stange taboos

You brought your wound and your war and your fear

Home to me here in our bed

Taught me the thorn in the flesh wound of sex

Gradually I learned to live

According to these strange taboos

I learned to go on living and

Sometimes only fucked and judged and fucked and judged

But wanted always only to love

Even with galactic distances between our souls

In recreational sex till the messiah comes

I sought love on the beach and love in the bar

I sought love in the eyes of a stranger

Who looked for all the world like a friend

To help the wound to mend

The gap in the heart of the soul

Till the wound heals and we are whole

Meanwhile

I write confessional poetry

  shadows of

  what should I blame

  a catholic girlhood

  a father’s vice

Some strain across a fault zone in the planet’s heart

Some original sin in my soul

Meanwhile

I write recreational poetry

Kill the messiah every time he comes

  from what

  from fear, from habit

  ego, lack of trust

Some geo-centric allergy to dust

While in my heart I know we must

Love one another body heart and mind and soul

Till the wounds heal and we are whole

And kill these strange tabboos.

A recent news article confirming suspicions that the five recent cuts of undersea fiber optic cables to the Mideast may have been sabotaged got me to thinking that there is an obvious explanation for the cuts. Fiber optic cables are difficult to tap without detection. Unlike copper wire, which can be tapped without breaking the communication stream, a fiber cable has to have a piece of hardware physically inserted into the light path to perform a tap. This produces a detectable outage that can be localized to the tapped segment.

But what if you cut the cable in one place and, while the cable company is readying repairs, you tap another segment of the cable? Nobody knows that you tapped the cable, and nobody knows where it has been tapped. This is the obvious explanation. Bush authorized the massive wiretapping of all the fiber optic cables that lead to Iran. Whether this is a preparation for war or just continuing intelligence activity is anybody’s guess, but it does not give me a warm feeling.

Fort Hood soliders breaking the silence in war in Iraq

A growing number of active duty soldiers or recent Iraq war veterans are speaking up about the war in Iraq.

And with the number of soldiers speaking up about their experiences in Iraq via online forums, blogs and pamphlets,

some vets feel it’s their duty to let the American public know the truth.

This occurred on the 17th, yesterday, outside of Ft Hood Texas, which has a rich history of action by Active Duty and

recent Veterans of the Vietnam Conflict, back than one of many bases, around the country, as well as the world, and In-Country

Vietnam!

The following is a short discussion, abit of a long read, by two Vietnam Veterans, on a VFP/VVAW, group board. The first post is a copy of a question asked and answered by another Vietnam Veteran. The two posts following that are a reply to the original than an answer to that reply.

I would hope that it might help our present Brothers and Sisters, serving in Theaters of War and when they return from, to help find the answers to any questions that may be.

With the Mutiple Tours, Extended Tours, ever Changing Reasons For, and the initial ignorance of what type of Conflict they were led into, as this countries military had already had a long running battle with Guerilla/Insurgent warfare and those lessons still aren’t being applied, there will be many more questions that need answering than even we ‘Nam vets have been seeking answers for, to the closed ears of our Government and the People of this Country.

“There must be some way out of here,” said the joker to the thief, “There’s too much confusion, I can’t get no relief.  

Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth, None of them along the line know what any of it is worth.”

“No reason to get excited,” the thief, he kindly spoke,

“There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke.

But you and I, we’ve been through that, and this is not our fate, So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late.”

All along the watchtower, princes kept the view

While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too.

Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl,

Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl.

Bob Dylan – All Along the Watchtower