What is war? I didn’t say “What is the military?” The military is people coming together for a common cause. Same story, new faces. Different function. What does war impose upon those who engage in it? My great grandfather was a medic in the Second World War. I worked the first half of my life as one in the civilian world. What was our business? Death. In both our work. To be specific it was the mitigation of death. Stopping it. Difficult work. Futile.
Rule number 1:
Young men die in war.
Rule number 2.
Doctors can’t change rule number one.
But it was the mitigation of death. And what is the business of war?
Making money… sorry to break the 4th Wall on that one…
…but the cat’s out of the bag.
And the function of war? Of the military? The invocation of death.
Why do so many people get defensive and angry when I say that the bill WILL come due should our country continue to fund, lie for, and provide weapons and training to brutal authoritarian regimes - with our tax dollars - all while alienating their own poor and working classes by unfettered business monopolies, curated elections, and an increasingly militant police who stands by while peaceful protestors are attacked by extremist counter-protestors.
Within the past month, 72-year-old Dr. Jill Stein, the well-known Green Party presidential candidate was assaulted by two police officers while meeting with encampment members of the Pro-Palestine movement.1 The officers allegedly worked together to shove her to the ground and as she reached out to grasp for support her hand brushed one of the officers before landing on the concrete surface. She was then charged with resisting arrest and felony assault on a police officer. In an interview with Stein she also stated one of the professors among the protest encampment had received several broken ribs by police officers before also being charged with crimes and arrested.
Are we living in a period of time that is seeking revenge? There is always cause for revenge. And it’s okay to think that shit. We want to match people’s energy, even when it means detonating an atom bomb. But do we really go forward with it? 2
Good weapons are instruments of fear; all creatures hate them.
Therefore followers of Tao never use them.
The wise man prefers the left.
The man of war prefers the right.
Weapons are instruments of fear; they are not a wise man's tools.
He uses them only when he has no choice.
Peace and quiet are dear to his heart,
And victory no cause for rejoicing.
If you rejoice in victory, then you delight in killing;
If you delight in killing, you cannot fulfill yourself.
On happy occasions precedence is given to the left,
On sad occasions to the right.
In the army the general stands on the left,
The commander-in-chief on the right.
This means that war is conducted like a funeral.
When many people are being killed,
They should be mourned in heartfelt sorrow.
That is why a victory must be observed like a funeral.
Yes, these cycles in time repeat themselves, but the peopled entrenched in them do not have to. Be the medic. Be the witness. Like the frog in boiling water friends, The Imperial Core of the West is increasingly becoming entrenched in blood. Calling for blood. Live by the sword… you know the rest. This is a plague on both houses. We tear into the fabric of humanity every time, and these things have their way of balancing out. How it looks in the subjective… well that’s the subjective part.
Do we usher the death in? Do we show it the way? Could it be that we could be a close companion to troubling times without invoking them? Perhaps that is what Jenkinson meant when he said that instead of stopping what is happening or becoming a martyr to it (in either direction), to instead be a faithful witness to the days ahead. Someone to tell the story, to be with the people… after.
How do we treat the people who make up the military in this coutnry? No we - the public, we as a government body. How do our institutions of power and beuracracy treat the people in the military when they leave? What do they leave them with?
Militaries have their place. Soldiers have their place. Should we not hold inside of us the heart of a pacifist alongside the discerning mind of a warrior? Soldiers embody the ethos “the group must survive.” It’s why veterans do so well in the labor unions. They know how to work efficiently in a group and achieve a common goal. Moreover, many have the ability to function independently from the group should they need to or be forced to. But the eye cannot see itself, and we often move (or are moved) too fast to see our own movie taking place in real time to see how we become non-playable characters (NPCs) in someone else’s movie. Only they aren’t in a movie. They are playing chess.. with other people’s lives. Real people.
No different than Vietnam, our soldiers are being told to die in foreign lands for ideologies and politics, while those who send them and their allies in the private sector get richer. Reminds me of a song…3
Well, come on Wall Street, don't move slow,
Why man, this is War-a-go-go.
There's plenty good money to be made
By supplying the Army with the tools of the trade,
Just hope and pray that if they drop the bomb,
They drop it on the Viet Cong.
And it's one, two, three,
What are we fighting for?
Don't ask me, I don't give a damn,
Next stop is Vietnam.
And it's five, six, seven,
Open up the pearly gates,
Well there ain't no time to wonder why
Whoopee! we're all gonna die.
Weapons manufacturing (Boeing, Raytheon), consulting (McKinsey & Company), telecommunication (FirstNet/ATT&T), and mercenary services (BlackWater) make up the military-industrial complex and influence nearly every aspect of our day-to-day lives. When those on the inside speak out, they die of mysterious suicides and medical conditions just before those pesky wistleblower depositions. Boeing likes to keep their business “in-house.” Like the Russians!
Memorial Day was a little over a week ago now, a federally recognized holiday in the United States to remember and honor those armed servicemen who have died in combat. All of the banks and government offices are closed. The golf courses are open. The busiessmen and politicians observe their moments of silence on the green while they carve up what is left of this country on the 18th hole.
Yet, in 2024 the American public continues to be denied a federally recognized holiday to ensure that we can be off work to vote for the people who send us to war.
Business is good, isn’t it? Time to change the channel, folks. Who the fuck watches golf in the first place? I’ll turn that channel on when they stop dropping all these bombs on another despite population of brown people and “misfire” a couple onto the Senior PGA tour. Maybe we’d get a new Congress.
I Feel Like I'm Fixin' to Die Rag by Country Joe & the Fish
So well said...You speak to the despair I feel...It is hard work bearing witness...Thank you...