Fifth of July

Yesterday was Independence Day. The first news of independence I received yesterday was from an old Army buddy. He had an eye problem that was threatening him with blindness. His ophthalmologist worked out a way to save his sight. So my good friend won't need a white cane or seeing eye dog. He'll be able to walk and drive, even ride his Harley. That's good news about independence.

My family went to the Fourth of July celebration on the river. It was lovely. Toward evening, the temperature dropped and a light breeze sprang up. We listened to the music and were comfortable. My two sons-in-law explored the breweries here in Little Rock and found some beers that were very much to their taste. They were noisily happy on the ride home.

But there were other things that I did not like so well. They were nice gestures, well meaning and they put me ill at ease. When the Little Rock Symphony began their part of the concert, the conductor asked all members of the armed forces, past and present, to stand. My daughters urged me to stand and I did. But as I stood, I could not help but remember the friends I left in Vietnam. The memories were not just of the dead (my company was remarkably fortunate during my tour; they were very few) but of the people I spent a year with who did not answer the letters or wrote back that writing to a buddy brought back too many harsh memories. Those friends were lost to me as were the ones whose addresses I never managed to obtain.

At the end of the concert, during the 1812 Overture, the fireworks started. They were magnificent, the best I have seen in Little Rock. The pyrotechicians fired them from the Main Street Bridge, over the Arkansas River. But as I watched, I remembered what they had been originally. The black red air bursts that showered shrapnel down on soldiers, the white smoke that meant white phosphorus had been used. The horrible burns that it inflicted, how they would not stop burning unless the doctors put the soldier into some oxygen free medium and removed the glowing particles in the dark. Those were not good memories.

What I experienced was not the flat panic of a flash back. I just was remembering the purpose of those explosions originally. What we and others have turned into beauty are deadly serious in war. They can injure or kill inexperienced people who try to fire them without the precautions on all their labels. Never-the-less, I enjoyed my day and the evening. It was good to be with so many people I love and so many others whose sole purpose was celebration.

Comparing Iraq and Vietnam

As promised last month, I have been thinking about the similarities and differences between the war we fought 40 years ago and the one we are fighting today.

To begin, both were started as the result of faulty intelligence and theories that just didn't pan out. Both were divisive for Americans since there were strong anti-war groups protesting our involvement. Both have stretched much longer than the administration starting them calculated. It is a point for debate if either was necessary for the security of the United States. Neither war attracted the hoped for allies. Finally, neither could be won on the terms that the administration of the time wanted.

Some gross differences were, the draft. Although many of the soldiers serving in Vietnam were volunteers like me. There was conscription at the time. Quite a few men of draftable age agonized over whether they would have to go and fight. Some even fled to other countries to avoid this. Iraq/Afghanistan is strictly volunteer. Every troop fighting there volunteered for duty in the armed services, even if they did not think, at the time, that they would have to go to war. The attitude of the anti-war movement was distinctly different. Most returning from the present conflict have been welcomed whether people agreed with the war or not. Vietnam returnees were greeted with hostility, even violence against them. The wounds caused by that reception have not yet healed for many.

In Vietnam, the US was supporting a government, a corrupt, inefficient government to be sure, but a government. While elections have been held in both Iraq and Afghanistan, the elected governments there are powerless beyond the security of their capitols. Without an effective central government, both countries will either continue in violence or the power will be ceded to local leaders.

Forty years ago, our troops were fighting just two opponents, the North Vietnamese Army and the Viet Cong. In Iraq/Afghanistan, there more factions than I can count fighting each other and the US. It is this high number of combatant groups, with mostly different objectives that makes the job in the mid east very difficult.

The United States is faced with what is called "non-centric" warfare. That is, instead of a capitol like Hanoi or fixed bases, the mid eastern opponents are dispersed through the population. Command and control are accomplished in many cases, without the individual fighters having to actually meet with their commanders. Unfortunately, that makes the common problem that sometimes a soldier doesn't know which of those people out there are friends and which want to kill him/her.

While in both conflicts, the enemy was flexible and could retake areas left by the Army, there is a difference in Iraq. Soldiers and police are being trained to keep the peace in their neighborhoods, Iraqi soldiers and police who can hold their areas and prevent terrorists from returning... for the present.

The major difference is (I think) that it is possible to achieve peace and stability in Iraq where in Vietnam, it could only happen if we had been prepared to completely conquer North Vietnam and protect both the north and south from their neighbors for at least 30 years. The kind of government that develops in the middle east won't be the type President Bush was thinking of when he pushed for elections. Hopefully, it will be something new that fits the region and religion.

There is more. But I'm going to have to ponder some to be able to write it.

pre-introduction to the wars

Rosalie Lepowski, an old friend has asked me to talk about the Vietnam War and its similarity to the present war in Iraq and Afghanistan. That's going to take some time to think out.

There are certain things that are familiar. Both wars were started from faulty intelligence and bad interpretation of it. In both, by entering, we upset the balance of power and made sure that if we left too soon, there would be very undesirable results.

But there are also some non-congruencies too. In Vietnam, we were supporting a strong, but corrupt government. We paid little attention to establishing real democracy there. Our troops were despised when they came home. In Iraq and Afghanistan, non of these are true. We have tried to establish working democracies in both countries. Each government is weak, not having even enough power to control their capitals, much less the rest of the country. And our soldiers are greeted as heros when they return. Sadly, their return is all too short with many of them starting their third tour in less than five years.

I'm going to think and write more about this.