MY TIME TO SERVE

I did not serve in the Vietnam War, though my graduating class was the last class to be conscripted into military service. How I escaped the draft is a long story which starts with a handout manual provided by the United Friends Service Committee, and the Selective Service that was a step or two behind the anti-war movement in 1968.

That was the existential threat of my graduating cohort, and those that came before. The Domino Theory turned out to be an unnecessary fear and a mere hypothesis. In truth, I have not favored many of the wars and military actions that were to follow, with the possible exception of the war in Kosovo back in the early 1990s. Most of them can be attributed to one particular party. Vietnam can be shared by both party's, but JFK was sacrificed to Mars so that the war could go on and businesses that were riding the big waves of profits could afford vacation homes on the Costa Del Sol. It's ironic, I typed Costa del Sol, autocorrect changed it to Costa Del Soul. Concurrently with the early years of the Vietnam War 1953, the CIA sent some agents to Iran to overthrow a legitimately elected leader, Mohamed Mossedeh. He was democratically elected, unlike how people get elected in red states. But he had the crazy notion that Iran's oil belonged to the people who curl their toes in that sand. He had to go, to protect British Petroleum. That didn't work out so well. Took 25 years for the payback  that would happen. 

It took nearly that long to declare a truce and scurry out of Vietnam. Getting out was not easy, it never is. Images of boat people would haunt the decade of the 70's. And then, before that decade was out, Iranian militants got their payback. They held our embassy staff in Iran for 444 days. That was not to become a shooting war, though a couple helicopters and some of their crew were lost in an escape attempt gone wrong. Good news though, the Republican presidential candidate at the time had become diplomatic friends with people in the Ayatallah Kohmeni regime. Iran held our embassy staff the better part of 3 months after the 1980  election until that candidate could be sworn in as POTUS. The deal was that we would sell Iran, through diplomatic channels, and with Israel's participation, anti-tank munitions. The money exchanged would go to support the insurrection of the Contra's in a small Central American country famous for Chiquita bananas. A conflict that Congress had specifically prohibited. Nothing to see there. Between dodging the flack from the Iran-Contra scandal and managing the trickle of the trickle-down from Arthur Laffer's laughable curve President Reagan figured we needed a brisk little war that we could win, so he invaded Grenada, a tiny island nation where doctors were trained on the cheap. He chose Oliver North to plan the invasion. Which took place in a tropical gale. We did manage to win there, but with great moral cost. Republicans have a phrase they use when preventing health care improvements, Moral Hazard. As best as I can figure out, it means that public Healthcare could lead to more people needing Healthcare and how can you tell them from people who want Healthcare. And we invaded a country that trains doctors on the cheap.

In the ensuing years succeeding presidents would show our military strength in Panama and then Gulf War I, where we saved an oil country from stealing oil by a want-to-be oil country. George H W Bush was president. Then we fought in Kosovo to protect the Muslim inhabitants from abuse by the Serbs. That was Bill Clinton who was known for stem-winder speeches and other oral feats. 

President Clinton was followed by another Bush, best known for his colorful artwork, George W Bush. A mere shrub to his father. Bush became president in a new millennium and he started a millennial war. In Iraq and Afghanistan. A terrorist bombing on 9-11 by some Islamic terrorists, mostly Saudi, which struck at the heart of our economy led us to choose a different Arab country to attack, Iraq. Iran was purported to have had oodles of weapons of mass destruction. None were found. They were turned in by a fellow held by German intelligence who went by the name, Curveball. Of the two wars in adjoining hemispheres, Iran was the least tolerated by voters. That and a recession that happened during the presidential election caused the next president to be from the Democratic party. As a consequence, Barack Obama became President and not John McCain. A large controlling block of Republican voters did not like that there was a black family in the Whitehouse. They were even offended that the First Lady grew an organic garden, and President Obama wore a tan suit. President Obama did not invade any countries, though he did not leave Iran as soon as we would have liked. By the end of President Obama's second term, Afghanistan was the only war still being fought. 

Donald Trump was elected on promises to keep us out of war. Actually he made a lot of promises. For a while it looked like he would keep that one. He did keep us out of war for his first term. He even made a treaty with Afghanistan's Taliban militants to end the war. On unfavorable terms for the incoming president, Joe Biden. You could not expect better from a small-minded, vexatious group of people as the racist/fascist wing of the Republican party that were driven into a frenzy by Ex-president Trump.

 I am now in the waning years of my life. Once more we are confronted with an existential threat, this time from within. Whether we live through this threat or not, we must fight however effectively we can to defeat this threat from within, or face an uncertain future for those who follow us. Actually, that future is pretty certain. We will become another authoritarian state, one of an increasing number of authoritarian governments that are no longer pushing the  rock of democracy uphill. And now we're at war, again. With Iran. And the United States has never had more incompetent people in important public offices. Or more corrupt. Welcome to the waining days of the Roman Empire.