DEJA VOODOO
It seems like only yesterday.
Back in the day when Americans still believed their government was led by its best and brightest and operated with noble intention, we allowed ourselves to be drawn into an undeclared war over ideology that cost thousands of lives, billions of dollars, and incalculable trust in the leadership of our nation. Vietnam was more than a failed military endeavor in the jungles of Southeast Asia; it was a self-inflicted gut wound to the body politic. It was a defeat for which we suffered decades after the last helicopter flew from the roof of our embassy in Saigon.
You’d think we’d have learned from our mistakes. And you’d be wrong if you did.
Once again we find ourselves involved in an undeclared war - this time in the desert sands of the Middle East- waging an ideological battle against enemies who hide among our allies, for allies who are hurting us more than helping us, in a country that, incredibly, is worse off now than when we first arrived to “liberate it”. Once more our objectives are muddled and imprecise, our military strategy is flawed, and our best reason for “staying the course” is that we’d rather lose more later than less now. Thirty years after Vietnam, our leadership is once again, accusing its critics of being unpatriotic, and questioning its citizenry’s right to dissent. Thousands of lives and billions of dollars into this latest quagmire, faith in our government is at a low ebb, cynicism at a high water mark, and our leadership is talking ‘troop surges” and “hearts and minds” as if George Santayana’s often quoted but rarely heeded caution (that) “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” is more a proscription for success than a dark and ominous warning.
At the end of the Vietnam war, two schools of thought emerged. One held that we lost the war because of a failure of will –that had we escalated our efforts we ultimately would have succeeded. The current administration is clearly of this mindset, as evidenced by its willingness to double down its chips like a gambling addict with a bad hand. Iraq, however, is a killing field and not a casino, and the stakes on the table are our sons’ and daughters’ lives. If the most outspoken architects of the war had ever served their country in active combat themselves, or had their own flesh and blood on the next plane to Baghdad, their testosterone-fueled policies would be no less misguided. Under the circumstances, however, their willingness to bet other people’s children like house money is nothing short of craven.
The other school of thought holds that the lesson of Vietnam is that it is impossible to impose a system of beliefs upon a people who are unwilling or unable to embrace it; that no amount of guns or bombs or troops or rhetoric can change that reality; and that any government that tells us otherwise is a government not to be trusted. This is the lesson that my children –that America’s children- are learning with every passing day of this horrible, horrible war. We are creating a new generation of cynics here at home. Once again, we are proving to be our own worst enemy. It’s deja voodoo all over again.
Jack
