Thank you for your service

I am jumping in but what has this got to do with anything? Monuments? Everyone has them. How would we be better without them?

 

Ever heard of a crazy little thing called "CONTEXT"??

 

If you are going into some long diatribe about it, it is obviously nonsense. Context be (*)(*)(*)(*)ed.

 

I'll explain it.

Some programmed armyboy on here doesn't understand that his opinion are not his own. I had to write him a reality check.

The point is that this nation's monuments are testaments to Lucifer, which reveals the motivations behind amerikas foreign policy.

 

Lol oh, ok.

Hey RiseAgainst, on behalf of all Military members (prior/current) here on PF.com. We just want to take the time to thank YOU, for giving is something entertaining to read and giggle at.

 

Thanks for proving the point of the OP.

 

Care to elaborate?

 

Stop trying to change the subject. You made a claim, now support it with evidence. It's not that hard.

 

The "point" in the OP cannot be proven because it is flat-out wrong. The military is not responsible for the foreign policy that CIVILIANS dictate.

 

There is a great passage from Toltoy's "The Kingom of God Is Within You". Now, I am not a Christian, but I think his words to apply to any person, including atheists like me, who holds to peaceful and moral principles.

"People will ask, perhaps: How ought a subject to behave who believes that war is inconsistent with his religion while the government demands from him that he should enter military service?

This question is, I think, a most vital one, and the answer to it is specially important in these days of universal conscription. All--or at least the great majority of the people--are Christians, and all men are called upon for military service. How ought a man, as a Christian, to meet this demand? This is the gist of Dymond's answer:

"His duty is humbly but steadfastly to refuse to serve."

There are some people, who, without any definite reasoning about it, conclude straightway that the responsibility of government measures rests entirely on those who resolve on them, or that the governments and sovereigns decide the question of what is good or bad for their subjects, and the duty of the subjects is merely to obey. I think that arguments of this kind only obscure men's conscience. I cannot take part in the councils of government, and therefore I am not responsible for its misdeeds.. Indeed, but we are responsible for our own misdeeds. And the misdeeds of our rulers become our own, if we, knowing that they are misdeeds, assist in carrying, them out. Those who suppose that they are bound to obey the government, and that the responsibility for the misdeeds they commit is transferred from them to their rulers, deceive themselves. They say: "We give our acts up to the will of others, and our acts cannot be good or bad; there is no merit in what is good nor responsibility for what is evil in our actions, since they are not done of our own will."

It is remarkable that the very same thing is said in the instructions to soldiers which they make them learn--that is, that the officer is alone responsible for the consequences of his command. But this is not right. A man cannot get rid of the responsibility, for his own actions. And that is clear from the following example. If your officer commands you to kill your neighbor's child, to kill your father or your mother, would you obey? If you would not obey, the whole argument falls to the ground, for if you can disobey the governors in one case, where do you draw the line up to which you can obey them? There is no line other than that laid down by Christianity, and that line is both reasonable and practicable.

And therefore we consider it the duty of every man who thinks war inconsistent with Christianity, meekly but firmly to refuse to serve in the army. And let those whose lot it is to act thus, remember that the fulfillment of a great duty rests with them. The destiny of humanity in the world depends, so far as it depends on men at all, on their fidelity to their religion. Let them confess their conviction, and stand up for it, and not in words alone, but in sufferings too, if need be. If you believe that Christ forbade murder, pay no heed to the arguments nor to the commands of those who call on you to bear a hand in it. By such a steadfast refusal to make use of force, you call down on yourselves the blessing promised to those "who hear these sayings and do them," and the time will come when the world will recognize you as having aided in the reformation of mankind."


What he essentially argues that is that we cannot, just because we are ordered to do so, "give up" responsibility for our actions. We own our selves, and therefore, we own our actions. He refutes the Nuremberg defense 50 years ahead of time.

 

Whatever helps you sleep at night. I know I'd be tempted to go to great lengths to avoid the reality, too.

 

I think you're making your own reality to coincide with what you think you know. But whatever helps you sleep bud.

 

You're a hero, thanks for that.

Thank God you folks killed a million+ Iraqi citizens, they were so close to taking our freedoms away but you folks saved the day. Plus they are religious nutjob brown folks which kind of makes them not fully human, possibly.

 

Million+? You mind letting me read the same information you read?

 

Sorry, 120k. Phew!!! I thought it was something like a significant number. Cleaning off 40 times the people who died on 9/11, in a conflict who had nothing to do with 9/11 is nothing to worry about. Close call there. Drink another beer. We're righteous.

 

Well, no matter how you sway it, 120k is ten times lessthan the original number you listed. You also realize that that 120k is caused by coalition forces....right? 27 of them.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/iraq_orbat_coalition.htm

 

I realize that NATO is the US's accomplices, yes.

 

Okay, I would agree with that, but does that necessarily mean that common soldiers are responsible for the policies that are implemented by political officers and intelligence agencies? How is the lowly private responsible for the Congress' decision to invade Iraq or the President's order to assassinate someone in Yemen? Yes, we could not invade Iraq without the lowly private, I understand that, but we couldn't protect the "nation-state" without him, either. A military, in one form or another, is needed to protect the homeland and enforce its trade and travel rights abroad, and in order to achieve these ends, we must have strict discipline and obedience in the military. This means that privates cannot just go around deciding for themselves which wars to fight. Obviously, there are moral precepts that transcend military "duty", but humans have attempted to codify these precepts via the Geneva Conventions and our military enforces the Conventions more rigorously than any military in history.

 

They are not responsible for the policies, but if someone orders them to kill and they do, then morally they are responsible for their actions.

As the passage pointed out, if a soldier was asked by his commander to detonate a bomb inside the Empire State Building, should he obey that as well. And would he? so where exactly do you draw the line over when a soldier should obey and when he should not?

 

A million Iraqi dead is a small price to pay for the peace of mind it brings to the average American consumer of corporate propaganda.

 

A document cannot abrogate the ownership of your actions. If you don't take ownership and responsibility, it's certain that the politicians won't.

 

The line has been drawn by our Constitution and by the Geneva Conventions.

 

I never said it could abrogate anything. I take sole responsibility for all my actions, good and bad. But labeling our entire military a bunch of criminals and terrorists is taking it a bit far, don't you think? To me, it's much more complex, much more nuanced than that.

 

Morality isn't decided by a piece of paper. As an individual, it does not matter whether you are an ordinary citizen or serving in the army. If you are asked by your superiors to kill unjustly, you say NO.

 

I can't lie. This thread is a perfect representation of my feelings on our military as well. And while I don't have much pride in our military, I do have a little more sympathy for our fighting men than the OP has.

I know a lot of military, and almost every person in the military today treats the military more as a job, and not as some political choice. And people who are only fighting because they are being paid are what? Mercenaries.

Where my sympathies come in is that, because of the state of our economy, I can understand why so many young men and women join the military and stay in the military. Our government is hanging a carrot in front of these desperate young people, and many have few other options.

The few people who don't join the military because its a job, are usually the barely 18 children of some religious or political nutjob. And these impressionable young people tend to be told from a young age how war is peace, and how Muslims are the devil.


But yes, I do get sick and tired of people telling me how I'm supposed to revere out military. I don't. They are just people doing a job. I don't remember the last time our military did something that actually protected our actual freedoms. Instead they are used to "protect American interests", which has absolutely nothing to do with freedom.