George Bush is Stripping Our Military of Honor

To paper over the fact that he is destroying our military by overextending it, President Bush has hired professional mercenaries by the thousands. I have a stake in this decision: it dishonors my son's choice to volunteer to serve as a Marine.

After 9/11 my Marine son served two combat tours in Afghanistan, one shorter mission to Iraq and participated in several missions to other hot spots in the Global War on Terror. He had volunteered in 1999. It is the spirit of selflessness that my son and thousands of other men and women embraced by volunteering that the president is squandering.

Today our war machine includes "contractors" who are not fighting for love of country but for love of money. They are from all over the world and literally no more than hired guns. The fact that some of them are former U.S. military personnel changes nothing. It just shows that the line between a patriotic all-volunteer force and a mercenary force is blurring. It also shows that some men and women in the U.S. military have figured out that there is a chance to make a buck out of a decadent county that asked them to be willing to sacrifice everything while most Americans act like there is no war.

(Just for the record I don't think we should be in Iraq. But my point here isn't about the war in Iraq per se. It is about how Bush has "led" our country as Commander in Chief.)

Since President Bush didn't have the courage to call for a draft and/or level with the American people and tell us that we would all need to sacrifice to do the job right in Iraq he sent two armies to war in our name: our actual military and a mercenary force.

Today we have about 160,000 military people in Iraq and another 130,000 mercenaries, sometimes called contractors. The tradeoff is that Bush can pretend that the military can handle a war it is in fact is too small to fight.

Even after tours have been extended, after the same men and women are asked to go back to Iraq again and again and again, after the underhanded and unofficial draft of "stop loss" is used to coerce the men and women who did volunteer into extended involuntary service, even after recruiting standards for the Army have been lowered and "signing bonuses" -- in other words, bribes -- have increased, our military still can't cope.

This isn't the fault of our military. It is the fault of an inept cowardly Commander in Chief. He has tried to have a war without paying the price politically, for instance, by honestly saying we needed to double the size of the military and raise taxes, and call for a draft.

In 2004 when I was doing research for Baby Jack, (my novel about the Marines, and issues about class structures and who serves and who doesn't) I lived on Parris Island while observing Marine recruit training. This privilege was especially meaningful to me because I was literally following in my son's footsteps. Knowing my son was part of the outstanding and fabled Marine brotherhood was humbling, especially because I never served.

The world might be a cynical place but that cynicism had not infected the Marines training the recruits or the recruits. The words posted all over the squad bays (barracks) "honor, courage and commitment" were taken seriously and lived.

One evening I was with a platoon nearing the end of three months of training. They were gathered around their SDI (senior drill instructor). He said, "Who hasn't told his story yet?"

Hands went up. The SDI barked out a name. A recruit spoke.

"This recruit was bouncing around in confusion. And he joined the Marines because of the war."

"Aye, recruit," murmured the other recruits.

The SDI barked out another name.

"This recruit is from Guatemala and moved to New Jersey with his mom when he was 12, and this recruit is 0-300, infantry-he joined because his friend was killed in Iraq and this recruit went down to the recruiting station the day of his friend's funeral. This recruit hopes to soon become an American citizen."

"Aye, recruit," from all the recruits.

"This recruit joined to see the world."

"This recruit joined to show my friends I had bigger balls than they do."

"This recruit joined because his dad's a Marine."

"This recruit joined because wanted to be proud of something."

"This recruit wants to get all his bad habits out."

"This recruit wants to protect his family."

"This recruit will be the happiest person alive in just one week, because he will be a Marine!"

Thunderous: "AYE RECRUIT!"

During hundreds of hours of conversations with Marines and recruits I learned that what had attracted most recruits to the Marine Corps, whatever their individual reasons, was the mystique of the Corps. They wanted to be part of something "bigger than myself." And they were being trained by DIs who believed in their mission, Marine traditions and the fabled history of the USMC, and who were also cheerfully working 18-hour days while earning less than they would flipping hamburgers. And these DIs were telling me that they felt privileged to be training tomorrow's Marines.

When my son was ending his second deployment to Afghanistan he was offered several "contractor" jobs for literally five to 10 times the pay he'd been earning as a Marine. He declined. He wanted to go to college, something he had delayed doing for five years while in the Marines. But there was also another reason: my son loves the United States Marine Corps. He doesn't love war. He had absorbed the honorable selfless ethic of the Marine Corps. He was a citizen soldier, not a professional hired gun.

Near the end of his second deployment to Afghanistan, John called home. My wife, Genie, was away so I grabbed a note pad and took notes so she wouldn't miss anything. I typed up what my son said word-for-word.

"I could make good money once I'm out of the Corps, if I wanted to get a job as a civilian contractor, but I don't want to... It isn't that I think what we're doing [in Afghanistan] is wrong. It's the right thing and absolutely necessary. The people we're after are really terrible. They have to be stopped... But I can't spend my life in this... One war is enough, at least for me... I think with any luck I'll be home for Thanksgiving; if not, then by Christmas... I'll tell you one thing: I never want to see another gun!"

I think what my son expressed was the traditional view of service that many a former Marine, soldier, airman, sailor or Coast Guard would recognize as their own. You serve your country then move on. Violence and killing are the sad realities of war, but nothing you want to do for a moment longer than duty requires. It's not about money. It's about our country and the man or woman standing next to you who depends on you.

We have a president who, unlike many other American wartime leaders, for instance Roosevelt, has no children of his own in uniform. There is no boot camp graduation picture of a beloved child on the President's desk. If there were Bush would care about the honor of our military. And he would not be asking our military to work with mercenaries who would work for anyone or any cause where the money is right.

Our military is overstretched. The president's "solution" is to hire mercenaries by the tens of thousands and spend billions of dollars on them, and then pass the enormous bill to someone else's grandchildren, just like someone else's children are fighting Bush's war while his own military-age daughter goes on a gold-plated book tour.

There is a better long term answer: the president should stand up and ask all age-appropriate Americans, including members of his own elite class and his own family, to volunteer. He could have done that after 9/11. He didn't. He told Americans to go shopping.

Instead of asking Americans to share in the sacrifice made by a few, the president is trying to buy his way out. In doing so he is dishonoring those who have volunteered. He has also stripped away the last vestiges of what was once a citizen military.

Baby Jack is now available in paperback. Frank's memoir, CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (OR Almost All) Of It Back, has also just been published.

Comments

[rfc1394]

I disagree with the idea of having a draft. It is unnecessary, and it is wrong. Personally I believe that the draft is involuntary servitude. Second, not having a draft prevents politicians like the one in the White House from using virtually unlimited conscript labor from doing the exact same thing he is doing right now with "stop-loss orders," which I also believe is a bad idea.

But, notwithstanding my own personal preferences, consider me, for a moment, "old blood and guts," willing to do whatever is necessary to get the job done. And a draft is unnecessary. For one very simple reason: being a soldier is a serious, professional job requiring serious technical capability equivalent to any relatively complicated profession. You do not want forced conscripts doing that kind of work any more than you'd want a surgeon who did not want to be there to perform brain surgery on you. When the country is attacked, there would be no shortage of people willing to volunteer to respond. There wasn't after Pearl Harbor and if it had been asked, I'm sure there would have been no shortage on September 12, 2001.

Because if you demand conscripts who don't want to be there, you'll have problems, as I put it in the book I am writing, "Being a soldier is a professional job that is as difficult as any highly technical operation, you don't want to have people who resent being forced to do it. Otherwise you get the sort of situation they had in Vietnam in my world, where ersatz soldiers, believing themselves to be considered expendable cannon fodder, drank and drugged themselves into a stupor to escape."

Paul Robinson - http://paul-robinson.us (My Blog)

[janmB]

You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war.
Albert Einstein

[usapatriot1973]

Considering Bush is the most un-American U.S. president in history, it should come as no surprise that he would strip away the honor (or at least attempt to) of the military. Bush has no honor. The mission was indeed accomplished, as the mission always has been to funnel billions of taxpayer dollars into the coffers of the oil/gas companies, Halliburton, and other war-profiteering corporation that the two biggest corporate whores, Bush and Cheney, serve.

[LewisWalsh]

The remarks by President Bush on November 1, 2007 invoking history to justify his agenda has provoked my attention.

Determining whether a police state exists can only be accomplished after the damage is well underway, however, there are early signs that can warn of looming despotic rule.

Anti-democratic governments are skilled at masking themselves as protectors of the people. In relying on history, Mr. Bush is correct.

The signs of an impending police state are sometimes difficult to recognize, but potential tyrants will invariably point to various entities - they can be nations, ethnic or religious groups - that they pronounce to be evil. Most often, they will distill the device to a single individual. At the same time, would-be tyrants themselves will approve torture, spying on their own citizens and they will disavow internationally established moral codes and agreements that require humane treatment of adversaries. In addition, they will attempt to economically, or in other ways, destroy the credibility of those who oppose them.

Police state types do not hesitate to initiate armed hostilities if it is deemed necessary to create anxiety within the populace. They will certainly maintain cozy relationships with domestic business leaders who can be of service to them and, they are happy to provide for the economic desires of this group to the disadvantage of the general populace.

Would-be despots are very aggressive internationally; they tend to ignore diplomatic opportunities. They will flout international treaties and care little when world opinion to turns against them. They will often reach far back in history, point to tyrannies of the past and they will promise to prevent such occurrences in the future, if they are given unusual (undemocratic) powers. Most often, they will seek outrageous military expenditures in times of peace; they will call it a time of war even though there will unlikely exist out-ward signs in everyday life of any sort of siege or sustained violent attacks.

Are there signs of approaching Big Brother rule in the United States? Each citizen is obligated to consider the possibility.

[Moralfiberseeker]

Frank,

Your excellent article had one phrase that I'll use out of the context in which you used it "GWB didn't have the courage". There could be various sentences continued after those words. ie....... to serve his country as a jet pilot even though we spent $million$ to train his lame ass. ie....to listen to advice from the generals and his Sec. of State and retired general Colin Powell before he "the decider" followed the lead of Turd,Darth, Rummy, Wolfy and the rest of the neocons as they lied and schemed their way into the biggest clusterf@#$
that the world has ever seen. Oh wait, they say that the war has helped the economy(yeah), of the fat cat neocons that bought the worst government $ can buy.

Honor?? W.asshole and the rest of the draft dodgers that put him him in power so that they could make billions "supporting" our underpaid and overexposed soldiers. Because the cabal is so inept, his corrupt benefactors don't have to bother to keep track of the billions they are stealing. What for? They know how to hide behind executive privilege, "classified" info and attacking anyone that questions them as unpatriotic.

It is time for the Republicans, hawks, and other idiots like bondaroid that still believe these crooks to pull their heads out of their butts. Honor our military structure and all soldiers and marines that have been dreadfully weakened by the arrogant and idiotic failures of this pathetic regime. Find the moral fiber to admit that you have been duped. If you are one of the SOBs that have profited from this war, I wish you the KARMA and POX that you, Prince and other thieves deserve.

[BushStoleMyRights]

Great article Frank - this hits right at home as my son was recently stop-lossed and now is in his 3rd tour of hell.

The Army has huge morale problems and the number of shoulders that have actually thought about hurting themselves so they won't get deployed again is quite common.

My son chose to not reup and had to face tons of scrutiny and discrimination when promotions are available. He did a very simple cost benefit analysis and very quickly realized the extra money ( enough to buy a 40" LCD )wasn't worth his time.

So they promote a less qualified candidate, one who never had any previuous combat duty, as their team leader. They now get deployed.

Fancy that, yer getting shot at from 3 different positions and you look for your team lead , who was promoted in front of you, for direction on how to save your squad from the ambush only to see his ass and your LT. buried in the fetal position on the ground with their heads covered up. Story has a happy ending thanks to my son - he emptied every shell available from his SAW and had another close their flank down. That team found a new leader that day - one that is a full rank lower than their team lead. The team lead and LT. both got Bronze stars for their heroism.

This business is broke way beyond what a 8-9 paragraph article can provide.

Bush and Cheney need impeached and should be held for war crimes.

[razajac]

I think I understand the negative impact of the mercenary mentality on the prospects for long-term Iraq stability. This also dovetails with my perception that, indeed, the "Mission" *was* "Accomplished" way back when; the mission being creating a money drain to preclude U.S. government social efficacy. As long as mercenaries create an atmosphere in which there is an understanding among Iraqis that the U.S. doesn't really give a shit about their plight, we can expect this war to drag on, to the delight of U.S. beneficiaries of such a state of misery and chaos.

But I want to comment on the positive tenor of this piece with respect to the USMC.

It's always been my understanding that the USMC is largely an "official" paramilitary group. When you look at their history, it seems pretty obvious to me that they exist to do jobs too politically dirty for the regular military. If sending the Army to, say, overthrow a democratically elected regime would sully the historical record of the U.S., then somehow the Marines possess a "degree of separation" that is supposed to immunize the American legacy from shame when they undertake these kinds of operations.

I think that's the real (psychological) deal behind the honor-on-steroids Marines culture. Sorry; that's just the way I've come to see it after much reading and reflection.

[LoriAnn]

No matter what the political bend I think we would all say thank you for your families service and for penning this important read.

[reddirtmarine]

I served as a junior officer in some of the worst fighting of '67-'68 in Vietnam. The last time I can remember some true UNITY in our Country was in the sad end years of Vietnam. My USMC experience couldn't have been better, our draftees fought with just as much tenacity as the finest Annapolis trained Lt's. We had the SHARED BURDEN of combat. White, Latin, Black, somewhere in between, our idenity was our unit. I have never again seen such daily shared toil as we together struggled to achieve the mission. Key, I believe, to straighting out this MESS is to establish a US NATIONAL SERVICE. Every young Man and Woman should serve some form of National Service for 2-3 years. The choices could be as broad as nursing, firefighting, teaching, conservation and my personal favorite: grunt. I met, lived with, shared feelings with, and yes, died with, people of all classes, ethnic and cultural backgrounds. One of the reasons I am proud to have served as a Marine was this spirit I was taught of "can do". It has served me well in several careers as I don't have much trouble figuring out where people are comming from. This country is so divided and the obscene $$ that seem to drive most relationships today just baffels me. The current Burns WWII production on PBS is quite instructive of where we have gone wrong. Unfortunately, to right the ship, we're going to have to "take back" from some of the hogs at the trough. At this point, Big Business and their K street lobby are RUNNING this country. W has done their bidding, Nancy Pelosi has become so arrogant she's "taken the i word off the table". Who gave her the right to change the Constitution. W. has stripped the military and this country of its honor.

[RobertPaul]

Here's what it boils down to:
Gen. Shinseki told Congress that it would take 300,000 men (and women) to occupy Iraq after we took control.

Well...let's see...160,000 US Troops plus 130,000 Mercenaries ...well that seems to equal right around 300,000!

And Shenseki was fired because Wolfowitz "knew better."

I rest my case.

[saami]

Can this discussion be civilized and on point instead of this hateful BS. We need to stop this war and bring our troops home and rebuild our country's infrastructure, provide healthcare for all and educate our kids. We are so off base and we are leaving our kids with debt they will struggle to pay off. Bush doesn't care about the military or for that matter anyone except the fat cats that put him in power and are his true base. Oil men make lots of money off his presidency and his threats of war with Iran drive the price of oil up. The pattern is clear. Bush needs to go. Maybe if congress started the impeachment process that might just scare the bastard enough not to completely destroy not only the military but our national honor.

[Caddisfly]

I suppose the crux of the matter is that Bush does not have the slightest idea as to what honor really is, he seems to possess none himself.

[newworldman777]

Good article. As of late, the noble efforts of our soldiers are unfortunately being overshadowed by the troubling behavior of those thuggish mercenaries. Those overpaid "guns-for-hire" are a warped reflection of our greedy capitalistic society, the preponderance of which places too much emphasis upon -- even to the point of worshipping -- the almighty dollar. They are there for the money and nothing else. They are foreigners in a strange land who don't understand the people or the culture -- nor do they seem to care to understand them. They have cultivated an image of being bullies who will shoot first and ask questions later, with a "kill them all, and let God sort them out" kind of mentality. Not good for America's image, to say the least. Such disturbing and aggressive behavior is undermining our "mission" in Iraq (whatever the latest "mission" may be that Bush and his cronies are extolling). They are creating Iraqi hatred for Americans in general, and our soldiers are paying the ultimate price for that hatred.

Now, I hear that the State Department has secretly granted those Blackwater "guards," who were involved in the massacre in Baghdad, some sort of "immunity" for their cooperation in the investigation of the murders. I'm sure that this news will do wonders for America's image in the Muslim world -- hell, the ENTIRE world, for that matter. The message from this fiasco: If trigger-happy American mercenaries kill Iraqi civilians, then they can avoid full punishment by cooperating with authorities, even if that cooperation helps the authorities to eventually determine that they murdered innocent civilians. Is this the kind of message that we should be sending to the world regarding our misguided -- even criminal -- endeavors in the Middle East? I think not.

[newworldman777]

If the authorites wanted the Blackwater guards involved in that shooting to "cooperate" with them, then offering them immunity was a mistake. A much more reliable method of obtaining the truth from those individuals would have been their use of "waterboarding." This administration defends the use of this torture (oops...Bush had "torture" redefined to suit his needs, didn't he...) to get valuable information from individuals. If they waterboarded these Blackwater guards, then they could not only get the truth from them, but they could also administer the full punishment upon them which they deserve. We could then show the world that we are serious about doing the right thing, instead of being a bunch of hypocrites who tell others to do as we say, not as we do.

[earthstar]

Thank you for speaking on behalf of all of our military sons and daughters.

[Archie1955]

Unfortunately patriotism may lead to war crimes and always enables criminal leadership to practice their bloodthirsty outrages against the world. In this case marines are enabling crimes against humanity. Please don't tell me that all the deaths of little innocent children is just part of war. Of course it is and that's why war should never be the first choice as it was in Iraq. Read my lips "Iraq was not associated with the Taliban, Al Queda or Islamic extremism". Get it? Saddam Hussein considered these groups competitors and would not allow them to get a foothold in Iraq. Of course they may be there now as a direct result of U.S. marines being there. Have I made my point yet? Being a marine or other military member of an imperial power is enabling that imperial power to destroy lives innocent and "guilty?" whether or not it has a genuine security component. In the case of Iraq you are liberating them...of their OIL and that's all your liberating them of! Open your eyes for Heaven's sake.

[BoulderSue]

Dear Archie,
My stepdaughter attended and graduated fro th U.S Naval Academy and chose to join the Marines as a helicopter pilot. She finished flight training just in time for the Iraq war. Her job was to to pick up the wounded and fly medicines and other supplies to where they we were needed. At that time her group spent their free time (one of the group spoke Arabic) visiting villages in their area. They drove in medicines and treats for the kids. They played soccer with the kids and were frequently invited into homes for tea or meals. On her second deployment, they were not allowed off her FOB except to fly (mostly at night because it "made them harder to hit"-we only know that she came under fire because of her decorations, not because she would talk about it). She came home and voted for John Kerry, and at the first opportunity resigned from the Marines and joined the Coast Guard, I think bcauseshe saw this as a more positive way to serve her country. She lost two levels in rank. She had lost friends in Iraq and surely saw things none of us should have to see. We are proud or her, even though we oppose the war in Iraq. Archie, if you would change you argument slightly to BLIND patiotism, I would agree with you almost completely. I have never asked her about how she felt about private contractors, just because she is so reticent about her experiences. She is genuinely very touchy about it, but I will. My gut feeling is that she doesn't think much of them, and I'll probably get a very succinct negative answer if I get one at all.

[ibsteve2u]

Well-stated, Mr. Schaeffer.

Watching this "president" through the shades of military experience is not easy.

You do a good job of capturing the conflict inherent to any attempt to reconcile the selfless idealism many volunteers are perhaps over-endowed with and the cesspool of self-interest this Administration represents.

[jwod]

Not blame the leadership of the military as well as the President? From Rumsfeld on through the generals, none had the balls to stand up to the mismanagement obvious to us civilians. Peter Pace, and the rest of the highly paid, no-opinion experts let Rumsfeld do away with Shinseki, and put his WalMart military into combat. Low prices all the time, since the cost of the contractors don't seem to be broken out, and added to the war budget, and the public price of the war. We could pay at least 5 soldiers/marines from the dollars we pay for each mercenary, and have half a million troops in Iraq, when and if necessary, if the ball-less generals and Bremer had publically declared their need. This war (Iraq) is a travesty in purpose, management, and strategy. And if 'Nam, Lebanon, and Somalia didn't destroy us as a credible military adversary, Iraq has. And they're talking about Iran??????????