Why Johnny Can't Come Home Just Yet

You know, America is a funny kind of animal.

I spent my childhood listening to people talk about how we ought to kick the Soviet's asses, or how we should blow the Middle East off the map. After our involvment in the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, we bailed on the Afghan people.

Do you know why we did that?

Because building a nation is not glorious, it is expensive, and it is hard work...

Which leads me to today's post.

America, for the most part, wants to be done with Iraq, and probably Afghanistan as well. I hear arguments about how we never had any buisiness going into Iraq...OK, so what? Maybe we had no buisiness invading Iraq, there were no WMDs, roger, I get it. We are in Iraq. Hell, I'm posting from Iraq right now.

This is my second tour over here. Things have changed. This country is getting better. I spent quality time dealing with IEDs and RPGs last time. Lots of small arms fire, too.
These days, not so much. I spoke to Iraqis last time who believed that Arab culture could never assimilate Democracy. Yesterday I had a long discussion with a young Iraqi man about how to select a candidate.

Don't get me wrong, there is still an armed insurgency out there, trying to kill off the Democratic process as much as they are trying to kill Americans. But this place is better than it was.

After WWII, we occupied Germany and Japan and reeducated folks. We rebuilt hospitals and schools and roads. The post-war mission was as successful as the war itself.
With Iraq and Afghanistan, we are not only rebuilding roads and schools and hospitals, but in some regions, we are introducing the very concept of infrastructure to the citizens...

We have an obligation to finish what we have started. We don't just owe the Iraqis and Afghanis this, but we owe our posterity.

Pay attention, here's the important part:

Our actions (or lack thereof) after the Soviet War in Afghanistan directly contributed to the events of September 11th, 2001. We had an opportunity to expend a few resources and a little time back then to help a nation get on its feet and join the modern world. We did not take advantage of that, and now we are paying the price. Almost every terrorist organization in the world at this time has had training in Afghanistan. The deadliest terrorist attacks all started in Afghanistan. We could have prevented it.

I'm not just bitching about the past, I am explaining how we need to look at the future. We have got to start learning these lessons from history, folks, or we will repeat them until we are all dead and our way of life a forgotten dream.

There are history lessons that are relevant to any number of our modern day issues.

Wanna know about the economy? Study the economic practices and policies that led to the Great Depression.

Wanna know about immigration reform? Read a history of India, Pakistan, Ukraine, Zimbabwe, Congo, or even Israel.

The information is available for us to know and understand what not to do. In most cases, it isn't too difficult to figure out what should have been done.

But screw it...we got commitees full of congressmen to do that stuff...

Recommended Viewing: Charlie Wilson's War

Integrity, and other stuff

I set aside trifling poitical contests and media enhanced strife to teach a lesson in ethics and humanity.

First of all, let us define integrity-recently I have heard integrity defined as "Doing what is right, even when no one is looking."

This is a pathetic attempt at a sound bite. It is also easy to regurgitate, in the fashion of the American Education System.

It is not, however, the right way to view integrity.

Integrity is not, as suggested, an external force, nor is it easily influenced by external forces. Integrity is the choosing, of one's own free will, to be consistent in choices and actions, so as to maintain self-respect. It means there are lines that you will not cross, no matter what the choice may cost you. I know men with real integrity, and they often miss out on opportunities, simply because they cannot be dishonest, or disloyal, or immoral. These men understand that one does not consider whether anyone is watching, they consider only that they will always know and understand what they have done.

Because at the end of the day, they are the men who have to live with their actions.

I wish so deeply that this country was full of men like this, but it is not. We have all become comfortable with the lie, or with the occasional disloyalty. You have to screw your buddy to get ahead, right? Its just business, right? Everybody else does it, I may as well get mine, right?

All men fail. Every man falls short some time. People disappoint.

Heroes get up again and continue to struggle with their nature, continue to fight to change the world.

Being the best is a work ethic, not an image. Being brave means not that you are unafraid, but that you walk into the fire with your fear under control. Bluster in peace doesn't prepare you for war.

We have churned out generation after generation of boys who think that they are men. A hypercompetitive state exists in these boys, which encourages only more bluster, which leads to emotionally charged decision making. I guess that's OK if you are a ditch-digger, I don't know.

It doesn't work in the Army, and it doesn't work in the media, and it certainly doesn't work in politics.

I hate to think that a man's ingrained insecurities would cause a shift in National Foreign Policy. It seems to me that a man or woman with integrity would avoid such a thing.