The Benefit of Perspective

I'm just about the oldest guy I know.

In fact, I consider myself a 25 year-old fellow held hostage in an octegenarian's body.  Against my will.  And not liking it one little bit, BTW.

Age carries with it a number of negatives.  It's sort of like a 1987 Honda Civic with 198,000 hard miles on the clock.  But it still runs.  The rear mail seal leaks oil all over the driveway, the brakes are shot, the tires are bald, but it still runs.  I'm sorta' like that.  But besides an elephant's memory, it also provides me with one important benefit:  

                      Perspective.

I was born during the Second World War.  And chances are pretty good that you, my loyal readers, know nothing about that experience.  In fact, the median age for Americans is now right about 39.1 years.  Meaning only about half of you know what it means to pay a price for your freedom.  To be forced to don a uniform, pick up a weapon and defend your country.  Against enemies sworn to kill you.  So let me bring you up to speed...

55% of our Country's Gross National Product during WW2 was engaged in fighting that War.  And more than 16% of all our citizens fought in that War at one time or another.  Both men and women.  Nearly 2,000,000 of our young men and women were in uniform, fighting that War at any one time.  And they fought it on two Axis Power fronts; Europe against the Nazis, and in the Pacific against the Japanese.

I recall my Mom staining her legs with lemon juice because she couldn't buy silk stockings.  Silk was reserved by our Government to make parachutes for our soldiers.  For our boys, "over there."

My folks were issued coupons to buy coffee, and flour, and meat, and other common items.  Even tires for the family car were rationed, as we needed all the rubber we could produce to fight the War.  The Ford Motor Company built a village outside of Detroit to make B-25 "Mitchell" bombers.  It was covered by camouflage netting to protect it from being bombed by the enemy.  You might be surprised to learn that they produced a brand new, battle-ready B-25 bomber every hour on the hour, around the clock.  And that most of the people who made those airplanes were American women.

And they produced more than 10,000 of them. 

That's how engaged our private industry was during the Big War.  The Remington typewriter company made some of our very best battle rifles, as an example.  General Motors made thousands of Jeeps.  They were called "General Purpose."  Hence, the nickname, "Gp."

I cannot recall anyone bitching or moaning about the War.  We knew it was a War for survival.  If we lost we knew we'd be speaking German.  Or Japanese.  And likely placed in interment camps.  No one asked when the War would be over.  It would be over when we won.  Or lost.  And it went on for years.  And anyone showing disfavor over the War or its length would be viewed as a potential traitor.  So no one did...

The 2nd World War was our last declared War.  Even though we've had two dozen military actions since then, none have been declared as such.  The Korean "War" was declared a "Police Action."  Viet Nam was declared a "Military Action."  Grenada and Panama and Afghanistan and Iraq were declared "Military Involvements."  Men in suits, sitting around big conference tables, sent our young men and women off to die in far-off places.  Without even a declaration as to why.  

And that's almost criminal in my book.   

Almost none of the people I know were among them.  They've lived in a bubble.  All the people you bump into each day have enjoyed freedom from worry for more than 6 decades.  Freedom bought for them by someone else.  They've lived free without ever having to pay a price for that freedom.  And they've come to expect it. 

I knew a guy named Bob Rosenau back in 1963.  He'd been a part of the original 100 "MAC-V" (Military Advisory Group - Viet Nam) Green Berets sent to Viet Nam in 1961.   They were sent there to train the South Viet Namese army regulars how to fight and win wars.  Apparently our Government failed to learn from the ass whipping France took by the communist North Viet Namese at Dien Bien Phu in 1957.  They were run out of town, butt first.  We thought we knew better.  Our decision makers didn't have the benefit of perspective, it would seem. 

And so from those original 100 advisors, there were 550,000 of our soldiers fighting and dying there by 1965.  You might not know that Prez. Kennedy had decided to pull all our troops out of VN by 1961.  Perhaps that was why he was killed.  Because his successor, LBJ, a tool of the "Military-Industrial Complex," turned VN into a dramatically expanded war.  Half a world away.  Hoping to prove we knew better, and fought better, than the French.

I was pulled into that conflict on Halloween, 1966.  No treat, some trick.  I was forced to do a job I didn't want to do, in a place I didn't want to be, for people I didn't want to work for, aiding no one, and solving no problems.  I was fortunate to return with all my limbs, but not without my contempt for a dumb war and the dumb people who ordered it.  

We lost 55,000 of our best and brightest there, attempting to prove that the French didn't know how to fight.  But that we did.  We had our hands tied behind our backs by our politicians, unable to win, and too dumb to declare victory and come on home.  Some can learn by others' mistakes.  Just not us.  The Viet Nam Memorial is on the Mall in Washington, D.C.  Please visit it the next time you're there.

Perspective.

And we continued to make the same mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Fighting a new kind of "war" with an all-volunteer force.  But not enough of them to actually win.  Just show up, shoot some folks, and get shot in return.  We lost 20,000 in Iraq and 4,500 in Afghanistan.  We sent too few people to actually win, and worse yet, not even knowing it.      

And so it is with Iran.  Even though they declared war on us back in 1979, after Prez. Jimmy Carter failed to back up our friend the Shah.  Carter felt he was too tough on his dissenters.  Human rights violations and all that.  Resulting in us pulling our military support.  Which caused him to be deposed by Iran's hardline Islamists.  And even though they've been killing our soldiers and sailors and Marines ever since, we've just sat back and taken it.  

We've had seven Presidents since the Mullahs took over Iran.  And we've done nothing.  We even tried buying them off with $Billions, two planes loaded with cash, hoping they'd stop trying to kill us (thank you, POTUS Obama!).  Even though Iran had killed more than 500 of our citizens, they've paid no price for doing so.  Breaking every promise they made us.  Infuriating folks like me.  

None, until Trump that is.  

Whether you know it or not, we're now engaged in an existential war for our way of life.  For our freedom.  Trump was the first President to stop letting Iran bully us around.  He decided that NOW is the time for them to pay that price.  He's engaged our entire Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps in an all-out War to end their attempt to eradicate us.  They've openly said they'll kill us all if and when they have the means to do so.  Their religion tells them that only by killing us, and Israel, will their 12th Imam return.  He wandered off somewhere 1,100 years ago and they're all about bringing him back ASAP.  Perhaps they're unaware that he's likely dead by now.

Trump knows we have to go all in to defeat an enemy whose religion teaches it's better to die than to live.

They've used their oil revenues to fund not only their proxies, like Hezbollah and the Houthis, but their ongoing attempt to produce nuclear weapons.  And if they get them, they would surely use them.  On Israel first.  And then on us.  Our B-2 strike on them last June should have given them a clue we meant business.  That it was time to mend their ways and join the ranks of civilized countries.  Without success, it appears.

They just proved they have missiles capable of accurately traveling more than 2,500 miles, having just struck our Indian Ocean base in Diego Garcia.  Putting all of Europe and the U.K. in their cross hairs.  And with North Korea's and Russia's help, they would have shortly had the means to hit America.  Putting a nuclear warhead they were week's away from building atop an intercontinental missile.  And we couldn't permit them to do that.  

Trump is all about stopping them.  And restoring our peace and tranquility.

Maybe Trump's critics are unaware that he has no third term.  He isn't running for anything past this one, and knows the Democrats will likely take back the House in November.  And when they do, they'll likely impeach him.  Or at least tie his hands so he'll be unable to use our military.  So all he has is NOW.  He's pulling out all the stops.  And throwing the full weight of our military behind his Iran mission.

Yet, half our Country is asking when all this will end.  Because it costs too much to fill their gas tanks, I guess.  The Democrats in Congress are demanding it to end.  The so-called "Main-Stream Media," water carriers for the Democrats, is calling for this war to end.  They fully intend to stop the funding for it when its sixty-day, Article 2 limit is reached.  In just over a month.  That's the leash Congress has on Trump.  He has 60 days to use our military to defend us, beyond which the Congress can stop all funding.  And I believe they intend to do so.  The Iranians know that.  All they have to do is sit back and wait.  Wait for our MSMedia to erode American support for this military action.  Just like they did in Viet Nam.

They may not have much of a country left when that day is reached, but they would still be in power.  And that's all they require to adhere to their religious dictats; to rebuild and keep on trying to kill us.  So as to bring back that 12th Imam.

The socialists and the communists intend to bury America.  They intend to rot America from within.  It was Alexis Du Toqueville, the famous 18th Century French philosopher and diehard American fan, who opined that America would only be vanquished from within.  We would never be beaten by a foreign power, he wrote, but only by the haters who succeeded in gutting America's power from within.  By helping to erode public opinion.  He was right, I fear.  And our lily-livered enemies are proving it.

I wish they'd been around during the Big War so as to know what it's like to fear for your personal safety.  As did we all back then.  Or the Cold War when we were dueling with the Soviets.  Practicing "duck and cover" drills, getting under our desks in school to save us when nuclear weapons were unleashed.  As if that would have helped.    

Or during the Viet Nam conflict when the talking heads would always end their Alphabet news broadcasts with a live shot from the Air Force base where our dead soldiers were offloaded every evening.  We averaged about 55 dead heroes a day back then, and Walter Cronkite and his competitors were happy to show them.  From their comfortable studio vantage points.  Undercutting our resolve to keep on fighting.  Eroding our Country's will to stay in the game.  Proving that our MSMedia wasn't - and isn't - our friend. 

We were winning that war on the ground.  Ask any old soldier.  We just couldn't win it in the MSMedia. 

These people frankly make me puke.  They would be ashamed of themselves...if they had any shame.  One of the benefits of age is that folks like me won't be around too much longer to see what America will become.  But I'm ashamed for them.  They are breathing the free air our dead soldiers and sailors bought for them.  At a steep price.  With their lives.

It's been said that democracies like ours won't last much past 250 years.  Rome lasted just beyond that, and was deconstructed shortly thereafter.  We're celebrating our 250th year come July.  I fear that it may be our last year of independence.  Of freedom.  That's the perspective I've gained from years of observing.  And of serving.  And learning.  Of using the benefits of perspective.  You should know that freedom isn't free.  It has a price.  We're now paying it.  Or at least some of us are paying it.  The others are "free riders," sitting in the wagon while our patriots are pulling it.  Bitching and moaning and dragging their feet.  The only question is, for how long?  

Look in the mirror.  Are you a Patriot?  Or are you a free-rider?  We are judged not by only by our words, but also by our deeds.  You're not due comfort.  You're not automatically due freedom.  It must be continually bought and paid for.  I beg you to stand up and proudly serve!  And if you can't personally serve, at least stay out of the way while those fighting for you are given the tools to win.  And maybe pick up the phone and call your Congressperson and voice your support for the war we're now fighting.  Only by so doing might we actually win this one.

We'll soon know whether Americans like you choose to do so or not...