The moral depravity of the Iraq war

Watch this video. About seven or eight minutes in you can see bound detainees being forced off the top of a three story building. It appears that American soldiers are doing this, though you can't see them clearly from the video. People in military uniforms come and whisk away the detainees after they fall.

It would be nice to think that American soldiers are all wonderful, brave people who would never stoop to such depravity, but that is what we call a "fantasy." Given the many other sickening things that have broken through the media firewall (soldiers tossing puppies over cliffs, tormenting Iraqi children, testimonies of war crimes at Winter Soldier hearings, Haditha, drop weapons, etc.), it would be totally irresponsible and cowardly for any American to dismiss these actions as impossible. There it is on video. Somebody is doing it. Does that mean that everyone in the military is sick? Of course not. But the military, as an institution, has a civilian leadership; and those people are sick. The fish rots from the head.

Besides that, the fact remains that American soldiers are systematically trained to dehumanize 'the enemy' in order to be able to kill them. That is the purpose of having a military, after all. So let us not get all righteous and defensive when something like this comes out. It is time for Americans to get real and face the meat-grinding, dehumanizing machinery of the US military and see what it actually it does to people -- our people and other people.

We have a military to kill people so we don't have to do it ourselves. We subcontract the dirty job to others so we don't have to carry the psychological burden. It's just like buying steak all shrink-wrapped -- we are preserved from the trauma of killing the cow and carving up its flesh. But somebody does those things, and it's the same with the military. They are not all over there building schools and hugging babies, you know. Well over a million people have been killed in Iraq. Who is responsible for that? Why, we are. Did our people kill every single one? No, but we started the war, so let's not get persnickety. The possibility of innocent people dying never did bother us that much.

What happens when you take the military and put it under a mentally deranged civilian leadership? You get utter moral depravity. Institutionalized psychopathy, with weapons. If you don't like this, then stop glorifying the military and war. But don't deny it. Don't deny that we are all responsible for tossing bound detainees off the tops of buildings, murdering for fun, destroying an entire country that had nothing to do with 9/11, causing the untold suffering of millions and millions of people and the gruesome destruction of our own fellow citizens. We own it all because we don't pay attention, and we are lazy, and we let ourselves be led around like a bunch of stupid idiots. We are so incredibly stupid that we are on the verge of letting this all happen again, to Iran.

I fear we are truly lost and the moral compass has been smashed. An attack on Iran would be as unjust if not more so than what we did to Iraq. It will cause unforgivable destruction, including our own this time. For certain, and here in the 'homeland.' It is all lies, just like the last time.

Do you have the nagging doubts? You must listen to them. That is what's left of your conscience. If you can see the faint thread of truth, you must follow it. Pick up the thread and follow it quickly, as quickly as you can until you find the whole thing. Go now. Go.