Tomgram: William Astore, Six Vows to Support Our Troops

Last year, in a joint investigation Propublica and National Public Radio reported that “[t]he military medical system is failing to diagnose brain injuries in troops who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, many of whom receive little or no treatment for lingering health problems.”

This year, the city of Clarksville, Tennessee, decided to relax restrictions on outdoor signage for those wishing to post banners in support of troops returning to nearby Fort Campbell from deployments overseas. Mayor Kim McMillan told a local television station, “We had a number of individuals that wanted to display banners that really honor our soldiers, those that are out protecting our freedoms every day. We really wanted to make sure they could do that without having to deal with those [restrictions].” It will cost $25 for a banner permit.

Last week, the Washington Post reported: “Nine months after President Obama authorized a broad expansion of benefits for those caring for service members severely wounded in the nation's two current wars, none of the assistance has materialized and it is caught up in a bureaucratic tangle that could shrink the number of families eligible for the help.”

Only days before, a local New Hampshire newspaper carried a story about municipal workers in the town of Somersworth who were planning to take part in a national "Red Shirt Fridays" campaign to show support for U.S. troops. "It's fun," Development Services Director Craig Wheeler told a reporter from the Foster’s Daily Democrat. "I think it's the right thing to do... It shows unity on behalf of the city and the staff and it's pretty clear why we're wearing them."

Somersworth’s T-shirts and Clarksville’s banners join a host of similar efforts, ranging from “Support Our Veterans” license plates to the National Football League’s dispatch of cheerleaders to military bases to boost morale. Such initiatives typify an American response to its distant wars -- acts of superficial support proliferate while Army suicides climb skyward, veterans have their sexual abuse complaints ignored, large numbers of troops with battlefield concussions continue to suffer, and military doctors fraudulently use diagnoses like “personality disorder” to discharge wounded soldiers and deny them disability benefits.

Late last year, at his Foreign Policy blog, former Washington Post correspondent and bestselling author Tom Ricks published an essay by a Marine who had served four tours in Iraq. It concluded:

“As a young person who served in a war you made, I don't want your handshake, your pity, your daughter's phone number, or your faded bumper sticker. I did my frigging job so now do yours. Baby Boomers and Generation X: I want your leadership. Rather than cower behind a set of fragmented ideals you don't even live up to, I am asking you to exercise your adulthood and feel some pain.”

He also called for an “open and vigorous discussion of compulsory national service” to diversify the ranks and create the conditions necessary for serious debate about America’s wars, present and future. He sounded a lot like the men and women who write to TomDispatch regular and retired Lieutenant Colonel William Astore, men and women driven to serve by love of country, who now disagree with the status quo and whose critical voices Astore offers up in his latest article. (To catch Timothy MacBain's latest TomCast audio interview in which Astore discusses the difficulty of speaking one’s mind in the military, click here, or download it to your iPod here.) Nick Turse



The Cost of Our Wars

On Listening to Our Troops

By William J. Astore “Support our troops” is an unconditional American mantra. We’re told to celebrate them as warrior-liberators, as heroes, as the finest fighters the world has ever known. They’re to be put on a pedestal or plinth, holding a rifle and a flag, icons to American toughness and goodness. What we’re not told to do is listen to them. Today, I’d like to suggest six vows we should make when it comes to those troops: Vow #1: Let’s start listening to them. And when we do -- when we begin to recognize them in all their frailty and complexity, their vulnerabilities and imperfections -- we’ll realize that they’re as restless and conflicted about our wars as many of us are.