I too love jeans and jazz and Treasure Island
and Long John Silver's parrot and the terraces of New Orleans
I love Mark Twain and the Mississippi steamboats and Abraham Lincoln's dogs
I love the fields of wheat and corn and the smell of Virginia tobacco.
But I am not American.
Is that enough for the Phantom pilot to turn me back to the Stone Age!
I need neither oil, nor America herself, neither the elephant nor the donkey.
Leave me, pilot, leave my house roofed with palm fronds and this wooden bridge.
I need neither your Golden Gate nor your skyscrapers.
I need the village not New York.
Why did you come to me from your Nevada desert, soldier armed to the teeth?
Why did you come all the way to distant Basra where fish used to swim by our doorsteps.
Pigs do not forage here. I only have these water buffaloes lazily chewing on water lilies.
Leave me alone soldier.
Leave me my floating cane hut and my fishing spear.
Leave me my migrating birds and the green plumes.
Take your roaring iron birds and your Tomahawk missiles.
I am not your foe.
I am the one who wades up to the knees in rice paddies.
Leave me to my curse.
I do not need your day of doom.
--Saadi Youssef (translation: Khaled Mattawa)
44 comments:
O'Brien's characters use humor to avoid focusing on death during the Vietnam War. I have found that this... defense mechanism.. still holds true today.
While in Iraq, my close friends and I would often use crude humor to avoid dwelling on the permanence of the dangers we faced. To give an example, one of my close friends would often reference the holocaust and joke that were he to die "he would not be the first Jew to be burned to death by his enemies."
I was with him in a group when this exact comment was made, and honestly that is the last thing I recall him saying to me before his vehicle ran over a landmine. Several of us attempted to pull him out of the vehicle as it caught fire but none of us were able.
The violence consumate in armed conflict wreaks havoc on the mentalities of all involved.
I think the word violence, especially for war, is inadequate. The word has not only become threadbare from over use in events of all conflict, but it also does not convey the senselessness of war and the needless suffering that occurs in it.
Karl, have you ever asked yourself--Why? If you have, and you were able to come up with an answer, can you say that it justifies all this--your friends' death, the constant danger, the fear, the forced humor to hide the fear, the indignity...
Humor is one defense mechanism stated by O’Brian but, we shouldn’t let it overshadow the primary defense mechanism displayed by O’Brian’s characters and by soldier’s that have been or will deploy to a combat zone and that would have to be the display of super macho-ism. Many soldiers I know, refuse to show any compassion or fear around there fellow soldiers. Thus causing soldiers to not only seem unaffected by the gruesomeness of war but welcoming it and even, at times, seeking it out.
I was watching a movie with my family and it really hit some good points about our war unit. There is a clip with a quote that hit me
really hard. The movie is Lord Of the Rings, and the quote comes from the very last scenes after all the war has taken place. The good guys have won the war, but still thousands were killed. So they try and
return to the way things were but its just not the same. Here is the quote :
"Twelve months to the day since Gandalf sent us on our long journey...
we found ourselves looking upon a familiar sight. We were home. But How
do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on... when in
your heart you begin to understand... there is no going back. There are
somethings that time cannot mend... some hurts that go too deep... that
have taken hold."
Let me know your thoughts,
-Jeremiah McCann
The... ramifications of war, OIF in particular, will not be entirely clear until many years in the future. Obviously if the... sacrifice that went into war produces good results than it is easier to feel at ease with what was lost. Although as Jeremiah mentioned, there are some changes which will always be irreversible.
When asked "was it worth it" I am reminded of what I mentioned that first day of class. Many countries have some sort of mandatory military service. To a pacifist at first glance, this might be seen as outrageous. However, if all citizens were equally represented in the armed forces than the government officials making war would be held up to much higher accountability. Perhaps armed conflict would not be as readily resorted to by our public officials, and surely our society as a whole would than be more widely affected by and more appreciative of the sacrifices that must be made when they are made. Sometimes I think of some type of more mandatory service arrangement as a guarantee that wars our country becomes involved in would always be "worth it" or justified.
Sorry, I accidently pushed publish instead of preview with that last one. :) Anyway, I know that war has many bad elements, but why doesn't anyone ever talk about the good things that have come out of war? I just read about a Iraqi town that was attacked by terrorists. They killed a few adults and two babies. One was fifteen months old. Before the war this would have "convinced" the people to shelter terrorists. Here's the catch, the terrorists got an unexpected reception. The local men grabbed their rifles and killed the men that were trying to destroy their families. I think this is a good thing. The people had a chance to defend themselves instead of being helplessly slaughtered. I don't know if anyone else agrees, but the war definitely gave these brave men the courage to stand up to the terrorists and defend their homes.
I would have to agree with Ashleigh on her point. I do think it is true, we never hear anything good anymore about war. It is always about people getting killed. War is about helping people too. People die without there being a war, because of there beliefs and religions act and also how they do things. War can help countries, it has in the past. We just need to remember everything happens for a reason, and I think war is a reason not for bad, but for good to rebuild.
What both Ashleigh and Amber mention is a groundswell of a grassroots movement--people curing the illness of their own society, because they will not take any more. This is totally different from a foreign power taking over to 'cure the illness.' Nine times out of ten, the foreign power has no idea what the real illness is. Hence, there are local uprisings, rebellions--against the foreign power. If we can say then that the locals have become terrorists then so be it. I consider this semantics.
Umit: I think it's interesting that soldiers are often portrayed as being extremely "macho". One would think that since death is so prevalent in their lives than the average person that they'd act differently. I feel as if I were in that situation (although I can never know this for sure)I would be a lot appreciative. I would try not to hold back any of my thoughts or emotions. I wouldn't care about what others thought and I would try to do what made me happy and let those I love and those that I'm not even too fond of know that they're special. None of us know when it will our time to go! So we need to shed sunlight everywhere we go! BE THANKFUL!
Amna, the point I was trying to convey is that at times soldiers display publicly a sense of extreme toughness or insensitivity regarding certain aspects of that moment in their lives. You should also try to look past the fact that soldiers die and look at what it is that they are trained to do, kill. Now if there is something in life that gives a person the feeling of supreme power it would have to be having the ability to dictate weather another person lives or dies. For the "average" person this isn't an issue, but for a soldier in a combat zone it is a reality. Now consider yourself in a position where you had to make that decision, it’s a split second decision, and after you made it you realize you were wrong. Would you not be devastated? my point is that, as a coping mechanism some soldiers will not show the fact that they have been affected in a way that could viewed as weak by their peers so they hide it or ever begin seeking out life threatening confrontations or doing things like cutting the thumb off a dead man. It gets pretty twisted, I’m aware of this and my saying it might not be viewed as spreading sunlight. Fact is my comment is based on my experience and to assume that I am not thankful for my life is....well, not true. I am very thankful and appreciate not only my life but also your sunny disposition to the matter. Please do view this as an attack I just feel the need to clarify the statement I made and I realize that there are exceptions to almost everything. Remember that what i speak of is just one way of many used to cope with war.
peace
this a poem i came across and i think feel it should be shared.
(if you dont wanna read it here is the youtube url : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pn-f8PgLVjU : i recommend reading then watching the vid)
dis poem
dis poem
shall speak of the wretched sea
that washed ships to these shores
of mothers crying for their young
swallowed up by the sea
dis poem shall say nothin new
dis poem shall speak of time
time unlimited
time undefined
dis poem shall call names
names like
lumumba
kenyatta
nkrumah
hannibal
akenaton
malcolm
garvey
haile selassie
dis poem is vex
about apartheid
racism
facism
the klu klux klan
riots in brixton
atlanta
jim jones
dis poem is revoltin against
first world
second world
third world
division
manmade decision
dis poem is like all the rest
dis poem will not be amongst great literary works
will not be recited by poetry enthusiasts
will not be quoted by politicians
nor men of religion
dis poem is knives...bombs...guns...
blazing for freedom
yes dis poem is a drum
ashanti
mau mau
ibo
yoruba
niahbingi warriors
uhuru...uhuru
namibia uhuru
uhuru
soweto
uhuru
afrika!
dis poem will not change things
dis poem needs to be changed
dis poem is the rebirth of a people arising...awaking...overstanding
...dis poem speak
is speakin...has spoken
dis poem shall continue
even when poets have stoped writing
dis poem shall survive...u...me...
it shall linger in history
in your mind
in time....
forever
dis poem is time
only time will tell
dis poem is still not written
dis poem has no poet
dis poem is just a part of the story his-story...her-story...our-story
the story still untold
dis poem is now ringing... talking
irritatin
making u want to stop it
but dis poem will not stop
dis poem is long
cannot be short
dis poem cannot be tamed
cannot be blamed
the story is still not told about dis poem
dis poem is old
new
dis poem is copied from
the bible
your prayer book
the new york times
readers digest
the c.i.a. files
the k.g.b. files
dis poem is no secret
dis poem shall be called
boring
stupid
senseless
dis poem is watchin u
tryin' to make sense from dis poem
dis poem is messin up your brains
makin u want to stop listenin to dis poem
but you shall not stop listenin to dis poem
u need to know what will be said next in dis poem
dis poem shall disappoint u because...
dis poem is to be continue
in your mind...
in your mind...
in your mind...
and sorry that sould of read...."please don't view this as an attack..." oO; i guess thats why proof reading is important.
Wow, so I'm the first of my class to leave the first comment? Sweet!
Anyway, I found this music video with footage from the film 300 that we watched in class awhile ago during our war unit. After watching it, I thought the music went really well with the video and listening to the lyrics made a lot of sense in this case.
Originally, the song came from the soundtrack of the Halo 2 game and if you compare it with the movie and game altogether, its ironic cause the the main character of Halo is called Master Chief but is also referred to as a "Spartan" Soldier because of the way he fights.
Here is the URL for the music video with the lyrics included so you understand it or just sing along if you want to! =)
http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/b/breaking_benjamin/blow_me_away.html
So just copy and paste it (or type it in) and enjoy the music video! Its on the left side of the page when your on the web page of the site.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAG1i3JfUvA
That is a video that my brother showed me. I'm still a little puzzled about what exactly the lyrics are supposed to make us think about our soldiers. Listen to it 2 or 3 times. It paints some very vivid pictures of what some soldiers face in a wartime situation.
Here are Nine Inch Nails lead singer Trent Reznor's thoughts on our former president.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBWhh5Jq9p4
Here, Bullet
If a body is what you want,
then here is bone and gristle and flesh.
Here is the clavicle-snapped wish,
the aorta's opened valves, the leap
thought makes at the synaptic gap.
Here is the adrenaline rush you crave,
that inexorable flight, that insane puncture
into heat and blood. And I dare you to finish
what you've started. Because here, Bullet,
here is where I complete the word you bring
hissing through the air, here is where I moan
the barrel's cold esophagus, triggering
my tongue's explosives for the rifling I have
inside of me, each twist of the round
spun deeper, because here, Bullet,
here is where the world ends, every time.
-Brian Turner
(I really enjoy the poet's use of personification with the rifle's cold-esophagus and triggering his tongue's explosives. It gives a very human feel to the firing of the bullet. I think his use of diction and personification symbolizes the truth that a gun is harmless until put into human hands, then it becomes part of them as if it was their own flesh.)
Heres a poem about soliders that I found intresting;
I am a Solider
by: Reggie Canada
Fear and anguish is the least bit of my worries
Nightmares and horror is but an eye shut away
Rage, hate and anger is my only allowed emotion
I am trained in the art of hatred because I am a soldier
I crave to murder and call it duty
I kill bread winners and claim to protect the family
I torture and inflict terror and pretend to love humanity
I torment lives and kill because I am a solider
I stand for honor or is it power I demand
I build malicious weapons for the sake of power
I torture the innocent for the sake of honor
I destroy hopes, dreams and lives because I am a solider
My fate asks for me to be evil and vengeful
My career asks for me to be destructive and vicious
My pride asks me to be unforgiving and merciless
Yet I stand and say I am a soldier
There is no honor in hate
Yet I have found honor in war
There is no pride in murder
Yet I have found pride with my bullet
This is my honor and pride because I am a solider
I go to war to kill because I say I value life
Only the death from my nationality is terrorism
The death of other innocent people is unfortunate
Unfortunate because they are voiceless and I am a solider
Sometimes I think it should be a rule of war that you have to see somebody up close and get to know him before you can shoot him.
~M*A*S*H, Colonel Potter
the long-range type of war that goes on today is dis-honorable. It is efficient, But you have no contact whatsoever with you enemy. For all you know, That Man that you just shot hadn't shot you yet because he had mercy.
Vietnam War Protest picture:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d3/Vietnam_War_Protest_in_DC,_1967.gif
Comic on War in Iraq:
http://oilblog.pbwiki.com/f/OILLL.gif
Picture of US Soliders caskets http://informedvoters.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/iraq-war.jpg
Memories of Iraq for soldiers
http://newsblaze.com/pix/2008/0105/pix/iraq-war.jpg
Political Cartoon about Bush and the War
http://z.about.com/d/politicalhumor/1/0/U/z/1/iraq_surge_year_later.jpg
Political Cartoon about the Bush plan on Iraq and Democrates' plan
http://www.cagle.com/working/070118/asay.gif
"War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other's children."
-Jimmy Carter
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVXeRrLPBrA
Here's a great video I found on YouTube, it’s a great tribute to the American Soldiers in Iraq.
War does not determine who is right - only who is left. ~Bertrand Russell
“In war, there are no unwounded soldiers.”
Jose Narosky quotes
http://images.ctv.ca/archives/CTVNews/img2/20070614/160_soldiers_070614.jpg
The link shows two soldiers grieving over a fallen comrade. Their friend was killed after his convey was hit by a roadside bomb. This picture brings out a lot of emotion.
My son
They stole him from me to send him off to war,
and there he stayed to fight and die till it was done.
It’s bad when governments steal sons from you,
and he was by son.
They said this war had to be fought
And that it was for a just and noble cause.
So, since I was patriotic and voted for them,
I stood by their laws.
But it always seems to be the young who go
And against whom the scales of death are swung.
It's bad when governments send young men off to die,
And my son was young.
For what matters to them of a million deaths
When war is the tender of life they promote?
You can be sure when their reelection comes up,
They won’t get by vote!
For the enemy is now my chosen leader,
The enemy called peace that all governments abhor!
And you can be sure they won’t get any more of my sons,
Till they end all war.
Oh they may think they can get away with murder
and do any damn thing they feel must be done,
but they won’t take what I love away from me again,
And I loved by son.
By: Patrick P. Stafford
I enjoyed this poem alot. The poem showed the hardships a father would face with his son having to go to war.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GM2HRznQTRQ
The link shows the trailer of a new movie coming out called Brothers of War. The movie looks pretty good, I can’t wait till it comes out on video.
I know that there are many good people in the U.S that help the brave men and women that are fighting overseas by sending anything that might help boost their morale or keep their well being intact.
I believe that there is one group that really helps them out, because they take the time to go out of their own busy life and entertain them during the holiday season once every year when the soldiers can't see their loved ones and family members.
This group is none other than the World Wrestling Entertainment group (also known as the WWE). I know that some people don't believe in wrestling or think its fake, but I really believe that they are doing a great job in making the soldiers feel at home by bringing some great entertainment from American soil.
I have a couple of links that show them being there for the soldiers during their stay in Iraq for the Holiday season in 2008.
The first link here is a speech by Former President George W. Bush to the American soldiers stationed in Iraq.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQzHeKRn6iQ&fmt=18
The second link is called Letters which is messages from children in America brought by the WWE to the soldiers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FIFBvRbCe4&feature=PlayList&p=9130C8AF8FDD1833&index=34&fmt=18
This last link is where the WWE Superstars are taken around the city and being shown areas where major events happened in Iraq and also thanks by the soldiers and some people in Iraq.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQsvnJVsbTM&feature=related&fmt=18
Thank you World Wrestling Entertainment for bringing joy and and entertainment to the soldiers in Iraq every holiday season and the brave men and women of the U.S Army for protecting us.
I can't wait to see them entertain them again this year!
"The tragedy of war is that it uses man's best to do man's worst." ~Henry Fosdick
“There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.”
- Howard Zinn
"I have seen war. I have seen war on land and sea. I have seen blood running from the wounded. I have seen the dead in the mud. I have seen cities destroyed. I have seen children starving. I have seen the agony of mothers and wives. I hate war."
- Franklin Delano Roosevelt
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20061211/soldiers_story
some interesting insight into a day in the life of a soldier in Irag.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.” Douglas MacArthur
How true, they suffer for the rest of their lives.
visit this link below:
http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=59588469722&h=e-fxN&u=UdgJf&ref=mf
It shows a sideshow about war in Palestine.
The story of a child
Not combat attire.
The story of a child
Disarrayed in the rain.
Columns of tanks in battle array
And a woman carrying a pitcher of the rain.
She is his mother in total disarray
Welcoming him in the sunshine rain.
Son, come drink this water from the day's rain!
Where's it, Mama?
Cries the boy disarrayed in the rain.
My hospital leg? My hospital leg?
The woman points to the column
Of tanks in battle array
Where stood their home before the morn's rain.
The boy limps on
On a single leg
Limps he on
To find the rally on.
His father lay high in the rain
On shoulders and tears of the day's rain
Gift-wrapped in the nation's rain
Face high in the rain
Peace! O Peace!
How doest thou lounge in this rain?
By Safi Abdi
Give me the money that has been spent in war and I will clothe every man, woman, and child in an attire of which kings and queens will be proud. I will build a schoolhouse in every valley over the whole earth. I will crown every hillside with a place of worship consecrated to peace. ~Charles Sumner
The tragedy of war is that it uses man's best to do man's worst. ~Henry Fosdick
What I have noticed after reading "The Things They Carried", "2000 lbs." in class and watching the film "300" was that: War leaves unforgettable memories in the hearts of those who were involved. Those memories stay with them forever.
http://img.slate.com/media/1/123125/123050/2133481/2154175/2156308/01_BestAmericanComics.jpg
He Was A Mate
He was a mate, a real good mate 'e was,
A friendly sort of feller, liked a joke;
And if it had to happen, it's a shame
It had to happen to such a decent bloke.
But - ah, fair dinkum, don't it make you wonder
What God in Heaven's thinkin' about up there;
The way He chooses who to sacrifice
To me somehow it doesn't quite seem fair.
You'd think He'd want to take a bloke like me
Who'd be no loss to no-one here on Earth;
But no, He always seems to pick the best
Whose life amounts to ten times what mine's worth.
But I suppose He'd say it's not His fault,
It's us and how we treat our fellow man;
And if too many good blokes' lives are lost
We can't just blame it all on His great plan.
He slung us here on Earth and said "Righto,
Get on with it you blokes, the world is yours";
But all we've done is fight among ourselves
And destroy each other with our endless wars.
Now, there's a sort of aching here inside,
I can't quite put my finger on what's wrong;
But a soldier can't afford to feel this way,
He's got to grit his teeth and carry on.
So how's a bloke supposed to deal with this?
I know they trained me well, I can't complain;
But this is somethin' you don't learn about
When they teach you how to play the soldier's game.
They teach you how to shoot and how to kill,
You even learn which enemy to hate;
But nowhere in their training do you learn
How to live with the loss of a real good mate.
Lachlan Irvine
Post a Comment