Called to Serve Vietnam

I received a request to share health information for veterans from a Navy veteran, Doug Karr.  Doug is the Outreach Coordinator for an internet resource that provides health information to the veteran community.  He had visited my website/blog and felt that offering the knowledge and awareness he has about the conditions faced by veterans via the blog made good sense.  Given the on-going horrific wars, not to mention what feels like a recent escalation by the forces opposing the U.S. occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan, such information is critical if our veterans are to be aware of the risk factors in their service and to receive the health care they deserve.  Here is what Doug sent to me to share with this blog community:

 

Health Risks Facing Many of Today’s Veterans

As a US Veteran of Operation Desert Storm, I clearly remember traumatizing events that many people can’t even imagine or think of; however, I also witnessed many tragic health risks that our veterans constantly face. Currently, there are thousands of veterans nationwide, and while they may be posed as the nation’s heroes, they are at severe medical risk.

During the war, these soldiers may suffer from lost body parts and head damage; in addition, they may have to face environmental hazards, dangerous chemical toxins, and various foreign infections. While many do survive these physical injuries, they are also at a mental risk, which can even be deadlier. Since these veterans were forced to witness live physical combat, they usually suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder and depression. This mental illness plagues thousands of people each year, and many soldiers re-live the traumatic events of the war on a daily basis through flashbacks and constant recurring dreams.

The common use of asbestos years ago in the military has also posed a great health threat. Because of this, the cancer solely caused by asbestos exposure, mesothelioma is most commonly diagnosed among U.S. veterans. The US Department of Veteran Affairs recently said that millions of soldiers have been exposed to asbestos during their military training and posting. Asbestos, a toxic compound, was tremendously used in the military because of its high boiling point; however, during the year, 1970, it was eventually discarded because of its long-lasting effects.

During Operation Desert Storm, mustard gas was used, and even though these weapons were considered dangerous, they were created into chemical compounds. If it gets exposed to the flesh, the physical body will suffer from toxic contamination.

Because of the intensity of the battles, many veterans were forced to live in cold and extremely hot settings. Unfortunately, this poses increased health risks for our valued veterans. Those scars caused by extreme temperatures may later result in skin cancer, and your muscles and bones may be slightly disfigured. Besides suffering from constant pain, you may also suffer from neurological injury that would affect your senses.

In all, our veterans are at a tremendous risk, and if they do not cautiously take care of themselves, then they are jeopardizing their lives. Unfortunately, a soldier’s battle is not over even after he retires from the battlefield.

 

I was hoping someone would take the time to respond to a recent letter to the editor in the Gazette that essentially castigated those who want to “Bring the War Dollars Home” as being disloyal to the troops.  The letter writer saw those who were trying to get our local governments to acknowledge the cost to us all of our utterly bloated, empire-building defense budget as unpatriotic and undermining of troop morale.

Lo and behold, a mere two days later the guest column below appeared and succeeded through thoughtful analysis in making the point that working to bring the war dollars home is equivalent to an effort to bring the troops home and to end what is increasingly feeling like perpetual war.  Here’s what Mr. Tartakov from Amherst had to say this morning:

 

WHAT “SUPPORTING TROOPS” MEANS

By Daily Hampshire Gazette
Created 07/20/2011 – 8:37am

AMHERST – I was moved by the guest column “Embracing the spirit of ‘support our troops’” (Gazette, Monday). I felt that it referred to me throughout.

I go to the gym that offered the young Marine a complementary pass. I have spent hours of my time transporting a member of my family in the armed forces around the country, enabling him to continue his commitment. And I’m one of those very people who is working on the project to “Bring the War Dollars Home.”

I’m not surprised that some local business refused to make a special accommodation for the young soldier. Most people in our nation are making no sacrifice that they can see to our continual wars on weaker nations around the world.

This isn’t World War II. We aren’t defending ourselves from aggression and mobilizing our population to defeat a threat to our lives. The government isn’t threatening to draft middle-class boys and girls and send them into harm’s way.

It has substituted an economic draft of the poor and covered it up with the misleading public relations slogan of an “all-volunteer army.” Our armed forces are only volunteer on the premise that all occupations in the United States since the end of slavery are volunteer.

Some of those in the armed services are there because they believe it is their duty to sacrifice for the benefit of their fellow citizens and that our nation is in danger. But they are a minority. Most of our citizens are satisfied that, as former Vice President Dick Cheney is said to have declared about avoiding service in the Vietnam War, they have “more important things to do.”

The business that refused a special concession to a Marine home on leave apparently belongs to that group. The people who stand on the street corners in Northampton and Amherst and around the country protesting the war do not. They are making an effort to change our public policy. Their work to “Bring the War Dollars Home” is an effort to protect those troops.

The votes in Northampton and Amherst and the Resolution by the U.S. Conference of Mayors to “Bring the War Dollars Home” aren’t symbolic at all. They are concrete efforts in that direction. Only those who have given up on citizens’ ability to change government policy think it is symbolic.

Those working to “Bring the War Dollars Home” aren’t dismissing the sacrifice of our troops. We have the troops’ interests upfront in our minds and our actions. We believe the killing of thousands of American troops and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans isn’t making us safer. We believe it is endangering us and it is diminishing our nation.

Most of us believe that our legislators are employing the most powerful armed force in the world for the benefit of the giant international corporations that pay for their elections, not for our protection.

We can condemn the federal government’s public relations successes around “weapons of mass destruction” and the “all-volunteer armed forces” as terribly misleading.

And we also condemn those who accept the bizarre proposition that opposing the invasion of anyone in the world by the armed forces of the U.S. is unpatriotic or anti-American. Or, against our troops.

We need a better debate about who and what is endangering our nation and when it is permissible to put troops into danger. The main point of “Bringing the War Dollars Home” is to bring the troops home.

When my neighbors write of spending money out-of-pocket to support our troops, I can’t help but wonder whether or not they realize that something like 25 percent of the thousands of dollars they pay in taxes every year to the federal government is going toward sending our troops into harm’s way.

Or that, indeed, they are being sent against their interests and ours.

Gary Michael Tartakov lives in Amherst.

 

I found the video I am about to share with you on www.commondreams.org, a progressive clearinghouse website that has provided numerous posts on this blog.  Jeremy Scahill, author of Blackwater: the Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army has put together a story in the style of the exceptional “Story of Stuff” (http://www.storyofstuff.com/).  Here’s how commondreams introduces the video:

COALITION OF THE BILLING: THE RADICAL PRIVATIZATION OF WARFARE
When the Bush administration chose to invade Iraq, it assumed that the war would be short and decisive. Yet by early 2010 the war had already cost over $700 billion, much of which went to corporations that profit from the conflict. Jeremy Scahill, best-selling author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army, has been a leading voice in opposing the war and in denouncing the radical privatization of the military. According to Scahill, at the time of this interview there were 630 companies on the U.S. government’s payroll in Iraq. More shocking are the 170 mercenary corporations operating in Iraq. Despite repeatedly committing criminal violations, these companies have been immune from prosecution and have repeatedly been rewarded no-bid contracts. Cultures of Resistance sat down for an exclusive interview with Scahill, in which he discusses the most recent stage of the military-industrial complex’s evolution.

Here’s the website for the video:

http://www.commondreams.org/video/2011/07/17

I always welcome your responses.

What with the “summer of the book” and all it has entailed vis a vis marketing and various appearances, it has taken me until now to start adding the stories I did not select from the 61 interviews I conducted to this blog.  Called to Serve is now launched and as recently as last night’s reading to a full house at the Odyssey Bookstore in S. Hadley, MA, I have been able to both read from the stories it contains and get it into folks’ hands so they can read the 30 stories that have been published.  But, truth be told, and re-visiting them these past several days only confirms my conviction, the 31 that were not included are just as powerful, poignant and worthy.  Take the extraordinary testimony of Ms. Penny Block.  I encountered her a good 3 years ago when I attended a performance of a play she’d written about her Vietnam War experiences as a nurse.  I was deeply moved by her honesty, her clarity about what she’d lived through and her desire to find ways to heal both herself and those she’d ministered to.  When she agreed to an interview I went with my dear friend, Lola Reid, to where Ms. Rock was staying at the Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge.  She transfixed and transported us to her years spent nursing soldiers back to health – mentally and physically – as well as watching many die from their wounds.  She immersed herself in the work and in the lives of these men so deeply that she definitely suffered her own version of PTSD.  Now her story is available through this blog and can be read at:

http://www.calledtoservevietnam.com/blog/those-who-loved-counseled-and-consoled/penny-rock/

Several people have asked whether I included a nurse’s story in Called to Serve.  Not choosing to do so was very difficult, so it feels good to be able to make Penny’s story available here and now.  But hers is just one of the many that will take up residence as “pages” on the blog.  Please help keep them alive and in our consciousnesses by reading them and experiencing the wide range of emotions they carry.

As always I welcome your feedback…

 

I found this on CNN while checking the latest Red Sox score (they defeated the Astros 10-4 last night for anyone else interested) and felt it richly deserved being posted here and arriving in your inbox whenever you next visit there.  It is much more than a cautionary tale about the horrors of war.  It is also an incredibly powerful story about both a tragic death on the battlefield and a crusade by grieving parents for their son not to have died in vain.  But their quest, though leftist in their thinking, is not to end the war.  Rather they are determined despite their enormous loss to make sure that this country for which their son died does not maintain its stance on allowing men and women who are gay and lesbian to marry.  They are fighting back against such archaic laws because they refuse to accept that their son died defending a country that would not let him get legally married.  It is a story worth telling and reading, though I also issue a warning that, if you choose to read this piece, you know there is a brief but graphic description of his wounds.

SOLDIER LEAVES LEGACY MUCH LARGER THAN ‘HE WAS GAY’

Rosemount, Minnesota (CNN) — Andrew Wilfahrt changed his gait in the weeks before going off to basic training. He walked more upright. He bulked up with weights. He spoke with a deep Robocop voice. He acted “manly.” Through the eyes of his parents, Jeff and Lori, it was all a bit strange.

This was the boy who told them he was gay at 16 after being confronted with exorbitant bills from Internet chat rooms. Who lobbied for gay rights in his high school and escaped the fists of football players when hockey players came to his rescue. Who had the courage to wear pink and green even after his car was spray-painted with “Go Home Fag!” All his parents ever wanted was for Andrew to be Andrew.

At 29, he sat his mom and dad down at the kitchen table and told them his life was missing camaraderie, brotherhood. “I’m joining the Army,” he said.  The news surprised them. Why would Andrew enter the military, where he’d be forced to deny a part of who he is? He was a lover of classical music, a composer, a peace activist, a math genius. He studied palindromes, maps, patterns, the U.S. Constitution, quantum physics.

A soldier?

It had never really crossed the minds of his left-leaning parents. Yet, just as they’d done with all three of their children, they supported him. It wasn’t easy. It became dreadfully painful. When their son wound up in Afghanistan in July 2010, Jeff awoke early each day to Google “Kandahar.” He tracked every soldier killed in the far-off land.

Then, on February 27, 2011, at the same oak table where Andrew said he was joining up, the Wilfahrts learned their oldest child was gone. “I want to talk directly to somebody in his platoon!” Jeff told the officer and chaplain seated across from him. He wanted to know for sure that this wasn’t a behind-the-shed killing of the gay guy.

Cpl. Andrew Charles Wilfahrt, 31, is believed to be the first gay U.S. soldier to die in battle since President Obama signed the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell,” the policy forcing gays in the military to hide that part of their lives or risk being kicked out. He was also among the smartest in the half-million force, scoring a perfect score on his aptitude test, a feat the Army says is rare.

Andrew was so well-liked his comrades named a combat outpost for the soldier with the infectious smile. COP Wilfahrt sits 6 kilometers from Kandahar. To his buddies, it is not named for a gay soldier, but for one who fought with valor. “Mom, everyone knows. Nobody cares,” he told his mother in their final conversation, a phone call from Afghanistan on Thanksgiving.

In a biography he left on his laptop, Andrew described himself as someone who “espoused casual solipsism, the idea that ultimately one can know only oneself and nothing more. “Although close to my parents and siblings, I generally prefer solitude and introspection, and have but few close associates,” he wrote. “I have maintained ‘bachelor status’ with the strictest of discipline, and a discipline I secretly wish would be compromised by a charming beauty.”

Andrew never denied his sexuality. But like so many, he struggled with what it means to be gay in America. Yet it was only one part of him. He was so much more. In the note on his laptop, he never used the words gay or homosexual to define himself. His younger sister, Martha, says it’s the least interesting thing about him.

But with his death, his parents have taken up the cause of gay rights. Andrew fought for his nation in a foreign land. His parents’ war is being waged in their home state of Minnesota. To them, it’s about defending the Constitution — protecting the rights of all citizens.

Gay in the land of Pawlenty, Bachmann

The red Toyota Corolla eases through the streets of downtown Minneapolis. The Wilfahrts are entering a part of their son’s world that was distant to them. They’re headed from their home in suburban Rosemount to the Twin Cities Gay Pride Parade, an annual event their son loved.

“It’s new for us,” Lori says . They ride in solemn silence. Harry Nilsson sings from the speakers:

“Remember, life is just a memory
Remember, close your eyes and you can see
Remember, think of all that life can be
Remember, dream,
Love is only in a dream …”

His mother puts her hands to her face and cries. Her son’s dream was to fall in love and find a job that allowed time to compose music.

“Are you OK, honey?” Jeff asks his wife.

The two have been married for 33 years. Lori works as a project manager for 3M. Jeff had a career there as well, but has been unemployed since the beginning of the year. The Wilfahrts have the milquetoast looks of middle-age Midwesterners: gray hair, rimmed glasses, apple-pie ordinary. Yet make no mistake: These lifelong Minnesotans might be the most powerful force to join the same-sex marriage movement.

In a state that has produced GOP presidential hopefuls Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty — who have made careers fighting gay marriage — these parents of an American hero present a major challenge to the establishment. They’ll take their battle to the Supreme Court, if that’s what it takes. To the Wilfahrts, denying gays the right to marry is discrimination against a group to which their son belonged.

Jeff has asked Lady Gaga to come to Minnesota to dance a same-sex marriage polka. He skipped a recent White House tea with the first lady held for families of service members. He wanted to send a message to the Obama administration: My son gave his life for his country, yet didn’t have full rights back home.

On a recent spring day, the couple stood outside the Capitol while lawmakers inside prepared to debate marriage. The legislators voted, largely along party lines, to put a constitutional amendment on the ballot for November 2012 to define marriage as solely between a man and woman.

Jeff had never spoken much publicly before eulogizing his son. He began by telling the crowd, “If I hold my finger up, I’m gonna be crying. When you see that, I need to pause.” A few minutes later, his finger dangled in the breeze. His voice cracked. “I challenge the one-man, one-woman champions to define manliness or womanhood. Will you as a human being, as an American, as a Minnesotan, be asked to open your trousers or to have your skirt lifted when applying for a license to marry?

” … I hope my son didn’t die for human beings, for Americans, for Minnesotans who would deny him civil rights.”

On this day, in the grandstands of the pride parade, the Wilfahrts will celebrate their son’s identity as both a gay man and a soldier. It’s the type of event that would stun Bachmann and Pawlenty: More than 100,000 gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transgenders and straights gathered in their home state, celebrating life and obeying the law. A Minneapolis police car led the parade, two officers waving to the jubilant crowd.

The night before, Jeff, 58, and Lori, 56, wondered if they were doing the right thing by coming. Their son was so private, would he want his mom and dad to speak out? Within minutes today, they get their answer. “Thank you for you and your son’s service,” a man says, offering a hug to Lori. Tears well in the parents’ eyes. Another stranger, Laurie Kermes, holds Lori’s hand. “Your son did a lot. He’s not going to be lost in vain.”

Soon, a float goes by carrying two poster-sized photographs of Andrew in Army camo. “That’s our boy!” Jeff says. He and Lori embrace. Their heads tilt toward the ground, two exhausted parents missing their son.

‘I am here to serve’

Andrew met with a retired gay Marine in Minneapolis bars and coffee shops in the months before signing up. He wanted to know the pros and cons of being gay in the military. He’d been volunteering at food shelters, animal shelters, an AIDS hospice, voter-registration drives and other non-profit initiatives. At 29, he was living with his parents and looking for more out of life.

The retired Marine says Andrew told him he wanted to serve so a soldier with a wife and children wouldn’t have to go fight. “He wasn’t making a statement” about being gay. “He was doing it for everybody else,” says Dan, who asked that his last name not be used. “He will forever be my hero because he joined for the right reasons. He was a silent part of the gay community, but it’s just unspeakable how big of an impact he’s had now.”

His name and face have been front and center in the state’s debate on gay marriage. Republican Rep. John Kriesel, who lost his legs while serving in Iraq, sent Andrew’s photo around the floor during debate in the Minnesota House. A few years ago, he said, he would have defined marriage as solely between heterosexuals. But his military service changed that. “This amendment doesn’t represent what I went to fight for,” he told lawmakers.

“I cannot look at this family and look at this picture and say, ‘You know what, Corporal, you were good enough to fight for your country and give your life, but you were not good enough to marry the person you love.’ I can’t do that.”

Andrew didn’t have a significant other. If he had, the partner wouldn’t have been allowed to escort his body home from Dover Air Force Base, nor would he have received Andrew’s $100,000 death benefit.

Andrew arrived at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri in February 2009. The man with the muscle-builder chest and six-pack abs drew immediate attention when quizzed by drill sergeants. He spoke in a Robocop voice. He asked question after question. Watching him, Kevin Gill wondered: Who is this guy?

“After we became really close, he told me that was his ‘tough man voice’ and that he used it to show his real ‘manhood,’” Sgt. Gill told CNN in a series of e-mails from Afghanistan. Andrew earned the nickname Slovak for his macho speak and exaggerated, arrow-straight gait. Andrew was like that, a ham who figured out a way to fit in. When he laughed, he threw his head back, closed his eyes and let out a sound that made everyone else chuckle.

In combat, he rode with two other soldiers. One was African-American, the other from Hawaii. They were known as “Team Minority.” Intelligent didn’t even begin to describe him. Everybody felt smarter just being around him. Shortly after Andrew arrived on post in Hawaii, a commander saw his perfect aptitude score and grilled him: What was somebody with such smarts doing as a grunt?

“Is this some kind of joke, Wilfahrt?”

“No, sir,” he said. “I am here to serve!”

Gill once asked him about World War I. Over the next week, for four hours a day, Andrew recounted the history of the first World War and all the other U.S. conflicts up through Vietnam. Andrew felt a connection to World War I: His great-grandfather, Charles Wilfahrt, entered battle in the European theater on September 26, 1918. Ninety-two years to the day, Andrew entered Operation Dragon Strike in Afghanistan as a member of the 552nd Military Police Company.

The coincidental timing wasn’t lost on him. He always found meaning in numbers. The numbers with meaning for him and Gill were their ages. They bonded at boot camp, where they were the “old” guys. Andrew was 29 at the time. Gill was 39. The two were like brothers. Their only difference before going to war: Gill headed to the straight bars during off-time at Schofield Barracks in Hawaii. Andrew hit the gay bars. Gill says Andrew always thought military investigators were following him.

None of his comrades cared about his sexuality. And, guys being guys, they cracked gay jokes around Andrew. His response: to laugh with them. He said it was funny that he talked more about his sexuality with his band of brothers than he ever had with gay friends.

Gill paid close attention and made sure the jokes never got out of hand. One of his own brothers is gay and moved to Switzerland in the mid-1990s. The two haven’t seen each other in 16 years, even though he accepts his brother for who he is. “That’s the tough thing about it.” Gill says it helped to talk to Andrew. No topic was taboo. They shared everything: about family, life, the war. Andrew told him how hard it can be to be gay in America.

One day last fall, the two were doing guard duty at a tower in a Kandahar police station when Gill’s understanding of what Andrew meant deepened. Andrew was reading a copy of Time magazine. In it was an article about gay teens who committed suicide after being bullied. Andrew began to weep. “This was more than just a tearful cry. This was all his emotion from the past just coming out all at once in front of his fellow soldier.”

Andrew’s parents say he struggled with suicidal tendencies in his early 20s. But every time, the thought of the four people he loved most — his mom and dad, sister Martha and brother Peter — stopped him.

In Afghanistan, Andrew confided in Gill. “I just trusted him and was proud to be serving next to him right there on the battlefield.”

‘A damn good soldier’

It was Sunday, February 27. Members of the 1st Squad, 3rd Platoon were on foot patrol in a region west of Kandahar, accompanied by members of the Afghan National Police. There were 11 of them, and they were familiar with the area. Andrew was ninth in line as they crossed a bridge toward a police checkpoint. Children scattered. A 122-mm mortar round lay hidden along the route.

At 11:48 a.m., the massive bomb detonated beneath Andrew. Three other explosives, daisy-chained together, failed to go off. Gill was 20 meters ahead of his battle buddy. He’d have been killed, too, if the other bombs had exploded. He rushed toward Andrew. A medic joined. They were at his side within seconds. It felt like a terrible training session. But it was all too real. Andrew’s legs were blown off, as was his left hand. He’d suffered severe wounds to his head.

Andrew was the 66th Minnesotan to be killed while serving in the wars in Afghanistan or Iraq. Some 7,000 miles away, in the Wilfahrt home in Rosemount, the world shattered.

Their firstborn, the baby who had taken 12 hours of labor to deliver.

The boy, who at 6 asked his father: “Do you think there is a different kind of gravity at the edge of the universe?”

The man who told them he loved his band of brothers so much he hoped to become an Army lifer.

He was gone.

Four months after their son’s death, Jeff and Lori sit at the kitchen table, the place where Lori says “a lot has gone down.” They both say the Army’s been good to them. They don’t feel anger, except as Jeff puts it, for “those f–kers at the Capitol” who voted against same-sex marriage.

Jeff places his son’s autopsy report on the table. “Don’t sanitize it,” he says. The document is inside a manila envelope with these words on the outside:

“WARNING: The information in the enclosed report is graphically described for complete accuracy in the physical details of the remains of Andrew C. Wilfahrt.

“It is STRONGLY RECOMMENDED that you read this in the presence of people that can provide you with emotional support during this time, such as your minister, a family friend, or a counselor.”

Jeff and Lori read the detailed eight-page report alone, on their own time. The anti-war activists whose boy once attended protests alongside them never thought they’d find themselves here, boasting about a soldier son. But they swell with pride, patriotic pride and gay pride.

Blunt and outspoken, Jeff says his boy didn’t die defending freedom. Don’t use that politician jargon “crap” around him. “He died for the soldier to the left and right of him,” he says. “And he was a damn good soldier.”

Shortly after Andrew’s death, Jeff wrote a letter to his son’s comrades. “A gay child will take you to places in your heart you did not know existed,” he said. “Regardless of orientation, I beseech all of you who are parenting now, or do so in the future, to give them all the love you can muster. At times it feels like you are bailing the ocean, but do not stop loving your children.”

Ashes at kitchen table

The soldiers of the 552nd are preparing to return home after a year in theater. They will leave behind Combat Outpost Wilfahrt. “We will never forget him and are honored to have served with such an outstanding person,” platoon leader 1st Lt. Brandon LaMar said in a letter informing the family of the naming of the outpost.

That letter arrived on May 7, what would have been Andrew’s 32nd birthday. Included in the package were memorial bracelets. The Wilfahrts wear theirs every day. Their home has become a shrine. Some of Andrew’s ashes rest in a brown container near the family table. His photograph is taped to the outside. Nearby are two teddy bears, one tattered from his youth, one given to the family in his memory.

Jeff’s greatest regret is not hugging his son when he first told him he was gay. “This is how it is for an old fool of a man. This moment is the burden I carry.” Jeff awakes in the middle of the night. Sometimes, he wanders the house. He’ll use Google Earth to zoom in on the exact spot where Andrew died. Lori often cries herself to sleep. She wonders if she’ll ever find the happiness she once had.

They try to maintain focus. “Andrew had courage. He had guts,” Lori says. “So I can have guts, too. And maybe it gives his death some meaning or a purpose, that he didn’t die for nothing.” The Wilfahrts speak to veterans groups, gay groups, book clubs. Their message: Our son was an American hero, not someone to be feared because he was gay.

In an Army cherry chest in the family library are Andrew’s six medals, including the Bronze Star and Purple Heart. They share space with a class assignment from when he was 10. “These people are important to me: every good person, friend, etc.,” the boy wrote. “The one thing I am most thankful for is my family.”

A loveseat across the room is overrun with compact discs, journals and Moleskine Music Notebooks he carried with him in Afghanistan. Inside are his scribbled music compositions. In one leather-bound book, Andrew jotted down favorite quotes.

“Speak your mind, even if your voice shakes.”

“The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek.”

“Too often we don’t hear the deaf and do not see the blind.”

“What we dream we become.”

His friend, Gill, says the man he will always remember is a great American hero. “Andrew became that person he always wanted to be.”

He was just two days from leave when he was killed. “With luck, I’ll be home as soon as the 6th,” he said in the last sentence he ever wrote his father. Instead of greeting their son with hugs on March 6, mom and dad buried their boy. His final resting spot is among thousands of others at Fort Snelling National Cemetery, a place where Jeff and Lori now come for solitude.

A lover of literature, Jeff always brings a collection of William Wordsworth. He flips the pages to “Expostulation and Reply.” He sits on the marble stone commemorating his son and reads aloud. Lori sits on the ground nearby. He gets to the last verse and chokes up:

“Then ask not wherefore, here, alone,
Conversing as I may,
I sit upon this old grey stone,
And dream my time away.”

Jeff stands quickly, touching the grey stone with his hand, as if reaching out to his beloved son from beyond the grave. He trembles and cries. “I can never get through the last paragraph,” he says. “What the hell’s wrong with me?”

Lori stands, too. The two stare at the headstone. Tears still streaming down his face, Jeff says, “It’s just the shits.” He whispers again, “It’s just the shits.”

They want people to know their son wasn’t a “gay soldier.” He was a great soldier who happened to be gay. Above all, he was a citizen.

A remarkable man, his epitaph reads.

 

 

I almost posted about the far beyond tragic and absurd cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars based on a figure of $3.7 trillion that was published earlier in the week on www.commondreams.org from a REUTERS article.  Then this morning the article in the Daily Hampshire Gazette about the unaccounted for billions of dollars for projects in Afghanistan seemed like a worthwhile story to post about, but what really grabbed my attention was an opinion piece in yesterday’s Gazette by retired Smith professor and Ashfield resident, Don Robinson, about the NATO bombing of Libya and Obama’s decision not to seek Congressional support.  That my dear friend and men’s group member, Alan Suprenant had just last week, while we were thinning his apple trees to make more room for the apples we left to ripen and grow large, told me that he was reading a book by the same Prof. Robinson about town meeting in Ashfield, no doubt played a role in my choice.  I called Don at his home and he was very welcoming of both the conversation and my entreaty to post his piece.

That the piece mentions Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon’s equally egregious abuse of power in undertaking and then escalating the Vietnam War contributed mightily to the article appearing below as well.  Robinson presents the War Powers Act (WPA) and how it came into being over Nixon’s veto in 1973 and then goes on to take issue with the Obama administration’s interpretation of the Act.  All hinges on the word “hostilities.”  Harold Koh, the State Department’s legal counsel, has seen fit, despite his history as a harsh critic of presidential unilateralism and the need to control it, to present to Congress and the American people the interpretation of “hostilities” that excludes what we are doing to Libya and thus prevents the WPA from being invoked.  How absurd!  We’ve been bombing the country for months because of the “hostilities” between Quaddafi’s forces and the various rebel groups desperately seeking to depose his government.  There’s a civil war taking place there.  What’s missing from the conditions that would have the Obama administration go before Congress to seek authorization for his heretofore unilateral actions?  Had the WPA been used, Obama would have been challenged to convince Congress that our bombs need to be part of the effort to depose Quaddafi.  In the absence of such a requirement, we are all left to wonder when our Libyan involvement will end and what it will take to bring it to a satisfying conclusion for our government…

Thanks go to Don not only for endorsing my posting his article, but also for his numerous suggestions of Smith professors to contact about my recently published book as well as the name of Jim Munroe, Vietnam veteran and Dean of the Christ Church Cathedral in Springfield, MA who he assured me would be very interested in CALLED TO SERVE.

Don Robinson: Responsible use of ‘war powers’

Thursday, June 30, 2011

ASHFIELD – The quarrel between President Obama and Congress over America’s role in Libya has been heartening in one important respect. This president does not dispute his obligations under the War Powers Resolution (WPR).

Enacted by Congress in 1973 (over President Nixon’s veto), WPR declares that the authority of the president to order U.S. armed forces into hostilities may be exercised only after a declaration of war, an attack on the United States, or specific statutory authorization. It obliges the president “in every possible case” to consult with Congress.

If the president determines to send military forces into combat without a declaration of war or an explicit authorization by Congress, he must submit to Congress within 48 hours a report telling why he was compelled to act and setting forth the scope and duration of the engagement. Congress then has 60 days to declare war or adopt a resolution specifically supporting the president’s action. If no such authorization is forthcoming, the president has an additional 30 days to remove the troops from the operation.

The WPR was enacted in the wake of grave abuses of presidential war powers by Presidents Johnson and Nixon in Vietnam. The preamble to the resolution stated its purpose: to fulfill the framers’ intent by insuring that the collective judgment of both Congress and the president controls an introduction of armed forces into hostilities.

Why? Not because representatives in Congress are smarter or more patriotic than presidents, but because the two branches occupy different vantage points. Presidents have a global perspective; members of Congress represent local constituencies. They are more concerned with costs and benefits, which they calculate concretely. Also, members of the House are always running for re-election, so they keep their ears to the ground, district by district.

That is the genius of the framers’ design. Sending troops into harm’s way is the gravest decision a government can make. Unless the nation’s survival is immediately at stake, a commitment of troops must be undertaken, not by one man and aides who owe their place at the table to him alone, but after careful deliberation by people with differing political constituencies.

How do we go to war? The president has troops at his command. He sees danger looming; he sees an opportunity to head it off. His advisers, smart, strong, persuasive people, clamor for action. Is there time to wrangle a resolution through both houses of Congress? The enemies’ forces are at the gates!

Off he goes. It is just a limited operation, he tells the nation. There will be no troops on the ground, no nation-building. Our allies and friends look to us. Remember how awful we felt when we didn’t act in Rwanda. We don’t want to be irrelevant, paralyzed, as the Arab world reorganizes. Besides, we’ll be in and out in no time.

Of course it hasn’t worked out that way. It seldom does. The administration needs more money and time, and so it must answer awkward questions.

The lead spokesman is the State Department’s legal counsel, Harold Koh. A former dean of the Yale Law School, he is best known for his work on “the National Security Constitution.” He has been a strong critic of the “imperial presidency.”

How has Koh answered critics of Obama’s action? “We are not saying the president can take the country into war on his own,” said Koh last week. “We are not saying the War Powers Resolution is unconstitutional or should be scrapped, or that we can refuse to consult Congress. We are saying the limited nature of this particular mission is not the kind of ‘hostilities’ envisioned by the War Powers Resolution.”

Earlier, supporting Koh’s nomination to the State Department post, Bruce Ackerman, his Yale Law School colleague, told a panel of senators, “President Obama has selected one of the few lawyers who has probed deeply into the constitutional implications of presidential unilateralism and how it might be controlled.” Koh, said Ackerman, would be taking his position at one of the rare moments when it might be “politically possible to # restore an effective system of checks and balances.”

Another distinguished academic, Harvard’s Jack Goldsmith, wrote recently that, for a quarter century before joining the Obama administration, Koh had been the “leading and most vocal academic critic of presidential unilateralism in war, and a tireless advocate for institutional cooperation between the political branches in war decisions.”

What happens to people when they join the government? It is too simple to say that “power corrupts.” One gets caught up in a particular set of challenges. Koh finds that the term “hostilities” in the WPR ought to be defined narrowly. America’s actions in Libya do not constitute “hostilities” in the sense used in the resolution.

To a non-lawyer, it looks like sophistry. What’s worse, future presidents and their aides will cite the Obama/Koh precedent to justify much more ominous actions. Obama and Koh have missed a great chance to set a better example.

Don Robinson, a retired professor of government at Smith College, writes a regular column for the Gazette, which appears on the last Thursday of the month. He can be emailed at drobinso@smith.edu.

 

It started in Maine and came to Northampton and now it’s gone viral.  The mayors of a number of mid-size cities – yes, they’re all democrats so far – are letting it be known that these wars are destroying their economies and now with Bin Laden gone there are no more reasons to “stay the course.”  This kind of response has not occurred since a similar call for an end to the War in Vietnam.  This time the dots are being connected – economic disaster, soldiers and civilian deaths, infrastructure nightmares and the environment.  No, it won’t stop our government from doing whatever it sees fit regardless of the consequences, but it will help by getting more people’s attention and, as the mayor of Minneapolis, R.T. Rybak, says in the article, “Sometimes issues that start small in our group make a great deal of difference globally.”

WASHINGTON — As the Obama administration readies plans for U.S. offices in Afghanistan, it’s not just national office-holders who are demanding an expedited drawdown.

On Friday, the U.S. Conference of Mayors will introduce a resolution calling for a quicker end to the war and a speedier withdrawal of troops. If it passes — a vote will come on Monday — it will be the first time the body has formally called for an end to an military engagement since Vietnam.

The mayors’ formal address of the conflict — which is still being debated, politically, at the federal level — illustrates how widespread skepticism about Afghanistan has become.

Just this week, several top candidates in the Republican presidential field raised serious concerns over the sustainability of current troop levels. On Wednesday, 27 senators signed a letter to the president pressing him for a new strategy and a major troop drawdown.

Unlike senators, mayors have no power of the purse. Nor do any of them currently aspire to serve in the role of commander-in-chief. But the resolution that they are set to consider still serves as a reflection of the current mood with respect to Afghanistan and Iraq.

For starters, opponents of the war remain largely Democratic. The signatories of the pending resolution include more than a dozen Democratic mayors of mid-to-large cities — Dave Norris of Charlottesville, Va.; David Coss of Santa Fe, N.M.; R.T. Rybak of Minneapolis, Minn.; and Carolyn Peterson of Ithaca, N.Y.

The basis of the mayors’ objections is not strictly the morality or strategic basis of the war, but the price tag. The resolution’s first clause references the “severity of the ongoing economic crisis” and “budget shortfalls at all levels of government” as reasons to “re-examine our national spending priorities.” The second clause notes that Iraq and Afghanistan are costing the country approximately $126 billion dollars per year. It is not until the third clause that the authors point to the wars’ casualties. They conclude with a plea for Congress to “bring these war dollars home to meet vital human needs.”

“As mayors, we recognize there is an absurdly false choice being put to Americans that we somehow have to pick between all the priorities we care deeply about but can’t touch massive spending on the military,” said Rybak. “There is this rationale that defense spending trickles down to domestic priorities. That is true. I’m happy that the space program developed Tang but that does not mean that’s the end result we should be going for.”

There is only a limited sense about the resolution’s prospects for success. But its supporters suggest that many members will be influenced by the overt national trends.

“I’ve been active in politics for many years in a number of different roles,” Joseph C. O’Brien, the Mayor of Worcester and a co-sponsor of the resolution, told The Huffington Post. “Nationally, the tide is turning on support for interventions abroad, whether Afghanistan or Iraq. … We are spending a billion a month after Osama bin Laden has been killed. And while I appreciate the effort to rebuild nations around the world, we have tremendous needs in communities like mine.”

In order to pass, the resolution would have to go through the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ Metro Economies Policy Committee first before heading to the full body for a vote.

That process is similar to what happened in front of the conference 40 years ago. Then meeting in Philadelphia, a group of mayors urged colleagues to go on record as supporting the federal amendment calling for President Nixon to withdraw all American forces from Vietnam in a matter of months. New York City mayor John Lindsay requested that the group invite a veteran of the war, one John Kerry, to speak before the plenary session. Nixon insisted that Vietnam Veterans for a Just Peace’s John O’Neill be invited to argue the other side. The debate and subsequent passage of the resolution earned a photo on the first page of The New York Times the following day.

It would be a Christmas-come-early gift for war protesters to get that type of press this go-around. Popular dissatisfaction with Afghanistan hasn’t registered as it did with Vietnam. And while there are a determined number of mayors who feel committed to seeing the resolution through, even they aren’t certain about its chances for success.

“I couldn’t tell you whether it will pass or not,” said Rybak. “Sometimes issues that start small in our group make a great deal of difference globally.”

READ THE FULL RESOLUTION:

1. WHEREAS, the severity of the ongoing economic crisis has created budget shortfalls at all levels of government and requires us to re-examine our national spending priorities; and

2. WHEREAS, the people of the United States are collectively paying approximately $126 billion dollars per year to wage war in Iraq and Afghanistan; and

3. WHEREAS, 6,024 members of the US armed forces have died in these wars; and at least 120,000 civilians have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan since the coalition attacks began.

4. NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the U.S. Conference of Mayors supports efforts to speed up the ending of these wars; and

5. BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the U.S. Conference of Mayors calls on the U.S. Congress to bring these war dollars home to meet vital human needs, promote job creation, rebuild our infrastructure, aid municipal and state governments, and develop a new economy based upon renewable, sustainable energy.

CALLED TO SERVE: THE STORIES OF MEN AND WOMEN CONFRONTED BY THE VIETNAM WAR DRAFT entered into the world officially last Sunday. 7 years in the making the homestretch was both gratifying and exhausting leaving me very little time to post. But that was a week ago and today on www.cnn.com I read a story that I had to share with as many people as I could about a tragic hero – Spc. Shane Parham – who is the subject of at least the first of a three part series on the effects of war on the mind, body, psyche and spirit of those who are fighting the wars our government has chosen to pursue. That cnn has written such a moving, powerful and distressing story is the good news since many folks read them on-line. That Shane’s story is one of countless Americans – men and women – of the 2.2 million who have been suffering the aftershocks of their service is the very awful news. But I want you to hear Shane tell it so here’s the link to both an incredibly honest and challenging film clip as well as the article:

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2011/war.at.home/part1/index.html?hpt=C1

I would welcome your comments either via the blog or to my e-mail at tweiner909@comcast.net
Of course, you are welcome to check out CALLED TO SERVE at either

I learned of the death of Osama Bin Laden the way many others did yesterday morning via the TIMES on-line NEWS ALERT, which I’ve been subscribing to since the tragedy in Japan and which sends me whatever the newspaper considers worthy of such designation. I was definitely relieved and then, soon after, saddened to see the outbreak of patriotic fervor at a baseball game and at numerous college campuses. I understand the excessive reaction to the death of the man considered responsible for the horror of 9/11 and many other terrorist acts, but I do not want it to be what dominates.

Thankfully there are other individuals who recognize that a person dying is not cause for celebration, even when that person has hurt so many others. This was the case last night at a wonderful ex post Earth Day poetry and music event my dear friend, John Berkowitz co-organized with the Molly Scott up in Greenfield. There the sentiment was also relief, but it was also more sober and cognizant that Bin Laden’s passing is not going to heal the gaping wounds in our world.

There are also organizations like RETHINKING AFGHANISTAN that are making the connection between the death of al Queda’s leader and the necessity for war. They have begun a petition, which you can access at:

http://rethinkafghanistan.com/?akid=1568.40705.Mvjn3O&rd=1&t=4

By signing you ask our government to acknowledge that the person whose leadership in the actions that led to the war is gone and that we must bring the troops home and end the war. That would be the most desirable outcome from the death of Osama Bin Laden…

My good friend, Geoff Lobenstine, has sent out an invitation to the next OPERATION RECOVERY event and it sounds very important so I am putting the word out. What this group is trying to do is incredibly vital to the effort to stop the wars – they want the government/military to take care of its own, which would mean not sending any one back to war who is suffering from PTSD or traumatic brain injury. This would effectively curtail the war because there would not be enough troops to serve. Here’s the invitation, which includes the guiding principles of the organization:

OPERATION RECOVERY – A CALL TO ACTION

Support traumatized troops—Make it hard to continue the wars

Saturday, April 30, from 3 to 5 pm at the First Congregational Church of Amherst (165 Main St.)

Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) and Veterans for Peace (VFP) will be holding a training for everyone interested in truly supporting the troops & ending the wars. If you missed our first event on April 2, about Operation Recovery—come join us on April 30. If you came on April 2, this training on April 30 will go into more detail.

In the training we will be hearing more about this campaign, and about reaching out to people in the National Guard & Reserves. Many of them have been traumatized in Iraq or Afghanistan, & may be sent there again.

If soldiers can stay home to heal, it will make carrying on the wars much more difficult.

Hear how you can help make it possible for these soldiers to heal. Some of this outreach will be in person, as we talk with these people. Other outreach will involve getting the word out, without having direct conversations.

In the training, we will also have a chance in small groups to discuss past experiences with outreach around other issues, ways in conversations to deal with anger in others & in ourselves, resources to offer people, and so on. We will also roleplay having conversations with members of the Guard & Reserves, answering common questions, and so on.

The training will be led by Ted Goodnight and Jenn Blain, from the local IVAW, as well as other local activists.

There is no charge for this event, and free parking for the duration of the event is available in the First Congregational Church lot, behind the church. (The First Congregational Church is a large stone church at 165 Main St in Amherst, just down the hill from the Common, Black Sheep, & the brick police station.)

Operation Recovery is an effort to aid Soldiers, Marines, & other GI’s based on three key points:

1. Service members have the Right to Heal

2. Service members have the right to receive medical care and advice from medical professionals.

3. Many service members experience Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Traumatic Brain Injury, & Military Sexual Trauma, and combat stress. They have the right to exit the traumatic situation and receive immediate support, and compensation.


Looking forward to hearing from you, either by e-mail or phone (Geoff–413-256-8647 or Ted—413-387-2377),

Geoff (Lobenstine), W. Mass. Veterans for Peace

PS Visit the webpage about Operation Recovery– http://www.ivaw.org/operation-recovery