Guns, war, patriotism and courage — Ukraine
We are seeing the best of humankind in the Ukrainians who are going to fight the Russian Army’s invasion of their country. Putin is emulating Hitler — the lies, the invasions of its neighbors under spurious pretexts. He can win battles, and he can destroy lives, families, buildings and cities; he can never ultimately win and prevail against the fighting spirit and patriotism of the Ukrainian people.
The Ukrainian people voted to establish their own independent nation by overwhelming majorities in 1991. The Ukrainian people threw out a corrupt President and ally of Putin’s in 2014. Putin’s Russia then invaded and annexed Crimea and fomented separatist movements in Eastern Ukraine. For the past eight years, the Ukrainians have been fighting in Luhansk and Donyets against Russian supported separatists. Putin has ordered a full scale invasion on all fronts to take over Ukraine.
Earlier this week, we were discussing the men and women of Ukraine, the courageous civilians taking up arms to defend their country; we were remembering our fathers who volunteered and went to fight Hitler, the Nazis and the Japanese attackers after Pearl Harbor. They were our father heroes as we grew up. We grew up on the courage and exploits of the American military in World War II.
Our generation’s parents volunteered in droves to fight Hitler. Our dad was blown up by a German land mine during the Second World War in France; he survived and recuperated. All his brothers fought in the war. We were brought up on family stories extolling bravery and military service to our country.
As young boys, we were trained and learned to accurately shoot a rifle, pistol and shot guns. We did target shooting, not hunting. We were trained to respect arms, clean and maintain them, and treat them with utmost safety. This was not training for war or the military, we never expected to use them against another human being.
As young boys, we gloried in American democracy and patriotism, flawed as we soon learned our nation was with its racism and bigotry.
In Norway where my sister lives, all men and all women must undergo military training and enter the service. Gun ownership for hunting is widespread, but Norwegians must store their arms in locked safes inside their homes. The Norwegians live right next to Russia; they know, understand and manage the dangers; they are also members of NATO and under the umbrella of protection it provides for its members. The Finns have comparable requirements for mandatory military training for male citizens. https://puolustusvoimat.fi/en/finnish-conscription-system Sweden and Finland, long time neutrals, are now considering applying for NATO membership.
During the Cold War, the US and the USSR nearly started a nuclear exchange while we were in high school over the Russian missiles being stationed in Cuba. I can remember walking to and from my classes in Newport, Rhode Island wondering which moment would be our last.
We grew to adulthood in the 60’s where our leaders lied us into war, and many thousands of our fellow Americans of our ages died and were badly wounded fighting against Vietnamese who were engaged in their own civil war. We had no business being there, but our involvement was sold to the American people as part of the anti-Communism of our day. In our generation, we developed a healthy distaste for war and distrust for our lying government leaders, and we expressed it in protest movements. Our protest leaders and protest participants were jailed, gassed and beaten; some were killed and thrown in prison. Our conscript Army of young men was disproportionately black, brown, working class, and rural young men, and they were turned off by the lies of their commanders and their political leaders, both Democrats and Republicans. Many with good educations and connections did our best to dodge the draft, and many succeeded, leaving a bitter taste among those who served. These divisions are still manifest in the politics of today.
The peace movement morphed into an anti-military movement, which was badly wrong headed and mistaken. It was labelled as anti-patriotic and treasonous. True patriotism must include the willingness to disagree about government policies. These strong disagreements about military and foreign policy and the nation’s direction are the essence of democracy, but they cannot/should not be allowed to turn either into violence or into accusations of treason against those espousing differing points of view.
After the experiences of Vietnam, the compulsory draft was abolished. The nation switched from conscription to a career military, to a more professional and better paid army. The US military operates within a strong code and culture separating them from domestic political disputes. That is not true in many other nations.
After 9/11, many Americans joined the military to fight in Afghanistan against the Al Qaeda terrorists, who, operating under the protection of the government of Afghanistan, had attacked our nation. We attacked and removed the Taliban from power and ultimately caught and killed Osama bin Laden, sheltering inside Pakistan (our purported ally).
The US President, Vice President, Secretary of Defense and Secretary of State lied to the American people and the global community to justify an invasion of Iraq, a nation headed by a despicable dictator, a nation that had had nothing to do with the 9/11 attack, but had vast oil reserves, a nation with a dictator with a history of attacking his neighbors. The US attacked and occupied Iraq, an oil rich nation, to effectuate regime change in the center of the Middle East. While we deposed the Taliban and Saddam Hussein respectively, we could not, despite overwhelming military superiority, subdue the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan who did not want to be governed and ruled by leaders selected in Washington DC and/or by the US armed forces.
The Civil War was the last major war fought extensively within the US, and it inflicted long lasting damage and widespread suffering, but that was in the 19th Century. By contrast, Europeans had two major and extensive wars fought in Europe during the 20th Century, and Russia and Ukraine were the sites of an extensive and destructive civil war during the Russian Revolution at the close of the First World War.
The Russian people have long memories of their valor and extraordinary sacrifice during World War II, which are deeply embedded in their national psyche. They can readily distinguish between a Hitler and Zelenskyy, between the invading Nazis and their peaceful Ukrainian neighbors. Putin is trying to convince the Russian people that the Ukrainians are neo-Nazis oppressing their fellow Russian-speaking Ukrainian citizens; these are lies, and most every Russian knows it, including those employed by Putin to tell them. Putin is now suppressing all independent journalism and imposing 15 year prison sentences on journalists who do not toe his party line on the war.
Putin and his allies and cronies will learn a hard and painful lesson from invading a peaceful neighbor who has posed no threat to them. It may take weeks, months, years, or decades, but the 46 million Ukrainian people will prevail in defending their country. The backlash from Putin’s lies and killings will likely poison the Russian people against their government and its leaders. The Russian people are already protesting, being beaten, and going to jail for their opposition to Putin’s unjust invasion of a peaceful neighbor; this will grow and grow and grow as long as this war goes on. We must support the courageous Russian protesters and the Ukrainian people; both are in terrible peril and showing remarkable courage.
Putin is a ruthless leader who kills and jails his opponents and brooks no domestic opposition. He views the Ukrainians as his domestic opposition, but there are 46 million of them, and by his actions, he has united them in opposition to him; there are far too many to be jailed or murdered. However, if and as he becomes exceedingly brutal in his destruction of Ukraine’s citizens and cities, the pressure on NATO to intervene to stop the slaughter could become overwhelming, leading us towards a World War III.
While it is hard to decipher Putin’s end game — Russian domination of all its neighbors and their resources we would all guess — the rest of the world needs to stay and stand united against him with the maximum sanctions and every other pressure we can apply, short of starting World War III and a nuclear exchange. He has no exit strategy from this invasion and war as he would likely be ousted, tried, jailed and lose his freedom and enormous hidden assets. The UN General Assembly has just overwhelmingly condemned the invasion; only a very few nations like Belarus and North Korea supported Putin’s invasion; China played its own cagey game of abstention while criticizing the US.