[Grovenet] Listen to the Vets

[Ron D'Eau Claire]

What better way to spend a few minutes on Veteran's day than by listening to
the current crop of "Vets" who are still walking the streets of Baghdad and
scouring the sands of Iraq for the next attack share their views of the war
and Secretary Rumsfeld's resignation? 

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1110/p11s01-usmi.html

Reading their comments takes me back half a century to when, as a National
Guardsman in the 40th Armored Division I was on alert to deploy to Germany
to tear down that nasty wall the Russians built through Berlin. Like these
troops we listened to the experts explain that the armor on our antiquated
tanks and personnel carriers was no match for the modern Russian tanks.
There were two rules: 1) Don't bother to shoot; your 'armor piercing' ammo
will bounce off their tanks and 2) If he shoots you're dead. 

The responses and attitudes of the guys in uniform seemed much the same
then. What was different back then was that cooler heads prevailed and, in
the end, we didn't go 'duke it out' with the Russians after all. For that
I've always felt more grateful than I can express, not matter how good the
German beer or how pretty the frauleins were reported to be. 

Indeed, things for those in uniform have changed so little I can easily
guess what this guy said, and it certainly wasn't "stuff": "I don't really
follow that stupid political [stuff]," says Mark, a specialist based near
Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, who gave only his first name. "I like
to keep things that closely impact me close, and things that I really have
no control of out of my way."

I think we felt pretty much the same. Forget the political agenda, just show
me how to survive this...

As a civilian now, I feel like I and the other civilians have let these men
and women down. They actually went to fight and get the job done right:

"I always backed the president and Rumsfeld ... but ... they misunderstood
what Iraq was going to be," says a bulky soldier, keeping his rifle trained
down a busy road. He spoke on condition of anonymity. "The situation is such
that if we left now, it would be even more [screwed] up." 

"I don't think anything is going to change," says the private first class.
"I was reading [in Stars and Stripes] ... about, if you go into someone's
house and mess it up, you've got to do the cleanup."

Who are we to tell them those sentiments are wrong? 

Will we do that by turning our back on Iraq and those who died there? 

Ron D'Eau Claire