Military Protests
March 14, 2009 @ 13:45
Some of you may have read about the protests of returning troops to England from Iraq last week. They were greeted by a friendly welcome by the majority with a minority holding signs describing them as “Butchers” and “Terrorists“.
I read this and felt torn. On one hand the protesters are voicing their complaints against the British Army’s part in death of thousands of civilians. On the other hand they are raising the issue in a hugely polarising way which probably does more damage to their cause than aid it. After this brief pondering I returned to my week.
Over the following days the typical figureheads gave their sound-bites to the media about how awful this was and about how the protesters should be ashamed of themselves. Gordon Brown made one of his stereotypical comments, trying desperately to prove that he can do something right to a increasingly disappointed public. Basically, an fairly expected reaction.
What was unexpected was today’s story about David Davis MP calling for it to become a crime to incite hatred of serving soldiers. “Inciting hatred” is the clever new way to sweeten further restrictions of our free speech in a way the public will seemingly happily accept. David Davis admitted personal concerns about the war but insists that British soldiers are “our finest young men and women, the cream of society“.
Personally, I believe that most soldiers are brave men and women. I don’t think that they are necessarily finer people than the doctors or members of the emergency services who save lives daily but that’s another debate. I’m came pretty close to joining the military myself. I had several successful interviews with the British Army and was one away from a university bursary which would have got me a place in Sandhurst after graduation. Despite my current pacifist leanings I respect the opinion of those disagree and I respect those in the military.
The initial reasons given for the Iraq war have been revealed as mistaken at best and outright deceit at worst. Iraq is turning into a nightmare with thousands upon thousands of civilians displaced or killed. There are several accounts of Iraqis describing Iraq under Saddam as a better place to live. If more of the military had been men like Malcolm Kendall-Smith and Ben Griffin then perhaps we wouldn’t have this disaster our hands.
This is why at the next election I will be voting for a party that campaigned against the Iraq war and is putting forward a bill to repeal some of the laws that have reduced our civil liberties. It’s time to take a stand against these attempts by Labour and the Conservatives to further reduce our freedom and increase their power. It’s time for the government of this country to be led by a party that stands for the rule of international law and respects the rights of the citizens of this country.
Posted in Politics
No matter how fine or brave they are, they gave themselves to the state. Governments couldn’t act like bullies without the military to back them up. Those who join the military are enablers. When you join the military you give up the right to follow your conscience. Governments have no conscience.
Comment by Roland — March 14, 2009 @ 14:17
Various parties are created to maintain the illusion that people have a choice. Behind every party in every country not only UK stand people that are invisible to the public and who pull the strings. Everything goes in the direction to gain complete control of information and people. If you’ve seen “V for Vendetta” then you’d realise that this movie is not far from the reality except one thing, one global government.
Comment by Bender — March 14, 2009 @ 14:53
When you join military you work for goverment but you give your oath to protect the Constitution and civil rights of respected state (at least here in cze). So if goverment gives you order that really violates it or something like that nobody will do it.
And soldiers are definetly not finest (maybe we’re most vulgar because we have lots of time to practise it ;P), there are smart pple all around, same as dumb ones. :]
Comment by scarabeus — March 14, 2009 @ 15:06
Well, I do not like that the soldiers are called as terrorists. Only the people who have the power, the Government, King and/or politicons can be terrorists.
Soldiers duty is to follow the law but to protect the civilians, are they their citizens or enemies but same duty is applied to them.
Soldiers even have responsible to act against their government, if government is using forces against their country law or international law. It is not easy task to be a soldier, because their duty is not to be like zombies. But that is what they are.
The politics is the only source of war, as von Clausewitz said. The war exist only for itself. Not to protect own country or civilians.
If there would not be politics, there would not be any meaning for armies, for use by those who has the power.
The Iraq is such assault war, that should never happend. If actually those who have the power (those few people in the world) wanted the Saddam to step down, they would never gived the money and weapons in the first place.
Same thing is happening on the Israel currently. Almost every attack war what has happend after the WWII, the US is responsible for that. But all the countries what have had the colonies, have done same things. In example the England in the India etc.
The International terrorism is done by those countries who are in higest position on the world and in UN. They can use their vote, even to protect them self and their own actions.
The democracy can not work as long as the politics can stay in the governments service over two periods. The power should switch every 6-8 years. This applies to every level of the civilization. Leaders of companies, to leaders of government etc.
The government just does not care what their citizens actually think of their actions. Because they have their own games and rules. And they believe that they know what is best of them all, and the people who voted them to those positions, should be quiet.
Comment by Friiduh — March 14, 2009 @ 16:26
I believe that staging a protest against the military over the Iraq war is a mis-placed effort. Here in the USA, we did that during and following the Viet Nam ‘police action’ (War) and we were wrong.
Citizens who join the Military do so in the belief that they are protecting their homes and families. US, British, and other allied troops went to Iraq in the belief that they were liberating an enslaved populace. These are noble motives and should not be disparaged regardless the outcome of the action.
Now that we (the allied forces) have toppled the Husein government, we have an obligation to leave a stable government in place when we go home. Anything less would be a disaster for the entire world and (like it or not) would enable terrorism by providing a place from which it can flourish. It is no longer pertinent whether the Iraq war should have been waged or not because it has been. Now all that matters is that we (the population of the world) learn the true futility of war and find a better way to solve our disputes peacefully.
Comment by Ernest N. WIlcox Jr. — March 14, 2009 @ 16:47
What I’m about to say, I’m going to say from a Canadian retrospective, simply because that’s the perspective I know.
In countries like Canada, when a military oath is sworn, the first and foremost thing that is sworn to protect is the people and their way of life. You’d die for any of your siblings, parents maybe; If someone threatened their life, if you can honestly say your willing to die for them, take it five steps farther:
Extend that to everyone you know, everyone you don’t know, everyone you love. Everyone you hate. Of course there are people in it for revenge, or the chance to legally use weapons, but the surprising majority swear into service because they want to protect everything many people take for granted; Like it or not, those people holding signs calling the military “butchers” and “terrorists” don’t realize it’s the military that helps hold the world away in an effort to let them have access to even simple rights, like clean water, schools, the right to dress uniquely, the right to go online.
The right to free speech can be difficult to draw lines with, because people can be terrible, hateful creatures. While most people agree that it should be a right not to be called (pardon the next words) “chinks”, “niggers” and the like, where should the line be drawn? Can we slur atheists, or Christians in public? Can we call a raped 16-year-old a “baby killer” when she tries to abort? Now, should we call the military murderers?
Can a de-clawed cat protect itself against a rabid dog? Countries need protection. People need protection. While we can claim never to have taken a swing to the high-school bully, parts of the world, people WILL walk up to you and cut out your throat without provocation because of who you are and what you represent. They will take your dignity, record every degradation to who you are, torture you in the eye of a camera lenses, and after all that slit your throat and post that hideous legacy online for the world to see. These are not nigh-school bullies we can just walk away from. The passive approach was taken before, and Germany, while doing fantastic things now, had a very dark period of time illustrating where things can go.
There are also cases where Canadian soldiers are called all these things. Canadians, under a common set of orders, cannot fire unless fired upon. Someone I know personally and respect deeply is being treated for PTSD because he was under these orders; he had to watch as children were shot in front of his group, and they could do nothing because they were under peacekeeping orders not to fire unless fired upon. Discipline.
Yet the deployed troops (who also happen to give out food and first aid to civilians; Generally unmentioned, but worth pointing out) will get called butchers when they kill the men threatening innocent people. Look someone in the eye, and say out loud “Butcher, you killed that man with the gun to that childes head”
It’s silly, but describing us as being “given to the state” is a grotesque way of saying it when you really look at what most UN-based military organizations stand for. Military organizations need to be controlled by somebody, and be it her Majesty, the white house, parliament, elected, so on; these people are groups that represent the people. And while some are questionable and while initial motives are tainted, we are in this mess now, and we need to clean it up.
Many people in the Canadian military, before they go to the middle east, will be told something; And before you read what it will mean, think about it for a moment. People going over the wire will get told “Save one for yourself”. It’s because when you’re over there, if you get injured and captured, you cannot escape; and you will not become a prisoner of war. There is no Geneva convention to these people. You will be treated with dirty, bloody diseased tools, then tortured until the brink of death. Then treated again, and tortured, rinse, repeat, days, weeks, months, until you break down before the camera with a slit throat ending.
This is the world we live in, it’s fun to watch high-school musical and call people “butchers” when they come home. Some of these people have seen horrible things, and lost parts of themselves; I personally hope never to see children get mowed down, or kill another person, but it could be my future too and I may be called a butcher for it. I can’t imagine the depths and breadth of the discipline and sacrifice the deployed went through, but I find it simply sad how unforgiving and shallow these protesters can be.
Comment by Rare — March 14, 2009 @ 17:44
@ Ernest N. Wllcox Jr.
Do you call liberating enslaved populance what happened in El Garib prison?
First it was said Irak has mass detruction weapons which was a lie.
Then they said the war is for libertating Irak citizens. Which was a lie too.
You think we shouldn’t blame soldiers? Come on, invading a country maybe goverment responsibilty. But shooting women and kids is just responsibility for every single soldier who did it.
If an Israel (or whoever) soldier shoots a 5 years old kid with a head-shot in the belief of protecting his home and familiy than I say he has no brain or worst he has no heart.
Comment by Rahman Duran — March 14, 2009 @ 18:40
Hi there,
I’m a Muslim and I found the protests a huge irritation. The people behind it are the former al-Muhajiroun group, which have used a number of other aliases since they were banned but are the same gang. The problem with them is that they go for maximum publicity, and will shout their offensive slogans to whoever holds a microphone to them. The media will grant them interview after interview, often in prime time slots but also during the daytime when the housewives and truck-drivers and cabbies are listening. While a few years ago you had Muslims willing to listen to them, more recently they have turned against them because they don’t actually care about Muslims other than themselves and most of us don’t want to share their publicity.
The Davies proposal is stupid, though; this was one small demonstration which did not lead to any violence against the soldiers. If there was a constant problem with violent disruptions at parades, that would be different. It is typical of a certain attitude which takes freedom of speech for granted, and whose reaction to a bit of annoying loud-mouthery is to shout “ban it”. Also, many dictatorships and authoritarian states, like Turkey, have laws outlawing insulting the military, and they are used to silence criticism, even when there are well-grounded accusations of brutality against the military.
I do think it was foolish to have the soldiers march through Luton; a fifth of Luton’s population is Muslim, and not only is there great resentment of the Bush wars in the Muslim community, but like most of the non-white minorities, many of them see the army as a white-dominated, racist institution (something that wasn’t mentioned much in the controversy). I also don’t recall any such parades after the army came back from Bosnia or Sierra Leone (but then, the MuhajiGoons would not have turned out for that), only Iraq, where the army went only because the British government did not have the guts to say no to Bush, who saw political capital in killing Muslims.
Comment by Matthew Smith — March 14, 2009 @ 20:09
Everybody who (in hindsight) thinks the war was good for the iraqi people should talk to hundreds of thousands who died and the millions who live in terror everyday.
They were better off under Saddam. Hurts to say it, but you have to look at the facts.
Comment by Kragil — March 14, 2009 @ 20:54
Well I don’t serve in the Army but I do serve in a military and I think it goes back to anything else. Soldiers are not saints just on account of having been sent to action, so there will be soldiers who commit atrocities, just as there are criminals (i.e. soldiers who shoot unarmed children) in any large population or group. *But* that doesn’t give people the right to paint the entire Army with that brush. I can definitely echo “Rare” comments about people who don’t serve really not understanding what it’s like.
So I would just say when you think about the military, keep together in your head the difference between policy makers (the politicians, leaders, senior military leadership and yes, the people) and the instruments of policy, the actual “boots on the ground”. You can protest the soldiers all you want but that won’t change anything, and it wasn’t their fault.
And I will say that any military where junior personnel routinely disobey orders based on perceived legality will soon cease to be a functioning military. American servicemembers, both officer and enlisted, are charged with following only “lawful orders” but it’s also not generally in the purview of a Lieutenant to decide that merely being in a country is unlawful. After all, the Allied invasion of Normandy in World War II could hardly have been construed to be “legal”, but no one complained because it was quite understood that Nazi Germany and the UK were belligerents. On the other hand, a servicemember who shot a prisoner of war in cold blood on orders would probably be in violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, along with the officer who ordered it.
So although I sympathize with what you say about more servicemembers repeating what Flight Lt. Kendall-Smith did, what you really want is more military officers in a position to dictate/implement policy to do that, not for junior personnel to do that.
Comment by Michael Pyne — March 14, 2009 @ 21:55
“turning into a nightmare”
Where have you been the past 5 years? lol.
Comment by Ian Monroe — March 14, 2009 @ 23:45
@Rare: “Can we slur atheists, or Christians in public? Can we call a raped 16-year-old a “baby killer†when she tries to abort? Now, should we call the military murderers?”
Yes, yes, yes, and yes. Even racial pejoratives should be just fine legally (though of course context matters with all of the above).
Not that someone with the Canadian and European perception of what ‘free speech’ means would understand that… where it ends when its gets really annoying.
Comment by Ian Monroe — March 14, 2009 @ 23:51
War is already bad and some make it worst.
You cannot blame the whole army for the violent acts some soldier and officers. But the problem is they protect these kind of soldiers until it leaks out on the press what they did and the protests increases. Yes this is the main problem with the armies. They dont intent to clean the army form this kind of soldiers.
Do you remember the El Garib prison? You you remember the torments. Do you think it was individual acts of some “evil” soldier? Or it was now by some “higher officers”? They didn’t care whats happening until the photos leaked out to the press world wide.
My be some of US, UK, Israel government members and High military officers don’t see the died civilians as human beings. So they dont care what some of their soldier do until its leaks out.
Comment by Rahman Duran — March 15, 2009 @ 05:50
@Rahman you certainly can blame the whole army for being violent, lol. That’s their purpose. El Garib isn’t the main issue here, but war in general.
Its mostly a question of whether you can blame individual soldiers for enabling the violence by actually supporting and carrying it out. As a tax-paying American I also enable the violence. I probably have the least sympathy for a Boeing worker or similar, since they make good money profiting on destruction whereas the soldier can actually be seen as a victim of our violent culture and certainly isn’t making much money. But when you get right down to it its a fault of our society as a whole.
You won’t see me cheering returning soldiers since that just strengthens the militaristic culture, I certainly wouldn’t protest. A group around here protests at the post office, that makes it pretty clear you’re protesting the government and not the people (since obviously we don’t have anything against postal employees).
Comment by Ian Monroe — March 15, 2009 @ 14:54
Well, I am a Brazilian and English is not my first languague.
First, if there were not weapons of mass destruction on Iraq, why Saddan don’t allowed the UN inspectors in first place?
Second, rule of international law, what is this? Tell the Sudanese in Darfur. They will not wait for international law, they are dying right now.
Third, I see some individuals can commit atrocities, not only in the military, but doctors and policeman, will you judge all of them because of some?
Most deaths after invasion were from acts from terrorism, they don’t respect anyone, children, women. After they commit these crimes, they blame the soldiers, this is disgusting. Think who is controlling these people, what they want to do in Iraq if all troops jump out right now.
Torment in El Garib? I have seen a video in which the baby son of a enemy of Sadan is being throw in a bag full of savage cats… This is real torment… How many DEATHS were in El Garib?
Let’s think in perspective, we live relatively good lives, we so think for granted, but imagine the persons who want to form a new Iran in Iraq ruled in Britain, USA or Canada; what would be your rights?
The question is, we have the right to interfere? We want to? The UN simple does not function. The security council can’t do nothing without the approval of communist China or Russia’s king Putin. For my shame, even Brazil was contrary to intervention in Sudan.
I’m sorry, I can read english, but write is much more difficult.
Comment by Flavio — March 15, 2009 @ 23:42
It’s interesting how the media plays such a negative role and has in all of this. I’m in Al Taji Iraq right now. I talk on a daily bases to civilians and military here. I’ve seen this war from 2003 until now and I can tell you this comparatively speaking we are the same society that plays out in the book Fahrenheit 451. We allow both the government and the media to educated us instead of actually finding ways of getting true facts. People watch the BBC, CNN and Fox and feel like because they saw a hour clip on the issue they now know enough to protest or for that matter accuse. I’m not saying anyone is innocent, maybe the US and other forces did get wrong information and I know for a fact all government have lied as I’ve been involved in various stories that the government has tried to cover up and the media has twisted. Soldiers are men and women doing a Job, there’s doctors here almost every occupation that’s in the civilian world. The only difference is they give up freedom to try and fight for yours. Even if that freedom is to protect the spoiled covenant lifestyles of the US and GB. They normally do the dirty work and get now credit, none from the governments they serve and from the civilians that were given a right to free speech because of there sacrifice. It’s the cars you drive the TV you watch and the freedoms you take advantage of that calls for a military, that calls for violence to protect a free lifestyle. Everyone wants power, that’s why protester protest, that’s why governments are over turned and that’s why there’s war. People want the power to chose to live life free, to drive that auto where and when they want. You can fight it but really you’re just fighting yourself.
Comment by JMiahMan — March 17, 2009 @ 02:53
Interesting thoughts everyone, thanks for the comments.
The main points I want to address are that, in my opinion, the victory no longer protect Britain or America, they protect the interests of our government abroad. I think that’s an important difference and one that should be remembered.
My grandfather fought in WWII, as did every generation in my family on my father’s side preceding that. I believe in honour and I believe in the past the military have protected our freedom. However, in my lifetime they military have not. The government have not. The government seems to seek only to control and restrict my freedom to make their job at policing the country easier and to increase their own power.
As pointed out above I don’t think that the actions of the protestors were the best but in a democracy people should and do have the right to protest, no matter how ill-informed they may be.
Not everyone wants power. Not everyone demands their lifestyle to be the same as they have. I don’t drive a car. I don’t watch TV. I would rather my income be halved and the poor fed and the innocent civilians in other countries need not fear “collateral damage†any longer.
There are evil people in every country. The difference is that, through our actions, we are being viewed as spoilt, evil tyrants who disregard the opinion of other countries to simply advance our own agenda. As long as we continue to do so we will increase the advance of terrorism throughout the world and justify the rogue states of this world in feeling they can violate UN resolutions, as we have done the same.
Comment by Mike — March 17, 2009 @ 08:49
This is my favourite quote from Albert Einstein:
“This topic brings me to that worst outcrop of the herd nature, the military system, which I abhor. That a man can take pleasure in marching in formation to the strains of a band is enough to make me despise him. He has only been given his big brain by mistake; a backbone was all he needed. This plague-spot of civilization ought to be abolished with all possible speed. Heroism by order, senseless violence, and all the pestilent nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism — how I hate them! War seems to me a mean, contemptible thing: I would rather be hacked in pieces than take part in such an abominable business.”
Comment by Michael — March 17, 2009 @ 16:47
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