Reflections on Being In Country

We have all been inundated recently by the movie and television productions featuring wartime situations--most notably, of course, has been Ken Burns' most recent fifteen hour documentary entitled The War. My husband and I have been taking some time to reflect on what it means to have a war fought in one's own country. Thankfully, the United States has been spared this atrocity since the Civil War. Even though World War II has been over some sixty years or so, we still argue with each other about the use of the atomic bomb to end it. Today as our volunteer soldiers fight in Iraq and Afghanistan, they are once again in country with its resulting devastating effect upon citizens and the environment.

Occasionally, my husband and I also debate the draft vs. volunteer army idea. Is it morally right, I ask him, for our soldiers to be paid (and not very well at that) to die for us while many other young people claim to dislike war but do not have a personal stake in it? I know that, like all wars, it is taking a toll on many there with their extended service obligations. This stress simply increases the likelihood of violence while in the service or out. The film In the Valley of Elah (based on a true story) starring Tommy Lee Jones features such violence between men and within families.

Frankly, I cannot imagine any of our U. S. cities ever resembling Dresden (from the fire bombings in World War II) or Hiroshima (from the atomic bomb). The horror would be too much even to contemplate. Sometimes I hear around here the cliched argument, "If we don't fight them there, we'll have to fight them here." What will it take to take the soldiers out of country and bring them home again? Was General Douglas McArthur right when he said something like, "War means going through hell, but you can't stop; you have to keep going"? Will we really be in the Middle East until 2013?