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  • From: Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] War
  • Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 09:41:27 -0500

I forgot to add that when one has done things that one finds repugnant, one tends to rationalize. Having been engaged in killing would, I think, tend to cause one to find justification. That might be necessary to live with the memories.

On Jun 19, 2008, at 9:36 AM, Gene GeRue wrote:

You'd think someone who had been tortured would revile it instead of
wanting another 100 years more.

It has been my observation that those who have been in battle, those
who have suffered in the military, and of course those of family
military history and pride, tend to feel that war is bad but
necessary, that service is a duty, and that it is necessary to engage
in war from time to time to let the world know we are ready, willing,
and able. I felt this to be evident when Tvo and I debated the Iraq
invasion. It came to me that truth, logic and reason are different if
you have a wartime background. Some of you will recall Tvo's
description of a pilot released at the end of a runway by his Japanese
captors--he had literally been skinned alive and begged to be shot.

Such memories change how one's mind works.

I was lucky. I enlisted in the Army just before high school graduation
and went to basic training right after graduation. My luck was that
the year was 1954, as the Korean war was ending and before the Vietnam
war had become full-blown. So I spent my Army years running a drafting
office in Japan. I am not one bit sorry that it worked out like that.
I respect and have great empathy for those who have served under more
difficult conditions, even more so when those conditions were
unnecessarily created by politicians, as has almost always been the
case in modern times.

Old men have experience and sometimes they have wisdom. Often they
have pride. When pride overrides wisdom, they do foolish things.




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