4000

At some point over the next week, days, or hours, the 4000th U.S. soldier will be killed in Iraq. Perhaps this horrible event has already taken place as I write this.

Our narcissistic political discourse being what it is, I suspect many people will be writing their reflections about the Iraq conflict, and the process which led our soldiers into combat operations there. People like Anne-Marie Slaughter, who I will forever be told is a "liberal," continue to rationalize their decisions to contribute to the drumbeat leading up to war in 2002 and 2003.

I no longer have interest in hearing what such people have to say for themselves.

September 11, 2001 brought about two terrible tragedies in our world, only one of which was preventable. First, a group of evil killers slaughtered nearly 3,000 innocent people in New York, Washington, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The political operatives who trained and equipped these people were then attacked by the United States and its allies, as they should have been.

A second, even worse tragedy, came about after this event. The United States attacked a country that had absolutely nothing to do with the terrorist attacks, removed its government, and embarked on a military occupation that will continue for the foreseeable future. In the process, by its own hand, the United States killed more of its own citizens than the terrorists did themselves on September 11. The United States also killed at least 100,000 innocent men, women, and children in a country called Iraq between 2003 and the present. Many more than that number were also killed, who may or may not have taken up arms against our occupying armies.

The decision to kill these human beings was taken by a neoconservative, Republican president and nearly unanimously supported by people who call themselves Republicans. This decision was also supported by vast numbers, perhaps majorities, of people who call themselves Democrats and liberals. Many of them now pretend that they did not in fact support the decision to arbitrarily authorize the deaths of American servicemen or other human beings who did not have any responsibility for, or awareness of, the American tragedy of 2001.

I have no interest in whatever remorse these people have for what they have done.

When the history books review the U.S. invasion of Iraq, it will likely be depicted as a bizarre, irrational act of aggression taken by a powerful country that was led by militant ideologues. A discussion of "idealistic democracy promotion" will almost certainly be attached to the retrospective account. It is unfortunate that this is the case. The lesson which should have been absorbed by U.S. citizens at this point is that it is not morally acceptable to arbitrarily kill other human beings, and that the decision to go to war must be taken only under imminent military threat. The U.S. Iraq policy has gone wrong any number of ways, but the most important reason why it has gone wrong is the one that will escape notice during this discussion of the number 4,000: it was an astonishing moral failure.

For some reason, the same lunatic voices which led us into this Iraq disaster still dominate the public airwaves. A rational country interested in self-preservation would instead elevate the voices of those who were screaming into the darkness about stupidity of this war before it happened. But of course these voices remain as marginalized now as they were in 2002.

A few doors down from my apartment, a homeowner has taken to updating the number of American war dead on placards which face the street, alongside a proudly-displayed American flag. This homeowner has been updating the casualty figures at least once a week since I've been here. Every time I walk past the house, I stop for a moment when I see that the number is larger. When the number is larger, another American family has lost a son or a daughter, a husband or a wife. The Americans who have died in this irrational conflict are heroes: they have shown how much they love their country in a way that most of us will never have the courage to do. We all have a responsibility to remember them, honor their sacrifice, and do whatever we can to take care of their families. We also have a responsibility to ensure that no more of these patriotic Americans die in a war that should never have taken place to begin with.

I can only hope that the sick view of the world which allowed this war to happen dies an ignominious death, but I have no reason to believe that will be the case.