Numbly Marching Into Hell
Mike Pulaski
April 10, 2008
Unedited Version
One of the things that has fascinated me since my Vietnam combat experience is how ordinary men can suddenly morph into psycho-maniacs, who kill, rape, beat elderly people, maim livestock, and burn down people’s homes.
I saw it happen to 18 year old volunteers and 21 year old draftees. They lost it once under the duress of being shot at and seeing buddies blown to bits by booby traps. War caused them to create a living hell and be its satanic tenders as a reaction.
When I was a newly commissioned lieutenant, 22 years old, and had just arrived in Vietnam, I was amazed to hear senior officers offering 3 day passes to any soldier who cut off an enemy soldier’s ear. Other platoon leaders either condoned it as the macho thing to do or looked the other way.
There were a few of us who didn’t think it was right. We believed in societal rules regarding the sanctity of life that prevail even on the battlefield.
Under my command, there were no rapes, wanton killings, or inhumane treatments by my platoon. However, there was the constant need for my vigilance to prevent such actions. I remember the first time one of my squad leaders came up to me and asked if I minded if a few of them had their way with an adolescent Vietnamese girl they found hiding in a village hut.
Some platoon sergeants didn’t agree with me, but kept quiet their objections. I could tell their feelings by looking straight into their eyes. I could see that the light, which is supposed to shine from their soul out through their eyes, had gone dark.
What fascinates me about soldiering in a hot, shooting battle is the question “What is a fair fight?” There are those who subscribe to “War is Hell” and therefore anything goes. The history of warfare is replete with broken rules of engagement - of bypassed Geneva Conventions - of countries declaring themselves neutral, only to be invaded by an aggressor .
Some people involved in fisticuffs are called dirty fighters by their eye gouging and biting. Others say “What’s so dirty about that? A fight is a fight. No rules. You win by any means necessary.”
Our country was won by a rag tag Continental Army that was half starved, poorly trained and ill equipped, fighting the highly trained British Redcoats, who were well fed and equipped.
American folklore romanticizes our Revolutionary War soldiers and how they employed guerilla tactics learned from the Native Americans. In battle after battle, the Redcoats were defeated. In Pennsylvania the British marched to drum and bugle corps into the teeth of the interspersed American soldiers, who were hiding behind trees and rocks, and picking off the British one at a time, turning it into a rout.
The enraged British thought that the Americans didn’t fight fair. Just like we feel today when Iraqis set off IEDs that kill American boys and girls.
The fairness of war topic keeps me fascinated, having been there myself. What is supposed to be a soldier’s code of ethics? I don’t know.
I volunteered for 2 tours of combat duty in Vietnam because I thought it was the patriotic thing to do, believing what I did believe at the time. My beliefs were the result of a conditioning I received by our society’s propaganda and jingoist history books. I was led to believe in the “just cause” for all American wars of territorial and resource acquisition.
However, I doggedly continued my liberal arts education.
I started to ponder: Were George Orwell’s “1984” and “Animal Farm” just academic abstractions? Or is it possible that the ideals put forth by our Founding Fathers have been twisted to such an extent that our imperialism is justified by “double think”? Otherwise, why are we convinced that we are “making the world safe for democracy”, or what in reality is mistakenly called democracy?
Has our thinking been so turned around that we self-righteously feel the need to force other societies into our way of life at gunpoint? What right do we have to interfere with other societies?
Our Founding Fathers were very explicit in their warnings of not becoming engaged in foreign affairs. President George Washington stated so in his farewell address to the nation.
Think about it. If we are such a great society, then others will want to mimic us and not have to be forced into it. Regardless, we have been the overt or covert root of all worldly strife for at least the last 120 years – all in the name of our self-righteousness.
It is finally catching up with us, my fellow citizens.
Our guns and butter economy is nearly bankrupt. Maintaining over 700 military bases around the world, a huge naval fleet, and hundreds of spy satellites are causing blowback from other societies (terrorism) and its toll is causing a loss of our civil freedoms, a crumbling of our own infrastructure, and a decline in general welfare.
Moral decay, economic decay, and a society’s decay all operate together.
I hate to see this happen. As a patriot – a believer in what our Founding Fathers envisioned – I am driven to speak out about it. Wake up, dear people!
Most Americans today have been turned into zombies by the likes of Fox News and all the other corporate owned media. Coupled with what Sigmund Freud’s daughter Anna and nephew Edward Bernays were able to actuate in this country – consumerism that controls the citizenry – and you find us living in a society nearly removed from reality.
We have become a docile work and consumer citizenry that is uninvolved in our governance – and we don’t even realize it!
We continue to think life in the USA is grand…..and yes, it has been, at least up until now. However, the bill is due to be paid and our credit cards are maxed out.
