Subject: Letter from a veteran

Date: Tue, 30 Aug 2005 11:01:27 -0500

Folks,

For those who believe that public opposition to the war at home undermines the morale of troops in combat, here is a point of view from someone who knows what he is talking about. For the record, many I served with in Viet Nam were angry about the protests in the US (in no small part because we were demonized in the process), but they were not demoralized by it. They, like those of us who thought as the writer of this letter below does, were demoralized by incompetent, careerist leaders, a lack of rational strategy and politicians who play the game for their benefit with our lives. THAT was demoralizing.

Please pass this along, particularly to those who, without benefit of war time experience, claim that protesting the war demoralizes the troops.

Honor the warrior, not the war

Bring our troops home, now

Take care of them we they get home

Dave Collins

Austin contact, Viet Nam Veterans Against the War
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http://www.lodinews.com/articles/2005/08/29/opinion/ltr_neely_050829.txt

Support our troops by keeping them out of war

I am a retired Army captain. I fought in Vietnam with the 196th LightInfantry Brigade. In Vietnam, I walked the jungle carrying an M-16. I know about anti-war protest, as I grew up in California during the 1960s.

Some people think that because someone does not support the war, that they do not support our troops. That is just not reality. There might be some soldiers who believe that protest equals lack of support, but the vast majority that I served with knew protesters were trying to end the madness.

Yes, we went over there, and yes, we fought the war, but almost none of us wanted to be there. But we stayed there and we fought, because that is what soldiers do.

Thank God that while we were there doing that, some brave people back here had the courage to stand up to say that war was wrong.

Thank God they were brave enough to act on their convictions and stand upto a government that had lied to us.
I applaud you! Maybe you could have treated me a little better when I got back, but that's another letter.

However, I do find incredibly offensive those who have never fought a war, never fired a shot at another human being, never been shot at or hunted, or never had to listen as a good friend screams in agony, sending or supporting the sending of our brave soldiers to war for lies.

Look at the facts. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

There were no connections with the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

There were no reasons to go to war. You should be outraged.

You want to support our troops?

Keep them out of war and get rid of those who would put them in harm's way, unless absolutely necessary.

Maybe we can't leave Iraq immediately because of the mess we created, but we should get rid of those responsible for the current situation.

God bless our troops. I do not support the war, but I do support you.

George Neely

Lodi
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I'm writing and posting this because I think Evil Emperor Bush is going to make it illegal to post anything on the Internet that criticizes or opposes him or his policies.

Let me say that again:

I'm writing and posting this because I think Evil Emperor Bush is going to make it illegal to post anything on the Internet,(and anywhere else,) that criticizes or opposes him or his policies!

I keep hearing these people who consider themselves "Conservative Patriots" saying that protestors are like noisy teens, ...or 'just' hippies, ...or inappropriate, ...or even TRAITORS! ...by not mindlessly supporting the President just because he is President and therefore must be right and sane and good.

(Aren't they thinking that 'God is on Our Side' and therefore Bush must be God's choice to lead us?)

'Supporting the troops' is somehow the reason for what they are saying.

Supporting the troops IS TO DO WHAT IS BEST FOR THE TROOPS, and when a traitor has taken over America with a coup and seems bent on creating a Holy American Fascist Empire over the bloody bodies of America's sons and daughters, THEN TO OPPOSE HIM IS SUPPORTING THE TROOPS, because they cannot do much against him, can they? And it is certainly not 'supporting them' if you support an evil fascist war and they come home in boxes, is it?

I think those who support Bush while thinking they are supporting the troops are not much different than those who are supporting the terrorists who fight against America. I think both are supporting terriorism and NOT supporting the troops, on either side.

I think it is traitorous to quietly sit back and let a tyrant take over your country. Protest IS the proper patriotic response to tyranny. I think it is not patriotic to support a tyrant's war killing your own citizens.

The soldiers who go believe in their Country, in defending their homes, and believe in what they are told, (---I certainly did during Viet Nam---) but once they find out what is going down, they should do what they can to stop the war. Putting your life on the line for America sometimes means putting your life on the line against tyrants when they have taken over America.

And no, I'm not talking about a civil war or revolution or anything like that. During Viet Nam, many soldiers didn't fight the war once they found out they were being sacrificed for the egos of old men making fortunes off their wounds and deaths, they simply stopped fighting instead. It is one thing to defend America and quite another to die for an insane Fascist President and his evil or duped cronies, who are making fortunes off the death of, and murder done, by patriotic soldiers.

(Soldiers are not mindless organic killing machines who have to do what they are told regardless of how evil the orders are or why they are given. Every soldier knows he is responsible for what he does regardless of his orders. God does not abolish his responsibility for what he does.)

What do you do when YOUR country is taken over by a bunch of cutthroat mobsters?

I think it is horribly traitorous to support a tyrant who has used the fear of a terrorist act to strip every American of every right in the Constitution of the United States! The vow every soldier takes is, or at least was, to defend the Constitution, not the tyrant just because he has manipulated himself into power... AND sometimes that means doing the unthinkable, whatever that might be. Bush is destroying America more than any terrorist ever had or could, and frankly, he is gaining on Hitler and Pol Pot in his infamy.

Republicans are supposed to be for the rights of the individual, for smaller government and less centralized government control of people's lives, for fiscal responsibility, for security... but Bush is tearing the republican goals to shreds, using their blind patriotism against them and against every American! He has taken away every right in the Constitution, swollen the federal government to a size never before seen, centralized power to such a degree the media is scared to tell the truth about it, written himself and his cronies a blank check which is bankrupting everyone in the country, and taken away all security from everyone.

There is so much that Bush the traitor has done that his supporters have to ignore, I think it puts many of them in the category of 'good Germans' during the rise of Hitler. Do I think he would, or will, set up concentration camps and kill people in mass? Ever see what a BunkerBuster bomb does to the people killed by it? There is little difference.

I really don't think anything is beyond his and his employers, whoever they are, who bought him his position, including killing millions of Americans as well as making America into a 3rd world country. He got in by a coup, kept it by intimidating his opponents with bought and paid for political appointees, and now he is killing the people. How much more do people need to see to understand what he is?

And I'm not predicting anything... all this is already done, and will America accept it? Remember, every German SS soldier's belt buckle had "God's on our side" on it. The Germans accepted it. And they learned the hard way the cost of freedom.