When James Madison declared war on Britain, we had about twenty ships to the Brit’s thousand. The Brits were hijacking American sailors and forcing them to work for them, which was an outrage, but a case for declaring war? The results of that declaration was that the Capitol and White House were burned, thousands killed, D.C. destroyed, and nothing accomplished.
When dishonest Abe decided to re-supply Ft. Sumpter in South Carolina’s harbor, after much warning not to do so, ’The shot heard round the world” was fired, 620,000 were killed, and Sherman tried his level best to destroy the South. That war had absolutely nothing to do with slavery, but about a huge central government, which Lincoln wanted, got, and which continues to this day.
When Woodrow Wilson and his cohort Col. House decided that America should get into a war which had absolutely nothing to do with us, World War One officially began, and the misery and degradation got the world Hitler, and World War Two.
Roosevelt, finding himself unable to get us out of the Great Depression, in spite of bankrupting the US Treasury with foolish spending, exactly like the Obama Administration is currently doing, guess what? He provoked the Japs into bombing Pearl Harbor, and we got out of the depression OK, but the number of millions killed in World War Two, may never be known. America lost 365,000, and the Ruskies 20 million, for a start.
Harry Truman thought that the North Koreans had no business messing with the South Koreans, and he would show them…with 50,000 American lives of course. The Korean War was never Constitutionally declared, but it was fought with American blood…wasted.
Republicans started the Vietnam mess, and JFK was going to end it quickly, as well as get rid of the CIA and Federal Reserve too. Cost him his life. JFK continued it with 50,000 dead Americans, and it took Nixon to get us out…defeated. That war was never Constitutionally declared either.
A Republican got us into Iraq and Afghanistan, and we’re still there for no known reason, and no Constitutionally declared war. Why are we there? A million killed on all sides? Maybe. Baghdad used to be one of the world’s most beautiful cities, even under Saddam. Now it is the site of huge amounts of wreckage.
Try to imagine the billions of tons of steel that have been used for tanks, ships, planes, guns, and war vehicles. Billions of tons of steel and iron sitting at the bottom of two oceans. Steel which could have been used to advance civilization, rather than to deplete the Iron Range. I get ill, watching B-17’s go down in World War Two films, with those young, innocent draftee pilots and crew having but a couple of seconds to live. Men who will never marry, or have a family. Troops in all wars, whose deaths and injuries will wreak havoc with surviving families. Think of the thousands of Americans who went down with the hundreds of ships which were sunk in both World Wars, and the infantry who were shot dead by the ’enemy.’
I remember the ’hippies’ during the Vietnam undeclared war. I despised their drugs, morality, music, and filth, but their message about bringing troops home and their idea of ’peace,’ struck an indelible note with me, and it still lives on in my soul.
I have never been in the service, never been through basic training, and never saluted an officer. I have never had my brain scoured and body brutalized with military service, but I salute those brave men who have fought in wars which they were forced to fight, even though the wars they fought, were utterly stupid and wasteful. I am a hopeless romantic, who cries at the sight of the brave military, and our flag flying in all its glory. John Phillip Sousa’s rousing marches fill me with unabashed patriotism, but still, down deep in my psyche, I hate war and the utter insanity and waste that goes with it.
Is it necessary to keep America in a virtual state of war all the time? Can’t we imitate the Swiss and be neutral? Can’t we imitate the Swiss, and require all households to own guns and ammunition, and know how to use them? Can’t we have the world’s best Army, Navy, Coast Guard, and Air Force, and use them to keep our borders closed and shores safe? Would we have to worry about terrorism if we stayed home and minded our own business, while trading with anyone who wanted to trade with us? Wouldn’t it be just excellent, not to have to watch the news about our casualties in Afghanistan, Iraq, and heaven only knows where, next month or year?
It would just be peachy keen to have a strong dollar, and politicians who weren’t glommed into seeming to approve endless, wasteful, pointless, killing, wars. Can’t we make great things which don’t kill people? I am sick of watching America self-destruct with endless wars. If there hadn’t been even a Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, not to mention two World Wars, I wouldn’t have a business trying to protect people from the insane dollar degradation, which no one can stop at this advanced stage of American history. Politicians who grovel at the military-industrial complex, make me ill, be they Republican or Democrat.
We can only hope that the Tea Party movement can influence the Republicans, and we can elect peace loving, freedom loving, flag waving, bring the troops home, candidates, who can wipe the Congressional slate clean, and return America to a neutral sanity, which we almost got at one time a long time ago. It was called “The Neutrality Act,” and was made law, August 31, 1935, over FDR’s objections. The violations have been endless, since the D.C. Gang, under all parties, seems to love to get us into wars. Maybe if their sons and daughters were drafted first, it wouldn’t have happened. Yes, the draft and the current compulsory registration does indeed violate the Thirteenth Amendment.
It’s just ever so important to protect yourself! The Greeks, Japanese, Portuguese, and Spanish, also need to protect themselves with gold and silver, as they’re in a terrible economic state also…thanks to politicians.