| > People accuse NATO soldiers of war crimes everyday without even realizing the legitimate war crimes we prevented every single place we went. Had we gone into Afghanistan in the 90s when various groups of locals were asking us to we might have fought about as much, in the end, but we'd have been there at the request of the people, actually building relationships, instead of continually rebuilding a failed-by-design state for some bullshit 9/11 excuse. Bin Laden might still have happened because he wasn't depending on Afghanistan, or he might not have, because the allies could have had a better (good) reputation in the area negating much of the terrorist fervor. But, I (one who criticizes our soldiers for war crimes) do recognize that we often, ultimately, bring some good to the survivors - hospitals, clean water, etc, and often stop many ongoing killings and other horrible practices. But never for the reasons we say we're there and only in doing things that perpetuate the cycle of war such as setting up dictators and selling critical resources and infrastructure. Even if in their specific case any given soldier may save more lives than they cost, our war overall and our continued ability to wage it via the complicity of our soldiers, will cost far more lives in the end. Refusing to fight for an unjust cause, or hurt without need, is a duty of all soldiers of modern civilized militaries. Sure, it realistically means jail for those who refuse - but it means death for their victims if they don't. Afghanistan and Iraq were clearly not justified by 9/11 or implicated by any related evidence. By fighting for the USA and allies despite these lies, without the mandate of the people, soldiers are essentially pissing on the rule of law. We're showing - through action not words - that no matter what they do we'll just make shit up and bomb them. Why do we expect them to expect anything else? If our governments couldn't field the army unjustly, our peacekeeping might not only be welcome but might finally work. |