Just One More Bullet

Even now, in the midst of a war, some veterans prostitute their own honorable service to advance the political careers of men who have never heard a shot fired in anger.  Politicians like George Bush and George Allen.  Veterans, who should know better, seek to put into the hands of those who never served the power of life and death over those who now stand in harmGÇÖs way.  These turncoat veterans dishonor their brothers and sisters in arms.

Those who have never stood on the field of battle and been prepared to die or to take another humanGÇÖs life can never fully appreciate what it means to do so.  In one of the first successful books about Vietnam, author Mark BakerGÇÖs Nam brought together a collection of first person experiences from that war.  Because it was written so close to the events described, Nam gives the reader a very accurate and vivid picture of war.  More importantly, it gives the reader a glimpse at the life-altering impact of surviving war.

GÇ£I watched what happened to Lawrence, a nineteen-year-old kid from Brooklyn with love beads and wire-rimmed glasses.  We had a very heavy ground attack.  Lawrence and a guy named Whip were on guard duty that night and they happened to be on the same bunker.GÇ¥ 

GÇ£The firing stopped as it always did before the dawn.  Shortly after that the guys started coming back from being on guard.  They had been under heavy fire for five and a half hours, nonstop.GÇ¥

GÇ£Lawrence was first . . . What I saw in LawrenceGÇÖs eyes was the horror . . .  What spooked me as much as anything else was that I could tell immediately that he knew that everything was different now.GÇ¥

GÇ£They had burned out their M-60 [machine gun] in the middle of it all GÇô just melted the barrel down.  They had run out of ammunition about three quarters of the way in all this s- -t. . .GÇ¥

GÇ£Whip was reasonably certain that they had accounted for eleven killed, some of them very close to their bunker.  They had gone through who knows how many moments of terror when they ran out of ammo and there were people coming through the wire in front of them.  They were saved only by the arrival of a tank to fill the slot which had been made by sappers blowing up the bunker next to them with a satchel charge or two.GÇ¥

I never knew Lawrence or Whip, and to this day still do not know them.  I donGÇÖt know the storyteller, but he was nearby.  You see, I was the gunner on the tank that plugged the slot between the bunkers at Quan Loi that night, August 12, 1969.  The bunker next to Lawrence and Whip was destroyed and the Americans manning it killed by sappers in the first wave of the attack.

North Vietnamese soldiers, having taken several bunkers, used them to stage Rocket Propelled Grenade teams including one that destroyed my commanding officerGÇÖs track grievously wounding him and two of my best friends, Ben Fields and Fred Sheetz.  With my tankGÇÖs main gun, and co-axial machine gun, I obliterated the bunker next to Lawrence and Whip.

I still gather with my combat buddies at reunions.  Not a one of us thinks of himself as a hero.  Yet, each of us thinks that our buddies are heroes.  In combat you didnGÇÖt fight for your country, you fought for yourself and to take care of your friends.  Had we not looked after each other, many of us would not be here today.

The greatest fear in combat, the one rarely discussed, is the fear that you may do something to cause a fellow soldier to needlessly die.  No soldier, sailor, airman, or marine deserves to have his or her life wasted by the mistakes of those who lead them.  ThatGÇÖs why the military puts its most experienced in leadership roles.  ThatGÇÖs also why combat veterans, serving as political leaders, are a voterGÇÖs best choice when it comes to life and death military decisions.

In the army lesson number one was keep your eye on the target.  Five years ago, America was attacked by religious fanatics.  These jihadists could have never dreamed we would have squandered our armed forcesGÇÖ strength and our national resources by attacking a country that had nothing to do with the attack upon us. 

Our President, Vice President, Secretary of Defense, and other civilians in the military chain of command have no combat experience.  That simple fact shows in the recklessness of invading Iraq, allowing Bin Laden to escape, letting the victory in Afghanistan wither, and the wholesale wasting of American lives for no measurable gain.  Our sons and daughters are literally bleeding because of our leadersGÇÖ inability to keep their eye on the target.

If George Bush and his cronies had fought in Vietnam they would know from experience that democracy is not a gift to be bestowed upon a people.  Democracy is the product of political evolution that comes when the human spirit is freed from feudal and tribal superstitions.  It is not a one size fits all commodity that the United States can export.  Democracy must be nurtured through discourse.  It can not be successfully imposed at the muzzle of a gun.

George Allen and those like him who have who never served and who have never seen the horror of war have no understanding of the limits and hardships of military service.  Americans who have not yet been born will die violent deaths as a direct result of the Bush administrationGÇÖs foreign policy misadventures.  No less culpable are the political enablers like George Allen, who like so many bobble-heads, have kowtowed to BushGÇÖs lunacy.

In this time of war we need men and women in key leadership roles who have been tempered in battle.  We need leaders who have walked the walk instead of just talked the talk.  And, we need those who havenGÇÖt GÇ£been there, done thatGÇ¥ to defer to the wisdom of those who have.  I am an Army combat veteran and on Election Day IGÇÖm voting for a Marine GÇô Jim Webb GÇô my brother in arms. 

My ballot for Webb is just one more bullet in defense of my country GÇô perhaps one of the most important IGÇÖll ever fire.

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