What legacy to ‘these honored dead’ ?
By Emmett Coyne
Special to the Star-Banner
Published: Sunday, May 15, 2016 at 6:30 a.m.
Last Modified: Friday, May 13, 2016 at 9:36 a.m.
... All U.S. military engagements, from the Revolutionary War to current conflicts, when combined, result in less casualties than our singular Civil War. A total of 2.5 percent of the nation’s population died and a greater number were physically and mentally impaired for the remainder of their scarred lives. The cost to property and disruption of the nation’s growth was regressive. Proportionate to today’s population ration, it is tantamount to 7 million American deaths. That might give us momentary pause ...
After the defeat of Germany, the Allies, through American insistence, imposed de-Nazification, a program to eradicate all vestiges of national socialism (Nazism): persons, groups, symbols. The germans complied, and today Germany has remarkably healed from its most horrific historical catastrophe. Can we say that 151 years after our implosion? Imagine Germany today if the Allies had not imposed de-Nazification. Imagine if the U.S. had imposed de-Confederization here. Might we be closer to “a more perfect union”? ...
The cloth of history is not made: we weave it. Do we wish to continue to fight the past or forge “a more perfect union?” ...
http://www.ocala.com/article/20160515/OPINION/160519914
