Letter From an Army Ranger: Here's Why You Should Think Twice About Joining the Military [View all]

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Last edited Thu Jan 15, 2015, 01:30 PM - Edit history (1)

from Rory Fanning at MoJones:


...Once you get to a certain age, you can't help thinking about the decisions you made (or that, in a sense, were made for you) when you were younger. I do that and someday you will, too. Reflecting on my own years in the 75th Ranger regiment, at a moment when the war you'll find yourself immersed in was just beginning, I've tried to jot down a few of the things they don't tell you at the recruiting office or in the pro-military Hollywood movies that may have influenced your decision to join. Maybe my experience will give you a perspective you haven't considered.

I imagine you're entering the military for the same reason just about everyone volunteers: it felt like your only option. Maybe it was money, or a judge, or a need for a rite of passage, or the end of athletic stardom. Maybe you still believe that the US is fighting for freedom and democracy around the world and in existential danger from "the terrorists." Maybe it seems like the only reasonable thing to do: defend our country against terrorism...

Make no mistake: whatever the news may say about the changing cast of characters the US is fighting and the changing motivations behind the changing names of our military "operations" around the world, you and I will have fought in the same war. It's hard to believe that you will be taking us into the 14th year of the Global War on Terror (whatever they may be calling it now). I wonder which one of the 668 US military bases worldwide you'll be sent to.

In its basics, our global war is less complicated to understand than you might think, despite the difficult-to-keep-track-of enemies you will be sent after—whether al-Qaeda ("central," al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, in the Magreb, etc.), or the Taliban, or al-Shabab in Somalia, or ISIS (aka ISIL, or the Islamic State), or Iran, or the al-Nusra Front, or Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria. Admittedly, it's a little hard to keep a reasonable scorecard. Are the Shia or the Sunnis our allies? Is it Islam we're at war with? Are we against ISIS or the Assad regime or both of them?

Just who these groups are matters, but there's an underlying point that it's been too easy to overlook in recent years: ever since this country's first Afghan War in the 1980s (that spurred the formation of the original al-Qaeda), our foreign and military policies have played a crucial role in creating those you will be sent to fight...

In such circumstances, it's difficult—I know that well—but not impossible to keep in mind that your actions in the military involve far more than whatever's in front of you or in your gun sights at any given moment. Our military operations around the world—and soon that will mean you—have produced all kinds of blowback. Thought about a certain way, I was being sent out in 2002 to respond to the blowback created by the first Afghan War and you're about to be sent out to deal with the blowback created by my version of the second one...


read more: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/01/military-counterrecruitment-global-war-on-terror