Time: An Army Apart
That’s the cover of this week’s Time magazine. TIME’s Mark Thompson reports: “Never has the U.S. public been so separate, so removed, so isolated from the people it pays to protect it….. Most Americans have not served in uniform, no longer have a parent who did and are unlikely to encourage their children to enlist…. ” It really is a good article and if you remember how, you should buy the magazine. the article contains mountains of facts to support Thompson’s contention, if you need facts to tell you what you’ve seen with your own two eyes.
Here’s a link to the article, but you need a subscription to read it all, that’s why I recommend the magazine. I don’t quite know what to make of it, The article seems to be a call to dismantle the military system we have now while at the same time it praises the umbrella of protection we currently enjoy.
Me? Personally? I’m proud to have been a part of this new system since before the fall of Saigon and the job that we did rebuilding the military might of the United States from our experience in Vietnam and I wouldn’t change a thing. But yes there is a divide between the warriors and the protected. No where was it more evident to me on the streets of Silver Spring maryland one night when I was buying drinks for some veterans of the Battle of the Ranch House who were rehabbing at Walter Reed. Their scars were obvious, but didn’t insulate them from the civilian punks who tried, like young gunfighters, to make their names by taking down some real warriors. Like it’s a game.
Thanking our troops for their service has become almost reflexive in the U.S., in part because of memories of Vietnam. Uniformed soldiers striding through airports are offered outstretched hands and words of gratitude; their tabs for sandwiches or beers are often picked up by strangers before the GIs have asked for the bill. But the sentiment reflects the problem: the public has scant idea of just how much the military has given since 9/11 beyond a vague sense that some 6,300 have died.
Not even a little of the fault for the divide rests on the media who don’t hesitate to highlight the anomalies of Abu Ghraib, the “Kill team” and what they thought happened at Hadditha – that helps to alienate the public from the military.
Then you have peckerwoods like Matthis “educating” public school students on things he’s never experienced. And the Jesse MacBeths who Eric May still thinks was telling the truth.
Look at the Nidal Hasan shootings at Fort Hood – the media was quick to jump on the untrue story that Hasan was a veteran of deployments to Iraq and had snapped at the thought of another deployment. Until TAH put that lie to rest. Politicians in Arizona were quick to tie the shooter of a congresswoman to the military…another lie TAH revealed.
It’s not the truth about the military that divides us from the general public, it’s the lies and the fantasies. And I’m pretty sure if Time takes an honest look at itself, they’ll find a bit of culpability for their own actions over the last ten years, too.
Category: Media, Military issues
Well said and happy Veteran’s Day To All Who Have Served.
I think the cover image sets the tone for the article inside. If anyone has a subscription it would be nice to see the whole article. When an article that is timed to come out on or before Veterans day, starts out like that, you got to figure what you’re in for.
It could have been a shot of aging WWII veterans, the Wall in D.C., or a returning soldier hugging a spouse or loved one. Instead it’s a surly bunch of recruits looking like they are trying to get out of the gas chamber.
Take a look at the reporters list of articles here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Thompson_%28reporter%29
As a Veteran, member of the younger generation and someone whose family has never hesitated to take up arms in defense of their Country, I must say that the divide is growing, and the Military could help fix that, by programs such as Troops to Teachers being expanded, not curtailed, by Congress making it mandatory that you have been a Veteran in order to teach certain subjects in school, like History, Geography, Social Studies and Government, and by the firing of any and all professors that both support the Occupy lunacy, and the Truther movement. If you ask me, Heinlein got it right, and since the Occupy shitstains doth protest too much, make them the new undesirable class, give their jobs to the returning Vets, and take away their vote and give it to those of us who know what it means to truly be a citizen and take up arms in defense of the Republic…
The rift is widening because society as a whole is circling the drain. There’s still quite a few good people out there though, so it’s not too late YET. There is still hope.
wait are all these cats at basic? This picture looks like you just turned the light on in a cattle car.
This is not post Civil War or WWII. the military didn’t wildly expand to win a war. nor was it large to fight the soviet menace. The “Peace Dividend” has been paid. and the result has slowly corroded society.
For those of you who, like me, wouldn’t spend a dime for that rag, it’s available at your local library. It’s not free: You already paid for it through taxes.
“Time” and the Truth parted ways a long, long time ago. I stopped reading it in HS, given how “Time” never missed a chance to belittle Reagan and anyone not a rockribbed socialist.
Like most of the American Media….they don’t report news…they just babble…not sure what the answer is because they don’t know what the question is.
The “nice” media folks I’ve delt with don’t seem to really know much about anything…so they just babble and ask questions like a drunken blonde on a date for her first time.
Maybe it’s not “America” or the “Army” we need to help, but help the media. Maybe they can hire some of the vets coming home who need a job.
“…like a drunken blonde on a date for her first time.” Oh, the openings! The possibilities!
To be fair, Time did send me the entire text of the article on the condition that I wouldn’t post the entire article, and you know me, I’m anal about that commitment stuff. So you’ll have to take my word for it that it’s a good article.
I still believe that Heinlein had the right idea for society.
Only the folks who serve at least 1 full enlistment, and receive an honorable discharge get to vote, run for and hold elected office, or apply for and hold a government job.
For the sake of argument, Tim… Female, too? Medical waivers?
And I just moved out of the city, and I’m telling you, there’s some losers you’d be GLAD haven’t enlisted.
Boo, that’s what Combat Service Support is for, I hate to sound sexist but I agree with Tim, Heinlein had it very, very right. In order to truly know what it means to be a citizen one must risk everything to defend society and for one’s chance to maybe, maybe be able to exercise their vote.
“It’s not the truth about the military that divides us from the general public, it’s the lies and the fantasies.”
Ayup. Got it in one.
O.T. : Happy Veterans Day people.
Boo:
In Heinlein’s world, everyone who volunteered for military service was accepted, regardless of gender or disability. If you had the desire, they would find something useful for you to do.
Honorable discharges included being medically released, etc.
V/R
The truth is that it’s not the military that’s drifted away from civilian society, but the other way around. I don’t think this is just because society is against the military, per se, though we still haven’t completely learned our lessons from Vietnam. Rather, the trouble a lot of organizations from hospices to fire departments have in recruiting and retaining volunteers seems to prove that most civilians love the benefits of living in this country, but don’t particularly like the hard work of maintaining those benefits. We love that our country does for us. We don’t love doing for our country. And it’s entirely our fault that you guys are the >1%.
[…] reprints my criticism November 22nd, 2011 Some of you may remember the review I did last week on Time magazine’s cover story about the widening gap between the military and the protected classes of our society. Well, Harriet […]