As I slogged my way through the turgid prose of Bret Stephens’ New York Times column entitled “20 Years On, I Don’t Regret Supporting the Iraq War,” I waited for the mention of just one death caused by our invasion of Iraq. Whose death didn’t matter to me – an American soldier, an Iraqi insurgent, an innocent civilian, an Iraqi child. I should have been able to predict from the column title that my wait would be in vain. Not one reference to anyone wounded, severely or not. No mention of American soldiers scarred for life by PTSD, or emotionally scarred Iraqi civilians, either. American soldiers rotated through Iraq on one-year tours. Iraqis have been there the whole time, through the American invasion, the insurgency, the sectarian warfare amongst Iraqis, and the rise and fall of ISIS, whose brutal war against practically everyone left Mosul in ruins before their reign of terror was through.
Thanks for writing this. My son was in the 101st Airborne and it was a source of pride for him. Sadly, his experience in Iraq messed him up to where he was aimless in life and homeless at times. He was my pride and joy. He died on November 26, 2017. Multiple substance toxicity or as I prefer to call it, a long slow suicide. He’s entombed in Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elburn, Illinois. Fuck Bret Stephens.
My best friend won a medal in Vietnam. The next day he was killed. I wasn’t there because nobody wanted a guy wearing a hearing aid. My best friend’s personal effects came home separately from his sealed coffin. His broken glasses had his blood on them. His mother lost it, crying and wailing every time she saw me since I was like a second son and especially since I had spent every spare moment with him during his one-month furlough just before deployment. His last letter to me said, “Our Colonel is a crazy bastard and is going to get all our shit blown away.” Which he did.
The Old Lie is: “Dolce et decorum est pro patria mori.” Another Old Lie is that our “National Honor demands it.”
I have a 50-year blood feud with any S.O.B. who starts a war.
Thanks, Lucian. I too can not, and will not accept that the invasion of Iraq was anything but an illegal war and, quite frankly, a total illegitimate and unConstitutional abuse of power by the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Rice gang of Neocons cheered on by a media that were all too willing to promote the administration’s lies and flimsy justifications. Twenty years on and many of these same soul-dead S.O.B.s are still unmoved by the reality of that devastating conflict. So stupid. So much waste. So needless. They are the kind of people who should be forced to read the definitive tome on the real tragedy of war by highly decorated, Marine Corps General, Smedley D. Butler: “War is a Racket” (1935). It is the kind of book that should be available in school libraries all over the country. But, now of course, that won’t happen, because a lot of students would undoubtedly not feel very good about all those ‘heroic’ American military exploits in places all over the world that don’t stand up very well to scrutiny. Better to ban them and go on living in Ignorant bliss.
Excellent. I hope fate has been kind to that man and his family.
I don't think that most decision-makers in the Bush II administration sincerely believed anything about the lies they told and continue to tell about Iraq. If they do, it's only in the self-deluded, wishful projection mode that Drumpf lives in. They had been looking for an excuse to go after Iraq from the time Dubya got appointed president and they seized the first best opportunity that came their way. It's been reported how determined those "Vulcans" (as some were dubbed) were to punish Saddam and install a compliant puppet government in Baghdad and dominate the Near East from there. Even Dubya said how he wanted to get Saddam for "trying to kill my daddy" (along with his other undeclared daddy issues). They cherry-picked intelligence to fit the picture they wanted to paint and show to the American public. (Much of the rest of the world didn't buy it then and even loyal Britain is embarrassed and angry in hindsight at being dragged into those wars by "Poodle" Blair.)
The arrogance and impunity with which Bush instigated and entered this insane venture...how he has gotten away with it!? How?
Not even an apology; because that would be admitting he LIED to us( and maybe even to himself). Too bad he gave up the alcohol; at least then the only victims would have been him and his family.
I'm another one who initially believed the lies and supported the war. Now I go back and forth on whether the ones who led us into it are war criminals.
Although I vehemently support Ukraine and want its lands returned and the invaders punished, I'm married to a Russian who believes the West forced Russia's hand in Ukraine and supports her country's goals, if not all its actions. I wonder whether if she and I are still alive in 20 years, she will feel about the invasion as I do about our invasion of Iraq....
It is columns like this that remind me why I signed up for your letter. The sensitivity, the understanding of the large chaos of war, yet the understanding of one poor war dog, trying to find his way.
Mar 23, 2023·edited Mar 23, 2023Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV
I also read his column and was taken back by his refusal in light of what we know to continue to double down. His arguments are beyond weak, and you are correct the cost in human lives is and continues to be enormous. And for what? We broke a country, both directly and indirectly caused massive suffering for a lie.
We also lost credibility, ended up creating ISIS through our post invasion incompetence then built them into a 10ft threat which we promptly threw more billions to a unaccountable Pentagon.
It should be some kind of virtue to reasses ones beliefs in the face of reality.
But the folks who are all about reckless ill thought wars do not consider the 1st, 2nd and 3rd order effects never are wrong because they never go. Just ask John Bolton, there's not a country he wouldn't bomb. And until we as Americans start to question our Gung ho politicians in the endless fear and giving money to the Pentagon it will never stop. It doesn't help when only %1 of Americans participate in you know the wars. Sorry about the rant but his article was a disgrace.
Thanks you Lucian: One: for the column and its truths; Two for saving a life injured in Iraq. I have two friends suffering from Vietnam PTSD (one went back so his brothers would not have to go....). It is vicious and consumes lives. Bush and the whole cabal lied to the USA and the World. I still wonder how Bush et al sleep at night. But if you have no morals, then perhaps you don't worry. Thank you again for your "yarn" about the Iraq Vet----your "yarns" rivet and tell truth.
Very powerful piece, Lucian . I despise Stephen’s and think less of the Times Editorial Board for allowing the shallow ideological columns to run unchallenged.
I had no idea that Stephens was an unrepentant Iraq War supporter, but I'm not surprised.
The last time I saw him was on Real Time with fellow knucklehead Bill Maher. The 2 of them were congratulating each other on solving the COVID crisis with their individual good brains. Apparently the answer was herd immunity: let everybody get out there and infect each other and somewhere down the line we, whoever is left alive, will be immune. It works with peanut allergies too!
I felt ill. I couldn't bring myself to watch Maher again and I lost whatever minor respect I had for Stephens.
Mar 23, 2023·edited Mar 23, 2023Liked by Lucian K. Truscott IV
Perhaps Bret Stephens is allergic to anecdotes. I am reminded of the R congressman recently arguing with Jon Stewart, “But that’s an anecdote!” To him the word meant a fiction, fake news.
Behind every statistic there are many, many anecdotes, as truthful and significant as the one you told here about a young soldier’s reason for nightmares. Seeing my cousin’s husband buried at Arlington Cemetery in 1966, I thought then that having to witness all the funerals would put a damper on the enthusiasm for war.
Thanks for writing this. My son was in the 101st Airborne and it was a source of pride for him. Sadly, his experience in Iraq messed him up to where he was aimless in life and homeless at times. He was my pride and joy. He died on November 26, 2017. Multiple substance toxicity or as I prefer to call it, a long slow suicide. He’s entombed in Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elburn, Illinois. Fuck Bret Stephens.
My best friend won a medal in Vietnam. The next day he was killed. I wasn’t there because nobody wanted a guy wearing a hearing aid. My best friend’s personal effects came home separately from his sealed coffin. His broken glasses had his blood on them. His mother lost it, crying and wailing every time she saw me since I was like a second son and especially since I had spent every spare moment with him during his one-month furlough just before deployment. His last letter to me said, “Our Colonel is a crazy bastard and is going to get all our shit blown away.” Which he did.
The Old Lie is: “Dolce et decorum est pro patria mori.” Another Old Lie is that our “National Honor demands it.”
I have a 50-year blood feud with any S.O.B. who starts a war.
Heartbreaking and poignant. Thank you for sharing another glimpse into your extraordinary life.
Vietnam: domino theory (whatever that means)
Iraq: we will be greeted as liberators
Afghanistan: fight them there so we don't have to fight them here
We just make shit up when we want a war.
You're a good man, Lucian. And this is a wonderful column.
Thanks, Lucian. I too can not, and will not accept that the invasion of Iraq was anything but an illegal war and, quite frankly, a total illegitimate and unConstitutional abuse of power by the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Rice gang of Neocons cheered on by a media that were all too willing to promote the administration’s lies and flimsy justifications. Twenty years on and many of these same soul-dead S.O.B.s are still unmoved by the reality of that devastating conflict. So stupid. So much waste. So needless. They are the kind of people who should be forced to read the definitive tome on the real tragedy of war by highly decorated, Marine Corps General, Smedley D. Butler: “War is a Racket” (1935). It is the kind of book that should be available in school libraries all over the country. But, now of course, that won’t happen, because a lot of students would undoubtedly not feel very good about all those ‘heroic’ American military exploits in places all over the world that don’t stand up very well to scrutiny. Better to ban them and go on living in Ignorant bliss.
Excellent. I hope fate has been kind to that man and his family.
I don't think that most decision-makers in the Bush II administration sincerely believed anything about the lies they told and continue to tell about Iraq. If they do, it's only in the self-deluded, wishful projection mode that Drumpf lives in. They had been looking for an excuse to go after Iraq from the time Dubya got appointed president and they seized the first best opportunity that came their way. It's been reported how determined those "Vulcans" (as some were dubbed) were to punish Saddam and install a compliant puppet government in Baghdad and dominate the Near East from there. Even Dubya said how he wanted to get Saddam for "trying to kill my daddy" (along with his other undeclared daddy issues). They cherry-picked intelligence to fit the picture they wanted to paint and show to the American public. (Much of the rest of the world didn't buy it then and even loyal Britain is embarrassed and angry in hindsight at being dragged into those wars by "Poodle" Blair.)
Thanks for the column
The arrogance and impunity with which Bush instigated and entered this insane venture...how he has gotten away with it!? How?
Not even an apology; because that would be admitting he LIED to us( and maybe even to himself). Too bad he gave up the alcohol; at least then the only victims would have been him and his family.
great column
I'm another one who initially believed the lies and supported the war. Now I go back and forth on whether the ones who led us into it are war criminals.
Although I vehemently support Ukraine and want its lands returned and the invaders punished, I'm married to a Russian who believes the West forced Russia's hand in Ukraine and supports her country's goals, if not all its actions. I wonder whether if she and I are still alive in 20 years, she will feel about the invasion as I do about our invasion of Iraq....
It is columns like this that remind me why I signed up for your letter. The sensitivity, the understanding of the large chaos of war, yet the understanding of one poor war dog, trying to find his way.
Don't stop. I need your humanity.
I also read his column and was taken back by his refusal in light of what we know to continue to double down. His arguments are beyond weak, and you are correct the cost in human lives is and continues to be enormous. And for what? We broke a country, both directly and indirectly caused massive suffering for a lie.
We also lost credibility, ended up creating ISIS through our post invasion incompetence then built them into a 10ft threat which we promptly threw more billions to a unaccountable Pentagon.
It should be some kind of virtue to reasses ones beliefs in the face of reality.
But the folks who are all about reckless ill thought wars do not consider the 1st, 2nd and 3rd order effects never are wrong because they never go. Just ask John Bolton, there's not a country he wouldn't bomb. And until we as Americans start to question our Gung ho politicians in the endless fear and giving money to the Pentagon it will never stop. It doesn't help when only %1 of Americans participate in you know the wars. Sorry about the rant but his article was a disgrace.
Thanks you Lucian: One: for the column and its truths; Two for saving a life injured in Iraq. I have two friends suffering from Vietnam PTSD (one went back so his brothers would not have to go....). It is vicious and consumes lives. Bush and the whole cabal lied to the USA and the World. I still wonder how Bush et al sleep at night. But if you have no morals, then perhaps you don't worry. Thank you again for your "yarn" about the Iraq Vet----your "yarns" rivet and tell truth.
Very powerful piece, Lucian . I despise Stephen’s and think less of the Times Editorial Board for allowing the shallow ideological columns to run unchallenged.
I had no idea that Stephens was an unrepentant Iraq War supporter, but I'm not surprised.
The last time I saw him was on Real Time with fellow knucklehead Bill Maher. The 2 of them were congratulating each other on solving the COVID crisis with their individual good brains. Apparently the answer was herd immunity: let everybody get out there and infect each other and somewhere down the line we, whoever is left alive, will be immune. It works with peanut allergies too!
I felt ill. I couldn't bring myself to watch Maher again and I lost whatever minor respect I had for Stephens.
Perhaps Bret Stephens is allergic to anecdotes. I am reminded of the R congressman recently arguing with Jon Stewart, “But that’s an anecdote!” To him the word meant a fiction, fake news.
Behind every statistic there are many, many anecdotes, as truthful and significant as the one you told here about a young soldier’s reason for nightmares. Seeing my cousin’s husband buried at Arlington Cemetery in 1966, I thought then that having to witness all the funerals would put a damper on the enthusiasm for war.
So powerful, Lucian.