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I'm a Navy Chaplain and Old Catholic Priest
November 19, 2015 · 07:00

The Refugees: 1939 & 2015

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A Syrian refugee carries a baby over the broken border fence into Turkey after breaking the border fence and crossing from Syria in Akcakale, Sanliurfa province, southeastern Turkey, Sunday, June 14, 2015. The mass displacement of Syrians across the border into Turkey comes as Kurdish fighters and Islamic extremists clashed in nearby city of Tal Abyad. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis)

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

There are times that I wish I had never become a historian, as then I could simply ignore history and its relationship to current events. Likewise I know that there are many people in this country who will call me all sorts of names for writing this post, but I can do no other. Thankfully, the U.S. Holocaust Museum which is committed to the truth about the Holocaust and genocide, agrees with me regarding the Syrian refugees. 

When I see the way that many in the United States and Europe are reacting to the Syrian refugees, I am reminded just how we turned our back on another group of victims of state sanctioned murder and discrimination in the 1930s. When I see politicians, preachers, and pundits railing against the immigration of these current victims of war and terror, I can see in them the faces of the Jews who attempted to flee the Nazis, but were rebuffed by so many nations, including the United States.

In 1939 the United States and the world turned their backs on what most euphemistically described as the Jewish Question, or the Jewish Problem. It was not hard for them to did, their hearts had been prepared for decades not to do anything by the same kind of anti-Jewish propaganda, and race hatred that the Nazis promoted in Germany. Leading American industrialists like Henry Ford wrote article after article promoting the idea that Jews were behind manipulations of the world financial markets that the Jews controlled the banks, that the Jews were behind radical political movements, and that Jews used diplomacy to bring about wars that Christian fought in order that they might profit. Ford’s articles were published in his newspaper, the Dearborn Independent and collectively were known as The International Jew: The World’s Foremost Problem. The articles were later published in a variety of languages and disseminated widely in the United States and abroad. They are still in the public domain and be found on the websites of many neo-Nazi and White Supremacy groups. Ford and his paper promoted the falsehoods of the anti-Jewish forgery called The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Through them, millions of Americans had their minds poisoned and believed that the Jews were both sub-human and an enemy.

Despite the support of President Franking Roosevelt for increased immigration quotas for Jews the vast majority of Americans wanted nothing to do with them. The country was still trying to pull itself out of the great Depression, jobs were scarce, isolationism was in vogue, and polls showed that 83% of Americans opposed relaxing immigration restrictions. Even allowing Jewish children into the country was opposed. A proposal to allow 10,000 Jewish children into the country was opposed by 61% of respondents in a Gallup poll released on January 20th 1939, months after the events of Kristallnacht. In June of 1939, over 900 Jewish refugees aboard the SS St. Louis were denied entrance into the country and sent back to Europe.

Of those who succeeded in getting out many faced prejudice and hatred in the nations that they fled. Most had nothing more than the clothes on their back and were faced with discrimination in terms of employment, housing, and civil liberties. The British government limited immigration not only to Britain but Palastine, many of the refugees were placed in British detention camps, where most remained throughout the war. Because they were German Jews they were considered potential enemies. 

When war came in September 1939 immigration became immensely more difficult, and after the United States entered the war, virtually impossible. As a result nearly six million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis. I wonder how many more innocent people will die this time because the west turns its back on them just as it did in 1939.

For years there have been Americans and others who have been demonizing all Moslems as if they were terrorists. Major political figures, prominent preachers, and nationally syndicated, radio, television, internet, and print pundits have created a narrative that makes all Moslems the enemy, and blames them for the acts of terrorists

It is actually a brilliant plan that DAESH has concocted. Commit acts of terror, like that in Paris, which the American and other western politicians, pundits and preachers can use to further alienate Moslems, and use to reject the refugees, and to roll back the civil liberties of Moslem citizens. Donald Trump and many others are already suggesting such actions. Our history shows that we will do this, just remember what we did to Japanese Americans in World War Two.

Of course, once another major terror attack happens in the United States you can bet that these cries will become louder and that some people will commit acts of violence against innocents Moslems, their businesses, and their places of worship.

I fear that day as much as any terrorist attack.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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November 18, 2015 · 07:00

DAESH’s True Believers

A man (C) identified in the subtitiles as Al Karar the Iraqi gestures as he speaks at an undisclosed location in this image taken from undated video footage released by Islamic State. Islamic State warned in the new video on November 16, 2015 that countries taking part in air strikes against Syria would suffer the same fate as France, and threatened to attack in Washington. The video, which appeared on a site used by Islamic State to post its messages, begins with news footage of the aftermath of Friday's Paris shootings in which at least 129 people were killed. REUTERS/Social Media Website via Reuters TVATTENTION EDITORS - THIS PICTURE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. REUTERS IS UNABLE TO INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE AUTHENTICITY, CONTENT, LOCATION OR DATE OF THIS IMAGE. THIS PICTURE IS DISTRIBUTED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED BY REUTERS, AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS. FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NOT FOR SALE FOR MARKETING OR ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVE. TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Today kind of a pause for reflection. I have been working with the Staff College’s editor on an article for a professional journal, and that has been tiring. In 1919 T.E. Lawrence wrote a memorandum to the British Foreign Office warning of what we are seeing today: “A Wahabi-like Moslem edition of Bolshevism is possible, and would harm us almost as much in Mesopotamia as in Persia…” The self-proclaimed Islamic State, or better called DAESH is the fulfillment of that warning.

As I have said many times, I am a realist when it comes to human nature and the reality of the evil that human beings can do. I have been to war, and personally I can think of nothing worse than more war. For me war is part of the reality that I live with, and which I am reminded of every time I try to sleep. That being said, the war which has been going on for close to two decades is gaining in intensity and threatening to blow away what is left of the old “new world order.”

For most modern Americans and others living in the West, war is an often abstract concept regulated to small bodies of professionals fighting actions far away, of which we only catch occasional glimpses of on television or the internet. For most Americans and others in the West, modern war has become a spectator sport, and one far less interesting to most than either American or European football matches.

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But in the chilling aftermath of numerous Al Qaeda and DAESH terror attacks that have spanned over 15 years, war has come to the west. The World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 9-11-2001, the attacks on London and Madrid, and now Paris killed thousands of people. Of course this does not mention the hundreds of attacks committed by those groups in the Middle East and Africa. In the past two weeks nearly 400 people, almost all innocent civilians, have died in attacks in Paris, Beirut, and the Russian Metrojet airliner. Earlier in the year, Kenya, as well as incident after incident in places like Nigeria, and Mali. Of course, most of us in the west really could care less about the victims of DAESH and related groups in Africa or the Middle East. We have seen the videos of DAESH terrorists beheading aid workers and journalists, shooting mass numbers of prisoners, burning a Jordanian pilot alive in a cage, and throwing homosexual men off of tall buildings to their deaths. The accounts of their enslavement, rape, and forced conversion of women are too numerous and brutal to describe.

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These attacks, coupled with the influx of massive numbers of refugees from Syria is bringing out the best and worst in us. If we are not careful we can find ourselves falling into the trap of imitating or e4xceeding the brutality of DAESH in order to win. Sadly the worst is how we are preparing to dehumanize and re-victimize people who have fled from DAESH, people who are victims of terror. I’ll leave aspect of the crisis that for the time being and probably return to it tomorrow.

The people of DAESH that we are fighting have embraced a fanatical cause, deeply rooted in a perverse understanding of their religion, but they are true believers. American philosopher Eric Hoffer described such people in his classic book The True Believer. Hoffer wrote:

“The fanatic is perpetually incomplete and insecure. He cannot generate self assurance out of his individual resources-out of his rejected self-but finds it only by clinging to whatever cause he happens to embrace. This passionate attachment is the source of his blind devotion and religiosity, and he sees in it the source of all virtue and strength. Through his single minded dedication is a holding on for dear life, he easily sees himself as the supporter and defender of the holy cause to which he clings….Still his sense of security is derived from his passionate attachment and not from the excellence of his cause. The fanatic is not really a stickler to principle. He embraces a cause not because of its justness and holiness but because of his desperate need for something to hold on to. Often, indeed, it is his need for passionate attachment which turns every cause he embraces into a holy cause. The fanatic cannot be weened away from his cause by an appeal to reason or moral sense. He fears compromise and cannot be persuaded to qualify the certitude of his holy cause. But he finds no difficulty in swinging suddenly and wildly from one holy cause to another. He cannot be convinced but only converted. His passionate attachment is more vital than the cause to which he is attached.”

Yesterday I outlined what I think is needed to overcome DAESH, and while the military aspect is just one component of that, it is still important, especially when dealing with the fighters and terrorists who are DAESH. Reza Aslan, the noted Islamic scholar understands the type of individuals fighting for DAESH batter than most people. He told CNN last year, “Number one, you do have to respond militarily to ISIS soldiers and fighters. These guys are fighting a war of the imagination, a war that they think is happening between the forces of good and evil. There is no negotiation. There’s no diplomacy. There’s nothing to talk about with these guys. They have to be destroyed.”

How to do this is another matter. I will touch on that topic soon, and discuss the potential dangers of such a war to who we are as a people, and to civil liberties and human rights.

Until tomorrow,

Peace

Padre Steve+

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November 17, 2015 · 07:00

A New Grand Alliance to Defeat DAESH

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Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

We are now waking up to the fourth day in the next phase of a war that began too long ago, a war that too many people have been victimized by, which only is getting worse and more widespread.

Winston Churchill wrote, “If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.” That may seem an odd statement, Churchill made it in reference to the alliance with the Soviet Union to defeat Hitler in World War Two, but it bears a particular relevance to the situation that we find ourselves in with ISIL, or as they are also known, DAESH.

This is a follow up to my posts of the last few days regarding the attacks of Islamic State supporters in Paris and it will not be the last. French President Hollande has correctly noted that the attack was an act of war, and he promised that the French campaign against DAESH would be ruthless. Hollande and other leaders, including President Obama are now beginning to plan a coordinated strategy to defeat DAESH. That being said, any real strategy to defeat DAESH has to include more than a few partners, it must be truly a grand alliance. 

I am a career military officer, an Iraq veteran and an anti-war liberal, but I am also a realist in terms of the world. I have no illusions about the world. I do not believe that the United States always acts with honor and I know in my heart of hearts that much of the chaos that we are seeing in the world, particularly the Middle East comes from years of misbegotten American intrigue and intervention. Of course the Americans were not the only ones involved in creating this mess, we can thank the French and the British for the Sykes-Picot agreement. That agreement and the subsequent post-war agreements artificially divided the Middle East based on British and French colonial interests and disregarded the traditional and historic interests of the people in the region. Those agreements also handed the Arabian Peninsula over to the House of Saud, rather than the more moderate Arabs that fought alongside the British against the Ottoman Empire. We can also thank the Russians for their contributions to the instability of the region, as well as the Israelis who in defending their interests have often made things worse. Finally we cannot forget the role played by many corrupt and despotic Arab leaders who have oppressed their people, and exploited their countries riches for their own gain. Finally, back to the Americans it was the ill-advised and criminal invasion of Iraq by the Bush administration that opened Pandora’s Box and unleashed what we now know as the Islamic State. Sadly, almost all the countries currently involved have had a hand in creating the monster that we know as DAESH and the Islamic State, and all should bear part of the responsibility for defeating it.

That being said, whether any of us like it or not we are at war, a war that has been going on in earnest since 2003. This is not a new war, it is simply DAESH’s continuation of the war that was declared by Al Qaeda, and that Al Qaeda Iraq fought against American, allied, and Iraqi forces from 2003 through 2011.

The genie of war is out of its bottle and it will not return on its own accord, and it will create more chaos, death and destruction, both in the Middle East, but also other parts of the world. The threats of DAESH need to be taken seriously and countered.

We have to understand that this war is not a movie, it is not a video game, and it has the potential to change all of our lives, and not for the better.

Likewise, the fight against DAESH will not be solved or won by military action alone. The falsehoods of the warn porn addicts who believe deploying ground troops without the support of the people in the region, nor dropping more bombs will win the war. President Obama noted correctly, in response to suggestions that large numbers of ground troops be deployed, “that that would be a mistake, because we would see a repetition of what we’ve seen before, which is if you do not have local populations that are committed to inclusive governance and who are pushing back against ideological extremes, that they resurface….” He is right for saying this because those who propose sending in large numbers of ground troops are not committed enough to the hard thing and fully mobilize the nation for war. Instead they would as they always do, put the burden of the war on an already worn out professional volunteer military force without being willing to work with other powers, even rivals that have an interest in defeating DAESH.

The full spectrum of national and international power must be deployed to fight DAESH. This includes the U.S., NATO, Russia, China, Japan, the Arab world, and even Iran. Yes, some of these nations are competitors and rivals, but all have a vested interest in defeating DAESH and all have capabilities that would be helpful in the fight. In the Second World War the President Franklin Roosevelt United States and Britain’s Prime Minister Winston Churchill allied themselves with the Josef Stalin and the Soviet Union in what was then known as the Grand Alliance to defeat Hitler. The Grand Alliance was a real world demonstration of the art of realpolitik. Realpolitik demands compromise and finding common ground with nations that we may not like. Those that practice realpolitik also understand that almost all alliances are temporary. This may be unsavory to idealists, but it is reality, and it is the only thing that will defeat DAESH. It is high time the world leaders to get real in combatting DAESH.

Military force seems always to be the first thing that people think of, and while important, it is not the only kind of power that must be used. If we are going to use military force, we need to work with our allies and commit ourselves to a massive use, on the order of World War II, and coupled with a massive new Marshal Plan for the Middle East. We must use diplomatic and economic power, intelligence and information, coordinate national and international law enforcement efforts, and seek to redress many of the wrongs committed against the people in the region.

Since I am a realist, I understand that whether I want it or not, that this war will most likely remain part of our lives, maybe for a generation or more. Honestly, if we do not make a full effort, I expect that a hundred years from now that young men and women will still be fighting this war. Most will have no idea how it began, even as their governments, corporations, and others make a steady profit off of the war.

I will continue this tomorrow with some thoughts on the civil liberties that we will undoubtedly lose as this war progresses. I think that I will write about the dangers of how xenophobic racists, and others who demonize all Moslems, and who want to punish all Moslems for the actions of DAESH, especially those who are the victims of DAESH who have fled to Europe and other areas to escape them. That is already beginning in this country. 

But that is all for today,

Peace

Padre Steve+

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November 16, 2015 · 07:00

Hard Truth, War, & ISIL

ISIS-MAP

The Imagined Caliphate of ISIL 

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Please know this is a difficult article to write. I have been to war, I have seen its devastation and heartache and I came back changed from the experience. I hate it. That being said, despite being a progressive who hates war I am also a realist. I am not one that finds any romance or glory in war, but I know that sometimes it becomes unavoidable and sometimes necessary. I have written about the nature of war, the kind of war we are now engaged in with ISIL and some of the ethical and moral compromises that could easily be made in such a war. Thus what I write here is a continuation of those thoughts and I encourage you to look at those articles. That being said, I do intend on adding some more thoughts to this in the coming days.

I do not expect that all of my readers will agree with me. In fact I had a reader who took exception to yesterday’s article because he could not agree with the fact that the Bush administration’s criminal war against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq was a major cause of today’s problem. He proceeded to lecture me that I was wrong, despite all of the evidence from Congressional hearings, the CIA, and other analysts that disproved his point. That is disheartening, but I expect that now.

That being said I know that there are people on the political right and the political left who will disagree with what I write today. All I ask is that people, regardless of their ideology actually read and take the time to think about what I write before they write me off.

I will be writing more on this subject in the coming days, including about the moral and ethical dangers, as well as the potential threat to our own civil liberties. 

Peace

Padre Steve+

Over the past two weeks elements of ISIL have brutally slaughtered nearly 400 civilians outside of areas that they control. The attacks on the Russian airliner, Beirut, and Paris were committed against innocent civilians going about their daily lives. In the areas that they control in Iraq and Syria, where their brutality is unmatched in modern times. This is disconcerting for those of us that would prefer a peaceful solution to the current conflict. But it is the truth.

Despite having served in the military for over thirty-four years, I am not a warmonger, and I am not enamored with the supposed glory of war, or American military superiority. I hate war, but I am a realist. I am a historian with a considerable background in ethics, philosophy, sociology, and political science. I have experience serving with American advisers in Iraq’s Al Anbar province.

Since 2012 ISIL has invoked a reign of terror in the areas of Syria and Iraq that they control. Massacres of opponents, videotaped executions of captives, including humanitarian aid workers and journalists, ethnic and religious cleansing, the forced conversion of female captives with the added element of rape, before and after their capture and enslavement, the execution of homosexuals, and the destruction or religious, cultural, and historic treasures. ISIL is not seeking peace, but rather to destroy everything that they find abhorrent. They are no different than Christians, Jews, Hindus, and even Buddhists that use the police and military power of the state to persecute those who do not believe just like they do.

We must recognize the significance of the attacks of the Islamic State in the past two weeks. These attacks have killed nearly 400 civilians and wounded close to 400 more. ISIL is not targeting military targets, but innocent people; as such their actions are nothing short of criminal. If they were a real nation state, their leaders would be war criminals.

Islamic scholar Reza Aslan understands ISIL better than many people. Aslan told CNN last year:

“Number one, you do have to respond militarily to ISIS soldiers and fighters. These guys are fighting a war of the imagination, a war that they think is happening between the forces of good and evil. There is no negotiation. There’s no diplomacy. There’s nothing to talk about with these guys. They have to be destroyed.”

Let that set in for a moment.

That is not the opinion of an American or Eurocentric scholar; it is not the ranting of an Islamophobic pundit or preacher, but it is the opinion of a learned, moderate, Moslem scholar. As such it needs to be given a lot of credibility. Aslan’s comment takes me back to the words of General William Tecumseh Sherman during the American Civil War. Sherman, who had to deal with insurgents and other Confederate sympathizers who attacked his supply lines and isolated garrisons noted, “This war differs from other wars, in this particular: We are not fighting armies but a hostile people, and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war.”

President Obama came into office as a President determined to end the wars that the United States was engaged in and usher in an era of peace. That did not happen. The genie of war and chaos that was unleashed when President Bush stopped pursuing Al Qaeda and attacked Saddam Hussein’s Iraq refused to go back into its bottle. Obama, dealt with the situation with quiet diplomacy and soft power. One cannot blame him. He was hamstrung by the financial crisis of 2008 which blew up just as he became President, as well as the consequences of the Bush foreign policy, and the deal that the Bush administration made with the Shia Moslem regime of Maliki in Iraq for the withdraw of U.S. troops. Since Obama took office, new and more violent terrorist groups have been spawned from the loins of Al Qaeda Iraq. Now, the dogs of war that have been unleashed on the region, which threaten all of the peoples who live there, and now have reached out to other regions.

I know that many of my readers are liberals, and progressives who lean toward pacifism. I am okay with that, because at my heart I am a pacifist, I have been to war, and I hate it. Even the must just war, waged for the best of reasons, and with right motives, still can bring about evil. The well-respected ethicist and philosopher Michael Walzer understands the moral, ethical, and legal aspects of war. He wrote in his book Just and Unjust Wars:

“We don’t call war hell because it is fought without restraint. It is more nearly right to say that, when certain restraints are passed, the hellishness of war drives us to break with every remaining restraint in order to win. Here is the ultimate tyranny: those who resist aggression are forced to imitate, and perhaps even to exceed, the brutality of the aggressor.”

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant is different than Al Qaeda. It is a hybrid that will not be defeated by traditional means. ISIL is a terrorist group to be sure, but it is also an embryonic state, which is conquering territory, subduing people, butchering its enemies and murdering innocents in cold blood. The leaders of ISIL boast in their atrocities and honestly believe what they are doing is blessed by their God. They have grown up and been nurtured by a culture of victimhood which they believe that past or present oppression justifies their actions. Eric Hoffer wrote something that is quite poignant if we are to understand the mindset of ISIL:

“It is doubtful if the oppressed ever fight for freedom. They fight for pride and power — power to oppress others. The oppressed want above all to imitate their oppressors; they want to retaliate.”

The leaders and fighters of ISIL are 12th Century people living in the 21st Century. They make use of 21st Century communications technology to further their crusade against all opponents. As Reza Aslan noted, they are incapable of negotiation, seeing it as only weakness and a way to impose their will on those unable to, or unwilling to resist them. Hoffer described their mindset well in his book The True Believer:

“A doctrine insulates the devout not only against the realities around them but also against their own selves. The fanatical believer is not conscious of his envy, malice, pettiness and dishonesty. There is a wall of words between his consciousness and his real self.”

Thus this war will be something different, something that we in the west do not want to comprehend. We want war to be neat, fast and comparatively bloodless, but this will not be the case in the war against ISIL. Such wars may be possible against traditional nation states with weak militaries. But to believe that war with ISIL will be neat, fast, and bloodless is wrong headed and dangerous because it ignores the nature of that group. Carl Von Clausewitz noted that:

“Kind-hearted people might of course think there was some ingenious way to disarm or defeat the enemy without too much bloodshed, and might imagine this is the true goal of the art of war. Pleasant as it sounds, it is a fallacy that must be exposed: war is such a dangerous business that the mistakes which come from kindness are the very worst.”

Ultimately, despite the fact that I almost always counsel that war should be avoided and peaceful solutions found to resolve conflict, there are times that wars must be fought. If ISIL were a true nation-state with a conventional understanding of diplomacy and the relationship between nations it would be conceivable that the United Nations or perhaps the Arab League could help broker a deal. But ISIL is neither your father’s terrorist organization, nor a real nation-state. It is a hybrid that is not driven by realpolitik but rather a fanatical religious belief in their cause.  This allows them to dispense with diplomatic niceties and allows them no compromise with those they believe are the enemies of their God; including other Moslems.

Their war has been raging for some time in both Syria and Iraq. What they are doing is further destroying the mosaic of peoples who are part of the Arab heritage in both countries. The atrocities committed by ISIL against Shi’ite Moslems, secular Sunnis, Yidazi and Christians have been displayed around the world. Mass executions, beheadings and the destruction of historic sites, which are important parts of the Christian, Moslem, and Jewish heritage, are only part of their crimes.

The only condition for peace given by ISIL to those it considers the enemy is “convert or die.”  Whether we like it or not, war is now unavoidable, the attacks on the Russian airliner, the citizens of Beirut, and the people of Paris show that.

Some politicians and pundits seem to think that this will be easy, simply destroy ISIL where they stand. But that belief is illusory. ISIL and its sympathizers may seem to be concentrated in Iraq and Syria, which is enough of a problem for us, but their supporters, financial supporters and sympathizers are worldwide. Interestingly Pope Francis noted: “Even today, after the second failure of another world war, perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction….”

That being said there is a warning that all must remember about this war. It is at its heart ideological and for ISIL is driven by a perversion of religion. The war will be long, brutal and most importantly, the Islamic State believes that it can and will win it.

Winston Churchill said:

“Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events…. Always remember, however sure you are that you could easily win, that there would not be a war if the other man did not think he also had a chance.”

Thus in this war we cannot waver, and we must believe in our ideals of freedom, justice, equality and the value of a single human life. We must do this even though our own practice often makes a mockery of them. But they are still ideals that are worth fighting for, because without them we lose something of our already flawed humanity. Carl Clausewitz recognized this and wrote:

“If the mind is to emerge unscathed from this relentless struggle with the unforeseen, two qualities are indispensable: first, an intellect that, even in the darkest hour, retains some glimmerings of the inner light which leads to truth; and second, the courage to follow this faint light wherever it may lead.”

Barbara Tuchman said, “War is the unfolding of miscalculations.” For over a century the leaders of the West as well as Arab leaders throughout the region have miscalculated far too many times, and what is going on now is the tragic and bloody result of all of those miscalculations. The suffering and the human cost will be great. It was General William Tecumseh Sherman who wrote:

“You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out…

The young Union hero of Little Round Top at the Battle of Gettysburg, Colonel Strong Vincent wrote his wife about how he believed the Union had to defeat the Confederacy. His words were much like Sherman’s and in dealing with ISIL I would hope that the American, Iraqi and coalition forces will take them to heart in combating ISIL: Vincent wrote:

“We must fight them more vindictively, or we shall be foiled at every step.  We must desolate the country as we pass through it, and not leave a trace of a doubtful friend or foe behind us; make them believe that we are in earnest, terribly in earnest…” 

Sherman and Vincent’s words may sound unduly harsh, but ISIL knows no other kind of war.

Pray my friends for peace, but remember reality, peace is not possible when the kind of religious extremism that motivates ISIL is the driving force. That kind of ideology cannot be negotiated with it has to be defeated.

It has been a long time since we in the west have had to wage that kind of war and it will come at some cost to our psyche, and it will take some getting used to, if you can ever get used to the evil, the carnage, the suffering and the devastation that is the essence of war. As William Tecumseh Sherman said “War is Hell.”

To be continued…

 

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November 15, 2015 · 07:00

The Lamps are Going Out: Paris & the End of the Illusion of Peace

Lamplighter

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

It is barely a day and a half after the massacre committed by Islamic terrorists in Paris, and the shock is still being felt around the world. In watching the images and listening to the words of various leaders I feel that something has changed; that the illusion of peace that we have lived under, has been shattered.

sKLhhPT

In two weeks the self-proclaimed Islamic State has claimed credit for the downing of a Russian airliner over the Sinai Peninsula, an attack in Beirut Lebanon, and, on Friday night the horrific series of attacks in Paris. The combined death toll for the three attacks is close to 400, almost all of who were innocent civilians doing nothing more than going about their daily lives. Hundreds more were wounded in Beirut and Paris. ISIL has promised to conduct more attacks on all nations that oppose them in Syria and Iraq. The attacks have awakened people to the fact that ISIL is not just a threat to the Middle East, but around the world.

Some are now calling this war, and in fact it is, a war that most of us have ignored though it has been going on for over two decades. But in just two weeks, the hybrid terrorist state known as ISIL has changed the course of that war. The war as we know it began in the years after the First Gulf War as young Saudis returning from Afghanistan, led by Osama Bin Laden took up arms against the “infidel” Americans based in Saudi Arabia. In the 1990s the terrorism was confined to Al Qaeda attacks throughout the Middle East, and included attacks on American military personnel, installations, and ships. Then on September 11th 2001 Al Qaeda changed the narrative by attacking the United States, killing nearly 3000 people at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and aboard four airliners. The United States responded by going after Al Qaeda and its supporters in Afghanistan.

Had the American response been contained to that action, the war might have taken a different course, and we might not be here today. But within months of 9-11 the Bush Administration began planning to attack Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and propagandizing the American people to support it, with or without allied or United Nations sanction. The operation to topple Saddam opened Pandora’s box, and who knows when we will ever live in peace again. Twelve years after President Bush announced the end operations in Iraq aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln with a banner that boldly proclaimed, “Mission Accomplished” behind him, the war that he unleashed in Iraq has spread in ways that even the most pessimistic critics of Bush did not predict.

With the war now entering an even more troubling and dangerous phase we should remind ourselves of the words of Winston Churchill, “Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events…. Always remember, however sure you are that you could easily win, that there would not be a war if the other man did not think he also had a chance.”

As I observe events on I am reminded of Barbara Tuchman’s description of Sir Edward Gray on the eve of the First World War, “Watching with his failing eyes, the lamps being lit in St. James Park, Grey was heard to remark that “the lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them again in our lifetime.”

Sadly, I do believe that the last lamps of peace are going out around the world in the fight against the Islamic State. I have no idea when, how, or even if this conflict will end.

Praying for peace,

Padre Steve+

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November 14, 2015 · 07:00

If They Destroy Our History…

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Destruction of Palmyra

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Note: I wrote and scheduled the posting of this article before the attacks in Paris. 

The great American writer John Steinbeck asked, “How will we know it’s us without our past?”

I have a very profound sense of the necessity of preserving our culture and history, and not just American, European, or Christian history, culture, art and literature. Cultural monuments and the great works of art and architecture belong to all of us, regardless of our religion, ideology, race, or nationality. They are a part of our common humanity, our common heritage; they must be protected, and when they are destroyed, it impoverishes all of us. Thus when a group, be it a group of political, racial, or religious extremists, decide to erase those monuments to humanity, it is an assault on all of us.

This has been done numerous times throughout history by various conquerors. In the past century it has happened all too often, and it has been happening with startling regularity in the areas controlled by the self-proclaimed Islamic State. Shrines sacred to Moslems, Christians, and Jews; wonders of the ancient world that give us a glimpse of the magnificent past, are destroyed, while other artifacts are looted, and sold in order to fund even more cultural destruction.

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The Islamic State are committing human atrocities that defy the imagination; ethnic and religious cleansing, forced conversions, rape and murder on a massive scale. In spite of that they can never succeed, unless they destroy the memory of the past.

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Kristelnacht

Hitler and other despots tried this. Hitler and his Nazi criminal state attempted to exterminate, and then eradicate the memory of the Jews from Europe. He was not successful, but given more time, he might have succeeded. I think that it speaks volumes about the real intent of the Islamic State. George Clooney, who plays the American professor Frank Stokes in the film told his team members:

“You can wipe out an entire generation, you can burn their homes to the ground and somehow they’ll still find their way back. But if you destroy their history, you destroy their achievements and it’s as if they never existed.”

That is why defeating the Islamic State matters. It is not just about geopolitics, or oil, it is about protecting who we are and human beings.

Have a great weekend.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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November 13, 2015 · 21:00

Terror in Paris

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Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Just a note this morning as I reflect on the terrible massacre that happened last night in Paris. So far it looks like at least 120 people have been killed in a well-coordinated terrorist attack on six sites in the French capital. It was the worst terrorist attack in a western city since September 11th 2001.

Right now we do not know much about the attackers. My guess is that the attackers are Islamic militants bent on mayhem. Whether it was a branch of ISIS or Al Qaeda, or sympathizers it matters not, the result is the same; innocent lives are lost, and xenophobic nativism with all of its intendant hatreds will victimize those who have fled to Europe from the very same kind of terror that occurred in Paris last night.

The attacks and the yet to be determined response of the French government, as well as other governments will mark a watershed. The initial reports indicate that the gunmen at close range executed many people, after holding them hostage, or while the victims were enjoying a night out.

I expect that this is a harbinger of even worse things to come. I expect things will get much worse before they ever get better. All the elements of a perfect storm of hatred and violence are in place. A geopolitical disaster is beckoning and as much as Americans want, the American people and our leaders must decide what we will do. I pray that we will stand by our oldest ally in their time of agony.

We must pray for peace,

Padre Steve+

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November 13, 2015 · 07:00

The Burden of Fear & Paranoia

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The Flag of the Know Nothing’s of the 1850s

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Captain Jean Luc Picard said in Star Trek the Next Generation, “the road from legitimate suspicion to rampant paranoia is very much shorter than we think….”

I am amazed at the amount of fear being sown on the political campaign trail and by so many politicians, pundits, and preachers, the Trinity of Evil who employ fear and falsehoods with great aplomb to drive people into their camp. Sadly, too many people do not see this and respond based on the emotion of fear, and distrust, driven by the paranoia sown by the politicians, preachers, and pundits. I write about history all the time, and a few month’s back I wrote a piece for my Civil War and Gettysburg text that dealt with the Know Nothing Party and movement of the 1840s and 1850s. The story of the Know Nothings provides good lessons for us today, that is why I placed their flag as header for this article, because their whole platform was based on fear and paranoia. For the Know Nothings it was the fear of Irish and German immigrants, especially Catholics; for us it is Arabs, Moslems, Chinese, and Latin Americans, particularly Mexicans.

We live in a time when there are legitimate threats, and real things to fear, but the politicians, pundits and preachers take things that are reasonable to be concerned about, and then find some external or internal enemy to blame them on. As Captain Picard so well noted, the road from legitimate suspicion to rampant paranoia is very much shorter than we think, and if we go down that road, we will destroy ourselves and our civil liberties. The Roman philosopher Cicero expressed this so well when he wrote, “No power on earth, if it labors beneath the burden of fear, can possibly be strong enough to survive.”

I am reminded of the speech made by the character played by Burt Lancaster in the great movie Judgement at Nuremberg. It is really amazing and speaks to the condition that we are finding ourselves in today.

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“There was a fever over the land. A fever of disgrace, of indignity, of hunger. We had a democracy, yes, but it was torn by elements within. Above all, there was fear. Fear of today, fear of tomorrow, fear of our neighbors, and fear of ourselves. Only when you understand that – can you understand what Hitler meant to us. Because he said to us: ‘Lift your heads! Be proud to be German! There are devils among us. Communists, Liberals, Jews, Gypsies! Once these devils will be destroyed, your misery will be destroyed.’ It was the old, old story of the sacrificial lamb. What about those of us who knew better? We who knew the words were lies and worse than lies? Why did we sit silent? Why did we take part? Because we loved our country! What difference does it make if a few political extremists lose their rights? What difference does it make if a few racial minorities lose their rights? It is only a passing phase. It is only a stage we are going through. It will be discarded sooner or later. Hitler himself will be discarded… sooner or later. The country is in danger. We will march out of the shadows. We will go forward. Forward is the great password. And history tells how well we succeeded, your honor. We succeeded beyond our wildest dreams. The very elements of hate and power about Hitler that mesmerized Germany, mesmerized the world! We found ourselves with sudden powerful allies. Things that had been denied to us as a democracy were open to us now. The world said ‘go ahead, take it, take it! Take Sudetenland, take the Rhineland – remilitarize it – take all of Austria, take it! And then one day we looked around and found that we were in an even more terrible danger. The ritual began in this courtroom swept over the land like a raging, roaring disease. What was going to be a passing phase had become the way of life. Your honor, I was content to sit silent during this trial. I was content to tend my roses. I was even content to let counsel try to save my name, until I realized that in order to save it, he would have to raise the specter again. You have seen him do it – he has done it here in this courtroom. He has suggested that the Third Reich worked for the benefit of people. He has suggested that we sterilized men for the welfare of the country. He has suggested that perhaps the old Jew did sleep with the sixteen year old girl, after all. Once more it is being done for love of country. It is not easy to tell the truth; but if there is to be any salvation for Germany, we who know our guilt must admit it… whatever the pain and humiliation.”

We must guard ourselves from the rampant fear and paranoia promoted by the politicians, pundits, and preachers who rant throughout the twenty-four hour news cycle if we are to maintain our civil liberties and freedoms. This is why I write, because we cannot allow ourselves to fall into the age old trap that is being set for us by the politicians, pundits, and preachers who make their living by exploiting people’s fears and sowing distrust which becomes a poison, which left untreated leads of vast and heinous crimes.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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November 12, 2015 · 07:00

The Day After Veteran’s Day

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Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

It is the day after Veteran’s Day and I still am in a reflective mood about it. Of course if there were no war, if war had become a thing of the past, a sad chapter in the course of human history, the day would be less personal. It would simply be a day where people looked back in time possibly honoring ancestors, but not to their left or right, remembering their family members, friends, and neighbors who fight the wars that most people avoid. Herman Wouk, in his classic novel War and Remembrance wrote:

“In the glare, the great and terrible light of this happening, God seems to signal that the story of the rest of us need not end, and that the new light can prove a troubled dawn. 

For the rest of us, perhaps. Not for the dead, not for the more than fifty million real dead in the world’s worst catastrophe: victors and vanquished, combatants and civilians, people of so many nations, men, women, and children, all cut down. For them there can be no new earthly dawn. Yet thought their bones like in the darkness of the grave, they will not have died in vain, if their remembrance can lead us from the long, long time of war to the time for peace.”

The First World War was supposed to be the war to end all war, instead became war to end all peace. That war ended at the eleventh day, of the eleventh month, and the eleventh day of 1918. However, the subsequent turmoil after that first “Armistice Day” which ended the fighting of the First World War, has birthed war without end. The Treaty of Versailles and the Sykes-Picot agreement ensured that war would be part of the last century and will be a part of life for the foreseeable future. Agatha Christie, the great English author who served as a volunteer nurse in the First World War, wrote, “One is left with the horrible feeling now that war settles nothing; that to win a war is as disastrous as to lose one.”

General Robert E. Lee wrote his wife Mary Custis Lee in 1864 as the bloodshed of the Civil War came to a climax, “What a cruel thing is war: to separate and destroy families and friends, and mar the purest joys and happiness God has granted us in this world; to fill our hearts with hatred instead of love for our neighbors, and to devastate the fair face of this beautiful world.”

As I noted, Veteran’s Day 2015 is over but I have not stopped reflecting on war and its cost. Having served in combat myself, and having stood over the wounded in field hospitals in Iraq and having seen the devastation of war up close and personal I have a hard time reducing war to the technology, the tactics and trivia that seem to satisfy the consumers of war porn. Call me whatever you want but I cannot get around the human cost of war. William Tecumseh Sherman reflected, “It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, more vengeance, more desolation. War is hell.” 

One of my favorite historians of the Second World War, Cornelius Ryan who wrote the magnificent accounts of D-Day, The Longest Day, Operation Market Garden, A Bridge Too Far, and the Battle of Berlin, The Last Battle said about his accounts: “What I write about is not war but the courage of man.” I think that writing about courage is appropriate and I do a lot of that. But I think in addition to courage that we also must write about the frailty and fallibility of human beings, especially the leaders who plan and conduct war, as well as the ordinary men and women who serve during war.

When I teach or write about military history I find it important to make sure that the people who made that history are not forgotten.  After all, as the British military theorist Colin Gray says, “people matter most” when we deal with history, policy, or politics, especially in the matter of war. He is right of course; people are the one constant in war. Weapons and tactics may change, but people do not.

Likewise we cannot forget that war, even wars for the most excruciatingly correct and even righteous reasons are always tragic. The cost of war, even so called “good wars” is devastating. Ernest Hemingway wrote, “Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime.” To the war porn addicts the words of Sherman or Hemingway surely are offensive, but they provide a necessary warning to the politicians, pundits and preachers who cannot get enough war to satiate their bloodlust and need for power. Sadly, most of the men and women who revel in war without end have neither served in combat or have any skin in the game regarding the wars that they support and those which they work so hard to bring about. Maybe if they did then they would not be so quick to send young men and women to war.

Those who follow me on this site know that I write about war a lot, some might say too much, but I cannot help that. My life has been forever changed by war.  If you look back through my archives you can see how my writing has evolved when it comes to dealing with war and part of that is because I do not want the sacrifices of the men and women who fought those wars to be forgotten or cheapened by a society which from the very beginning of our history has done so. Lieutenant General Hal Moore who co-authored the book “We Were Soldiers Once, and Young” wrote: “in our time battles were forgotten, our sacrifices were discounted, and both our sanity and suitability for life in polite American society were publicly questioned.” By continuing to write and teach I hope to ensure that this does not happen. Maybe I am “pissing into the wind,” but I cannot stand by silently and pretend that war can be glamorized and glorified for the benefit people who never serve.

I am a combat veteran, I have seen the devastation of war, I have lost friends in war, men and women who did not come home. I have seen other friends struggle in the aftermath of war, and I have seen some lose that struggle. Because I am a military historian as well as a priest, I feel a sacred duty to ensure that people know the real cost of war.

I do this in my official capacity teaching ethics and leading the Gettysburg Staff Ride for the Staff College where I have the honor to serve as faculty. This itself is interesting as I am spending the final few years of a three and a half decade military career teaching the men and women who in not too long of time will be our nation’s senior military leaders. That is a responsibility that I take most seriously. Thus I always, whether it is in teaching the ethics of war, or about the Battle of Gettysburg I attempt to impress this on my students. I preach from day one to every class that their decisions in the planning process, their recommendations to senior political and military leaders, and their decisions on the battlefield impact real people, their soldiers, the people in the lands that they fight and on the home front.

I have been writing a text for the Gettysburg Staff Ride, which I believe, will eventually become at least two and maybe more books. I tie a lot of biographic material in with the text, again in order to make what could be a dry and mechanical affair more real to my students and readers. That is one of the reasons that I find going to Gettysburg and walking that hallowed ground so important.

I find that the lives, beliefs, motivations, relationships, and experiences of people to be paramount to understanding events. People are complex, multi-layered and often contradictory. All of my heroes all have feet of clay, which in a sense makes their stories even richer, and the events that they helped bring about far more fascinating. By not denying their humanity, by understanding and appreciating their flaws, even the flaws in their character, I gain a more holistic perspective and develop a greater appreciation and empathy for them and a deeper understanding of my own flaws. As T.E. Lawrence wrote, “Immorality, I know. Immortality, I cannot judge.” 

The complex and contradictory nature of humanity leads to a lot of confusion for people who see the world through the black and white lens of cosmic dualism where there is only good and evil and “if you’re not for us, you’re against us.”  Human nature shows us that things are much more complex, nuanced and blurry, there are far more than fifty shades of gray when it comes to humanity and the participation of men and women in war.

Because of this otherwise good and honorable people can find themselves for any number of reasons, fighting for an evil cause, while people who are more evil than good can end up fighting for a good cause. Now if you are one of those people who are trapped by an absolute ideological or religious certitude that cannot allow for such contradictions, that statement may confuse or even offend you. For that I do not apologize and I hope that you are offended enough to face the truth, for that is the human condition, and that my friends is what history, and especially that dealing with the most destructive and consequential issues involving humanity must deal with.

So I will continue to write about war and try in the process to humanize it for my readers and to tell the stories of the tragedy that is war in such a way that even those who have not been to war, can imagine it and in doing so make wise decisions if they are to send other people’s children to fight their wars. The subject is far too important to be left to the purveyors of war porn who seek to satiate the bloodlust of others. Thus I write to ensure people remember, so that those who do not know war will never have to experience it.

As for the form of my writing, I am becoming much more deliberate in trying to craft the story. Barbara Tuchman wrote something that I am now beginning to appreciate as I write my own book on Gettysburg and the Civil War, and other works that I plan on writing, “I have always felt like an artist when I work on a book. I see no reason why the word should always be confined to writers of fiction and poetry.” 

Anyway, that is all for today.

Peace

Padre Steve+

 

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November 11, 2015 · 07:00

A Personal Bond: The Veterans who Impacted My Life

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

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Today is Veteran’s Day. I wrote a reflective piece on it two days ago and I want to follow up on it in a more personal manner in this post.

I am one of those unusual people for our day whose entire life has been somehow connected to life in the military. Thus I always become a bit more thoughtful and quite often emotional around Veterans Day and Memorial Day.  I’ve been in the military for over 34 years now.  I enlisted in the National Guard while in college and entered Army ROTC back on August 25th 1981.  Since then it has been to quote Jerry Garcia “a long strange trip.”  During that trip I learned a lot from the veterans who I am blessed to have encountered on the way, men and women who have touched my life in truly special ways.

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My Dad, Chief Petty Officer Carl Dundas aboard the USS Hancock in 1972

I come from a Navy family and was born in in a Navy hospital. Growing up in a Navy family in the 1960s and 1970s was a big adventure for me that never got old. I still remember looking forward to each new duty assignment with only the wonder that a child can have and to each new adventure that the next move would bring. We lived up and down the West Coast, Oakland, San Diego, Long Beach, Oak Harbor Washington, and finally Stockton California. My earliest memories of life come from our tour at Cubi Point Naval Air Station in Philippines, the sharply dressed Marine gate guards, the Navy officers in their resplendent white uniforms, the jungle that came up to our back yard, and the wild boars that would show up and tear up our garden, trees and lawn. I remember the Blue Angles flying directly over our house in Oak Harbor, those huge F4F Phantom jets roaring over me so low that every detail could be seen. I remember going on my dad’s last ship, the aircraft carrier USS Hancock and being amazed at how big and impressive everything on it was, the sights, sounds, and smells of the ship evoked a wonder that to this day I feel whenever I set foot about a ship. Of course compared to our modern carriers Hancock was old, and small but she was my dad’s ship and I was proud of him.

My dad retired from the Navy in 1974 as a Chief Petty Officer. While he was assigned to the Hancock was sent to manage aviation supplies at an emergency airstrip which was in the South Vietnamese city of An Loc when it was surrounded by the North Vietnamese for 80 days in 1972.  He didn’t talk about it much when he came back; in fact he came back different from the war.  He probably suffered from PTSD.  All the markers were there but we had no idea about it back then, after all he was in the Navy not the Army.  I had friends whose dad’s did not return from Vietnam and saw how Vietnam veterans were treated by the country as a whole including some members of the Greatest Generation.  They were not welcomed home and were treated often with scorn, even by veterans who had fought in the “real wars” of World War II and Korea.  Instead of being depicted an Americans doing their best in a war that few supported they were demonized in the media and in the entertainment industry for many years afterwards.

My dad never made a big deal out of his service but he inspired me to pursue a career in the military by being a man of honor and integrity.

Growing up then, we had a Navy family that surrounded us then remained part of my family’s life long after. My mom and dad remained in contact with friends that they served with or were stationed with, and now many of them are elderly and a good number have passed away.  Even so my mom, now a widow stays in regular contact with a number of her Navy wife “sisters.” There are not many of them left anymore, but mom tries to stay in touch with them. It was the early Navy family experience that shaped much of how I see the world and is a big reason as to why I place such great value on the contributions of veterans to our country and to me.

But there was another part of growing up in a military family in the 1960s, and that was the Vietnam War. I knew kids whose dads never came home from that war, and of course every night the evening news broadcast a “body count” segment which looked like a scoreboard showing how many Americans, South Vietnamese, Viet Cong and North Vietnamese were killed, wounded or captured; but to me, at a very young age, those numbers on that “scoreboard” were flesh and blood human beings. This was my first experience of war.

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LCDR Breedlove and Senior Chief Ness

My second view of war came from the veterans of Vietnam who were my teachers in Navy Junior ROTC and the men that I served with in the National Guard and the Army.  Some of these men served as teachers and mentors.  LCDR Jim Breedlove and Senior Chief John Ness at the Edison High School Naval Junior ROTC program were the first who helped me along.  Both have passed away but I will never forget them.  Commander Breedlove was someone that I would see every time that I went home as an adult. His sudden death the week before I returned from Iraq shook me.  I have a post dedicated to them at this link.  (In Memorium: Chief John Ness and LCDR Jim Breedlove USN)

When I joined the California Army National Guard in 1981 Colonel Edgar Morrison was my first battalion commander.  He was the most highly decorated member of the California National Guard at that time and had served multiple tours in Vietnam.  He encouraged me as a young specialist and officer cadet and showed a tremendous amount of care for his soldiers.  Staff Sergeants Buff Rambo and Mickey Yarro taught me the ropes as a forward observer and shared many of their Vietnam experiences as we sat on lonely hillsides at Camp Roberts California calling in artillery fire on so many weekends and during annual training. Buff had been a Marine dog handler on the DMZ, and Mickey a Forward Observer and they were fascinating men, with so many stories and such great experience which they imparted to me.

The Senior NCOs that trained me while in the Army ROTC program at UCLA and Fort Lewis had a big impact. All were combat veterans that had served in Vietnam.  Sergeant First Class Harry Zilkan was my training NCO at the UCLA Army ROTC program.  He was a Special Forces medic with 7th Group in Vietnam.  In Vietnam he was wounded three times, and was awarded two Silver Star Medals. He still had part of a VC bayonet embedded in his foot at UCLA, a reminder of his time serving in Southeast Asia.  He received my first salute as a newly commissioned Second Lieutenant as well as a Silver Dollar.  I understand that after the Army he became a fire fighter.  He had a massive heart attack on the scene of a fire and died a few years later from it.  Sergeant Major John Butler was our senior enlisted adviser at UCLA, he served as a paratrooper and infantryman with the 173rd Airborne brigade in Vietnam.

Another fascinating character was Sergeant First Class Harry Ball was my drill sergeant at the ROTC pre-commissioning camp at Fort Lewis Washington in 1982. I kid you not, that was really his name, but this was probably one of the most important experiences of my life, which was incredibly difficult but most necessary. Sergeant First Class Ball was a veteran of the Special Forces and Rangers and served multiple tours in Vietnam and when he walked across the drill field his Smokey Bear hat reminded me of a shark fin cutting across the water, the man was scary as shit, but he had a heart of gold. Though he only had me for a summer he was quite influential in my life, tearing me apart and then building me back up.  He was my version of Drill Sergeant Foley in the classic movie An Officer and a Gentleman. Like Zack Mayo played by Richard Gere at the end of that movie I can only say: Drill Sergeant “I will never forget you.” Every time I see that movie

As I progressed through my Army career I encountered others of this generation who also impacted my life. First among them was First Sergeant Jim Koenig who had been a Ranger in the Mekong Delta.  I was the First Sergeant that I would measure all others by.  Once during an ARTEP we were aggressed and all of a sudden he was back in the Delta. This man cared so much for his young soldiers in the 557th Medical Company.   He did so much for them and I’m sure that those who served with him can attest to this as well as me. Jim had a brick on his desk so that when he got pissed he could chew on it.  He retired after he was selected to be a Command Sergeant Major because he valued his wife and family more than the promotion.  It hurt him to do this, but he put his family first.

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1985 with 2nd Platoon of 557th Medical Company (Ambulance) in Germany

Colonel Donald Johnson was the commander of the 68th Medical Group when I got to Germany in January 1984.  Colonel “J” as well all called him was one of the best leaders I have seen or served under in 34 years in the military.  He knew everything about everything and his knowledge forced us all to learn and be better officers and NCOs.  On an inspection visit you could always find him dressed in coveralls and underneath a truck verifying the maintenance done on it.  He served a number of Vietnam tours.  He died of Multiple Myeloma and is buried at Arlington.

Chaplain (LTC) Rich Whaley who had served as a company commander in Vietnam on more than one occasion saved my young ass at the Army Chaplain School.  No really he saved my career at least twice, and kept me out of big trouble on both occasions. Personally I don’t know too many senior chaplains who would put themselves on the line for a junior chaplain the way that Rich did for me. He remains a friend and is the Endorsing Agent for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. As a Mormon he is one of the most “Christian” men that I have ever met.  I know some Christians who might have a hard time with that, but Rich demonstrated every trait of a Christian who loved God and his neighbor.

When I was the Installation Chaplain at Fort Indiantown Gap PA I was blessed to have some great veterans in my Chapel Parish.  Major General Frank Smoker flew 25 missions as a B-17 pilot over Germany during the height of the air war in Europe. He brought his wonderful wife Kate back from England with him and long after his active service was over he remained a vital part of the military community until his death in 2010.  Sergeant Henry Boyd was one of the 101st Airborne soldiers epitomized in Band of Brothers. He had a piece of shrapnel lodged next to his heart from the Battle of the Bulge until the day he died and was honored to conduct his funeral while stationed at Indiantown Gap. Colonel Walt Swank also served in Normandy.  Major Scotty Jenkes was an Air Force pilot in Vietnam flying close air support while Colonel Ray Hawthorne served several tours both in artillery units and as an adviser in 1972 and was with General Smoker a wonderful help to me as I applied to enter the Navy while CWO4 Charlie Kosko flew helicopters in Vietnam.  All these men made a deep impact on me and several contributed to my career in very tangible ways. Another man who I knew at Indiantown Gap was Sergeant Billy Ward who just passed away last week of a major heart attack. Billy was a bear of a man, but one of the kindest and gentlest men who I have ever known. Billy never knew a stranger and loved people no matter what their station in life, no matter what their beliefs, no matter what their lifestyle. I can honestly say that Billy didn’t have an enemy and though he was a lay preacher and was later ordained to the ministry, he just loved people and never judged anyone. He exemplified what it is to be a Christian. 

Al Waleed Iraq 2007

In 1999 I resigned my commission as an Army reserve Major to enter active duty in the Navy, with a reduction in rank. Since joining the Navy my life has continued to be impacted and influenced by other veterans. A good amount of my Navy career has been spent serving with Marine Corps. I served with some great Marines and Sailors in those units, including Lieutenant Colonel T D Anderson, and then Major, but now Brigadier General Dave Ottignon of the 2nd Combat Engineer Battalion, Lieutenant Colonel Desroches of 1st Battalion 8th Marines, Colonel Lou Rachal of 3rd Battalion 8th Marines, and Colonel, now Major General Richard Lake of Headquarters Battalion 2nd Marine Division. My friends at Marine Security Forces Colonel Mike Paulovich and Sergeant Major Kim Davis mean more than almost any people in the world.  We traveled the globe together visiting our Marines.  Both of these men are heroes to me as well as friends, Colonel Paulovich was able to administer the oath of office to me when I was promoted to Commander.

I was blessed to become friends with many of the Marine Corps veterans of the Battle of Hue City including General Peter Pace, Barney Barnes, Tony “Limey” Cartilage, Sergeant Major Thomas. They and so many others have become close over the years, especially after I did my time in Iraq. They and all the Vietnam vets, including the guys from the Vietnam Veterans of America like Ray and John who manned the beer stand behind the plate at Harbor Park all mean a lot to me.

hue city boarding team

Boarding Team of USS Hue City 2002

Finally there are my friends and brothers that I have served with at sea on USS HUE CITY during Operation Enduring Freedom and the advisers on the ground in Al Anbar mean more than anything to me. Perhaps the most important is my bodyguard, RP1 Nelson Lebron, who helped keep me safe and accompanied me all over the battlefield.  Nelson who has done Iraq three times, Afghanistan, Lebanon and the Balkans is a hero.  Two others who matter a great deal to me from Iraq were Army Colonel David Abramowitz, Navy Captain (Chaplain) Mike Langston, and Father Jose Bautista-Rojas, a Navy Chaplain and Roman Catholic priest. Then there are the men and women of Navy EOD who I served with from 2006-2008 have paid dearly in combating IEDs and other explosive devices used against us in Iraq and Afghanistan are heroes too.  There is no routine mission for EOD technicians.  Then there are the friends that I serve with in Navy Medicine, medical professionals who care for our Sailors, Marines, Soldiers and Airmen, family members and veterans at home and in the thick of the fighting in Afghanistan.

There are many from my time in Navy Medicine who have meant so much to me. Chaplain Jeff Seiler, an Episcopal Priest at Naval Medical Center Portsmouth and Father Fred Elkin, a retired Navy Chaplain who served there helped keep me together during the darkest time of my life after Iraq, as did many of the physicians and nurses that I worked with there, and many of them were not Christians, but they helped and cared for me. That continued at Naval Hospital Camp LeJeune, where I served as Director of Pastoral Care. At Lejeune I was fortunate to serve with Duke Quarles, a civilian pastoral counselor and retired Navy Chaplain. Duke was a rock for me there, as was Command Master Chief Ed Marino, one of the most spiritual and kind people that I know.

I now serve in a wonderful place, the Joint Forces Staff College. I am surrounded by great people here, from all the services of our armed forces, active duty and retired. I get to do wonderful things, and despite having gone through absolute hell dealing with the military mental health system this year, these folks have stood by me, especially Commander Lisa Rose, our former staff nurse who retired last year. Lisa is a highly skilled nurse and a courageous woman. For eighteen years of her career she served always wondering if someone was going to try to persecute, prosecute or try to run her out the Navy because she is a lesbian. For years she could not take her spouse to official functions, she could not even take a chance on being seen in public by someone with her spouse, even under “don’t ask don’t tell.” She was finally able to do that, but truthfully I cannot imagine what it would be like to want to serve your country, your shipmates and your God, while always knowing that anyone could end that simply because they didn’t approve of who you loved. I am glad that Lisa and my other gay and lesbian friends in the military are now able to openly serve.

me and nelson

Me with RP1 Nelson Lebron just prior to leaving Iraq

There are others who I have served alongside who have died while in the service of the country, or after their service had ended. Some, like Staff Sergeant Ergin Osman, who I served with at 3rd Battalion 8th Marines, were killed in Afghanistan, others like Commander Marsha Hanley, a nurse I served with in the ICU at Portsmouth, who was one of the people who helped hold me together when I was so fragile; she died of complications of chemotherapy treatment at far too young age. Damage Control Specialist 2nd Class Ray Krolikowski, who I served with aboard USS Hue City died just over a year ago, eleven years after suffering an injury that left him a quadriplegic in 2003. Then there those who died by their own hand, having never recovered from war. Captain Tom Sitsch who was my last Commodore at EOD Group Two, and Father Dennis Rocheford committed suicide after being tormented by the demons of PTSD and TBI. Both men were real heroes. I could mention so many more, but will end there because I am getting a bit emotional.

There is a closing thought from the television mini-series Band of Brothers which kind of sums up how I feel. The American troops who have fought so long and hard are watching a German general address his troops after the German surrender. An American soldier of German-Jewish descent translates for his comrades the words spoken by the German commander, and it as if the German is speaking for each of them as well.

Men, it’s been a long war, it’s been a tough war. You’ve fought bravely, proudly for your country. You’re a special group. You’ve found in one another a bond that exists only in combat, among brothers. You’ve shared foxholes, held each other in dire moments. You’ve seen death and suffered together. I’m proud to have served with each and every one of you. You all deserve long and happy lives in peace.

So for me Veteran’s Day is intensely personal because of the veterans, living and dead, who made an impact on my life. I have a bond, a special bond with so many of my brothers and sisters who volunteer to serve. Today we number less than one percent of the nation, a tiny number of people in comparison to the size of our nation and the commitments that our leaders have engaged us.

hats

The military is a young persons game, and I am now older than almost everyone on active duty. I have been in the military longer than almost everyone that I know, including many people senior in rank to me. I am a dinosaur, and sometimes a cranky one at that when it comes to dealing with the bureaucracy of the military, but my long strange trip continues. That being said, though I served over half of my career in the Army, at heart I have always been a navy man. I think that President John F. Kennedy expressed how I feel about serving the best. He said, “I can imagine no more rewarding a career. And any man who may be asked in this century what he did to make his life worthwhile, I think can respond with a good deal of pride and satisfaction: ‘I served in the United States Navy.’”

So today I give thanks for all them men that I mention in this post, especially my dad. For the countless others that are not mentioned by name please know that I thank God for all of you too. Someone once said “A ‘Special Day’ once a year creates an excuse for neglect on the other 365 days for mothers, fathers & veterans” Please do not let that continue to happen, please do not just look at this as time off, or if you are a corporation or retailer use this day to boost your sales by acting like you care.

I do hope that people will remember the Veterans that impacted their lives this and every day. Some may have been the men and women that we served with, perhaps a parent, sibling or other relative, maybe a childhood friend, a teacher, coach or neighbor. As we pause for a moment this Friday let us honor those who gave their lives in the defense of liberty in all of the wars of our nation. They have earned it and please thank any veteran that you know in some small way today.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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