Dear Dirty America

U.S. Army photo by Capt. Daniel Bustamante

Just over a year ago DDA posted an article called Justifying the Murder of Savage Iraqis: However you get to sleep at night. The subject matter was about a former Navy SEAL named Chris Kyle, who bragged he’d become the deadliest sniper on record.  His book, “American Sniper”, which detailed his time in Iraq, and his experience killing 160 Iraqis, had become a bestseller.

Because the article received a fair amount of traffic and was even used in the description section of a YouTube video, there is a need to update this audience on what has since happened to Chris Kyle. He met a grisly end:

Kyle, 38, was shot to death Saturday, by a former Marine, police say, while shooting for fun on a Texas gun range. Another veteran was also fatally shot.

Is there a more fitting ending? Can a man really have no regrets blowing people away? Kyle claimed he had none. He could stand before God, he wrote, with a clean conscience. And he was killed by another veteran, Eddie Ray Routh — a man who suffered from PTSD — in a Texas gun range.

Unfortunately, for some, this man is a hero. He represents patriotism and American Exceptionalism. Some consider those honorable words, but in truth they are indicative of the sicknesses plaguing our nation. They represent a disease that causes some people in this nation to actually believe their lives are worth more than other people living in other (poorer) nations.

Kyle was knocking down Iraqis who fought against his fellow soldiers, but it seemed he never asked himself why the Iraqis were, in the first place, fighting back. They were being invaded. Destroyed. Torn apart by bombs and bullets and American military machines. The people in Iraq, whether part of the military or not, had and have every right to defend their homes and families any way they can. That cannot be taken away from them.

What makes the entire matter worse is that America invaded Iraq on false pretenses. Fabricated stories. Fear mongering. It was a lie. A very costly series of lies made very deliberately by leaders the American people trusted.

We are still living through that nightmare. It hangs above our heads as we bring back to the US men and women de- and reprogrammed to kill an enemy they’ve learned to despise. Many of these soldiers have seen and done things we at home cannot imagine. They suffer greatly, and there is very little mental help and resources for them. How will they reintegrate into society?

The damage done from these wars in Iraq and Afghanistan extends much further than blood and treasure. We will not be able to live peaceably for long. We’ve overstepped — or, rather, we’ve allowed our leaders to overstep what’s morally and universally right, and this portends a frightful future for all of us.

SEE ALSO

Justifying the murder of savage Iraqis: however you can sleep at night

For George Bush on his deathbed

How America lost the War on Terror

Can you support the troops, but not the war?

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