Speaking the unspeakable about war

By TERRY GARLOCK

Cindy Sheehan and her supporters gather near the President’s Crawford, Texas ranch and chant, “Bring our troops home!” in reaction to U.S. casualties in Iraq.

Which of course is precisely the result sought by the terrorist bombers in Iraq: defeat the Americans by raising protests at home over casualties.

Ms. Sheehan gets a pass in her anti-Bush media campaign because her son, Army Specialist Casey Sheehan, was killed in Iraq. A grieving mother is allowed special latitude.

Of course you have to ignore the fact she already met with the President and said good things about that meeting.

And her shrill demands for another meeting with the President don’t seem to be for a private exchange of views since she now publicly accuses the President of killing her son, lying about the war’s purpose, going to war to enrich his oil-industry friends and perpetuating American imperialism.

Ms. Sheehan says she wants answers, but sounds to me like she wants an anti-Bush, anti-war media event.

Here’s a message for Ms. Sheehan and her supporters:

If our goal is to minimize casualties, all we have to do is direct our military to stand down and do nothing. In fact, we could disband our military entirely and get rid of training accident casualties as well.

Think of all the lives we could save.

We could use peaceful dialogue with our enemies to win their trust with our earnestness, and to better understand our own shortcomings that provoke our enemies to try to kill us.

But that flower-child thinking is clearly absurd. We need a strong military, ready for tough action and able to pay the price in priceless lives when our national interest calls.

And listen carefully, because I’m about to say the unspeakable.

Sometimes, casualties are a sign of progress.

There, I’ve said it.

When the trigger of our military machine is pulled, a dangerous business begins. People are likely to die on both sides. It is sad but true.

When the important and dangerous work of our armed forces begins, the casualty count usually begins as well. Sometimes the most vital military operations meet the strongest resistance, and our casualties might peak even as we achieve the most vital objectives.

I am not saying casualties are a good thing. But I am saying we cannot measure the merit of the war in Iraq through the lens of a grieving family.

Last year, during the presidential campaign season, Michael Moore posed the question, “Would you give your son’s life in the battle of Fallujah?”

As the father of two girls, I will answer Mr. Moore’s question: “No, I wouldn’t give my kids’ lives for the battle of Fallujah or any other battle in any war. I would rather die first. I would be proud of them serving in the military even in time of war, but I would never trade their lives for anything.”

Which is obviously why we cannot let the families of our troops make strategic decisions for our nation.

We need elected leaders to make hard decisions, tough decisions that involve foreseeing and estimating casualties.

Before this war began, I was opposed to it for an unorthodox reason. We lost in Vietnam because our enemy played successfully to the anti-war sentiments of the American public.

Our country and our media seem never to have learned that lesson, and I doubt our nation’s ability to do difficult things over an extended period of time while dozens of TV channels show us everything that goes wrong, 24-7. So I said no to the idea of war in Iraq.

But our President has a more optimistic and strategic vision, and he has faith in the stamina of our country to take on hard jobs like Iraq. And we elected him to make tough decisions like this. We seem to forget that he told us up front this mission could take years and would demand sacrifice.

I’m inclined to follow his lead. Some of us sacrifice a great deal with the loss of a loved one. Maybe the rest of us could sacrifice by supporting our President when times are tough, when our own 24-7 TV channels seem to be working against U.S. success, even when terrorists play to our weakness by murdering our troops.

And maybe the President’s sacrifice is sharing the grief with families who lost a loved one. Even irrational people like Cindy Sheehan.