The American Way of War

[rug]

Robert Jay Lifton
Author, Psychiatrist

Posted: 05/06/2012 1:29 pm

The American way of war has been turning many of our own soldiers into criminal killers and desecraters, and does great harm to our overall spiritual health. The wars we have chosen to fight in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, different as they are, have all given rise to what can best be called an "atrocity-producing situation." Sergeant Robert Bales' rampage in which he randomly murdered 17 Afghan civilians, at least 9 of them children, is only the most recent example.

Yes, atrocities occur in all wars, but in a certain kind of war they can become almost inseparable from everyday combat. By atrocity-producing situation I mean an environment so structured, militarily and psychologically, that an average person entering it, no better or worse than you or me, could be capable of committing atrocities. The military structure includes a counterinsurgency war in a distant, alien environment, against a nonwhite adversary, where it becomes extremely difficult to differentiate combatants from civilians. Add to that the uneasy psychological responses of occupiers or invaders, combinations of fear, helplessness, angry grief in response to the death of buddies, and hunger for an enemy who will "stand up and fight."

- snip -

Hence the overall pattern of shocking incidents: repeated killings of civilians, Marines urinating on Taliban bodies, the burning of Korans, the defiling of insurgents' remains as photographed by participants. A readiness for atrocity was observed by Neil Shea, a journalist embedded with American soldiers in Afghanistan. One of them told him that "this is where I come to do fucked-up things," words Shea heard "in many variations, from many American combat troops." Men could be aware that such behavior helped the enemy and could even express cynical pleasure in "recruiting for the Taliban." American soldiers in Afghanistan, as in Vietnam and Iraq, could thus become both victims and executioners, the two roles that Albert Camus wisely warned us to never take on.

- snip -

We've been involved militarily in Afghanistan for 10 years, long enough for someone born when the war began to be now in the fifth grade. Can we not, however belatedly, draw wisdom from the kind of war we have been fighting there, and have also fought in Iraq and Vietnam? It's time for us to confront and renounce this American way of war.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-jay-lifton/war-atrocity_b_1490147.html

[infrared]

1. Yes, "war what is it good for - absolutely nothing - say it again.."

but some like war ...Cheney + Halliburton + White House + Bush + military Industrial complex + greed + stupidity + most of the 1% (their bought politicians told us that).

[RZM]

2. It's rubbish to argue that this is 'the American way of war'

In fact, some of the worst atrocities occur in the exact opposite circumstances that the author says caused these incidents, i.e. 'an environment so structured.' It's often groups like irregulars, terrorists, paramilitaries, and partisans that commit the worst atrocities, precisely because these groups DON'T have a strong command structure or rigid discipline.

And the racial argument is odd as well. Again, many terrible atrocities occur in civil wars/insurgencies, where victims and perpetrators often have very similar backgrounds. A 'collaborator' is often treated far worse than an enemy soldier.

Bales will probably get a long sentence. Charles Graner (of Abu-Ghraib fame) served 6.5 years in prison. Does al-Qaida discipline members for beheading people? Is Joseph Kony handing out stiff sentences when one of his child soldiers murders an innocent civilian?

[rug]

3. That is the history of American wars for the last half century.

And it's intensified in the last ten years.

What does Kony have to do with this?

[RZM]

4. My point was that

Atrocities happen all of the time, especially in forces with either little discipline or where civilians are specifically targeted. That was why I brought in Kony. The US military has rules and a strong command structure. That helps to tamp down on the atrocities and punish the offenders when they do happen (not that it happens all or even most of the time, but it does happen).

In an irregular army you don't have that, so there are more opportunities for atrocities to occur. It's the opposite of the author's argument. I believe the rigidity of the military works against the commission of atrocities, not the other way around.

[rug]

5. And the point of the article is that particular conditions of war increase the atrocities.

Specifically, the type of war waged in Vietnam, Iraq, and continuing in Afghanistan.

Worse, they are eroding any civilized notion of military justice.

http://www.digtriad.com/video/default.aspx?bctid=1626175437001&odyssey=mod%7Cnewswell%7Ctext%7CFRONTPAGE%7Cfeatured