Both
my parents served in World War II, and were proud of their service. Both had scars from that service, especially
my dad, who saw combat duty in Europe. As
I’ve learned more about what veterans suffer with after war, I see a part of
their suffering that often goes unnoticed is “moral injury”. Moral injury is when your moral center is
damaged because you’ve done something you know is wrong. My father’s generation didn’t talk a lot
about their experiences in the war, but one thing my father once said has stuck
with me, probably because it was the only time he spoke it: “Sometimes in war
you have to do something you shouldn’t do.”
Admitting
to moral injury means having the honesty to admit your participation in evil
and the humility to suffer through what that means. It is the part of healing that rarely, if
ever, gets publicity or calls for support or understanding. Nearly every week, there is a TV news show
that shows veterans bravely coping with physical injury, and the committed caregivers
who work with them. There are constant
calls for us “to remember and support our veterans.” Every NFL game last Sunday had some “Salute
to the Troops”. Today Perkins is giving a free breakfast to past or present
service members. All these gestures are accompanied
by the statement that they “did it for us”—to “protect our freedom”, usually.
I’m
sure the breakfast was appreciated, but when was the last time you hear anyone
talk about moral injury—in the news, in entertainment, or even in your place of
worship (which should be the very place we talk about evil and heal from
it)? When have you seen a feature story
or human-interest story about someone helping a returning vet to admit to the
evil he or she had done, been forgiven for it, and be welcomed back into a
community that has its own need to repent.
Probably
never, I would guess. Because for us as
a society to offer that kind of help, we would have to admit that the evil done
by our military was done for us and by us.
Which would mean that we have suffered moral injury as a result of our
supporting and benefitting from what our nation has done in its wars. My Lai, the tiger cages, Operation Phoenix
(what a macabre irony that name is) and all the other atrocities done in Viet
Nam are our atrocities. Abu Ghraib, water boarding, drone strikes on civilians,
Guantanamo are our shame. The mining of Nicaragua’s harbors, the
training of assassins at the School of the Americas in Georgia are our war crimes.
Often
when I bring this up, particularly near Memorial Day or Veteran’s Day (or 4th
of July, which had nothing to do with the military), I am told “this is not the
time to discuss that.” But when exactly
is the time to do so? Is it just a pipe
dream of mine that some day we the people will spend as much time remembering
Hiroshima and Mozote as we do Pearl Harbor? Or spend even a fraction of the
time remembering what we did on the other 9-11, facilitating a military coup in
Chile on 9-11-1973?
Don’t
want to think about all this? Well let
me ask what is to me what is one of the most problematic questions of all: Why
is it that every country we’ve invaded since the end of World War II has been much
poorer than us: Viet Nam, Cambodia, Laos, Grenada, Panama, Iraq, Afghanistan,
Korea, and including our proxy wars in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras,
Colombia and Nicaragua? Not to mention our support of military coups and
dictatorships in Iran, Dominican Republic, Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, the
Congo, Uruguay and on and on. What does it say that the richest country in the
world goes to war against some of the poorest?
What does it say about our values?
(Of course we did plenty of invading prior to WWII, mostly of other
Americans—Native and Latin Americans, that is).
My
father was a member of the VFW, but stopped going in the late sixties and
seventies. He didn’t like the jingoism
that seemed to dominate every gathering.
I also think he was struggling with the idea that his sons could be
drafted to fight in Viet Nam, in a war that he came to see as unjustified, from
top to bottom. In the last decades of
his life, I believe that he found the most important “welcome home”, which was
forgiveness and reconciliation.
I
know that it is hard to hold together gratitude for the sacrifice our troops
make, and anger at what our troops have done, in our name. But it can be done. At least some Germans reflected this November
9, about the 25th anniversary of the end of the Berlin Wall, and the
76th anniversary of Kristallnacht. Many, many Latin Americans love our country
for its freedoms and opportunities, while detesting what it’s done to their
lands. I think we owe it to ourselves as
a people and as a nation to try.
This
poem is one of a series about my father, and was published in the Ilanot Review
from Israel, in their issue about “Conflict” (which ironically, went on-line
right at the beginning of the latest war between Israel and Palestine).
FALLING
A
man hung from his parachute
like
a seed softly whirligigging down,
shouting
“Don’t shoot—I surrender!”
in
the tongue of the enemy, your first tongue.
He
had no way to reach
his
weapon, but the men under
you
did, and in a minute—though your voice
was
raised and your rank commanded
obedience—it
was the county fair
in
Shreveport, in Pembina, in New Ulm
and
New Prague, step right up, everyone
wins
a prize, the lights flashing,
the
girls all giggles, and bullets
and
a ribbon for the man who hits the nose.
Then,
silence, the head of the boy
on
his chest, his body limp
in
its harness, gravity doing
its
work. The son of German cousins—
perhaps
the grandson of your grandfather’s friend—
spoiled
blood over his uniform. Father,
why
did you tell me this story
and
not my brothers?
Your
memories are like your hands:
big,
calloused, open.
His
boots newly shined, pulled him
down
to the earth he finally
met
as a shroud, a nothing,
a
home. Your men did not speak.
They
held their rifles across
their
chests, as if bearing sick children.
* * *
Today,
I feel that to
Be justice, and
Be beauty
We must mostly
Be
honesty
Patrick
