Letter to the Editor: Veteran responds to ‘Military Violence’

Letter+to+the+Editor%3A+Veteran+responds+to+Military+Violence

Last Monday, the Northern Iowan published an opinion piece that infuriated me to the point of writing this response. I consider myself, normally, rather mild mannered, but the offensive comments therein were reprehensible.

In the referenced article, the author chose to end her argument by calling the United States Military a “terrorist organization.”  This kind of rhetoric is completely uncalled for and harkens back to the Vietnam war of the late 60s and early 70s in which military personnel were persecuted by a discontent public which had misplaced their anger.

I am a member of the United States Army and have served in Afghanistan twice.  I have witnessed the destruction of war the previous author seems to loathe (likely not having experienced it for themselves) and experienced what true terror can be.

I have served both tours in a medical capacity, as a combat medic defending my compatriots and as a flight medic picking up the wounded of all parties involved. I have had to treat friends, comrades and civilians all caught in the injustice of true terrorist attacks.

The men and women of your armed forces are not there for profit or personal gain.  They are there because they chose to raise their hand in defense of freedom no matter where oppression rears its ugly head.

I have seen the Afghan people struggling against oppression.  They have accepted our help in making their country a better place and are willing to die for it.  They are tired not of war but of the narrow-minded ways of the past, where women are denied education, beaten and traded as if they were livestock.

Where religious intolerance stifles the minority and the fear of change suppresses the betterment of their society.

The people who have volunteered their lives in defense of your freedoms are not your punching bag.  Calling the US Military a terrorist organization is equivalent to using a racial slur, stands on the same bigoted ground as xenophobia or homophobia and absolutely should not be tolerated.

What’s more is that this kind of prejudiced rhetoric only cheapens one’s arguments and should have been left out entirely.

I hope that the readers of this column understand the hardship that the military endures in order to support those in the most horrific of circumstances.  Do well to remember, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing” – Edmund Burke.

-Christopher Rew,

Graduate Student of Biology