Dear Media,
Shall we start a war? How easily you ask that question.
Do you realize what you are asking? Do you have any idea? No, you do not, because it will not personally affect you. You might get some more ratings out of it. You might get an award for talking about it. You might get paid for your memories of the event that you watched through heavy glass.
Allow me, to explain to you, what you are asking.
(Full Explanation on the flip)
You are asking if Thousands of young men should sacrifice their blood, their freedom and their sanity in the hope that it will prevent other people from dying.
You are asking that millions of meals be taken from the mouths of schoolchildren in order to buy weapons that intentionally or not will end the lives of other schoolchildren.
You are asking us to look at our fellow human beings as "the Enemy." To reduce them from human to a faceless mass that can be killed with impunity.
You are asking us to go after ONE bad guy, but to use the tool of war in such a manner is akin to using high explosives to kill roaches.
You are asking currently living children to grieve for parents, and currently living parents to grieve for children, all in the hope that theoretical future children and parents will be spared the pain.
You are asking men to fear the dark, to fear the sun, and to fear the stranger. You are asking for them to live their lives in the memory of their mistakes and fear, and call it glory.
You do these things because you desire to be a patriot. You ask these questions because your master Mars demands it. He has many treats and toys for those that sit at his feet and smile, and he dispenses them to those that serve him well. Mars loves his toys: his implements of destruction, his grand parades, and his fine clothes. He cares not one whit for the men inside them, nor the poor victims sacrificed on his altar.
You are asking us to go to war. You have no fucking idea what that means.
War is death. War is destruction. War is a terrible servant but an even more hideous master. War is the sacrifice of what is, because of the fear of what MAY be. War is tears, and blood, and fear. War is the man who has written a will because he fears that he will not see his child again. War is the child who hangs on to every precious moment of a father, for exactly the same reason. War is evil, done to prevent greater evil.
That is why you cannot ask that question so calmly. That is why "A few Airstrikes" is not a solution. That is why before we go to war we must be totally convinced that what we do is for the future that most likely will happen if we do not act, not on maybes, and the word of those that sit at the feet of the warmakers.
And what after? Have you asked that? What happens after the war?
Have we set aside for the thousands of men who will come back forever changed? Have we prepared to deal with what WILL happen, and we KNOW will happen? War is not a game where you get to restart. War will destroy the lives of thousands and we cannot simply write them off with a speech about how the mission was achieved with a minimum of casualties.
But you will not hear this. You will hear only the following soundbite which I provide merely to prove your ignorance.
War sucks.
(I couldn't sleep. This speech kept running through my head, but every time it started I kept imagining a talking head shouting "Cut his Mike". So, I decided to write it down. Still sounds better with the intonations and pauses I imagined.)