Why Iraq War such a problem for Dems - HBO's Baghdad ER

For those who don't understand how thorny of an issue the Iraq War is for Democrats, watch the excellent documentary Baghdad ER on HBO.

Here's the link to it

http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/baghdader/?ntrack_para1=leftnav_category5_show0

There is one sequence in this documentary that shows how powerful of bonding soldiers have with each other and what many do not understand. A young soldier gets a piece of shrapnel in his eye and is told that some of his vision might be saved in that eye. The medical worker then tells the soldier that he'll be bandaged up and then sent "home". The soldier simply replies, "Home" and that one word says volumes about the thinking of a soldier. He doesn't want to go home and wants to stay with is fellow soldiers and trudge on.
It is an amazing clip.

I can't recommend this documentary enough, though it is graphic.

instead.

you prove my point a hundred percent.

DU needs more people like you.

politics. The fact that some soldiers might wish to stay with their buddies, doesn't mean that if given the option those soldiers wouldn't want all their buddies sent home. there is a lot of psychological smoke and fog involved in a soldier's view of combat - it isn't like summer camp. We have to look past the simplistic, emotional response to a mixed and confused state of mind when dealing with matters of life and death on a national scale.

I saw the documentary and I highly recommended it. I saw a lot of pain and hurt, and the documentary was devoid of ideology. When they brought the Marine with the shrapnel in the chest, I found myself rooting for him to survive just like the doctors were (he didn't!).

and it's not about being given the "option" of sending a buddy home or coming home by choice. These amazing people do not have that luxury.

This is what I find so distressing - so many are critical of these soldiers and what they believe, while at the same time are of those who have never been put in situations like war, life and death and placing your life in the hands of another.

Sadly, often times people with out military experience think soldiers are simpletons, when that is far from the truth.

Dhalgren, I'm not saying this is you, but only pointing out that it is much more complex than lookin beyond things.

I am saying that these soldiers have been put into harms way for criminal reasons - and frivolous reasons, as well. They are killing people and being killed for no legitimate purpose. It simply makes no difference what the soldiers think about their "mission". As you say, they are doing their duty regardless of what duties have been assigned. The fact that at some point it will become clear to everyone, the soldiers included, that they have been misused is what we should all be concerned about. Facing war and death and sacrifice is exactly what we should only ask our soldiers to do in the SERVICE OF THEIR COUNTRY, not for the whims of greed maddened criminals. The soldiers' well being should always be paramount in our considerations, but their opinions as far as national policy goes are equal to those of any other citizen. The hardships our soldiers are going through in Iraq has to be seen as a problem for those who wantonly, and with complete disdain, placed them in harms way for no good reason; anyone who who wants to extend the hardships of our soldiers by perpetuating this failed, criminal war, must also own this problem.

BY the way, I am an Army vet - 1972-75...

and this is another thing that is very tough for Democrats to get across: your thoughts are very deep and very hard to get across to the average American voter. It is my belief and lately there are scientific studies that are backing this up, is that liberals and conservatives process information differently. And to take it one step further, it seems as if the electronic age, especially television, favors the conservative mind than the liberal mind.

For example, many of us like Democracy NOW or Bill Moyers while they like FoxNews. The differences between the two are wide and many but easy to see.

And believe me, I don't disagree with your points at all, only point out that the Dems always have this problem when facing many military issues: weak on military issues, don't support the troops, et cetera. I wish I knew the answer (it's like cops in America - every benefit and wage received by cops in America has came through Democratic Party ideals, but look how cops vote, and from my experience, it comes down to about one issue: the perception of Democrats being weak on crime.)

than most people like to think. And I don't know how to make the public understand what is at stake and what are the issues. Perception is very important, and I, too, wish I knew the answer...

:pals:

I have and each person is different. You can not apply a wide brush to all as you seem to be doing. When I was in every soldier had a "short time calander". do you know what that is?

Please explain what you mean by applying a wide brush. I don't think stating that the majority of soldiers have a deeper bond to fellow soldiers that many don't understand is using a "wide brush".

But I do agree that each person acts differently.

I am too young to have been in Vietnam, but was in the Gulf for the first time around and not a infantry solider. Fortunately for me, my deployment was safer than most.

As far as "combat", I can say yes and if you want to know my credentials, I will send you a private message. One thing I have learned is it's distasteful to openly ask those who have things like "have you seen combat" or "have you ever killed a person" and the like.

I will end this by typing that I do know what it is like to put your life in the hands of another and do the same in return and hope that is adequate.

What he was talking about "short time calander" was from Vietnam. Soldiers could not wait to go home. Most if not all when they had only a hundred days left would get a calander to mark the days off with. Usually they were pictures of naked women or such that had been divided into one hundred sections that you filled in as each day passed. You made the point soldiers would rather stay in combat with their "friends" than go home. That is a fairly wide brush stroke IMO. I would think the very great majority can not wait to get the hell out of Iraq..

I never meant my comments to mean that a solider would prefer to stay in combat rather than go home, but that there is a special bond between people who face danger together on a regular basis. (I think a contrast has to be made between a person walking away from an active and on-going hazardous incident and that of meeting the time requirement of his or her deployment and leaving through a normal rotation. Does that make it clearer?)

I guess a better way to clarify it is to suggest that a fire fighter would not leave a burning building with fellow firefighters inside to go home, or a police officer would not leave the perimeter of a building with armed suspects inside to go home. Though these examples are greatly different than a firefight, they do show a type of behavior that is similar.

Hope that clears it up a little bit more.

Also, my original point was that if you go back and watch that clip in the HBO documentary and see the reaction of the soldier when he is told he is going "home" it shows how difficult aspects of the Iraq war are for democrats.

It is part of basic training - commodary. Leave no Marine or legonnair behind. Very powerful documentary that really brought the war home. Definitely not for the squeamish. This is good for the dems because they truly support the troops by wanting to give them armor & good equipment. The best way to support the troops is to get them out of that mess. Chaplin praying for the end of this mess & chaos is very powerful. The rebups want to spin the war so that if you are against the Iraq war you are against the troops. Don't fall into that trap.

...it is only thorny when you lack courage.

We require courage from our surrogates, but somehow not from ourselves. We want to be "protected."

For our so-called leaders who wax on and off about moral clarity and spit the words "moral relativism" out of their mouths as if it were an epithet, such "core values" suddenly perform a smart about face when we speak of "liberating Iraq." Liberation - such a sweet euphemism for blood and brains spattered all over a wall.

War is hell, especially when experienced with a remote control and a bowl of popcorn.

Ah, there is so much "liberation" before us and so little time. Maybe we should start by liberating our own minds.

with support for the policies that sent them there. That includes the troops themselves. They have their mission to complete -- never mind that it is unnecessary and frankly impossible. While virtually all of them would rather be here than there, to abandon their mission and their unit is unthinkable -- if it were not, there would be an unceasing procession of self-inflicted wounds, gross insubordination and outright mutiny on the part of individual soldiers who are desperate to leave. The fact that there are not these signs of morale collapse does not mean they want to be there. Only that their focus is on their unit, and its mission (as they are told it to be) rather than themselves.

The military mind is not so unfathomable. The only thing to keep in mind, is that they do not see themselves as being tools of an illegitimate regime. They'd be doing what they are told, following their orders, no matter who was in charge. That's their job.

Where have we heard that one before?????

Generally speaking, a soldier can't get out of following a direct order unless it is something as egregious as shooting civilians or inflicting torture. Just about anything short of that, you follow your orders, even if under protest, and file a complaint later.

Back in the day I had a high draft number which saved me from some painful decisions. But when I felt it was time, once the illegal war in VN was all but over, I enlisted. Once I enlisted, if we had been ordered to go back in as VN began to collapse, I would have gone. It was part of the contract. My base in Okinawa was on high alert the week Saigon fell, but we didn't mobilize. If we had, I'd have obeyed orders and... Well, I'll never know. It's all part of the job.

Yes it was a great documentary, however; your premise is that soldiers are so bonded that they would rather be with their colleagues than home? And willing to be in any war just to fight? And this isa problem for Dems?

include the appearance of being weak on defense - which has now grown to being weak on terror (notice I type APPEARANCE) to that of not being able to build a good message when faced with this issue.

Many people here at DU try to look at this issue in black and white when it is not. Take the soldiers. They have lived, trained and socialized with their fellow co-workers for a long time and when put in this situation, it is hard not to agree their actions are noble.

As for being home rather than with their fellow soldiers - I never typed that. What I typed was the soldier's reaction to being sent "home" when it was obvious he felt he still had something to give and he didn't want to leave his soldiers behind or let them down. (I can say from first hand knowledge soldiers would rather be home than away, but that was not my point. My point was about how dedicated they are to each other in times of war.)

This is just a difficult area for the Dems to navigate in. Look back at Somalia and how that chased Clinton and the Dems for quite some time (Clinton has even stated what happened in Somalia impacted on his decision making in Rwanda).

It is a betrayal of our troops to send them to fight a war of choice!

Iraq is they haven't got the guts to stand up and say what you just said. If this war is wrong, then it is wrong for the troops to be there, it is wrong for them to be killed and injured and wrong for them to kill and injure Iraqis. This isn't an issue of "black and white", it is an issue of right and wrong. And when it involves the murder and maiming of thousands of Americans and Iraqis then there can be no "shades of gray", no relativism - murder is murder, even if "heroes" are doing it on both sides...

that is just one of the hard parts getting the rest of America to understand and it's more complex than just seeing the black and white.

Again ... The fact is that only one of 40 or so Afganistan/Iraqi vets who are running for national or state office are running as repukes ... The rest of are running as Ds ...

The only problem is Ds being passive about it ... We now know that Murtha, as he said, WAS speaking for a very large portion of the leadership and actual troops who are currently serving in Iraq/Afgansitan ... We also know that polling among the troops over there pretty clearly shows that they know that they have been put into a bad situation ...

The Repukes are absolutely chicken crap punks, who will continue to hide behind the valor of our troops ... The Ds problem is not saying it loud enough, saying it often enough ...

OUR BRAVE BOYS AND GIRLS DESERVE BETTER CIVILIAN LEADERSHIP !!! They were put into harms way in Iraq for reasons other than what was stated, they have beem horribly mismanaged by their civilian leadership, and were sent into battle without proper gear and technology for the kind of action they are seeing ...

Repeat it over, and over and over ... CIVLIAN LEADERSHIP ...

Did you catch the chaplin saying it was a senseless war?

for national and state office as D's is more a reflection of the DEM's response to the perception that they're week on defense than some kind of indication that Afghanistan/Iraq vets are coming back overwhelmingly democratic. The democratic party is actively recruiting these vets to help erase the (in my opinion, false) perception that they are weak on defense. The repukes aren't courting the vets because they're out trying to recruit minorities to fight the perception that they're racists.

It's true that some very prominent Democrats have gone out of their way to recruit veterans to run. But Repubs would like to have more of their vets on the ballot too. They're just not there.

The Fighting Dems, and especially the IAVA candidates, by and large, would not be running if they weren't personally moved to help set this country back on course. They are ALL disgusted with how they, their buddies, and the military as an institution have been misused and abused by the chickenhawks in power, as well as how the returning veterans are being left uncared for. It's by no means their only issue, may not even be their main one; but in at least some cases, it's the one that pushed them over the top.

Some of these guys and gals are running even tho the party has not been particularly supportive. In at least one case I know of (Eric Massa, NY-29), the DCCC told him early on they would not give him any funds (thankfully, they've changed their minds, but only because he proved his viability on his own) and at one point even looked into recruiting an independently wealthy candidate.

but only because I was bawling uncontrolably and it was the only way to get me to stop crying