As Obama revs up his Afghan surge, let us all take a moment to salute the true heroes who have been fighting the war since 2001.
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Tedrall's Blog 
March 6, 2009 at 10:27 am |
there are more people training to fly uav’s, from the safety of their base in the usa of course, than there are conventional aircraft.They still suffer from stress though.
March 6, 2009 at 10:27 am |
there are more people training to fly uav’s, from the safety of their base in the usa of course, than there are conventional aircraft.They still suffer from stress though.
March 6, 2009 at 4:22 pm |
Ted Rall hates all US troops. This cartoon proves it.
March 6, 2009 at 6:58 pm |
Dude, I am old enough to remember your similar comic “War Is Hell” about crullers!! Not that I mind, it’s just amusing. Plus la change.
March 6, 2009 at 8:05 pm |
Ted rall hates moderating his board. your post proves it.
March 6, 2009 at 11:26 pm |
yeah, now the beheaders, they’re really evil. we, on the other hand, like to do it from the comfort of our shotgun palaces in florida. you don’t hear the screams, that way.
March 6, 2009 at 11:26 pm |
yeah, now the beheaders, they’re really evil. we, on the other hand, like to do it from the comfort of our shotgun palaces in florida. you don’t hear the screams, that way.
March 6, 2009 at 11:49 pm |
Yet another job that will be off-shored to India.
Who doesn’t understand this cartoon? Killing is now easier than ever. You think the Pentagon is not doing this deliberately? It’s a happy accident? Hah! Just google soldiers +”shoot to kill” +percentage, you get that all wars through WWII only 15 to 20 percent of Americans were shooting to kill. It’s 95% now, probably 100% when there is video evidence sitting around for review.
What about on the home front? This is something that concerns me most about so many of my fellow countrymen when it comes to our deadly occupations: they don’t care. When someone says something stupid like Rall hates our military, I can only infer that he lacks enough human empathy to rank what is the greatest evil in the cartoon, which is people are dying because of us.
March 7, 2009 at 1:53 am |
Ted,
When humans stopped hacking each other up with broadswords and started merely pulling a trigger on a firearm, did they stop suffering from stress simply because they didn’t personally drive a piece of hot lead through another human being’s body?
Just curious.
March 7, 2009 at 8:32 am |
I figure as soon as citizens can volunteer to fight terror from home by piloting UAVs over Xbox Live, modern society will have reached its apex and we can all move on.
March 7, 2009 at 2:20 pm |
Could be the soldier in the white cravat
Who turns the key in spite of the fact
That this is the end of the cat and mouse
Who dwelt in the house
Where the laughter rang and the tears were spilt
The house that Jack built
Where the laughter rang and the tears were spilt
The house that Jack built
Bang, bang, shoot, shoot
White gloved thumb
Lord thy will be done
He was always a good boy his mother said
He’ll do his duty when he’s grown
Yeah
Everybody’s got someone they call home
March 7, 2009 at 10:04 pm |
Anonymous 3/6/09 11:22 AM is the dumbest person alive. His/her blog post proves it.
Wow, prejudging is so easy to do, isn’t it, “Anonymous”?
March 7, 2009 at 11:52 pm |
Greg, the search you mention brings up a lot of dissenting opinions. I don’t think that’s a reliable statistic. I do think the percentage has gone up, but remember that the US military in WWII was a) more desperate for manpower, and b) relied heavily on draftees. The current US military tends to have more devoted and higher-morale volunteers–at least until the recruiters became desperate and started taking gang-bangers and mentally ill individuals who would have been rejected earlier. That could also increase the “kill percentage”.
Aggie Dude, the initial adoption of firearms was actually more traumatizing that swords and arrows. Thomas Arnold notes in The Renaissance at War that soldiers of the 15th and 16th century felt their work was butchery compared to earlier periods: a sword or arrow wound was relatively “clean”, and so long as you survived the shock and blood loss, you could be patched up relatively easily (infection was a big danger, but another matter). Injury and dismemberment from cannon shot or musket ball tended to rip flesh and bone away, however.
March 8, 2009 at 3:01 am |
Who’s that guy supposed to be in Panel One? Kinda looks like Frank Zappa.
March 8, 2009 at 2:09 pm |
Basically the same message that got Bill Maher’s ‘Politically Incorrect’ tossed off ABC.
March 8, 2009 at 8:33 pm |
Thanks False Prophet,
So the point of my question was to consider the empirical question here about proximity to target and stress level of perpetrator. Perhaps Ted is overlooking the intensely psychological aspect of stress due to an overly simplistic understanding of what’s going on.
March 9, 2009 at 12:40 am |
False Prophet said…
[US soldiers were less kill-happy in WWII because we] b) relied heavily on draftees.
This kind of argument is always used to justify devaluing life. It’s even used against Afghans.
Men do not join the military because they are killers. There are exceptions like Ted Bundy, who was in the army, but as a cook. I did it myself to get out of Hillbillyville when I turned 17. If anything, I always thought it was the general public that showed the least concern with the harm our military will inflict on others.
Support Invading Iraq: Poll Oct 2002 from U Tex San Antonio
See figures 6 and 7 for a laugh about how support for the invasion changed after hearing Bush explain his reasons for it.
March 9, 2009 at 3:05 pm |
Baron Munchausen: What’s this?
Vulcan: Oh, this is our prototype. RX, uh, Intercontinental, radar-sneaky, multi-warheaded nuclear missile.
Baron Munchausen: Ah! What does it do?
Vulcan: Do? Kills the enemy.
Baron Munchausen: All the enemy?
Vulcan: Aye, all of them. All their wives, and all their children, and all their sheep, and all their cattle, and all their cats and dogs. All of them. All of them gone for good.
Sally: That’s horrible.
Vulcan: Ahh. Well, you see, the advantage is you don’t have to see one single one of them die. You just sit comfortably thousands of miles away from the battlefield and simply press the button.
Berthold: Well, where’s the fun in that?
March 9, 2009 at 3:05 pm |
Baron Munchausen: What’s this?
Vulcan: Oh, this is our prototype. RX, uh, Intercontinental, radar-sneaky, multi-warheaded nuclear missile.
Baron Munchausen: Ah! What does it do?
Vulcan: Do? Kills the enemy.
Baron Munchausen: All the enemy?
Vulcan: Aye, all of them. All their wives, and all their children, and all their sheep, and all their cattle, and all their cats and dogs. All of them. All of them gone for good.
Sally: That’s horrible.
Vulcan: Ahh. Well, you see, the advantage is you don’t have to see one single one of them die. You just sit comfortably thousands of miles away from the battlefield and simply press the button.
Berthold: Well, where’s the fun in that?
March 9, 2009 at 5:52 pm |
My experience with friends who were or are in the military encourages me to agree with Greg on this one, military personnel have always seemed to me to be far less blood-thirsty and militant when discussing or considering the value of human life than the general public. The general public doesn’t pay the human and emotional cost of war the way military personnel and their families do.
That being said, the US military is extremely efficient at following orders, and once committed to a task they tend to carry it out as efficiently and thoroughly as possible. “Collateral Damage” is considered but secondary.
Also, Americans are getting more violent and hostile toward “others” in recent decades, and this appears to have bled over to young GIs going over there and essentially viewing Iraq as a video game – in part because of technology.
This isn’t necessary the fault of the military establishment, but they could have some responsibility in conditioning against blood thirstiness (although effectiveness is more important).
I’ve known a few former Marines with Iron Man complexes who come across as anarchist, bloodthirsty rapists and killers, but that’s more an outlier.
The American public has been systematically conditioned over the past 60 years to support warfare, link warfare to economic good times and national unity, and relish in authoritarianism.
From my experiences (not having been in the service but coming from a West Point family), military culture in the US is very professional. If the mission is to kill the enemy, they enthusiastically carry out that mission. If the mission is to feed the poor, they enthusiastically carry out there mission.
One of the biggest unspoken crimes of Iraq and other unnecessary wars is its abuse of the US military by ordering them to fulfill ill-motived, disingenuous, and dishonorable missions, which they still carry out enthusiastically.
March 9, 2009 at 5:52 pm |
My experience with friends who were or are in the military encourages me to agree with Greg on this one, military personnel have always seemed to me to be far less blood-thirsty and militant when discussing or considering the value of human life than the general public. The general public doesn’t pay the human and emotional cost of war the way military personnel and their families do.
That being said, the US military is extremely efficient at following orders, and once committed to a task they tend to carry it out as efficiently and thoroughly as possible. “Collateral Damage” is considered but secondary.
Also, Americans are getting more violent and hostile toward “others” in recent decades, and this appears to have bled over to young GIs going over there and essentially viewing Iraq as a video game – in part because of technology.
This isn’t necessary the fault of the military establishment, but they could have some responsibility in conditioning against blood thirstiness (although effectiveness is more important).
I’ve known a few former Marines with Iron Man complexes who come across as anarchist, bloodthirsty rapists and killers, but that’s more an outlier.
The American public has been systematically conditioned over the past 60 years to support warfare, link warfare to economic good times and national unity, and relish in authoritarianism.
From my experiences (not having been in the service but coming from a West Point family), military culture in the US is very professional. If the mission is to kill the enemy, they enthusiastically carry out that mission. If the mission is to feed the poor, they enthusiastically carry out there mission.
One of the biggest unspoken crimes of Iraq and other unnecessary wars is its abuse of the US military by ordering them to fulfill ill-motived, disingenuous, and dishonorable missions, which they still carry out enthusiastically.