Roguely Stated

In my first blog on Roguely Stated, I did not want to immediately jump into the rhetorical combat that makes this blog both interesting as well as insightful. On the contrary, I want to take a moment to pause and remember those who carry out our national security policy — our armed forces. Also, I wanted to remember the innocent people in the world who our nation endeavors to protect. We often debate the policies in a vacuum, but for anyone who has served up close and personal with the people who are directly affected by our policies — it is well worth the reflection. As we discuss and debate various security policies in our national discourse, we must always maintain a special appreciation for and consciousness of the consequences of our nation’s policy decisions.

But first, our military.

Two weeks ago, I attended a funeral at Arlington National Cemetery. While I have been to Arlington Cemetery many times, I have never attended a funeral there. It was an extremely moving event — one, in which, we lay our nation’s heroes to rest in a superbly dignified way. Since I have been out of the military, I have become somewhat detached from the military community that is continuing to make sacrifices on our behalf daily. I was impressed on this day with how many military service members traveled from around the world to be at this funeral. In some ways, while in grad school, I had forgotten the impact that losing a brother or sister in arms has on the military community. The shared burden of such an event is palpable. What’s more, at this funeral, I was the only person outside of the immediate family not wearing a uniform. In a multitude of ways, I found it to be truly strange. Now, that is not to say that there are not many civilians out there attending funerals for soldiers killed in combat, sending care packages to soldiers deployed in combat zones, or impacted by those who make the ultimate sacrifice for our nation. However, for me, this day symbolized the disparity between the less than one-half of one-percent who are deployed overseas in the fight and the American populace at large. In may ways, the fact that our nation does not have to mobilize its citizenry to fight a two-front war and transform the military at the same time reflects the strength of our country. However, there are, in my opinion, extremely negative second and third order effects when so many Americans are not even tangentially engaged with what is truly happening on the ground, in the fight, around the globe — to include our ongoing military efforts in Africa and Eastern Europe — not just Afghanistan and Iraq.

Now, those we touch through our policies.

My battalion, in Iraq, had a translator that we recruited off the street in Samarra. As far as I know, he was born and raised there. He was a young guy, in his twenties, who was intrigued with American culture — so intrigued that he went by the name 50-cent. 50-cent was an excellent team player in the battalion. It appeared that he was committed to helping his home city, Samarra, rebuild and not become over run by the al-Qaeda-led insurgents (which was occurring in 2004). However, 50-cent was being continuously recruited by insurgents and, in fact, we ended up discovering insurgent videos in his possession. My battalion had to let him go because he could no longer be trusted to work with us. In that same time period, 50-cent’s family was taken hostage by al-Qaeda insurgents. My battalion executed a short notice raid to rescue his family members who were tortured and threatened to be killed. My battalion ended up rescuing his family and relocating them within Iraq. 50-cent did not end up (to my knowledge) going over to the al-Qaeda side specifically due to what “the Americans” did for his family. 50-cent had been recruited by al-Qaeda many more times, and he, like many others in Iraq, was forced to choose a side — he chose us. However, if we did not build that relationship with 50-cent, and many others, it is uncertain whether they would be siding with the moderates today.

The policies that we debate have far-reaching impact on our military families as well as families across the globe. While this is intuitive, too often, this understanding is taken for granted and not outwardly stated. My experiences serving as a peacekeeper in Kosovo and as a war fighter in Iraq inform my opinion as to the way forward in Iraq and, more broadly, the Global War on Terrorism. Let us never forget our military families or our Veterans — they are national treasures - or the innocent people who we serve to protect in conficts throughout the world.