A Navy mom speaks out

Pundits and politicos have often assumed that rural America blindly ascribes to the President's polemic. Not so. The following is a beautifully worded letter from a mother whose son is in the Navy. From the New Ulm, Minnesota, Journal:

Critics of U.S. ‘war’ on terrorism are also patriots

TO THE EDITOR: Once again, I could not hold back tears as our family last week sent off our Navy son, Matt. After missing him dearly while he served 18 months on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, he was heading back to his new base in San Diego, preparing for six to nine months at sea. Like other parents of military children, we are proud and pray for his safety. But more than ever before, we are also frustrated and angry.

And despite what U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and President Bush say, we have every right to both support our troops AND criticize the Iraqi war. Enough is enough. This latest spin from the Bush administration — likening critics of the Iraqi “war” on terrorism to Nazi appeasers in World War II — is more than astonishing. It’s un-American.

Freedom of the press, freedom of expression, freedom to disagree. These are all attributes of democracy that must be preserved every bit as our other freedoms. Today, many journalists and politicians are realizing they were misled and misdirected by the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld war machine. The price — in U.S. military lives and thousands more innocent, Iraqi civilians, along with escalating violence throughout the Middle East — has been horrific. And this administration’s focus on Iraq has only blurred the war on terrorism.

This is the same administration, through the deceit and military mistakes of U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, which underestimated the number of troops needed for the Iraqi effort. Despite cries from U.S. generals for more troops and better equipment in the initial stages, Rumsfeld said he knew better. All this from a man – Mr. Rumsfeld – who shook hands with Saddam Hussein in 1983 during the Reagan administration, which then sold weaponry to Hussein’s army of thugs.

But another real issue of concern in all this is how the American public remained so quiet for so long. If a rural Minnesotan spoke out initially against war, he or she was branded as unpatriotic. If one simply didn’t sport a yellow magnetic “Support Our Troops” car attachment or agree to such a lawn sign from the local veterans’ group, one’s patriotism was questioned. So, too many of us took a step back and remained too quiet.

Where were all the voices of dissent in rural Minnesota, Middle America? Why were we so quiet? Why do we remain so?

My U.S. Navy son still has a couple years left on his initial enlistment. I remain proud of his decision. I can not say the same for our government and its own role in increasing tensions and terror in the Middle East and throughout the world.

It has gone on too long. In 2001, my daughter was in India when the World Trade Center buildings in New York went down. We, as do all Americans, remember it well. She was initially flooded with sympathy and compassion. The U.S. had this difficult, but definitive opportunity to show the world how to lead. But before her overseas schooling was complete, she was hustled back after the U.S. bombings of Afghanistan began. The international sympathy and compassion turned quickly, and so sadly. Five years later, we remain stuck in this quagmire.

Today, she works with the homeless program efforts in Chicago, one of the many neglected issues which this “war” has robbed of attention and resources. And despite her criticism of this administration and its war policies, her service is every bit as courageous and patriotic as my Navy son’s. Matt survived the destructive tsunami while serving his country on the island of Diego Garcia, a British territory on which U.S. bombers at times head off to Afghanistan and Iraq. This complex irony is not lost among my family members. Now I can only pray and hope he survives his remaining years serving this administration, this country.

And we can both support him and others who boldly serve in the U.S. military and still speak out against this administration and its policies. Both are patriotic and rich in American history.

Dana Melius

Winthrop