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Bullets and Beans (Part Two)

Men like Charlie Rangel perplex me. The Congressman is a Korean veteran and was awarded the Bronze Star and yet, he is a staunch opponent of the military, a hypocrite, and either a liar or unmitigated fool. In a recent television interview, he said repeatedly that the U.S. military is deliberately bombing women and children away from military targets.

I shrug and ignore it when Daschele says that the President’s “diplomatic failures” have led us to war (even though the diplomatic efforts in question were for the purpose of rallying support for military action. Sure, because the French refused to take a moral stand and support a war, we had to go to war, and therefore a failure to increase the supporters of war created a war. Whatever you say, Tom.) Senator Byrd’s refusal, right now, during the war, to approve even minimal funding for supply to troops in the field does not surprise me. I understand selfish ambition and senility but Rangel puzzles me; I expect better from a veteran.

War reveals a lot about a man, especially to himself. I know veterans who have returned home with a dark hardness they secret away and with a new depth of compassion and gentleness. Men in combat grow and change, usually for the better. I cannot help but wonder if Rangel saw in himself a deep flaw or weakness that, rather than face internally, he has externalized and so now fights against the mechanism that revealed it to him. That would explain his statement that no one fights from bravery, that the only motive in war is fear. As a veteran, he has earned my gratitude and respect. As a politician, he has squandered this and shamed himself. I expect better because he knows better. Most distressing to me is that, after accusing our troops of deliberately targeting civilians, he insists that he supports the troops—an egregious lie without even ignorance as an excuse.

About three or four years ago, when I was first floating around the outline of S.K. (Speakers and Kings, 2002), a majority of the people I spoke with accused me of putting too much emphasis on logistics and supply lines rather than battle strategies. The experience reaffirmed to me what Jerry Pournelle wrote years ago—as a people, we do not study war any longer and we should.

In light of this, recent media reporting does not really surprise me. They dance around discussing supply lines as though it were some arcane secret they discovered that no man had dreamt of before. While the advancing columns pause to resupply, the pundits, believing that if they had not brought up the subject, the military would never have realized that men need to sleep. As for the war plan, I claim no special knowledge; but even I understand the strategy thus far. We are mixing old tactics and new equipment in a wondrously successful blend.

We hit the sand running with overwhelming force, ring and bypass the peripheries, fix the enemy’s force, and resupply before decisively engaging the enemy’s center of gravity in Baghdad. If I can figure this much out, the so-called experts in the media should be ashamed of themselves.

Let us hope after they finish tossing about the current military word of the day, both reporter and general citizen go on to learn the deeper truths of supply lines—not only do they span the battlefield, they reach through time.

Bombs, bullets, and beans do not magically appear the day a war begins and neither do trained men. Munitions and equipment must be not just manufactured, but designed. Food stores must be constantly replenished. Men must be kept constantly available for defense and emergency. They must be fed, sheltered, and drilled to a state of constant readiness. This pre-provisioning, the preparing and setting aside for the day of need, is the true measure of supporting the troops.

Over the past decade, our troops have not been supported and that lack endangers them in the present. Our military man-power has been reduced by half of a million men. Six army divisions, over one hundred fifty ships, and twenty-six flight squadrons have been cut away and the money siphoned into political pork. The pay freeze instituted by the Impeached Clinton that locked eighty percent of our troops into pay of $30,000 a year or less did not support our troops. The elected officials who supported this did not support our troops. The voters who elected them did not support the troops. The same people who now avow their support have spent a decade performing the opposite and, even now, congressmen dither and cut away at the requested supplement for current support. This behavior is either grand incompetence or total hypocrisy and it is certainly not supporting our troops.

Maybe there has been a change. Maybe, in the face of a clear enemy threat, an epiphany has occurred. If so, we will judge by actions, not words. It is in the future that we will see if these politicians truly mean the platitudes they recite and truly support the troops. If they do not, then we will see in the voting booths if the citizens then stand by their statements of support. It is easy to say you support the troops, more difficult to mean it and act.

Cutting the military budget is not support. Paying our fighting men and women pittance to risk their lives is not support. Hampering the work of our intelligence community as they identify the enemy and root out threats is not support. Punitive taxation that discourages businesses in the private sector from developing new technologies is not support. Opposition to the space program and SDI is not support. Foreign policy which caters to nations that betray us and appease tyrants is not support. State department actions which subjugate our sovereignty to the UNASS and the World Court is not support. To support our troops we must stand with them before and after, not only during.

We have heard the masses talk the good talk but only time will show if we, as a people, spoke the truth and will back words with actions.