A somber anniversary came and went on March 19, 10 years since the day then- President George W. Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq, and our nation’s all-volunteer military went off to that costly and misguided war. You would hardly have known it was a milestone day in our nation’s capital, however, or in the broadcast media, save for a few short retrospectives before they all went back to talking about the weather, the sequester, and whether the budget cuts would cancel the White House Easter Egg Roll.
My cynical side says they all have their own reasons for their relative silence on this sad anniversary. The Republicans, obviously, don’t want anyone to remember that it was the leadership of their party that lied to and misled the American people into spending precious lives and treasure on what turned out to be a war of revenge and adventurism. The Democrats, many of those still in office, don’t want anyone to remember that they supported the war, at least in its early stages, even though the country’s ultimate disgust with that war brought them to power. And the national media doesn’t want anyone to remember that they failed to do their duty by breathlessly reporting shock and awe, and body counts — like it was a sporting event — instead of closely examining the administration’s statements and justifications to get at something that might have resembled the truth.
It’s like they all agreed they just wouldn’t talk about the Iraq War, in hopes the whole thing would slip from our memories — and if you believe the national polls, for the most part it already has. I suppose that should have been expected. Few Americans had much of a connection to the war, other than what they read or saw in the media. According to a recent HuffPost/YouGov poll, only 52 percent of Americans even knew someone who served in Iraq, while 44 percent had no personal connection whatever.
I’ll tell you who didn’t ignore the anniversary, and for whom it had a visceral, gutwrenching meaning. It meant something to the more than 1.5 million veterans who served in Iraq over the course of the eight-year war, many of them on multiple deployments. It meant something to the families of the almost 4,500 service men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice. It meant something to the more than 32,000 who were wounded there, many of them grievously. It meant something to their families, who are still dealing with the effects of those wounds. It meant something to the nearly half-million veterans — and their families — who returned less than whole and with less obvious but debilitating wounds like post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, hearing problems, untreated and previously undiagnosed brain injury, and a host of other physical and mental ailments. It meant something to the families of the hundreds of active and veteran military who have taken their own lives since the war began, and are continuing to do so at an epidemic rate. At this point, 22 veterans and 1.5 active-duty military take their own lives each day. Just think about those numbers for a moment, and contemplate the magnitude of our national failure. Will there ever be a full accounting for those sacrifices? I doubt it, and with every passing year, with every anniversary marked with less attention and national reflection, the chances of that accounting fade even further.
Those who know our family know that we marked last week’s anniversary with sadness and grief — but I also marked that anniversary with anger. I’m angry that the Veterans Administration (VA) has done such a miserable job of providing the medical and other benefits we promised those who served, and which we owe them. I’m angry about a report on the news last week that said many veterans are waiting as long as a year or more for disability, medical, educational and other benefits promised and administered by the VA (which was completely unprepared for the demands these wars would put upon the organization, and has consistently lied about its ability to meet them). I’m angry that the VA said that it will be at least 2015 before it works through its backlog of claims (many of them stored on paper in unopened boxes at various warehouses) and starts to meet new ones in a timely fashion, without acknowledging that because of their ineptitude, in many cases it’s already too late. I’m angry that the VA has dragged its feet, or refused to partner with civilian-based support organizations like the successful New Jersey-based Vets4Warriors call center in Piscataway, which is struggling for long-term funding despite the fact that its 26 trained peer counselors have fielded more than 25,000 calls since it began operation in December 2011.
But most of all, I’m angry that the men and women who got us into that war — like George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and others who promoted the war so deceptively — have been allowed to fade into obscurity, or occasional crackpot sniping, and go on with their lives without being held to account.
Last week, on the day of the anniversary, I read a letter from an Iraq War veteran named Tomas Young, who enlisted in the Army two days after 9/11, was paralyzed in combat and is now near death. The letter, addressed to George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, begins: “I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice, but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans — my fellow veterans — whose future you stole.”
It was one of the most powerful, truthful and painful things I’ve ever read, and before the next anniversary, I encourage you to read it as well. You can find it at www.truthdig.com.
Gregory Bean can be reached via email at [email protected].