While the US was an empire before the Second World War, the victory in 1945 created an America that was The Empire. We have been reaping the consequences of that transformation ever since.
While corporations shell out discounts and lawmakers offer their thanks for veterans’ service, some veterans, like EMN Director Dennis Fritz and Assoc. Director Matthew Hoh, say Veterans Day is a painful reminder of their own service, especially as war rages in Gaza.
Stop listening to the screech of war hawks. Invest in life instead of death.
We should not be sending any of our young men and women off to war unless it’s truly about the defense of our nation. Once we send them off to war, we need to take care of them always—not just on Veterans Day.
Young people turning 21 today have never known a time when America hasn’t been at war with somebody somewhere.
Rather than celebrating Veteran’s Day, I wish we could celebrate Armistice Day or, you know, the end of all war as we know it. That would be wonderful. I would much rather like to live in a world without conflict.
The unfortunate truth is that we don’t.
I come to this Veterans Day with dread. I often am asked what the United States will learn from its wars in Afghanistan and Iraq?
We have not rid the world of war. It continues in its small scale fashion at this very moment in conflicts all around the world.