A Foreigner Among Friends

The Berlin Wall fell on 9 November 1989, and suddenly we were all aquiver over not being vaporized under a mushroom cloud of fissionable material. Our jubilation of avoiding sudden irradiation was elevated by the promise of the “Peace Dividend”. The Cold War was over and now all would share in victory, harmony, and the reduced cost of a detente military. Where would that money go? The Cure for Cancer? Colonizing Mars? Ending world hunger? Poverty? The ludicrous idea of putting it back in the pockets of the people who earned was even considered momentarily. 

While we contemplated, discussed, and contended over how we would allocate our windfall Peace Dividend, the rhythm of war drums could be heard from beyond the horizon from half a world away. At first, barely detectable but soon their constant pounding drowned out every voice, then every other sound. Louder and closer they grew. The drums now deafening, panicking, frenzying, and driving us into madness. Madness and murder… and that’s how you get a ten year discount on crude from the Emir of Kuwait at the price of peace and her elusive dividend. 

The ubiquitous peace demonstrators waving placards reading, “Stop Bush’s Illegal War!” flooded every strategic intersection in urban America. Anti-war rallies appeared in public venues throughout George W. Bush’s two terms. It looked every bit the legitimate peace movement reminiscent of the 1960’s protests. Then, on the day Barack Obama was elected to the Oval office the protests vanished like wisps of smoke. The wars went on and intensified, but the “peace protesters” never returned. The “peace protesters” exposed themselves as political agitators willing to accept war without end when it suited their political party. With a Republican in the White House today the wars overseas have become a distant sideshow to the homegrown battle of Russian election interference. The new enemy is the only enemy we can see. I can’t decide which political faction is worse, those who use the pretense of peace for their own ulterior motives or those who denounce peace as Anti-American.  

Even the Romans one of the most militaristic empires ever to scourge the planet had a goddess of peace named Eirene. They valued peace so much that they deified her. We have no such value today, but I knew Peace and I loved her. 


Since The First Gulf War, the conflict we fondly recall as "Operation Desert Storm", there has been a change in the character of American culture. That change culminated at 8:46 AM on 11 September, 2001 when American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the northern facade of the World Trade Center Towers Building 1 and changing forever in the American mind the desire for peace. From that moment we would never again stop and look back at Peace, the girl of our youth whom we knew and loved.

Instead, we marched like zombies into twenty years of war and seventy more armed conflicts. Even now the embers of those conflicts still smolder and flare into current crises. This is the predictable results of putting out fires with a baseball bat. America at war became normalized, no casualty reports, no horrors, just photo ops, and an occasional hero mourned in a fifty-word blurb on page six. Peace was not openly spoken of or considered out of fear of putting American troops at risk. Imagine that, anything but uncompromising support for constant war being a threat to "our men and women in uniform". Even a football player taking a knee in silent protest became an act of betrayal deeply wounding those who proudly fight for freedom. This is the acceptable insanity, the pervasive mental sodomy of this day some twenty years march away from Peace.

  

A whole generation of Americans has grown from infants to adulthood over these last decades. Children born of and raised on war. Children who have never know a single day of peace. They do not miss what they have never known. But we... but I knew her and loved her. 


Once in a while, in moments of weakness, I still long for Peace. Meanwhile, you want for bloody conflicts, thrilling skirmishes, and epic showdowns, all employing baseball bats. All showering embers into the tinderbox of your next fucking war. All taking us further from peace. 

I still praise Eirene. You glorify the rider of a pale horse. I have become a foreigner among friends. 

Death rides a pale horse.

Three Decades and Seventy Conflicts later... check my math: 
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_military_operations

Then, I'll count your tears.