The Day I Knew We Had Lost the War
By Charles P. McGathy, Chaplain U.S. Navy, (Retired),
Madison, NC
The day I knew we had lost the war I was serving as a Navy Commander in Rota, Spain. Accounts of torture along with pictures from Abu Ghraib prison had been released for the entire world to see. Shocking photos were displayed on the Armed Forces Network broadcast of CNN. The details were printed in Stars and Stripes and The Early Bird. I was walking to my chapel office with a cup of café con leche warming my hand, when the impact of the breaking news hit me. I paused, looked into the Spanish sky, and muttered, "The war is lost."
There could be no mistake. This was bad, really bad. The meaning of what had happened at that prison was even more devastating than the mistreatment, which was all by itself reprehensible enough. Soldiers from the United States of America had purposefully engaged in activities designed to humiliate Muslim men. Furthermore, they bragged about it. The photos revealed much more than a young woman holding a naked Iraqi by a leash. Later it would be revealed that this was not isolated acts by a few rogue soldiers, but a reflection of a policy change that allowed and even encouraged mistreatment of prisoners.[1] And someone took photos. They announced our defeat. The war was over. We had lost.
It`s a question of ethics. At stake is the attempted infusion of ethics from a nation that claims to be committed to democratic principles, among which is the free exercise of religion, verses fundamentalist extremists who advocate their brand of theocracy as the only proper ethic. In this ethical slug fest the ultimate prize is the sympathy of the people of Iraq. Ours is a nation with the ethic of respect for others, even those who differ from the majority. This is more than a simple toleration by a dominant religion over minority faiths. Instead the American religious ethic is freedom of all religions, no one religion is in a position to "tolerate" another; all expressions of faith are considered equal. Church and state are separated. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights are documents that speak in those ethical terms. They describe how we believe people ought to be treated.
We gave away the moral high ground at Abu Ghraib. Perception isn`t reality, but it is through perception that we lost this war. In their (the Iraqi people) eyes America became the new evil empire.[2] Our system of ethics, even democracy itself, is now judged inferior by much of the Muslim world to that which is offered through Islamic theocracy. At Abu Ghraib we used the beliefs of Iraqi prisoners against them.[3] Our representatives in military uniform were caught violating one of our primary national ethics when we disrespected their religion. Chances are we will never get the Muslim in Iraq to believe that democracy is superior to his tribal conception of religious law. We have lost that war.
How could I say such things? I find it hard to believe myself. On September 11, 2001, I was with the Marines. As a chaplain at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego I struggled to find some way to minister to my comrades. We gathered around and watched in stunned horror as the towers collapsed in New York and the Pentagon burned. Some around me had relatives who worked in those towers and others knew friends in Washington. While we kept vigil by the television set, drill sergeants on the other side of the depot continued their task of making young men into Marines. I wondered what the future would hold for them. It was an ominous day.
We all wanted to do something that would correct this injustice, protect innocent lives, and most important of all see good triumph over evil. How do we decide what is the ethical thing to do? "Nuke them `till they glow," but who is "them?" Even if we could identify who was responsible, is military force the best response? These were the questions I pondered while we as a nation buried our dead and comforted one another.
I`ve been out of the Navy for almost a year now. For over two decades I served my nation by caring for men and women in military uniform. I have counseled them on countless occasions regarding personal ethics. Rarely has their individual struggle over the justice of war been the presenting problem. I suspect that is changing these days. As more and more servicemen and women struggle over the meaning of their sacrifices, I would anticipate that chaplains are being called upon now, more than ever before, to help them deal ethically with their participation in an unpopular war.
A confession: I supported the invasion of Iraq. I hoped and prayed until the first bomb was dropped that Saddam Hussein would come to his senses. The war could be avoided if only he would allow unfettered inspections and assure the nervous world that no weapons of mass destruction (WMD) were left in Iraq. It seemed so simple, but Saddam wouldn`t budge. I later came to the conclusion that the Iraqi dictator couldn`t admit any degree of weakness in front of the fragile nation he held together through intimidation.
My government assured the world that there were indeed WMDs and they were on their way to us thanks to Saddam. If he couldn`t deliver them personally he`d make sure Al Qaeda got the nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons so that they could broaden the war against America.[4] Although Saddam hadn`t started the terror war on the U.S., he certainly appeared as if he was ready and able to help. We were forced; it seemed, into a difficult and ethically precarious decision, at least for those of us who subscribe to Just War theory.[5] As reasonable and responsible Christians we need some way to decide the right thing to do. In light of the threat of WMDs possibly being used in terror acts against our nation, preemptive war seemed the only answer.
I wasn`t the only one in uniform who thought such things. I was there the day President Bush took off from Naval Base Coronado to declare on the carrier deck, "My fellow Americans: Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq the United States . . . prevailed."[6] We all expected that it wouldn`t be long now before the preemptive war would be entirely justified as cache after cache of WMDs were discovered and neutralized. So we waited. And waited.
Recently I read Making Ethical Decisions by Michael Josephson. It`s a short booklet designed to help an individual understand the basics of ethics and hopefully adopt six pillars of character. The sixth pillar is citizenship. Josephson describes a good citizen in part as an individual who "stays informed on the issues of the day, the better to execute her duties and privileges as a member of a self-governing democratic society."[7] The dilemma for the American citizen soldier is growing more difficult because the more they learn the harder it is to perform their duty with a clear conscience. Not only are the numbers of dead and wounded ascending, but the number of military personnel returning with mental problems has exploded.[8] These are the hidden casualties, the post traumatic shock victims we identified and recall from the Vietnam experience. And these are only our dead, wounded, and mentally shattered. The civilians of Iraq have suffered even more (reported civilian deaths resulting from the U.S. led invasion number between 64,879 and 71,042 as of 6 June 2007).[9]
Soldiers can think. Because they now know that the primary rational for the war was a colossal mistake at best, a self-serving and shameless lie at worst, they are left with an ethical struggle. Most often it is expressed in the simple question, "Why are we here?" Ethics will just not go away.
Then along came Abu Ghraib. It was just too much for some of us. Whatever it is our government is trying to accomplish over there can never happen in light of those photos. To modify an old proverb, "One picture is worth a thousand terrorists." Unfortunately there were lots of pictures. The war is lost. I think Tony Campolo put it best when he said we ought to admit our mistake, ask for forgiveness, and help to end the bloodshed. In other words, act ethically.[10]
I am proud of my friends who serve faithfully. They genuinely represent the best of our nation. Because they are on active duty they cannot speak out and express their opinions as freely as I can. Not all agree with me, but there are many who do, much more than can be imagined. These are the talented, dedicated citizen soldiers who are now deciding against a career in the military.[11] In part their decision-making is based upon family separation, but I also believe it is due to the failure of this war to pass the ethical test.
We have lost this war not because of the failure of our soldiers, sailors, airmen or marines. It was the ethical failure of our nation to act according to our own principles. Instead of fighting a war on terror, perhaps we should consider fighting a war on injustice. That, I think is how our struggle should be framed. It is also a right war to fight.
In another war at another time the question of winning or losing finally came down to an ethical formulation. Through the simple brilliance of Abraham Lincoln our nation came to understand what it was really fighting for; what the war was really about. He put it this way, "our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure."[12] Once again our nation is being tested. Will we live up to the principles by which we were birthed? That is the war we must never lose.
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[1] Reed Brody, The Road to Abu Ghraib (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2004), 1-32.
[2] Adarsh Kumar, "America: The New Evil Empire," The Citizen, 17 April 2000.
[3] U.S. Army, "Article 15-6 Investigation of the 800th Military Police Brigade," May 2004; available from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4894001.
[4] Juan Cole, "The Lies that Led to War," Salon, 19 May 2005.
[5] Brian Orend, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2005 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.).
[6] George Bush, Remarks by the President from the USS Abraham Lincoln, at sea off the coast of San Diego, California, 1 May 2003.
[7] Michael Josephson, Making Ethical Decisions, ed. Wes Hanson (Los Angeles: Josephson Institute of Ethics, 2002), 14.
[8] Ben Wasserman, "One Third of War Veterans Suffer Mental Problems," 13 March 2007.
[9] Available from http://www.iraqbodycount.net/database/, 6 June, 2007.
[10] Tony Campolo, Keynote Address at Religious Emphasis Week, Guilford College, Greensboro, NC, 22 January, 2007.
[11] Gene-Thomas Gomulka, "Retention Ups and Downs," The Military Family Network, 13 April 2006.
[12] Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln: Passages From His Speeches and Letters (New York: The Century Company, 1901), 190.
