Wednesday, July 22, 2015

ISIS; A Veteran's View

     For the past several months I have been going to the VA Hospital in Jamaica Plain (Boston) for weekly treatments due to several service connected issues I am dealing with. Nothing new there and I am not complaining or looking for any sympathy; there are plenty of Veterans dealing with a lot more serious issues than me. What I do want to write about today is ISIS.
     As a veteran, I considered it to have been a great honor to have served my country both in peace time and in war time. Like most other veterans I know, even with the medical complications, I would not trade my experiences for anything and if I was called upon today to go back in I would. A few years ago, I started to publicly acknowledge my service, first by putting the veteran plates on my registered vehicles, then by wearing hats or t-shirts proudly displaying my service in the Army. I never thought for one minute I was putting myself or my closest associates in danger by doing this. Rather, I felt it was an extension of my marching in the Memorial Day and Veteran's day parades. I never had the unfortunate experience of being spat upon by other Americans either. Rather I joined at a time when the country was embracing its military under a patriotic President in Ronald Reagan. During the First Gulf War, the country's support was palpable and evident, at home, and more importantly, at the front line with the troops on the ground. It did not waiver even as the conflict waned and we came home, seemingly victorious, to cheering crowds and ticker tape parades. Even after almost three thousand Americans were slaughtered on 9/11, both parties came together and supported the military actions taken later. As the wars dragged on, public support for them disappeared, yet, with the exception of a few throwback hippies from the sixties, support for the troops never did. I have witnessed this first hand while traveling around the country as total strangers would stop to thank a veteran or military person in uniform for their service. During this time, I have never thought about donning a baseball cap denoting me as a veteran, as being something dangerous to do. Until today.
     I was on the commuter rail between Worcester and Boston when the train pulled in to Framingham to pick up inbound passengers. As it came to a stop, I was looking out the window when I spotted two women on the platform wearing burqas and two men who were with them who appeared to be of Arab decent. As I made eye contact with one of the men, I noticed in the reflection of the window, my hat, which proudly read US Army Veteran. For a split second I tensed up and watched for any movement which might be construed as a threat. At that moment I was saddened to think I was now profiling people who were almost certainly citizens like myself, and who never had, nor will ever have, any ill intentions against me or anyone else. Yet, because of the attacks which have occurred in the past few years on our own soil, including in Boston, the threats made constantly by ISIS and others, and the feckless response to those threats, it was not a reaction born of prejudice or bias. It was simply the reaction of a trained veteran who could not help but be reminded of other places far away, where tensing up was a constant state of being. One big difference is, I was on a commuter train going into Boston, not on a road in Iraq.
     Last week five more American Heroes were gunned down by a radical Islamic Terrorist. This is just the latest in an ever growing list of attacks attributed to this global war between the Radical Islamists and the rest of the world. My fear, and that of many other veterans and cops alike, is that the war is surely going to escalate here at home. How many more attacks will it take to wake up the general populace to this real threat to our citizenry? Right now, it is only us veterans or those on the front lines, here and abroad, who are reacting this way, rightly or wrongly. Having our leaders pretend it is something else, or ignoring these events in the hopes they will die out, is not going to work.  These enemies are motivated by deep routed beliefs coupled with an indifference to dying never before seen. In any rational thinking persons view, that is a lethal combination which can only lead to more carnage if it is not stopped.
     After contemplating my decision to wear or not to wear my hats or shirts, I have decided to not let them dictate how I live my life. I would rather go out standing up than survive cowering under a bed of fear.