Tag Archives: military

Portuguese in Vietnam

As I sit down to lunch with my parents at a beachside resort famous for having a huge population that immigrated to Newark, New Jersey, the waitress walks over with a bottle of wine. “This one is compliments of the gentlemen sitting in the back of the restaurant.”

My dad is already smiling as he looks across the very basic and typical Portuguese establishment, he starts talking and suddenly I realize he’s talking to me as he looks at the man “Don’t you recognize M? Mr. M who has the so and so business in Newark?” I turned to look at a familiar yet unfamiliar face.. already coming my way with a hand extended. He sat down next to me and immediately began going over all the old Newark stories that he remembers involving my parents, going all the way back to 1960.

Of all the stories he told at the lunch table, one in particular kept coming back and stuck out in my mind. His time in Vietnam. As he showed me scars all over his body, from bullet and grenade wounds, he spoke about his Portuguese friends who had grown up with him, immigrated, and died in the jungle. My dad followed each name, seemingly going through his own list of which Portuguese neighbor who he knew from grade school in Portugal that had wound up serving in the US military and dying in Vietnam.

As he spoke about the day he was ambushed, and the coma that followed, and all the people who thought he was dead… he would occasionally come back to the present, talking about all the young kids and immigrants serving in Iraq. “We had kids with us back then, but they were surrounded by adults, people who could take care of them and teach them… not like how they send them out today.”

Seemed like hours that he spoke, story after story.. and I kept thinking about all those immigrants.. Portuguese people who hadn’t been in the country for more than 5 years, and how they ended up – of all places – in Vietnam.

I sat and listened to Mr. M’s stories well after lunch was over. Sad as it may have seemed, there was a tone of quiet satisfaction…. to have lived a full life since then and to be able to remember each person and tell about them.

When Most of America are Veterans

I have this memory of my mother, when I was a kid, and its not the clearest of memories, but this is how it sits in my mind:

My mom was finishing her masters degree in social work, I must have been in the 5th grade. I remember because I would tell my 5th grade teacher sometimes, “My mom is getting her masters degree.” No idea why I needed to tell her that. Hopefully she had asked otherwise, what a little showoff I was.

Regardless in my memory she had a job or some kind of internship as part of her degree, at some counseling center in a city like Elizabeth, NJ. I can almost remember dad dropping her off at that place. I think alot of veterans went there.. vietnam vets. Mom would never, and has never been one to discuss people’s private details, I’m sure it wasn’t something she’d want to relive at home anyway. But I remember, and its still true, if you bring up life for Veterans trying to pick up the pieces back in the US, she has quite alot to say, and experience counseling them as her qualification to speak on this topic.

I thought about those days, which I’m sure my mom does as well as we watch hundreds of thousands of people being shipped off to a war zone… to a disaster.. and asked to do inhumane things such as kill or torture. I thought about it because I was cleaning the boat and listening to Radio Open Source’s program entitled “Coming Home: Iraq Veterans”. Now I wouldn’t say anything about it if it hadn’t reached into my heart and squeezed when I listened to these veterans speak.

Speak about the violence. What it was like to live that horror and follow orders to shoot people, and then come home and try to just be a friendly well adjusted neighbor again. At one point, one soldier is asked how people would act if they knew the types of things he had to do and what soldiers were required to do in Iraq.

The soldier replies…

“If they knew… they wouldn’t do it…. If people knew what war was about, war would stop. If my family knew, if people on the street knew, war would stop… if people knew, they would be alot more cautious about when war needs to happen.”

I listened to this show and I hit repeat to hear it again. I looked down at my dirty hands and the canal water.. I worried about what kind of future the US could possibly have with so many people damaged in such severe and not visibly detectable ways. I finally gave the engine a few pulls and listened to the engine reawaken after winter slumber, as Iraq veterans talked about their experiences in my ears.

Please listen to the show. Because besides the struggle to bring troops home and end this illegal and politically orchestrated war, the next biggest struggle that will effect the country for generations.. is how to help veterans deal with what they’ve been through, and handle the future as healthy civilians.

bm185 GI Janes Return from Afghanistan

It was over a year ago that GI JAne first appeared on this program, discussing the problems and concerns of her upcoming delpoyment to Afghanistan. Today, thankfully, she has returned to the US and to this program, and with plenty to say about her experience and the state of the military.

We discuss:
-Her tasks in Afghanistan, daily life
-Other militaries, the differences from the US
-Getting into trouble for strange reasons
-Support for Afghanistan?
-Predictions for what will happen and what needs to happen
-Political awareness of soldiers
-What media do soldiers use?
-The national budget and a soldiers finances
-Contract Clauses
Listen to the show to hear the full list.

Weekend News and Developments

On the g-chat the other day I spotted GI-JANE, still out there doing her job in Afghanistan somewhere. It had been awhile so of course we had our usual fun conversation about all topics under the sun. The great news is that she said she’s going home.. after I can’t remember how many months guiding the convoys for the US army.. she’s going back to the US. And eventually.. she’ll be free and travelling, surely to pass through Europa. Unbelievable to think of how much time has passed since we spoke together on that podcast prior to her deployment.

Elsewhere there was this vlog moment from Ryanne, which I’m sure is getting is deserved share of links and references. She had one of those experiences I often hear and notice happen to our lady friends. The construction worker wooping and whistling. Well, using the power of the camera and her keen vlogger skill, she went back and confronted the workers.. and well.. you watch.

bm178 Resisting the War, Moving to Canada

Many of us grew up with stories of how soldiers who disagreed with Vietnam found asylum in Canada. Over 30 years later, soldiers are once again acting on their principles and beliefs and moving to Canada… with some help.

My guest, Lee Zaslofsky, the coordinator of the War Resisters Support Campaign

We discuss
-what is was like during the Vietnam era, to seek aslyum in Canada.
-how the support campaign began and when
-the steps a soldier must take, or what the process is today
-Canadian laws, courts, and the government in relation to how easy or difficult it is
-The rights of US soldiers living in Canada, the benefits and options
-The response to critics who despise the work and ideals of war resisters
-Alternative destinations for war resisters in the world

The article I mention, posted on Alternet

Collective Amnesia and Unecessary Deaths

One US television weekly news program that I watch fairly religiously is 60 minutes. I don’t love it, but I’m fascinated by it and my own research indicates that 1 out of every 6 stories they cover are actually quite good. Still, I watch them all; the good, bad, and obscenely cliché.

In their most recent program, they began with a piece that had me extra annoyed and yelling at the screen as I so often do as I slowly spiral into madness. I highly recommend watching it online, as the channel has apparently decided to “get with it” and offer their content online for free.

The piece focused on the US military’s medical care for wounded soldiers, how modern, fast, efficient, and effective it has been. Throughout the report they include lots of impressive images of helicopters and super-medical planes to hammer home the point that the military is very modern and good at treating wounded. Which, I must say, is useful since you’ve got over 44,000 wounded soldiers so far.

Also included in the report are a few first-hand testimonies, from soldiers who survived and army doctors based in Baghdad. One particular lady got on my last nerve, as she did what so many of those interviewed did: get very solemn and teary eyed remembering those that died and then she goes on to say how hard they fight to save lives of soldiers and iraqi’s as well. There’s a few minutes even dedicated to an Iraqi child who died on the operating table.

Dead, wounded, and still they rationalize the bullshit.

That is about when I lost it, and I shall try to explain why…

There is no ignoring the enormous irony in all this. An army doctor crying about not having saved an iraqi child, while for most of the last 15 years, her military has bombed the shit out of the country and killed thousands upon thousands of children. Or the spectacle of an Iraqi working with the military talking about how so many people have died, but it is worth it.

How the hell does he know it is worth it? Who promised him that when democracy comes all lives will get better and peace/justice will reign. I can think of many many nations that have democracy and no such conditions exist in those countries. Yet this guy tells the camera, as he looks over the dead bodies of children: it is a sacrifice, but it is worth it.

What the hell measuring stick do these people use? How do they determine how many dead people per vote or maimed children per mcdonalds, indicate that it was all “worth it.”

All I see is violence on a terrible scale. And deaths that did not have to happen. Crying army doctors, destroyed lives, and legless veterans, going around telling us what a shame it sometimes is…. but hey.. it is all WORTH IT.