[HCCN] Letter to the editor about the War and the Bar Harbor July 4th parade

[Dick Atlee]

This is a letter I wrote and had signed by members of the Westside Peace 
Group that does the vigils in Southwest Harbor.  It is based on the 
startling information provided by Michael Hastings in the Rolling Stone 
article that precipitated General McChrystal's unseating, which we 
believe is useful in clarifying what is happening there.  It invites 
people to join us and the banners-of-the-dead in the Bar Harbor July 4th 
parade on Saturday morning.  Feel free to join us if you have time.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
We hope you will join us in the Bar Harbor July 4th parade on Saturday 
morning.  Why?

"We're *** losing this thing."

These words of a front-line soldier in Afghanistan were not the words of 
an isolated "non-patriotic" malcontent. They echoed the sentiments not 
only of many such soldiers spoken directly to war director General 
Stanley McChrystal, but also of officers in his inner circle.  These 
sentiments were described in the Rolling Stones article that ended the 
general's Afghanistan career.  Much as been said about the article's 
having caused the general's removal.  But not much has been said about 
what the article was actually about.

What the article revealed in painful detail is a reality that our 
friends and neighbors might be thinking about, as patriotic Americans 
who love what our country has symbolized, as they watch or march in the 
July 4th parade on Saturday. It's a reality we hope will move those who 
recognize it to walk with us in the parade.

The article spelled out the bind we are in -- the same 
"counterinsurgency" bind that eventually drove the French out of Algeria 
and us out of Vietnam.  What's the bind?

As in those earlier destructive episodes, General McChrystal's 
"counterinsurgency" plan is to win the hearts and minds of people by 
placing large numbers of troops in with local civilians to offer 
"security" (from the enemy) and help improve their lives.  To succeed at 
this, the troops have to be restrained from killing people. As the 
general says, in describing "insurgent math" -- for every innocent 
person you kill, you create 10 new enemies.

But he's also observed "We've shot an amazing number of [innocent] 
people." So troops are ordered to restrict their "lethal force" -- thus 
placing them in greater danger -- and avoid areas where they might have 
to use it -- thus making their purpose as soldiers questionable in their 
minds.  Hence the "losing it" comment at the beginning of this letter.

Yet, as the Russians found out, to do the reverse and just kill people 
who might be your enemy (it's hard to tell who's what), you also lose.

That's the bind, and the reason the old description of Afghanistan as 
"the graveyard of empires" is not out-of-date.

No one running the war -- White House or Pentagon -- has used the words 
"win" or "victory" in a long time.  It used to be said that victory 
meant establishing a stable non-Islamic, democratic, central government 
that would prevent terrorism. The absence of historical precedent for 
any of these three things in a country of decentralized warlords and 
fiercely tribal-oriented people made such a dream extremely unlikely 
from the beginning.  With a steady bleed of hundreds of service deaths 
and hundreds of billions of dollars, whatever happens is "not going to 
look like a win, smell like a win or taste like a win," to quote the 
general's chief of operations.

As we have said before, there is no military solution in Afghanistan. As 
one of McChrystal's senior advisors said, "If Americans pulled back and 
started paying attention to this war, it would become even less 
popular."  It is time to start paying attention. We hope you will join 
us in saying so, in the Bar Harbor parade on Saturday, meeting at 9:30 
at School and Main Streets, near the YMCA.

Further information: Kate Henry, 244-3702.

Members of the Westside Peace Group
Dick Atlee, Southwest Harbor
Starr C. Gilmartin, Trenton
Kate and Eric Henry, Southwest Harbor
Rick Hirte, Bar Harbor
Molly Lyman, Southwest Harbor
Marsha and Charlie Lyons, Somesville
Susie Thompson, Bar Harbor
Lynne Williams, Bar Harbor