There was a sort of rebranding of the American solider after that catastrophe. The American citizen is now supposed to see the American solider as a utilitarian third party cog in a system where soldiers don't make decisions they just execute them. So if you're unhappy with the war you take out your disapproval on the government not the lowly soldier who is "just doing their job/just following orders" etc.
Obviously this is very ethically questionable but I'd say it's the standard attitude towards the American soldier in my experience (in group social settings with ex-military people). The military is simply the hammer, the will of the people and politics. The hammer only acts when the hand picks it up hence we're supposed to hold the hand (government) accountable not the hammer (military).
The time to consider the impact of this is before you deploy the solider. Ergo, to affect change, we must look at the government and not the solider.
Else- in theory, couldnt your goverment just rent you out to the highest bidder as mercenary and you would still have to do whatever this entity demands of you. This cart blanche of action, combined with the chance to loose your life- that is strange.
The draft saw 2,215,000 conscripted. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_the_United_S...
Maybe not by the mainstream media, as they were getting pretty reluctant to point out things like Obama, the Nobel Prize recipient, dropping over 20k bombs in countries we were not even at war with in just 2016. Some did report though ex: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/09/americ.... Was there someone's mom or baby killed by those bombs? Was that more humane than landing a helicopter and shooting them in the head?
As for general Iraq war criticism, you can still follow Democracy Now, Amy Goodman and others did a good job there. There was a video they did with drone operators who describe how they did the killing. They also currently have retrospective on My Lai as well https://www.democracynow.org/2018/3/16/50_years_after_my_lai... (it' s a shorter interview not a full piece like the article we are discussing).
The people you're talking about are more to blame, given how much they were war profiteers themselves and were intertwined with war profiteering firms.
Also it can't seriously be called negligent killing if there's no serious effort to reduce or let alone count the dead and find what the "mistakes" were. Probably because there are no mistakes, it's calculated acceptable "colateral damage" (I hate this euphemism). Just like after Trump changed the rules and US related killing rate rised by some 400% or so right after that.
I'm sure if someone tried, they can find good sounding justification for a lot of things within any of these highlevel thought systems. For example my mind boggles at the fact, that part of american left is pro-Assad (which is basically a horryfying middle-eastern dictator). If what he does would be happening in America, they'd be horrified. Currently there's some pushback against a new proposed CIA chiefess, because of overseeing torture. Yet Assad is acceptable despite running horrendous prisons like Adra, Sednaya, etc. (read some HRW reports, see "Caesar" photos).
To me it's more interesting to look at behavior/stated motivations of individual people, which leads to a more realistic view of the world. Yet it will cover very little, almost nothing, because it's hard to generalize from that.
Common knowledge says that the US was probably not always like this. I'm not old enough to remember the Vietnam era, but the stereotype goes that returning soldiers / military were treated with disdain by the civilian population. I have to admit I've wondered at how widespread this mistreatment was, but it is probably safe to say that the military of the time didn't enjoy all the unequivocal support, standing ovations and endless TYFYS that permeate American culture these days.
I do know that after 9/11 and at the outset of the GWOT it was universally taboo to do anything but loudly praise the military. Where this sentiment came from, how it was disseminated, why it persists to this day : all are frankly mysteries to me. It didn't make sense then, and it doesn't make sense now.
It has dropped one bomb every twenty minutes, mostly on innocent people, for the last 3 decades.
The US currently has the world ensnared in its remote military bases, and is a number one cause of trouble in the world. It regularly defeats real democracies using covert means, installing its own puppets to function as feudal lords. When covert means fail, the USA goes overt - and has practiced and refined its presentation of these actions such that the rest of the world is helpless to do anything about it. Nobody wants to believe it, but the USA is a wholesale exporter of death, destruction and mayhem.
Yet, the American people are ignorant of all of this, because of the luxuries afforded them by their state.
Until we deal with the decadence problem, we will not be able to deal with the militarism.
In a Western democracy soldiers are volunteers to enact the will of The People as expressed by a democratically elected government. If the representatives of The People, chosen by The People, decide that a war is necessary then they go - it's rare for soldiers to be eager to rush into war. Well apart from Colin Powell who sat there and lied to the UN with a straight face. It's usually chickenhawks like Bliar and Obama who are eager to strut about on the world stage.
Iraq is an unstable conglomeration of religious and ethnic groups. The blame for this goes back to 1916: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-the-curse-of-sy...
The US invasion jostled that mix, and the resulting friction directly caused those deaths. So, to be more accurate (but possibly oversimplified), the US was a witless catalyst, and the fragmentation of Islam was the fuel.
If the US consistently practiced being a good global citizen, maybe one could make a case for “humanitarianism military intervention” in limited cases.
What we have now is apparently open ended military activity, around the globe, for an indefinite timeframe.
Most of the conflicts we are party to are civil wars, and by definition these are not “winnable.”
As far as I can see, the US continues to wreak havoc on innocent civilians around the world to this day, with total impunity. This serves only the interests of the corporate military political complex. The fiasco of the US response to 9/11 beggars disbelief.
It’s sickening how the propaganda apartatus in the US has shutdown virtually all reporting on what our armed forces are actually doing.
Perhaps the worst of the US conduct is the continual supply of arms to States and factions in conflicts around the world, thereby radically increasing the lethality of the conflict.
Of course, the US is not alone in this arms dealing, but this is something where we could unilaterally make a dramatic action towards world peace. Withdraw from current wars, end arms dealing, and work towards negotiated outcomes, where possible.
The problem is that the political elite in the US doesn't see it that way. Military leaders from Vietnam who committed mass murder were awarded commendations. Soldiers who raped and tortured women and children were given awards for kill counts. A Secretary of State whose actions led to the genocide of millions of people still enjoys political celebrity. And a President who killed tens of thousands of civilians by remote control was given a Peace Prize. This is America.
I believe one of the key points is that it's not the foot soldier who makes the decision to start a war. When the soldier was drafted into the military, they had absolutely NO control whatsoever. In times without the draft (volunteer forces), one may say that individuals have some control by NOT volunteering (enlisting). But even that argument is incomplete.
People enlist in the military for different reasons, and it's not as simple as pro-war vs anti-war sentiment. Some of the reasons why some enlist: economic (to support themselves and their family), learn trade/skills, carry on family legacy, sense of duty to country, to see the world, physical and mental challenge/discipline, become a fighter, coercion by others, etc. Even if a person enlists because they desire combat, that person still doesn't have any authority or ability to start a conflict. Once in combat, there's still a chain of command and accountability.
When a country engages in military conflict, it is due to the decision of politicians. And once the conflict begins, it is the foot soldiers who pay the highest price.
To give a counter-example to the Vietnam war, what would have happened if all of the Allied military forces rebelled and refused to participate in the D-Day invasion of Normandy in WW2? Or even if the US decided to not fight in WW2, despite Pearl Harbor attack?
The officer who gave the command to massacre civilians in My Lai was wrong. Other individuals throughout the conflict inevitably did wrong. I believe that the vast majority of those who fought did so admirably and honorably. And I believe that I can have this opinion and still not be pro-war.
But that was largely a result of the decisions made by the civilian leaders in the Bush administration. What does that have to do with the quality or respectability of the soldiers?
Still other Americans initially opposed the invasion but believed that, having overthrown the government, we had a moral obligation to stay, develop the istitutions of the country, and prevent sectarian violence from breaking out again. I was in this camp back in 2006.
I don't understand the pride at all. Pride is a sin.
Does anyone remember Kuwait?
As for the actual justification behind that, it's highly up for debate. But regardless, you'll generally find the vast majority of the US left in the somewhat paradoxical position of unilateral praise for soldiers with simultaneous hatred towards the government's military decisions and actions.
Finally, most wars the US gets involved with are sold to the people as defense. We we sold that Iraq was behind the attack on the World Trade center and the removal of Sadam Hussein would make our country safe.
I heard that in WWI, soldiers were naive and didn't understand what they were getting into. Now though, there's no excuse. Everyone learns history at school and can use Google. So the decision to join should be fairly obviously likely to lead to doing bad things. The US has been nearly continuously at war since WWII, it's not going to suddenly stop when your son joins the army.
Also, how do Americans reconcile that "my family" attitude with the fact that the people they're fighting are also somebody's sons and brothers? It's not seen as equally noble to be an Isis soldier as a US one. What makes the US special other than "my country"?