Analyst's note: Absolutely must read and carefully consider the message here. I for one tire very quickly of arm-chair generals who have never served this country in uniform, so you really don't want to get me started. War is hell on earth and no, fighting for your very survival is NOT akin to some sporting event with only a scoreboard and the cheers of the crowd to reflect who won or lost. Amen to the comments below of Lt. COL. James G. Zumwalt, USMC (RET). Semper Fidelis
[....] an athlete, a coach and a parent who got caught up in the emotional "fog" of a sporting competition -- causing each to act in a way, had they taken time to think first, they normally wouldn't have.
It is important to understand in each case the adrenalin rush giving rise to such out-of-the-norm conduct was generated on a field of battle where victory or defeat was merely reflected on a scoreboard -- the competitor's life never being in danger. Yet emotions among the player, coach and parent were so frenzied, they caused each to embark upon a less than stellar course of conduct.
One can only imagine then, the emotional high created when winning means survival on a combat battlefield. The warrior's adrenalin rush comes from the exhilaration of having cheated death. While the consequence of losing is much greater for the combatant who fights for survival than for he who fights for sport, both can get caught up in an emotional high. However, it is always more intense for the former as the stakes are always higher.
It is within this emotional context we must assess the conduct of military personnel who have committed battlefield taboos such as urinating on the dead bodies of enemy combatants or posing for pictures holding up body parts of a suicide bomber.
[....] the repeated deployments of our warriors to Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade have made for the longest protracted period of warfare in our nation's history. These are conflicts fought by less than 1 percent of our population. With a limited stable of volunteers involved, many soldiers have been forced to make multiple deployments. Unbelievably, one U.S. soldier killed last year was on his 14th combat tour.
It is unfair for our civilian and military leadership to issue a knee-jerk response of outrage when such photographs are published, immediately casting aspersions upon our warriors without regard to the revolving door tours they have endured. It is these same leaders who have ordered our warriors into that environment, requiring them to fight what is on track to become a generational war; it is these same leaders who should be examining their own actions in doing so.
Poor judgment exercised after an emotional combat "high" coupled with a lack of discipline give rise to battlefield misconduct. But, there also must be accountability by those demanding so much of our fighting forces.
Instead of quickly blaming our warriors for being solely responsible, our leaders need do some soul-searching. At a time we should be increasing our forces to take the load off our over-committed troops, they should be speaking out against defense cutbacks having an opposite impact.
Our leaders should direct their outrage at those cutbacks -- perhaps suggesting reductions target the budgets benefitting the 99 percent not fighting the war rather than the 1 percent who are.
The exercise of a warrior's poor judgment is a factor of the fog of war. What excuse do our leaders have for exercising theirs?
Lt. Colonel James G. Zumwalt, (USMC,ret.) is a retired Marine infantry officer who served in the Vietnam war, the US invasion of Panama and the first Gulf war. He is the author of "Bare Feet, Iron Will--Stories from the Other Side of Vietnam's Battlefields" and frequently writes on foreign policy and defense issues.
