I still remember driving down from NYC to Washington DC during the beginning of the Gulf War conflict.  It all seemed pretty clear cut.  We were killing people for oil, which was wrong.  At least it seemed clear cut.  I also remember arriving in DC and finding a very different scene than I had envisioned.  There were multiple organizations all vieing for support ... a serious lack of solidarity.  It wasn't necessarily about stopping the bombing.

So here were are again, testing out different new technology (eg., B2 bombers and satelite-guided 1 ton bombs) on some poor struggling nation.  Being a few years older and potentially wiser, I find myself tempering my cynnicism.  Is it all so clear cut?

I must confess that I enjoy watching all those History Channel documentaries on this and that peice of military hardware.  I think I've seen "The sinking of the Bismark" a few dozen times.  The engineer in me can't help but respect.  But all that death and destruction.  The little catholic school boy in me starts asking, "What about 'Thou shalt not kill' and 'Turn the other cheek' and 'Love thy enemy.'"  Sadly I have no answers for him.

I'd like to think that the $2 billion spent on a single B2 could be put to some better uses.  Repeat:  $2 billion for just 1.  Would being 1 short really hurt.  It could fund a small university for several years.  But how I do I know?  That precisely is the point.  We don't know.  Truth has been obscured better than any radar signature.  The lessons and deception of Vietnam are not that old.  What if we're all just being decieved?  Recall the lessons of history.  Roman generals repeatedly marched on Rome.  Who does our military serve?  Large corporations?  Or the freedom I currently exercise here in writing this?

My cynnical side, not completely dead, lives in fear.  It all seems so clear cut.  Clinton has the support of Nato.  Milosevic is a criminal.  We're the good guys, they're the bad guys.  But we're always the good guys, aren't we?  I'll bet there are people in other cultures around the world who would disagree.

So how do we get at the truth?  How do we help dissect and clarify the issues that have led up to this conflict?  How do I get a free ride on a B2 so I can visit friends in London?  Shit, I payed for a lug nut somewhere on the darn thing.

I miss the days when things were clear cut.

Appended Wed Jun 2 11:29:33 EDT 1999

So we're still bombing. It's not headline news anymore, but we're still at it. A few weeks ago, we hit the Chinese embassy. As I used to say in high school, nice head. For several days after the "accidental" bombing of the Chinese embasy by NATO air forces, there we all sorts of various round-table discussions. I didn't hear any of them discuss the following:

It almost seems as though the US media takes accidental bombing of civillian structures as an unspoken given, for the greater good of stopping Milosevic. I have to scratch my head at that one.

Let me take a step back and say that I've discussed this issue with several folks, some of whom are pretty close to "central command." It does in fact seem as though Milosevic was attempting to "cleanse" the territory. But I doubt if we'll ever know the specifics. Furthermore, how much of that kind of activity goes on here? What if "ethnic African Americans" tried to move out of Harlem and into the Upper East Side of Manhattan? Thankfully, our methods of cleansing here in the US are more humane. The almighty $ solves things like that for us. I remember trying to buy a bumb a hamburger once in a more upscale NYC restaurant. They refused and told him to get out. I followed him, wondering out loud how many of them called themselves "Christian."

Ok now I'm starting to rant.