Opinion Editorials, April 2014

Soldiers do not go to fight the unknown enemies on their own. They are indoctrinated and pushed to war paradigm by the political monsters who use them as digits and numbers – to compile official statistic, and to support the economy of dehumanization.  Consequently, the fighting soldiers - men of conscience lose unity of the human consciousness - unity of material and spiritual factors of life and balanced characteristic– fair and foul.  It is a tragic conjuncture of inner revolt of human consciousness for a crime that is not part of the human nature and character and not visible to scientifically expert minds – the doctors who simply identify mental health issues of those suspected of syndrome to commit suicide. These are the net causalities of man’s insanity against man. The real reasons are hardly mentioned in expert reports. Science and machines cannot comprehend the intricate balance between material and spiritual life and inner consciousness of the self- the human. Politicians who entangle the human beings into warmongering are void of the knowledge of Unity of Human Self - an all embracing sanctity of sacred life created by God. 

Leaders or Men of King using People for Profit 

Powerful nations use the power and sadistic behavior to invade far-fetched lands to destroy the human lives and habitats, more for fun, strategic games and to experiment new and invisible weapons on the innocents.  Come and see the pictures of Abu Ghraib and it speaks its own language of human insanity of the few. Take a tormenting tour of fragmented burnt out bodies of children and women killed by the US drone missiles in Northwest Pakistan. If you still want to see more evidence, move freely across the silent Afghan graveyards without any identity cards.  American led invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan and the on-going drone attacks on the Pakistani civilians are the most recent instances to challenge the global human conscience. At Fort Hood, Lopez, an Iraq war veteran opened fire on his fellow soldiers yesterday and killed 3 soldiers and wounded some 20 or so others. First the commander of the fort denied if Lopez had PTSD treatment but subsequently various media reports attributed the action to mental sickness and described him as suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  Cyrus Massounmi (“22 Soldiers Commit Suicide Every Day, One Veteran Says Many Die For A Profit.” MRConservative.com: 5/23/2013), reporting in the MRConservatice explains the saga:   

“22 Soldiers Commit Suicide Every Day, One Veteran Says Many Die For A Profit”….the benzodiazepine is used to treat the returning war veterans, “Pentagon officials also released reports in which they strongly encourage doctors working with veterans who have P.T.S.D. to focus more on therapy and less on medication, one class in particular, the benzodiazepines, for which ‘risks exceed benefits.’ ” 

“What are the dangers of benzodiazepines?” Asks Cyrus Massounmi:  “One of the biggest is loss of judgment. Regular users have been known to begin participating in never before practiced dangerous behaviors such as unprotected sex and criminal activities. Could this be one reason the U.S. prison system has been crowding up with veterans from the wars in the Middle East? One of the fastest growing gang factions in the U.S. prison systems is that of veterans from the wars in the Middle East.” 

Contrary to publicly acknowledged causes of the military suicides, a new research finding according to Uchechi Kalu (“Why Are Soldiers Committing Suicide? Not Because Of the War.” PolicyMic: 8/7/2013), asserts that “when it comes to military suicides, we tend to blame the deaths on combat trauma. But that relationship may be a myth after all. A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association is challenging everything we think we knew about military suicides and their causes. Yet they did discover a few striking patterns:

(1)   Men were twice as likely to commit suicide as women. (2) Depression doubles the risk of suicide. and (3) Alcohol abuse more than doubles the risk. 

But this research does not illustrate the prevalent facts that active duty soldiers and war veterans are used as pawns by the political chess masters and abandoned once they become an economic liability to support them.  Western nations entangled in the self-geared war of aggression against the poor and helpless nations hide the facts from public mind and investigative scrutiny. America, UK, Canada, Australia and other politically aggregated or hired war affiliates maintain language of silence on the humanitarian impacts of the aftermath of the killing spree - soldiers to kill or get killed.  

Politicians Need Animosity and Degrade Human Life and Values 

 America and some of the West Europeans NEED “animosity” to stay politically afloat and strategically viable. The American led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq had no other purpose except to occupy the natural resources and to kill people and to destabilize their socio-economic lifelines to keep them subjugated to the foreign economic and political dictates. Today, the whole of the Arab Middle East is outcome of this policy and strategic practices. The bogus War on Terrorism and its indoctrination drives the combatant soldiers to political indoctrination of “ennobling enmity” and wired to instigated emotional madness, forced to animalistic behavior and they end-up losing the balanced material and spiritual manifestation of the Nature of human originality. War means planned deaths and destruction of all that is holistic and progressively imagined by the human emancipation for the larger good of the mankind. The contemporary politicians lack the realization of the hard facts of logic and moral foresight. The sensation of political power removes fear and accountability and the warlords get embolden to commit unchallenged cruelty and crimes against the people just to comfort their sadistic ego and to claim success at the cost of ruthlessness and barbarity spearheading human degeneration and continued viciousness across all spectrums of human affairs. To contemporary ego maniacs like George Bush, Tony Blair, Dick Cheney and now Obama and the historic Ivan the Terrible of Russia, torture and killings bring psychological satisfaction and enjoyable acts of sadistic pleasure to a favorite perversion. Common masses are duped to believe by the affiliated news media’s propaganda that war is a necessity to protect the national interest and security without any rational choice. After more than a decade, the war on terrorism appears unstoppable and unending. Its real victims and causalities are the ordinary people – the present and future generations entangled in a cruel web of ripple effects and undefined rationality of the war. Those combat soldiers who were pushed to such animalistic behaviors on the front-line – man killing man without any enmity and reason, are the real victims of the few insane politicians.  

North American and West European combat forces and societal thinking reflect ambiguous and varied stonewalls erected by the war machine industries as if people are not the victims and that in an advanced technological age, machines fought machines in Iraq and Afghanistan. The hidden truth becomes reality when every day large numbers of war veterans commit suicides and internet news makes it public.  According to Congressman Ron Paul (“The Death of Daniel Somers.”  Information Clearing House, 6/24/ 2013):  “The numbers sadly tell the story: more military suicides than combat deaths in 2012, some 22 military veterans take their lives every day.”  The US Army News (Rick Maze: “18 Veterans Commit suicide each day”: 4/26/2010), reported that 18-25 war veterans commit suicide every day and noted “Troubling new data show there are an average of 950 suicide attempts each month by veterans who are receiving some type of treatment from the Veterans Affairs Department……. Suicide attempts by Iraq and Afghanistan veterans remains a key area of concern. In fiscal 2009, there were 1,621 suicide attempts by men and 247 by women who served in Iraq or Afghanistan, with 94 men and four women dying.” 

Human Consciousness and Tyranny of Wars 

Human consciousness enjoins a synchronized balanced of material and spiritual life but killing others is an affront to continuity of the self within the interwoven compound of human life. Overwhelming materialistic powers, advanced technology and rigid expert determination often stall approaches to understand the reality of human life composed of material and spiritual balance and the imperatives of freedom of critical thought and Divine knowledge to articulate a better future. Life is not an invention of human mind or machines but God is the creator of all living things: Life, Time, Universe and Earth and its sustainable supporting system - immensity of factors constituting the scope of self-realization of human life. Could the reality of life and death be realized by human thinking, instruments and approaches?  During the 2011 London annual war memorial parade, the last surviving First World War British veteran age 111 years made it known on BBC news camera that “he did not know why he fought in the war and war made no sense to him.”  With broken hearts, wounded minds and tarnished bodies, when combat soldiers return to homeland, they confront another challenge of survival – the ripple and constantly haunting images of the inhuman cruelty of man against man. None of post war syndrome treatment (PTSD) can cure or sideline such first-hand real life experiences asking for rational answers why and what for were they fighting and killing innocent peoples?  All politicians are self-centered; they have no knowledge and understanding of the human nature as they have not fought on any real war fronts or created anything durable except amplifying the self and re-election ambitions. Greed and wickedness knows no ending. Politics is a game of pretension on stage, not a connection to reality of life-making and life-supporting endeavors.

Daniel Somers (“War Criminals Bush and Blair Claim Another Victim - "I Am Sorry That It Has Come to This": A Soldier's Last Words.” Information Clearing House: 6/24/2013),  an American war veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom 2004-2005 and then again 2006-2007, was 30 years old and suffered greatly from PTSD and was diagnosed with traumatic brain injury and several other war-related conditions. On June 10, 2013, Daniel Somers wrote the following letter to his family before taking his own life.

“I really have been trying to hang on, for more than a decade now. Each day has been a testament to the extent to which I cared, suffering unspeakable horror as quietly as possible so that you could feel as though I was still here for you. In truth, I was nothing more than a prop, filling space so that my absence would not be noted. In truth, I have already been absent for a long, long time………The simple truth is this: during my first deployment, I was made to participate in things, the enormity of which is hard to describe. War crimes, crimes against humanity……….To force me to do these things and then participate in the ensuing cover up is more than any government has the right to demand. Then, the same government has turned around and abandoned me….. And for what?  Bush’s religious lunacy? Cheney’s ever growing fortune and that of his corporate friends? Is this what we destroy lives for……. My body has become nothing but a cage, a source of pain and constant problems. The illness I have has caused me pain that not even the strongest medicines could dull, and there is no cure. All day, every day a screaming agony in every nerve ending in my body. It is nothing short of torture. My mind is a wasteland, filled with visions of incredible horror, unceasing depression, and crippling anxiety, even with all of the medications the doctors dare give. Simple things that everyone else takes for granted are nearly impossible for me. I can not laugh or cry…….Thus, I am left with basically nothing. Too trapped in a war to be at peace, too damaged to be at war. This is what brought me to my actual final mission. Not suicide, but a mercy killing. I know how to kill, and I know how to do it so that there is no pain whatsoever. It was quick, and I did not suffer. And above all, now I am free. I feel no more pain. I have no more nightmares or flashbacks or hallucinations.”

Politics of the Morally-Corrupt Expert Moral Thinking

American politicians no longer enjoy moral and intellectual leadership but claim it and act like surrogated mothers to the war-lobbyists and pundits of the major military-industrial complex. Politicians waging wars against the mankind are not the competent people to answer vital issues of moral and spiritual values and significance affecting the soldiers and on the growing epidemic of combat soldiers committing suicides. Fighting soldiers and the common people are the victim of delusional and vengeful hatred of the few global warlords who have vested corporate interests in the oil and gas supplies coming out of the Arab Middle East. All troops are indoctrinated with mythology of animosity to fight the unknown enemies. While on the war front, they lose rational consciousness by targeting and killing the innocents - men, women and children as are the instances in Afghanistan and Iraq and daily drone attacks on innocent Pakistani civilians – a cold-blooded murder game of the warriors. It is probable some governments and secret agencies could be using drug formulas to enhance the invisible crush for fighting and enmity. Consequently, the fighting soldiers - men of conscience lose unity of the human consciousness - unity of material and spiritual factors of life and balanced characteristic– fair and foul.  It is a tragic conjuncture of inner revolt of human consciousness for a crime that is not part of the human nature and character and not visible to scientifically expert minds – the doctors who simply identify mental health issues of those suspected of syndrome to commit suicide. These are the net causalities of man’s insanity against man. The real reasons are hardly mentioned in expert reports. Science and machines cannot comprehend the intricate balance between material and spiritual life and inner consciousness of the self- the human. Politicians who entangle the human beings into warmongering are void of the knowledge of Unity of Human Self - an all embracing sanctity of sacred life created by God, time, material, spiritual, thought, life and purpose of life - the ultimate source of all individual life and human unity. Politicians and concerned social scientists and military strategists perceive the broken hearts and minds of returning soldiers as they want to see it and they do not wish to see the reality as it persists.

Daniel Somers letter tells us all:  “My mind is a wasteland, filled with visions of incredible horror, unceasing depression, and crippling anxiety, even with all of the medications the doctors dare give. ….. I can not laugh or cry…….Thus, I am left with basically nothing. Too trapped in a war to be at peace, too damaged to be at war. This is what brought me to my actual final mission.”  The war-torn human consciousness needs spiritual and moral enhancement support to come out of the self-inflicted tragic and inhuman experience of killing other human beings. Politicians and society that drives soldiers to the madness of war fronts to kill others and get killed have no sense of moral responsibility to facilitation of remedial human help to console and motivate the entrenched life - the wounded inner soul of the combat soldiers. Pills alone do not remove spiritual stagnation but scholars of the Divine religious knowledge and wisdom could help the fractured human soul and body in moment of self- endured crisis for survival and sustainable future-making. All experiences are immediate and individual. Others see the prevalent reality differently with overwhelming societal and political expediency. Strange as is, during the elections, nobody questions the politicians: why do 22 American war veterans are daily committing suicide? Are they just digits and numbers to be counted as statistic or sacred embodiment of precious human life and soul who served the country? Do they not deserve to be looked after in a humane way and responsible systematic manner once they serve the interests of the country?

Every beginning has an end. The contemporary warlords need to see the mirror and the urgency of a navigational change, if they have the moral and intellectual capacity to Think and Act and to spare the mankind from further catastrophic tragedies. The 21st century of political Change, knowledge and learning and great expectations should have an Inner Human Eye - The Human Conscience - focused on Change and to serve the interests of global humanity. Strangely enough in a knowledge-based information age, American and West European politicians are not mindful of this historical and unstoppable phenomenon of Change. The living Universe and the so called five powerful nations exist in conflicting time zones and appear to be set on a direct course of clash and ultimate extermination. America being acclaimed as the most powerful nation does not appear to be on a path of peace and harmony with itself or with the rest of the global community. In situations of adversity and crises, competent leaders extend moral and intellectual security to the concerned people and represent hope and optimism for a navigational change and future-making, not egoistic political agenda, certainly no more warmongering against anybody on Earth and irrational behaviors challenging the interests of the people who elected them to govern.

(Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja specializes in global security, peace and conflict resolution with keen interests in Islamic-Western comparative cultures and civilizations, and author of several publications including the latest: Global Peace and Conflict Management: Man and Humanity in Search of New Thinking. Lambert Publishing Germany, May 2012).

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