"The War" and this war

An excellent essay by Peter Smith over at The Huffington Post looks at the major differences between the war in Iraq and World War II. Images from Ken Burns' documentary The War bring to mind the extreme sacrifices made by every American for that effort:

There is the sheer scope and scale of the respective war efforts. In World War Two, everyone pitched in. Burns shows us a Michigan bomber factory that turned out a B-17 every 63 minutes. We see housewives saving bacon fat "for the war." And ration cards. And paper and tin drives. And bond drives to help fund the effort.

In George W. Bush's desert folly, on the other hand, nobody back home sacrifices, except for the families and friends of the men and women fighting the war. There are no war plants because we don't manufacture anything any more. We don't pay additional taxes to support the war. Any war bond drive takes place in Red China, not on Main Street.

In World War Two, Life magazine published images of dead American soldiers. Everyone knew someone who'd been killed or some family who had lost a loved one. Different classes shared the risk. President Roosevelt's oldest son fought in the jungles of the South Pacific. Another son served on board a Navy ship in the South Pacific as well.

In George W. Bush's war, the dead come home in the dark of night. The burden falls on the National Guard and poor and working class kids. Evidently, death and war wounds, like Leona Helmsley's taxes, are for, "little people." Meanwhile people who have sacrificed nothing and who have never heard a shot fired in anger talk blithely about what "we" should do in Iraq.

Read more here.