On Nov. 12, NIU was treated to another of Mike Lacy’s shoot-from-the-hip columns castigating all “idealistic, anti-military, anti-war, anti-anything people out there who think anyone who serves his country is a knuckle-dragging, mindless idiot.”

These people, many of whom I have had the pleasure to meet, are some of the most selfless people I have ever met. I share with them the vet’s natural abhorrence for war and the stupidity of the military. I also share the pain and suffering vets go through to pay for America’s imperialistic foreign wars. How many young, American vets have laid down their lives to take part in stealing half of Mexico in the Mexican War, a part in slaughtering the American Indians, or in killing 500,000 Moro Tribesmen in the Phillipine Revolution following our takeover of the islands from Spain?

With Vietnam fresh in mind, haven’t we demanded enough of them, calling for them to lay down their lives to save business interests? I suggest that the powers that be, fight their own damn wars to make the world safe for Coca-Cola. America’s vets have had enough of it. The next time “duty” calls us to kill innocent civilians, the government can go to hell.

As a peacetime vet, I haven’t had to deal with such guilt. I pray I won’t have to, either in the months I still have in the inactive reserve or in the Selective Service system. In any case, I know my conscience will “just say no.”

Tom Rogers

veteran

U.S. Army and National Guard