I Never Served My Country

I received an email yesterday from a friend who, as a quick side note, thanked me for doing my "military duty."

The truth is, I never did my "military duty." My military duty was to defend my country. Instead, I spent five and a half years defending my government's lunacy during the Viet Nam era.

There is a huge difference between serving your country and serving your government.

I spent a year in Viet Nam. And although I was never a combatant, it occurred to me a few years after I got out that I had voluntarily placed myself in a position where I might have had to kill someone for no better reason than that my government told me it was my job to kill its enemies.

That's not something I can ever take pride in.

Comments

[Jeremy Jacobs]

Yup, governments sometimes use their populations as "cannon fodder"