"Combat, Hell!"

Some time ago, I was hanging out in a bar. A kid was in there who had been on a Navy ship or sub which was operating in support of Operation Something-or-Other. The ship or sub had fired Tomahawk missiles at some target on shore. The kid was boasting about being in "combat." Some gray-haired guy in his late 50s asked him what opposition his ship/boat had faced. The kid said none. The older guy snorted derisively and a couple other guys his age or older snickered.

Those guys were Vietnam veterans. Odds are that they saw combat, in that they knew what it was like to be shot at.

I think they had the right of it. The kid's "combat" operations were probably less dangerous than any other day on the job for him.

Every once in awhile, you may read or see a story about Predator drones. Predator drones are controlled by "pilots" (they call them that) and they are "piloted" from a base in Neavada by satellite links. They fly around Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan, and on occasion, the drones shoot missiles at people or things. The Air Farce considers them to be "combat" missions.

That's not combat. That's not even as dangerous to the "pilots" as opening day of whitetail deer season is in most eastern states. The biggest risk those "pilots" face is getting in a car crash while commuting to work.

(And, while not the subject of this rant, real pilots are up in the airplanes they fly. People who sit on the ground and fly airplanes by remote control are "operators." They are no more pilots than some kid who is good at FS`02.)

Now I'm not as big a throwback as the character Mulay Ahmed Muhamed Raisuli the Magnificent was in "The Wind and the Lion," but I think John Milius was onto something when he wrote these lines:

"I prefer to fight the European armies, but they do not fight as men - they fight as dogs! Men prefer to fight with swords, so they can see each other's eyes! Sometimes, this is not possible. Then, they fight with rifles. The Europeans have guns that fire many times promiscuously and rend the Earth. There is no honor in this - nothing is decided from this."

I am not a romantic about war. There is nothing romantic about killing people and about having the young men (and now women) of your nation come home maimed or dead. There is nothing romantic about burning cities to the ground or sinking ships. I've known a lot of guys who came home from Vietnam just fine, I've known a few who came home without a scratch on them, other than the terrible damage done to their psyches. I've seen the holes in families who had loved ones go off to wars, from World War I to Vietnam, and not had them come back.

War is terrible. War should never be easy. War should not be fought from a computer terminal or an air-conditioned office in Nevada. That is not war, that is not combat. That is not even hunting.

If I could make one edict stick for the planet, I would not outlaw war, for there is something deep within primates, especially the hairless ones, which makes them prone to killing each other.

What I would outlaw is indirect fire weapons. No long-range artillery, no missiles, no drones. If you are going to engage in the business of killing people, you have to be close enough to see them.

Killing people should be more than just a day at a job, where after your shift, you can have a swim and then catch a show at the casino. That's not war, that's technological inhumanity.