Sick of scapegoating

Is anyone else sick of George Bush using the armed forces as scapegoats for his miserable failure in Iraq? He's always going on about how they deserve better than what Kerry can offer, and how Kerry is insulting their courage of being in harms way. Sure they are in harms way, but you know the million or so people who have (mostly) voluntarily put themselves in harms way owe it to the commander-in-chief for deciding where harms way is. There is absolutely no diminishing their sacrifice if they die or are wounded in harms way in the name of our country.

It is perfectly possible to discredit those who decided the location, timing and even caused the existance of the harm they are put in the way of. No it wont make our troops feel any better, it will sow seeds of doubt in their minds. But the people in the armed forces are trained to follow orders, they are trained to kill following those orders and they are trained to expect and deal with casualties of war regardless of the reason or justification.

So at least give the troops the decency of the respect they deserve and allow them to hear and think whatever they want about the war but still do their job. Don't use their feelings as an excuse to keep doing the wrong thing. The "fog of war" is a well documented and widely accepted concept - mistakes happen in war and people die. Civilians die by accident or as "acceptable collateral damage", friendly forces kill each other by accident, and tactical errors by commanding officers lead to unecessary and futile carnage in the execution of "victory". All these are facts of war and we cannot let failure to recognize and publicly admit the harsh realities of warfare prevent us from doing the right thing and electing the right President.

If America could face these realities and stop scapegoating the instruments of war instead of the surgeons wielding them then perhaps we, as a nation would go to war less often or perhaps even never again?