When is enough, enough?
More than a few complaints have been raised that one group or another has been disproportionately harmed by the losses in armed conflicts fought in the war on terrorism. These claims are usually based on race or ethnicity. Every now and then it is geographic, as when the Associate Press reports that "Iraq attacks hit Ohio military families hard" (via MSNBC.com):
Rosemary Palmer and her husband were making plans to attend memorial services for six Marine reservists killed earlier this week -- five of them from the same battalion as her son, Lance Cpl. Edward Schroeder -- when two uniformed servicemen came down her street. It was her family's turn. "“We knew. They didn't even get a chance to knock,"” Palmer said.I read that and immediately thought back to the tragic (and probably the deepest) scene in the movie Saving Private Ryan when a mother sees an official car pull up in front of her house and she instinctively knows that news about one or more of her boys is being delivered.
The war on terrorism is a just war, in my opinion, but I feel that it is being waged in a completely in unjust manner. Certainly I'm no expert, but there must be a better way to handle the conflict than to sacrifice more lives. It just seems so shallow, hollow, and without dignity. Compounding tragedy with more tragedy seems so ... I'm at a loss for words.
