Remembrance is the key to learning from our mistakes, so that we might never again conclude a conflict with such cavalier ignorance.
Remembrance is the key to learning from our mistakes, that we might never again conclude a conflict with such cavalier ignorance.
A s a newly minted Marine Corps second lieutenant back in 2007, I can recall one of my battle-hardened infantry instructors reciting a quote I would often hear over the next nine years and four tours of duty.
“America is not at war, the Marine Corps is at war. America is at the mall.”
At first, I found the dripping cynicism comical. I also felt a sense of tribal pride in its exclusivity.
I joined the Marines because I felt a deep conviction to serve my country after 9/11. As a boy, I lived just twelve miles from what would become known as “ground zero.” My mother and I watched the thick, black smoke engulf the New York City skyline from a lookout point not far from our house in New Jersey. People from my town died. It was personal, and I took tremendous pride in being one of the few and the proud to wear the uniform in a time of war.
But over the years, as I gradually became similarly cynical; that quote was stripped of any humor or personal satisfaction. Its legitimate interpretation was now inescapably laid bare.
The American consciousness has a short memory. After the towers had collapsed, our patriotism and resolve could not be contained. Political partisanship was placed on hold. Important race and class issues that drove us apart had become ancillary to the ties that bound us together. An awful tragedy had given way to maximizing our potential as a truly united society.
And then, a year later, the American flags waving proudly on Main Street had been folded up and put back in the basement. The Marine Corps went to war. America went to the mall.
For 20 years.
Admittedly, in 2016, I left the Marines and went to the mall myself. Life got busy, and keeping up with a distant and scantly reported conflict became less of a priority when pitted against returning to school, finding a job, and raising a family.
Now, living on the other side of the mall–military equation, I realized that our nation’s ability to defend itself and our values with a relatively small, all-volunteer military force was actually exceptional. Americans going to the mall in a time of war without fear of being attacked by our enemies, or forced into conscription by our government, was the mark of a peak-functioning society, not a broken one. So as the Afghan conflict wound down, I allowed myself not to think much about it. I went about my life and focused on other things.
But this time last year, like so many of us, I was violently roused from my deep slumber when our blunderous withdrawal from Afghanistan got underway.
Those of us who had served in Afghanistan were appalled by the glaring flaws in the evacuation plan. Why were we not using the fortified and defensible Bagram Air Base as our evacuation point, instead opting for a civilian airport in the middle of the densely populated city of Kabul?
Why were we trusting the Taliban to provide external security for the U.S. forces they had recently been killing and the Afghan civilians they had recently been oppressing?
Why did the Biden administration continue with this plan after State Department, DOD, and every intelligence agency had advised against it?
Human lives were at stake here. Why did something so important feel so rushed and utterly lacking in strategy?
Then, the inevitable happened: American troops were killed in the line of duty, ordered to do the impossible. In the blink of an eye, 13 more Gold Star families were added to the thousands created by two decades of perpetual conflict.
We were appalled until we weren’t. By Thanksgiving, the American consciousness had moved on.
But 13 families don’t have the luxury of moving on. Standing shoulder-to-shoulder with them are the thousands-upon-thousands of post-9/11 war veterans who gave their blood, sweat, tears, and friends to this war, only to see it end in squandered disgrace.
We live in deeply uncertain times. A war of Russian aggression rages on in Ukraine. China continues to rattle its saber against Taiwan with increasing seriousness. A deeper global recession appears inevitable. Our post-war understanding of peace, prosperity, and order is being aggressively challenged at home and abroad.
None of this means we should stay home from the mall. We should go. But once we are there, it falls on each of us to fiercely combat the short-term memory of our American consciousness.
Remembrance is the key to learning from our mistakes, that we might never again conclude a conflict with such cavalier ignorance; that we might never again take for granted the lives of those who facilitate our mall-going way of life; that we might think of their families who wait for their return before we send our kids to war.
So let us now remember the young American volunteers who gave their lives for a just operation that was unjustly managed.
Their names are:
Staff Sergeant Darin Hoover, Age 31
Staff Sergeant Ryan Knauss, Age 23
Sergeant Johanny Rosario-Pichardo, Age 25
Sergeant Nicole Gee, Age 23
Corporal Daegan Page, Age 23
Corporal Hunter Lopez, Age 22
Corporal Humberto Sanchez, Age 22
Hospital Corpsman Third Class Maxton Soviak, Age 22
Lance Corporal David Espinoza, Age 20
Lance Corporal Rylee McCollum, Age 20
Lance Corporal Dylan Merola, Age 20
Lance Corporal Kareem Nikoui, Age 20
Lance Corporal Jared Schmitz, Age 20