Anyone else completely appalled by Navy commercials?

[ChristianLoeschel]

One thing that has irked me badly for a while now are the armed services recruiting commercials on TV lately. Worst of all, the one where the US Navy spends their air time bragging about their newest weapon system, how accurate, and how deadly it is. Does anyone else see something wrong with this picture?
Did we not learn anything from the last 200 years? Besides the fact that the general redneck attitude of "HELL YEAH WE GUNNA COME KICK YOUR DAMN AIRAB ASSES!" is just an abhorrent testimony to the stupidity of the general population, a militaristic society is inherently predisposed against democracy. And a militaristic society is whats being built here. It goes deeper than just Bush and his croneys, look at the toys! I mean, Im not like my mother here and wont let my kids play with water guns because theyre "war toys", but the other day I was strolling through the mall and happened to pass the boardgame stand. Imagine my surprise, when among the piles of versions of Monopoly, theres an ARMY, NAVY and AIRFORCE version of the classic!
Now dont get me wrong here, a working military is, unfortunately, a necessity (however I dont necessarily agree with a COUNTRY having its own military rather than a group of countries, but thats not the point here), but glorifying it to the point of worship is NOT acceptable. This is brainwashing here, instilling this awe and admiration in children of armed service, of kicking the everliving shit out of the "bad guys".
Besides the obvious problems with a country's population completely ignorant of diplomatic solutions, a society like that just cannot have a functioning democracy. Democracy requires every individual to have their own, free-thinking and active mind, making decisions for themselves, not because someone said so. Military on the other hand is built on recieving orders from your superiors and following them without question. If a large percentage of the population turns into militaristic lemmings, allowing Bush and his neocon croneys to think for them, there will no longer be a democracy.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

America is already full of people who believe and do what they're told. They're sheep and proud of it. Their bible told them that sheep will be welcomed into the kingdom of heaven and that's all they needed to know. Wars allow them to be attack sheep - as far as they are concerned, the best of both worlds - especially since very few of them will actually have to face combat or the kind of mess that Iraq is - so they can be virtual attack sheep. It doesn't get any better than that!

I would like to see universal national service - a combination of military, wpa, and ccc (throw in some things the VISTA and Americorp people used to do - weatherization, tutoring, maybe child care, etc) - everybody does it, 2 years (18-20, or starting as soon as you graduate from high school). You want to do career military, re-up at the end of your national service. You want to go to college or vo-tech, you earned tuition while on national service. Loving your country isn't confined to killing somebody for it.

[Dardedar]

...the US Navy spends their air time bragging about their newest weapon system, how accurate, and how deadly it is.

DAR
I don't know how long you have been here from Germany, Christian, but I noticed many of the same things when I moved here from Canada some 19 years ago. The US is very militaristic and nationalistic (tribalist). Not a good mixture for sure, especially if you have a ignorant snake like Bush at the top. Certainly an interesting time to live.
Sometimes this American pragmatism is a good thing I think. For instance in Serbia when most of Europe was sitting on it's but while genocide was going on. The Americans got in there and made them deal with Slobodan. At other blatantly obvious times, their glorification of war and open militaristic bent has produced disasters (Vietnam, Iraq especially).

D.

[Guest]

Yeah, I agree Darrel, the contrast between Germany and here is shocking. We had militaristic mindless flagwaving 60 years ago, and for that reason anything even remotely resembling that mindset is shunned. One reason I just about fell off my couch the first time I saw the abovementioned Navy commercial was the thought "Wow, I couldnt imagine this commercial in Germany".
Interesting that you mention Serbia. I can vividly remember the debate in Germany about sending troops there and it was controversial to say the least. It ended up being the German military's first non-humanitarian mission since 1945, and admittedly should have been done earlier. However, if you look at how the mission was done, it was NOT American-lead, it was a UN mission. That little detail makes all the difference, not only in legitimacy, but also in supplies, international support, and planning.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Little details like something being UN-led are always ignored in America. It's only war when we start fighting (check American history books - WWII started 12/7/1941 according to them) and, then, of course, we are the ones who win it - no matter how many other countries are fighting with however many people involved. You will hear to this day that the US "saved England's ass - again" as far as WWII is concerned. Most Americans do not know (or do not believe) that Britain had more men and material on all fronts, individually and combined, until August of 1944. UN-led forces in Korea - that's an American war. Somolia, Serbia - doesn't matter (unless the Rs are trying to escape responsibity - like Vietnam was a Kennedy-Johnson problem, don't mention Eisenhower send the first "advisers" over there). If American forces are there, it's an American war - even if war hasn't been declared. This diatribe brought to you by an at least 8th generation American who reads (and taught) history. I love the many wonderful things about my country - but militarism isn't one of them.

[Doug]

Worst of all, the one where the US Navy spends their air time bragging about their newest weapon system, how accurate, and how deadly it is. Does anyone else see something wrong with this picture?

DOUG
And don't forget this little detail too: Often, reports of the amazing accuracy or deadliness of our supposedly great technologically advanced weapons systems are greatly exaggerated, if not downright false.

=========
Iraq's main missile threat during the Gulf war was the Scud, a missile Iraq bought wholesale from the former Soviet Union and later modified to extend its range. Iraq is believed to have hidden enough missiles or parts to have up to two dozen Scuds left.

It fired about 90 Scuds during the Gulf War, with 43 landing in Saudi Arabia and 39 in Israel. The deadliest single incident for U.S. troops was a Scud attack on a barracks in Saudi Arabia that killed 28 soldiers and injured 98.

The Pentagon reported firing 47 Patriot missiles at incoming Scuds, at first claiming an 80% success rate. After the war, the military revised that success rate downward several times and a congressional report concluded that Patriots succeeded in downing only four Scuds.

Patriots didn't work in the deadly barracks attack, for example, because of a software glitch that made the tracking system inaccurate by more than 740 yards.

==============
USA Today

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Wars bring out exaggeration like nothing else (except maybe fishing). Winston Churchill noted in his history of WWII that, while the Allies did take down more of theirs than they took down of ours (fill in the blank - planes, subs, tanks, etc) the 3 and 4 to 1 ratios were actually more like 1.5 to 1 - and the German, Italian, & Japanese records were the same, claiming 2 to 1 kills when they were (again) 1.5 to 1 loses. Wonder what you get when you cross a fisherman and a military leader? Total disconnect from reality?

[Dardedar]

UN-led forces in Korea - that's an American war. UN-led forces in Korea - that's an American war. Somolia, Serbia...

DAR
Well according Wikipedia (and others I checked), Americans lost 54,246 in the Korean war.

Wikipedia has:

***
South Korean military

* 187,512 to 217,000 killed and/or missing

South Korean civilians

* 550,000 killed and/or missing

United States military

* 33,629 killed in action, including 8,142 originally Missing In Action; 2830 died of other causes[1]
* 54,246 total on-duty fatalities from all causes

United Nations military

* 2,700 killed and/or missing

DAR
With the US sustaining 54,246 of the non-South Korean casualites, compared with the 2,700 from the other UN led allies, this makes reasonable to consider it more of a US war, than a UN war.

Likewise with Serbia, I think it was American pragmatism that was the driving force in going after Slobodan.

D.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

I wonder how the history books will write it up if the Koreas decide (which I've heard they're thinking about) unifying. Korea is just about the only place we're still fighting the Cold War.

[Hogeye]

Barbara, you'll probably like my song Judas Cow. It was inspired by one of those commercials.