Wars and Who Fights Them

I am not a big fan of the "chickenhawk" insult. It's over-simplistic - it implies that all wars are created equal; that everyone who fights or doesn't fight does it for the same reasons; it opens you up, a bit, to claims that you are saying that only soldiers should make foreign policy decisions (expressed in this Rich Lowry article on National Review Online). If the "chickenhawks" themselves weren't already committed to the far more offensive idea that opposition to the war = treason, they could turn it back around: "if you want to oppose the war, shouldn't you be out there making love not war?" Both are good sentiments, I admit - if you support the war you should do something meaningful about it - if you are against the war, you should do something meaningful about it - but what is meaningful depends a bit on who you are.

But even though I am uncomfortable with it in general, there are quite a few cases where it seems perfectly legitimate. James Wolcott expresses this position very well here:

For me, the working definition of a chickenhawk is--a chickenhawk is a cheerleader. A cheerleader for war. And not necessarily just the war in Iraq, or regional war in the Mideast, but war in general. A chickenhawk glorifies war as an enterprise, enjoying the heroics inside his or her head, mocking those less enthusiastic military aggression as pacifists, appeasers (Michael Ledeen's pet word), even traitors. Who patronize anyone with qualms, from the Quakers to the Chuck Hagel, with edgy impatience and disdain. Who treat the destruction of human life as a stupendous flourish as long as it's the US doing the destroying--who, that is, propose "creative destruction" on a geopolitical scale as an instrument of transformation. Not to mention an opportunity to teach those desert folks in sandals a lesson upside the head.

That is close to how I feel. People who mock opponents to the war - people who dismiss the ideas of actual soldiers - people who attack Cindy Sheehan and her supporters - who glorify a war they have no intention of taking part in (despite being of the proper age) - those are chickenhawks. The college kids who rave about how this war is the Great Issue of the Age, then whine that they have every right to hold political opinions without consequences (to themselves) - those are chickenhawks. And - the Vietnam generation - the Dick Cheneys and Tom DeLays and so on, who skipped the war, but feel free to attack veterans, to agitate for new wars that their kids won't have to fight in - they are chickenhawks, and deserve no sympathy.

There is another point here that should be made: in real wars, people serve. People signed up to fight in WWI, in WWII, even if they weren't required. The country, as a whole, supported the draft in those wars - and a draft that was not as patently unfair as it was during Vietnam. You do not hear the supporters of the Iraq war calling for a draft (unless they can find a way to blame it on a democrat). You do not see many of them volunteering, because they think it is the right thing to do - and, despite what Ben Shapiro thinks - it's the right thing to do, if you believe this war is necessary, and you are of a certain age. In fact - another sign of the chickenhawk is their attitude toward people like John Kerry who did just that - signed up for a war they could have ducked. They don't consider military service worthy of praise or respect. They may glorify the military in the abstract, but the left treats actual veterans and the families of veterans with more respect than the right does.

Meanwhile - at Pandagon, Amanda Marcotte writes about John Fogerty and class issues - which again, points up the difference between this war and others. The fortunate sons fought in WWI and WWII - they did not fight so much in Vietnam - and now, they seem to take it for granted that they are not supposed to fight. That's what we have poor people for. The exceptions (poor Pat Tillman) prove the rule, a bit. You just don't hear much about pro-war types joining the army to put their money where their mouths are. Does every single warblogger have to join the marines? No, probably not - but you'd think you'd hear of a few more trying it...