We are around the same age. My father was a bomber pilot in ETO during WWII. Both my brother and I served during the Vietnam War. I have a nephew currently serving in the US Army who at this very time is in Eastern Europe. A family member was lost in the GWOT. I noticed, however, that you mentioned nothing about YOU ever having served; just other members of your family. Yet, you subscribe to a Civil War regiment as a screen name. So, perhaps you like to surround yourself with a military aura, but did not personally earn it. That’s okay; and is kind of like kids who never played a down of football in their lives hanging posters of some pro football star on their bedroom walls.
But, like you, I have also studied history ever since I was a little kid; and I still read history— avidly. My university degree is in history.
“With all your jibber-jabber, you still didn’t explain what national security interest there is for the U.S. in Ukraine.”
Is our economic health a national security interest? Is our global trade and commerce a national security interest?
Is keeping close tabs on countries that wish us ill, and have wished us ill for generations a national security interest? Is the fact that — because of modern armaments and weaponry with international ranges — we no longer enjoy the security of the once formidable buffers of two huge oceans (two oceans that at this very moment have submarines and warships from countries that wish us ill sailing in those waters) not a national security interest?
You may read history, but I think perhaps you failed to comprehend it. Because history is chock full of unprepared or naive countries or societies being crushed by other countries or societies that WERE prepared and were anything BUT naive when it came to what they wanted, and how to get it.
We don’t live in Pollyannaland. We live in the real world; a world filled with the most barbarous, treacherous, untrustworthy, venal, and warlike creature ever to draw breath: Man. THAT is the real story of history. That is reality. And we must forever be on guard because of that reality.
"I noticed, however, that you mentioned nothing about YOU ever having served."
That's because you assumed I was a man. I'm not. I'm a woman, and I'll turn 76 next week. I got married and had two sons, one who enlisted in the U.S. Army. I didn't mention his service previously, because he was injured while at Fort Knox, and eventually given a disability discharge (honorable). I also didn't mention my father who was born in 1904, and came here with his parents and two brothers from Holland in 1913. He was too young to serve in WWI, and by the time WWII rolled around, he had already contracted Osteomyelitis (TB of the bone) from a leg injury during his childhood, which rendered one of his legs shorter than the other, so the military would have never taken him. The rest of his life he had an open wound that drained pus. It was considered a chronic infliction, and in those days, there were no actual treatments for it. He worked for the NY Central Railroad for over 50 years, first as a laborer, and later as a Track Foreman, which is the job he retired from. He lived to enjoy 7 years of his retirement. As well, my only brother, the one who enlisted in the Army and served in Vietnam, died of a massive heart attack at the age of 51, leaving a wife and five kids. My father's brother who served in the U.S. Army in WWII, died at the age of 40 from blood poisoning. My other Uncle, my mother's brother who enlisted in the U.S. Army in WWII, died at the age of 48. I'm the last one left in my family. Nobody in my family lived to be 75, so I'm definitely living on borrowed time.
I got divorced in 1979, and raised my two sons alone. My ex-husband wanted nothing to do with his kids. All these years later, he has no idea his youngest son is a cancer survivor. The ex, by the way, never served anything, other than himself. I worked as an officer and Sergeant for 25 years in NY State's prison system, much the wiser than when I started. I retired in 2003. Prior to that, I worked in office situations, which were about the only jobs available to females when I graduated in 1965. College was not pushed for females back then either. I won't get into my experience of being one of four females working in Auburn Prison when I started...but it wasn't the inmates that gave us the problem.
"But, like you, I have also studied history ever since I was a little kid; and I still read history— avidly. My university degree is in history."
Same here. I have a masters degree in history. For my undergraduate degree, I majored in Human Services with a minor in psychology. And my learning of history has continued all these years. I spent many of my vacations over a 10-year period at the National Archives, the Library of Congress, college libraries, public libraries, historical societies, etc., searching out primary source material for my thesis. I also tracked down descendants of the men, both black and white who served in both the 54th and 55th Massachusetts. I provided official documents that enabled one family of an enlisted man (escaped slave) to get the Medal of Honor for their ancestor...awarded by Congress, and given to the last surviving daughter of the Civil War soldier by Bill Clinton, just before he left office in 2001. I shared all my research with other people I met along the way...some of whom were both historians and authors. They acknowledged me in their books, and sent me signed copies those books. In 1993, I co-edited the book: "No Middle Ground: Thomas Ward Osborn's Letters from the Field (1862-1864) [Battery D, 1st NY & Army of the Tennessee].
"Is our economic health a national security interest? Is our global trade and commerce a national security interest?
How is fighting a proxy war with Russia, while sending billions of dollars that are unaccounted for, helping our economic health? How is fighting a proxy war with Russia helping our national security, when our southern border is wide open, and thousands of individuals we know nothing about, are pouring over the border? How is that helping our economic health?
"Is keeping close tabs on countries that wish us ill, and have wished us ill for generations a national security interest?"
How has that worked out so far? Did any of that stop this country from becoming the third-world commie $hit-hole it is today? Did it help protect our God-given rights here, or those that are supposed to be protected under the U.S. Constitution? How did surveilling our "enemies", stop U.S. politicians from selling this country out to the highest bidders? Obama/ Iran; Clintons and Bidens/ China? What good has any of it done when this country is being destroyed from within?
"Because history is chock full of unprepared or naive countries or societies..."
You mean like Europe failing to enforce the Treaty of Versailles on Germany after WWI, and allowing them to continue to manufacture arms, then rebuild their military, and organize an Air Force? Krupp, the major arms factory in Germany admitted at the Nuremberg Trials that they had never stopped manufacturing arms despite the ban put in place by the Versailles Treaty. And whose fault was that? It's obvious that Europe was only interested in the reparations that Germany was paying them, not what they were actually doing in the background. What good are treaties if nobody is going to enforce them? Europe failed in that respect. It wasn't our job to police Germany. It was their's. In the end, it took Germany almost a hundred years to finally pay off their WWI reparations.
As well, after WWI, when the German Navy scuttled their U-Boat fleet off the coast of Scappa Flow, Scotland, a large amount of the metal was salvaged by a Scottish company, who then in turn, sold the bulk of it back to Germany. Yeah, that was a bright idea wasn't it? Whose responsibility was it to make sure that Germany didn't have the material to wage war again? It was Europe's, and again, they failed miserably. I bet a lot of that salvaged steel, ended right back with Krupp, and used to build armaments. The company is still in business.
"We live in the real world; a world filled with the most barbarous, treacherous, untrustworthy, venal, and warlike creature ever to draw breath: Man."
And we've got politicians doing business with that type of people, helping to make them, and theirselves rich, while they are also letting people like that cross our border unhindered everyday.
Sorry, but I think you are the one living in Pollyannaland, because you seem to think things in this country are hunky-dory, and that the only real threat to us here is from overseas, specifically Russia, when it's clearly right here in front of you. And it's because of that threat being ensconced here, that weakens us. We can't even have honest elections here, and you're worried about threats from overseas?? Hello!!!