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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LindyBill who wrote (78609)	10/18/2004 9:22:53 AM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 793914

Greg Kelly was one of the best embedded reporters during the combat phase. Before he was a journalist, he was a Marine, an all too rare career path these days. OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR - NYT There's No Politics in the Foxhole By GREG KELLY Greg Kelly, a correspondent for the Fox News Channel, is a former Marine jet pilot. ashington — Punishment will continue until morale improves" - or so goes the absurdist joke told in every barracks and chow line in the American military. In this election season, however, an almost equally absurd caricature of the American warrior is emerging - that of a hyperpolitical, ultrasensitive creature whose morale rises and falls with every modulation in the debate back home over the progress of the war in Iraq. Readily fueling this notion are President Bush and Senator John Kerry, each of whom would have us believe that the troops stand squarely behind him. In their first debate, the senator told this story of being at a political rally a few days earlier: "A couple of young returnees were in the line, one active duty, one from the Guard. And they both looked at me and said: 'We need you. You've got to help us over there.' " Minutes later, President Bush warned against the prospect of a Kerry presidency: "The troops would wonder, how could I follow this guy?" So, when the troops are not fending off insurgent attacks, are they obsessively tuned in TV news, waiting to be patted on the back or offended, their performance contingent on the rhetoric emanating from the small screen? Of course not. If all politics is local, so is morale. A rifle platoon commander in Falluja knows his unit's morale is not the president's responsibility; it's his. I speak from experience. I served in the Marine Corps under two Republican presidents, Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, and one Democrat, Bill Clinton. I flew missions over Iraq enforcing the no-flight zone in the late 1990's. And I saw combat with the Army as a journalist, embedded with the Third Infantry Division during the invasion of Iraq last year. In all of that time, the morale of the units I served in or beside was never determined by politicians, pundits or the press. High or low, the spirits of our men and women in Iraq stem from more mundane concerns. They ponder the same problems that Americans have back home, only with their quiet moments occasionally punctuated by unthinkable worry: Do I like the people I work with? Who will be killed next? Why is the e-mail system down again? Would I rather be mutilated by an improvised bomb or captured? That is not to say military men and women don't care about or follow politics. They skew decidedly Republican, especially among the officers. Overall, however, partisan preferences are mostly benign, akin to rooting for one sports team over another. Professional warriors do not have much time for political debate when they have a mission to conduct and troop welfare to worry about. But there are plenty of people who don't wear a uniform who will try to draft those who do into the political realm. Some members of Congress tried as much last month, when the House Armed Services Committee brought in a group of recently returned soldiers and marines to testify about conditions in Iraq. Members invited them to weigh in on one of the most politically charged debates of the past year and a half: the question of the news media ignoring the "good news stories" inside Iraq. The officers had the good sense to stay above the fray. And there is particular zeal on the talking-head circuit to score political points through the troops. On "The McLaughlin Group" earlier this month, the conservative pundit Patrick J. Buchanan said that Mr. Kerry was demoralizing the troops by "poor-mouthing" America. This led the liberal political analyst Lawrence O'Donnell to respond: "I don't care if they're demoralized! They have to go to war and be prepared to live with the debate that goes on in the United States about whether it's right or wrong." Mr. O'Donnell will not be running the U.S.O. any time soon, but he was more right than wrong, and professional warriors understand that. Citing troop morale to advance a political campaign is an unwelcome politicization of an institution that strives to remain apolitical. It is also ineffective: our service members don't let the political winds determine their morale. Their work is too important. Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company