World War II and Iraq -- the inevitable yet pointless comparisons

So, it has been made known that the Iraq war has now lasted as long as World War II, thus inviting the inevitable comparisons between this war and WWII. Before addressing those comparisons, I want to say that these really are pointless comparisons -- the wars are vastly different in many, many ways. I much prefer the Vietnam comparisons because at least the types of fighting in Vietnam and Iraq are similar, though obviously there are differences between Iraq and Vietnam as well.

The Washington Post ran an interesting article in which WWII vets explained WWII in relation to the Iraq war. Many vets, including rather famous ones, gave their points of view on the issue in their own words. Many of the same themes appeared throughout the vets' paragraphs. WWII had a clear moral purpose with clear goals, whereas Iraq, from the beginning, has been messy both on purpose and goals. WWII had tremendous unity across the country, whereas support for the war in Iraq has always been fractured and tenuous. WWII required sacrifice on everyone's part, whereas Iraq has required sacrifice from the very few.

Despite the mostly apolitical nature of the vets' comparisons, a couple of them made implicitly political arguments, which would not bother me so much if they weren't wrong. Bob Dole, who I generally respect as a WWII generation Republican (very different from today's breed), said: "In WWII, the media coverage was far less intense, while heavy coverage of the war in Iraq contributes to the loss of American support." This statement is an implicit criticism of the media, in that Dole places the cause of the loss of support on the media coverage of the war, at least in part. Again, this would be his prerogative to make such an argument, if it weren't wrong. To say that the media coverage of WWII was "far less intense" is simply FALSE. The newspapers covered the war every single day, in as much detail as they could fit into the articles. Granted, the war was a much vaster undertaking, thus stretching journalistic resources thin. Nonetheless, the coverage, as indicated by any newspaper front pages from the time or by radio broadcasts at the time or by the newsreels they would show at movie theaters before the main feature began, was far MORE intense (I mean, how many of us have seen newsreels about Iraq at the beginning of a movie?). There is a difference in that TV was not around then, but that's hardly the fault of the media -- plus, the movie reels made up for that. Moreover, as acknowledged by the other vets, WWII consumed the homefront, from rationing to buying bonds to the fact that everyone knew many, many people who were off the fighting the war -- it is impossible to imagine that people during WWII were less aware of the war, as implicitly suggested by Dole's comments.

The other political commentary that bothered me was not so much wrong as hypocritical and, ultimately, lacking in conviction. Ted Stevens (a U.S. senator) complained that, in WWII, "Everybody did something to help. No one's doing anything like that now." He is quite correct that there are vast differences in the way the homefront is operating in WWII compared to now. In WWII, though, people sacrificed because they were asked to. They were told what to do to help the war effort and the president made appeals to all Americans to do everything they can to aid the effort. This was total war. Taxes were raised to pay for the war and it was considered your patriotic duty to pay them (can you imagine Bush doing that?). Bonds were issued and Americans bought them up. All money and effort had to go to the war (deficit financing was not in fashion then). Instead, now, taxes on the rich are cut (supported by Ted Stevens), while American troops were not given the proper armor for them or their vehicles at the start of this war. Despite these money problems, Stevens himself was working the system in Washington to bring pork home to his state. He is the one, now famous, for creating the earmark to spend tens of millions of dollars to build the "Bridge to Nowhere". Apparently, he doesn't see any hypocrisy in continuing pork-barrel politics and the vast wasting of money while troops aren't given all they need to fight the war in Iraq.

Overall, though, I enjoyed reading the vets' commentaries and I began to think about why there is such a difference on the homefront. Obviously, the size and scope of the wars make a dramatic difference. The fact that we have an all-volunteer military that, despite Bush's feigned hurt at Kerry's idiotic comments, disporportionately comes from the lower socioeconomic strata of society also affects us -- the pain of having friends and family in Iraq, of having them be injured or having them die, is not distributed evenly across society. Some people know lots of people there, while others know very few. I have known only one person who has served in Iraq and he is no longer in the military.

Perhaps the biggest reason for the difference is the attitude of our leaders. The American people have not been asked to sacrifice -- we've been asked to spend more. We are not encouraged to save or decrease consumption -- instead, our leaders worry about keeping people flush with cheap oil. Ultimately, the blame rests squarely with Bush and his administration. They have never encouraged such thinking and, in fact, have tried to finance this war with little cost to the country. They get upset when the media show pictures of caskets (though the media did that in all previous wars -- the Civil War has far more gruesome photos than I've ever seen for this war) or when the lists of those who have died in Iraq are read in public (commonplace during WWII). Essentially, they have treated the American people as the Roman leaders treated their citizens -- keep the people happy with their bread and circuses and don't ever let them feel pain. It is stupid, absurd, and insulting to the American public. Clearly, this country can handle sacrifice. This country is strong and proud and has ideals that carry much weight with its citizens. However, its citizens must be convinced of the importance and necessity of the war. When leaders try to get the people to follow blindly, people may follow at first, but eventually their feelings change. Americans can handle great sacrifice -- but only when the circumstances are appropriate. That Bush et al. do not believe the country could handle the sacrifice of war or even being reminded that we have troops fighting and dying in Iraq is very telling about their own beliefs about the circumstances of this war.