And, that's ok, Hitchens says, because the boy felt he was doing some good.
Having volunteered for Iraq, Mark Daily was killed in January by an I.E.D. Dismayed to learn that his pro-war articles helped persuade Daily to enlist, the author measures his words against a family's grief and a young man's sacrifice....
I was actually able to bring myself to read this whole article, which is just another self-absorbed and self-excusing chickenhawk screed.
"Somewhere along the way, he changed his mind. His family says there was no epiphany. Writings by author and columnist Christopher Hitchens on the moral case for war deeply influenced him ... "
I don't exaggerate by much when I say that I froze. I certainly felt a very deep pang of cold dismay. I had just returned from a visit to Iraq with my own son (who is 23, as was young Mr. Daily) and had found myself in a deeply pessimistic frame of mind about the war. Was it possible that I had helped persuade someone I had never met to place himself in the path of an I.E.D.?
Was it POSSIBLE, Hitchens whines, that Hitchens influenced this boy to volunteer for Iraq? No, it was not merely POSSIBLE. THAT IS WHAT HAPPENED. Hitchens joined the chorus urging us to war with the army we had, not the army we needed. Hitchens joined the chorus urging us to go to war for oil. Hitchens helped circulate the lies that led us into this unjust war.
But only SOME of us went. The young, impressionable, overly idealistic. Hitchen and his son survived to VISIT Iraq on his own steam. And return home safe and sound. No doubt, to them, like visiting the Iowa County Fair.
So then, to make himself feel better, Hitchens drops in on the dead man's family:
In the midst of their own grief, to begin with, they took the trouble to try to make me feel better. I wasn't to worry about any "guilt or responsibility"
And now, Hitchens feels blessed that this soldier's family didn't spit in his face when he called to check in with them to assuage his guilt. And reassures himself and us that Mark
had signed up with his eyes wide open and ... " knew the possible outcome might be this, he would still go rather than have the option of living to age 50 and never having served his country...."
I wish they had spit in his face. Asked why his son wasn't fighting the noble fight. Explained to him that this boy would wrote poetry and loved his country might have served us all much better as a policeman or physician or lawyer or naturalist or artist, and living husband, father, grandfather, brother, son, ...
Sorry, no point to this. It's just a rant.
-- Emily