Describing him that way is not my choice of words, but those of The Washington Post, in piece in this morning's paper titled In Iraq, the last to fall: David Hickman, the 4,474th U.S. service member killed.
Hickman, 23, was killed in Baghdad by a roadside bomb that ripped through his armored truck Nov. 14 — eight years, seven months and 25 days after the U.S. invasion of Iraq began.
He was the 4,474th member of the U.S. military to die in the war, according to the Pentagon.
And he may have been the last.
The article explicitly quotes the famous words of now Senator John Kerry in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?
It then quotes a close friend of Hickman:
“Thank God if David is the last one to die, because that means nobody else will have to go through this,” said Logan Trainum, one of Hickman’s closest friends. “But it’s crazy that he died. No matter your position on this war — if you’re for or against it — I think everybody thinks we shouldn’t have been over there anymore.”
Except that Hickman will not be the last to die for the mistake of our invasion of Iraq. There are still veterans in our military hospitals suffering from the wounds and shattering of their psyches, some of whom will die from those wounds, others who will take their own lives.
There are hundreds, perhaps thousands, yet to die in the instability we have left behind in Iraq.
There are those Americans who will die from lack of medical care and food support or who will take their lives from despair because we plunged this nation into severe debt and our response has been not to raise taxes on those who can afford it but to slash support and services from those who need both.
We should not forget David Hickman. Perhaps to some he will be a symbol. We should not reduce him to that. He was proud to serve, albeit critical of our continued presence in Iraq.
The last - so far - of the 4,474 American war dead.
A fellow American.
A fellow human being.
An unnecessary death at the end of an unjustifiable war.
And yes, The last man to die for a mistake: David Hickman.
