Friday, April 14, 2017

"Join the Army; travel to exotic, distant lands" - and be kept in a cage in transit

The anti-war movement of the Vietnam era gave us some memorable slogans and posters, one of the most remembered being "Join the Army; travel to exotic, distant lands; meet exciting, unusual people and kill them" from 1971.

Times have changed since then. The U.S. military has become an all volunteer force, saving at least some presidential candidates from having to explain why they did not serve in any of the almost continuous wars the U.S. has fought since. Militarism has become even more entrenched and glamorized as stories and experiences of conscripts recede from memory and embedded journalists turned out to be shameless cheerleaders.

One largely overlooked aspect of the past couple of decades or so has been that American soldiers have become less visible in foreign countries - despite an increase in the number of "engagements".

Traveling by car through one German region with the largest American military community in Europe, the blogster was struck by how little visibility US troops have these days. It* had to look up recent history to find out what had happened.

Nowadays, if you happen to see a car or truck with a Confederate flag or, in English, a sticker warning Don't Mess with Texas, chances are that the vehicle belongs to a German redneck or someone who had too much fun in Texas as a tourist. The Americans blend in, and only their driving style still gives them away.

Even more surprisingly, the private vehicles of U.S. personnel in German have local German license plates,

American soldiers transiting through Germany for deployment in the Middle East or other exotic places can not enjoy a trip outside of the airbase if they have a layover of sufficient duration.

Not only are these Americans stuck on base, they have even less freedom than civilian commercial travelers, who usually find an overpriced but livable duty free transit area at an international airport.

Our freedom fighting heroes, on the other hand, are kept in a closed space.

They kept us in a cage, we didn't get to see anything, two soldiers described their recent transit experience on a U.S. airbase in southern Germany.

The heroic pictures you see on TV don't include that portion of travel to exotic, distant lands.

* Gender neutral, folks. 

[Changes 4/15] Typos, grammar

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