An UnAmerican Essay

Do We Keep Lincoln’s Promise to Our Veterans and Their Families?

            Realistically, the United States of America has not kept Lincoln’s promise he made during his second inaugural address on Saturday, March 4, 1865. The United States hasn’t been in a justified war since World War II when it was antagonized into participation by the Pearl Harbor bombing on December 7, 1941. Not only did we have no true reason to invade Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, but we have not upheld President Lincoln’s assurance “to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan.”

            I will begin with a brief analysis on the Vietnam War. The United States of America deployed soldiers to North Vietnam in order to prevent the spread of communism. This era is, in my opinion, when the United States took upon themselves to become the “world police”. We invaded North Vietnam unjustly and caused unnecessary casualties and injuries. The only reason the American people realized this was a needless cause was due to the unprecedented media coverage of monks self-emolliating, young children running ablaze from a napalm bomb, and wounded soldiers dying in their fellow brothers’ arms. All of this can be credited to the U.S. government thinking they needed to intervene in a situation that had nothing to do with them. And for what? We lost the war. History.com reveals, “More than 3 million people, including 58,000 Americans, were killed in the conflict.” North Vietnam still has a communist government today, which shows we really socked it to them back in the day. Furthermore, when U.S. soldiers returned home, they were shown disdain. Even though they fought in a battle they didn’t believe in and watched their friends die in a muddy jungle, they were the ones who were treated like trash. History.com reports: “According to a survey by the Veterans Administration, some 500,000 of the 3 million troops who served in Vietnam suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, and rates of divorce, suicide, alcoholism and drug addiction were markedly higher among veterans.” Is this taking care of our vets? Is this helping the widows and children who lost a parent in the war? Nixon was an idiot, the president at the time, and we fell right along with Saigon.

            There’s an article by CNN titled “September 11th Hijackers Fast Facts” that discloses the 19 assailants were from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, United Arab Emirates, and Lebanon. The Encyclopedia Britannica Online explains, “Afghanistan War, Afghanistan: anti-Taliban fighters international conflict in Afghanistan beginning in 2001 that was triggered by the September 11 attacks and consisted of three phases. The first phase—toppling the Taliban (the ultraconservative political and religious faction that ruled Afghanistan and provided sanctuary for al-Qaeda, perpetrators of the September 11 attacks)—was brief, lasting just two months...” None of the people involved were from Afghanistan or Iraq, but that’s where we ended up. Thanks, Bush! The first sentence of a Huffington Post article reads: “Ten years after the U.S. first invaded Iraq, returning troops are filing for disability benefits, seeking education and employment assistance and struggling with combat trauma.” It continues on to say, “While the VA is working to improve its mental health services, suicide and PTSD rates remain alarmingly high. About 22 veterans committed suicide each day in 2010 and 228,875 troops who served in Iraq or Afghanistan returned with PTSD as of 2012, a crippling condition some experts say close relatives can contract.” Similarly, a late September 2015 Washington Post piece tells, “Despite promises for widespread reform, nearly 900,000 military veterans have pending applications to access health care from the Department of Veterans Affairs…” Need I say more?

            In conclusion, when President Lincoln promised “to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan”, he was mostly referring to the Civil War era, because since then, the United States of America has not supported our vets the way we should.

Works Cited

• "September 11th Hijackers Fast Facts." CNN.com. 24 Aug. 2015. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.
• Goldberg, Eleanor. "5 Growing Problems Iraq, Afghanistan Wars Veterans Face (And What’s Being Done)." HuffingtonPost.com. 9 Sept. 2013. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.
• "Vietnam War History." History.com. A&E Networks, 2009. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.
• Wax-Thibodeaux, Emily. "Nearly 1 Million Veterans Have Pending Applications for Health Care at VA — and a Third May Already Be Dead." WashingtonPost.com. 3 Sept. 2015. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.
• "Vietnam War." Wikipedia.org. 2016. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.
• Witte, Griff. "Afghanistan War." Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 2016. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.