Trump Not Alone in His Attitude Toward the Military

For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!"

But it's "Saviour of  'is country"  when the guns begin to shoot

—Rudyard Kipling (Tommy)

Recent reporting by The Atlantic magazine that Donald Trump referred to U.S. Marines killed during WWI as “suckers” and “losers” hardly comes as a revelation to anyone who has followed his comments and actions toward the military. From claiming the late Sen. John McCain was “no hero” because he was captured during the Vietnam War, to disparaging Gold Star parents of service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan along with the country’s senior most leadership, to summarily firing Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and his twin brother for simply performing their sworn duties, Trump has shown nothing but disrespect to anyone who ever served in uniform. (See: Every time Trump has attacked American veterans or military families)

The sad truth, however, is that attitude toward service personnel is not uncommon among the American people, especially rich Americans.

I experienced some of that attitude when, as a young Coast Guardsman, I was stationed in Virginia in 1973 just as the U.S. began its withdrawal from Vietnam. The local population was so jaundiced toward military personnel, we were ordered not to place base access stickers on our vehicle windows. To do so invited baseball bat-toting redneck good ol’ boys to bash in your car’s windows. We also could not wear our uniforms off base for fear of having those same bats used against our heads. Signs saying “Sailors and Dogs Keep of the Grass” spotted the landscape.

While some Vietnam vets complained about being disrespected by hippies and war protesters, my discussions with other vets of the period showed just as many experienced the same hostility I did from the good, God-fearing people of the American South. Apparently, people in the South—the same South that committed treason by seceding in 1860—felt those of us in uniform toward the end of the Vietnam War needed to be taught a lesson for “losing the war.” In fact, David Morrell’s post-Vietnam thriller, First Blood, featured a Vietnam veteran named Rambo targeted by a Southern sheriff and his town folk. Morrell said news reports about the mistreatment of vets in the South gave him the idea for his book. (Ironically, the movie made from the novel moved the story to the Pacific Northwest to spare southern feelings.)

Not Limited to Modern Times

This attitude toward the military isn’t limited to modern times. On March 15, 1783 officers under George Washington's command discussed mutinying because Congress failed to provide them with long-promised back pay and pensions for serving during the Revolution. The mutiny was averted when Washington addressed his officers with a speech about the sacrifices they all made that brought tears to the officers’ eyes.

In the aftermath of the American Civil War, thousands of disabled Union veterans were left hanging while Congress argued over whether pensions or other remuneration should be provided to the former soldiers. It was years before Union veterans received any benefits; Confederate veterans received nothing—notably, not even from the southern states they fought for.

Following the Civil War, soldiering as a career fell into disfavor. If you watch a western movie about the U.S. cavalry, with few exceptions all the soldiers will be white. However, in the real Wild West one out of every three soldiers—cavalry and infantry alike—were black, members of two regiments of the segregated U.S. Colored Troops, the legendary Buffalo Soldiers.

Even among the white troops, there were few patriotic Americans. Most were immigrants from England, Ireland, Poland, Germany, and other European countries because soldiering was widely considered beneath a “real” American. (The same was true about police officers; hence, the stereotype of the Irish beat cop.)

During the Spanish-American War, Buffalo Soldiers—by now professional fighters—stormed Kettle Hill and San Juan Hill alongside Teddy Roosevelt’s untested volunteers, the Rough Riders. Yet it is the Rough Riders, led by a wealthy socialite, who received the most credit for that battle victory.

When America belatedly entered WWI, her soldiers were sent “over there” with parades and patriotic songs. Once home, however, they were less heralded. In 1932, suffering from the indignities of the Great Depression, veterans marched on Washington, DC, demanding payment of bonuses Congress promised them for their service. The veterans were treated as traitorous “Reds” by the Hoover administration, which launched a deadly military attack on them. (See: Nearly 100 Years after the Bonus March, Trump is Making the Same Mistakes)

Veterans of WWII were treated better—if they were white. The GI Bill provided them readjustment and educational benefits. But 1.2 million black veterans were denied the full range of benefits provided by the bill, thanks to racist Southern Democrats who feared it would provide African American vets with a chance to socially advance. (See: How the GI Bill's Promise Was Denied to a Million Black WWII Veterans)

A Deeper Chasm

The end of the Selective Service draft in 1973 created an even deeper chasm between those who serve and those who don’t. According to the U.S. Census Service, 18 percent of the U.S. population were veterans in 1980; by 2016 that was down to seven percent. Some of that decline, of course, was due to older vets passing away. But during the height of the Vietnam draft, there were 3.5 million men and women on active duty; today there are only 1.3 million on active duty, or less than .5 percent of the population.

In the days following the 9/11 attacks, I was discussing whether the draft would be reinstated with a fellow veteran I worked with. I pointed out that if it were brought back, it would have to include women. A young female colleague became horrified at the idea she might be drafted to fight in a war. “Why me!” she shrieked. “There are people who enjoy doing that.” Doing what? we asked. “You know,” she said. “Killing people.”

So, that’s what she thought about us.

In the cluster-you-know-what that became the Bush administration’s response to the terrorist attacks, yellow ribbon magnets with “Support Our Troops” were displayed on cars, and people started thanking us for our service (I was on a reserve Coast Guard boat crew, and later became a medical service corps officer in a component of the California National Guard). Sailors, soldiers, Marines, and airmen were suddenly “warriors,” as if they belonged to a separate social stratum. And still the Bush administration forbade the media from photographing or videotaping aircraft filled with flag-draped coffins bringing home our country’s honored war dead.

It’s gratifying to see America’s outrage over Trump’s reported comments about our war dead, but I wonder how long it will last or if it will have any impact at all. Despite Trump’s multiple Vietnam draft deferments—the last due to a spurious diagnosis of bone spurs—and despite his dismissal of John McCain’s military service, and despite so much more, he was still “elected” president. And the bulk of those who voted for him were the good, God-fearing people of the American South and other rural areas, the same people who treated those of us in uniform so badly 47 years ago.

And that’s why I fear Trump’s slandering those who served and sacrificed as “losers” and “suckers” won’t make a difference at the polls. 

Why the South Cannot Rise Again

I have often argued that had the Confederacy successfully seceded from the Union, the American South today would be part of Mexico. The South was never in a strong position for war. It was an agricultural region with little capability for manufacturing war materiel. Had it been sprung from the Union, the French Army occupying neighboring Mexico would have marched into the South in such a way as to make Sherman’s March to the Sea look like an afternoon hike.

In the aftermath of President Barrack Obama's election, a bunch of Obama-hating post-election dead-enders passed around petitions in all 50 states calling for secession from the Union. Most of the action, of course, was in the Red states, those that vote most often for Republicans. And most of those Red states are in the Old South. Since Donald Trump took up domicile in the White House, his racist-bating rhetoric has only encouraged those same dead-enders.

I stand by my conjecture above. If secession succeeded today, the result would be the same as it would have a century and a half ago—the South would still end up part of Mexico.

But it won’t succeed. It won’t even get a start. Bigotry might still be alive in Dixie, but the sociological

conditions that allowed the secession of the South in 1860 simply don’t exist today.

A Rich Man’s Movement

The southern secession movement in the mid-1800s was largely a rich man’s movement. The South has always been more oligarchic than the North. Plantations owners wielded great political power. They used their wealth to finance “filibusters,” mercenaries armies sent to take over Latin American countries to turn them into future slave states. Abolition threatened their cheap source of labor and that, in turn, threatened their profit margins.

The average southern man, however, was simply poor and ill-educated. He had little knowledge of the Union, or anything beyond a few square miles of the state in which he lived. Typically, he had no concern about slavery one way or another. To him, his state was his country. The idea of blue coats marching into his state was simply an act of aggression against his country. As a result, southern men were easily fooled into becoming cannon fodder for slave owners looking to save their profits.

To begin with, African Americans are no longer an enslaved people in the South. Minorities of all races are becoming the majority in the United States. Unlike the 1800s, they have a voice—a strong voice. And they vote.

The populace of the South today is also much better educated and much more aware of the rest of the country, if not the world. Far more of them were raised in other states, or studied in other states. They have a world view that just didn’t exist in the 19th century.

Moreover, those better educated Southerners are well aware that their very livelihoods depend on spending from Washington, D.C.

Dependent on Washington

Federal spending on such programs as defense, aerospace, agriculture, energy, Social Security, and Medicare is heaviest in the Red states. As much as some of their citizens might think of themselves as independent and self-reliant, they are actually the biggest “takers,” receiving far more federal funds per person than they send to Washington in taxes.

According to research conducted by the business website 24/7 Wall St., Red states make up eight of the top 10 states receiving the most federal dollars: North Dakota, West Virginia, Alabama, Kentucky, New Mexico, Maryland, Virginia, and Alaska. Connecticut and Hawaii were the only Blue states in the top 10. Research by the Washington Post found similar results.

The fact is this Union is held together by an economic spider web of federal spending. Any attempt by a state to break away would result in an immediate economic collapse in that state. Large corporations with federal contracts – whose only loyalty lies with the source of their profits – would quickly pull up roots and relocate to a loyal state to keep those contracts. Subcontractors working for those corporations would do likewise or wither. Housing markets in secession states would collapse as workers moved to Union states to keep their jobs, and construction jobs would soon disappear.

Breakaway states where the economy relies on imported and exported products would be unable to do either. The federal government not only controls all the air corridors crisscrossing the nation, but also all the intrastate waterways. Without the FAA to regulate air traffic, or the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to maintain ports or rivers like the Mississippi and the Missouri, commerce would come to a standstill.

Defenseless

Seceding states would be left defenseless from outside aggression. In 1860, state militias were funded entirely by the states. When the Civil War started, they were able to raise an army from state-funded militia. But it didn't last. The Confederate states were unable – perhaps unwilling – to raise enough tax revenue to fund the rebel army. By the end of the war, the Confederate Army was short of everything needed by its troops—clothing, shoes, food, ammunition. Johnny Reb fought much of the war barefoot and starving.

Had the South successfully seceded, its army would have been no match for the French army in Mexico. Napoleon III was keen on recapturing land the first Napoleon reluctantly sold to the United States as part of the Louisiana Purchase. Throughout the Civil War, French troops stood ready to invade the American south had the opportunity arose.

Today, Washington, DC pays 95 percent of the costs to maintain each state’s National Guard, the modern day organized state militia. Since Red states today are as reluctant to raise taxes as their Civil War predecessors, it would be impossible for them to maintain their state militias. Any border state that secedes from the Union would see its state militia fall apart, leaving the state vulnerable to invasion from more powerful countries such as Mexico, Canada or, in the case of Alaska, Russia.

When our Founding Fathers created this country in the 18th century, they originally founded a confederation of states. The loose bounds of that confederacy made governance nearly impossible, so our Founders created the Union.

In 1860, the seceding states also created a confederation. It worked no better than the original confederation. Despite early rebel battle victories, the Confederacy could not support its army or maintain itself as a country.

There is no reason to believe a third try would be the charm.