Hero's Funeral in 2040?

     Hero’s funeral in 2040 ?

Guest blog by the Rev. Dr. Peter Kjeseth, 

    (Peter is Professor emeritus of Wartburg Theological Seminary, former colleague, dear friend, and justice advocate with a global perspective)

The week-long mega-funeral of Senator John McCain is still being analyzed and evaluated by our pundits and even by those of us who are not experts.  Noteworthy has been the value placed on the negative:

     Who was NOT invited, Trump and Palin, and what was NOT said about his heroism.

     In praising McCain’s courage in the Vietnam war, none of the elite speakers affirmed that he and his fellow warriors won the war for us.

     We lost that war.  Rather he was praised for refusing to be freed before his fellow prisoners of war.  The overriding theme of praise was for his unflinching and bipartisan support of “American values”.

     Fair enough – and deserved!

    But do we dare ask ourselves today who and what might be celebrated and praised -or condemned and rejected – in some hero’s funeral in, say, 2040?  What sort of heroes will emerge from US military involvement in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya and even Yemen?

   Hard on the end of the McCain funeral, which won global headlines, we see the much less celebrated event of the retirement of General John Nicolson, long time head of US forces in Afghanistan.  His farewell message was unflinching: “It is time for the war in Afghanistan to end.”  This after our 17 years of serial redefinition of mission and total failure.  Will the military/industrial complex and the present Republican leadership seriously consider any real alternative to another round of redefinition and restarting of our “mission” in Afghanistan?  Good luck to incoming General Austin “Scott” Miller, who has already had to report and more-or-less justify a US soldier’s death.

   Even more morally problematic is our ‘proxy’ involvement in the devastating war in Yemen.  Saudi Arabia has now admitted that the August 9 airstrike in Yemen’s Saada Province that killed dozens of people including over 30 children riding a bus to a holiday event was a mistake.  Many voices across the world and in the UN name this event, and others like it, as war crimes.  Our military spokespersons tepidly explain that we ‘only’ provide inflight refueling of aircraft, intelligence help in defining a mission, training and other services.

   Lockheed Martin MK 82 bomb parts are clearly identified in Yemen.  If we dare look at it, there is ample evidence of our massive military supply to the perpetrators of the war in Yemen.

  When we look back on this day from the perspective of 2040, will there be anything heroic to celebrate?

  A question worth considering.