My employer this year made a big thing of 11/11, holding a celebratory dinner to which all employees who are veterans were invited and at which they were emphatically and ceremoniously thanked.
I did not attend.
The soldiers of the Union deserved the thanks of the freedmen.
The soldiers of our revolution deserved the thanks of our ambitious national politicians.
It's not so clear they were owed thanks by ordinary folk.
All of our other soldiers are owed, not thanks, but apologies for fighting, and in most cases being made to fight, and in far too many cases being injured or killed, in wars America had no stake in, or anyway those Americans had no stake in.
Come to that, so are most, if not all, of those soldiers of the Union.
The best thing we can do for the American troops of today is knock it off.
We here should highly resolve to stop making our people fight wars that are none of their affair.
Why don't we?
Because people like war, just as they like hockey, boxing, and football.
Because when they see a fight in a schoolyard the other kids don't try to stop it, instead surrounding the fighters and urging them to beat the hell out of each other.
Because we are the vicious, bald chimpanzees that we are.
Or seem to be.
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