English Education Professor

When the towers collapsed, many of us did not want to be perceived as unpatriotic. The fury and faith of Fox News patriots weakened us. So we silenced our beliefs that the military industrial complex is the most shameful element of the American experiment.

Our silence resulted in global scorn. It resulted in the expansion of U.S. military bases into over 150 countries, the equivalent of Rome at its imperial height. Our silence resulted in mistaking cruelty for strength. Do the 5 million orphans in Iraq view American troops as liberators?

As the number of U.S. soldiers returning from Iraq with traumatic brain injuries exceeds 360 thousand, we are expanding operations in Afghanistan. We best remember that failure to respect the Pashtun people, the ethnic majority in Afghanistan, crushed Russia’s army and lead to their collapse. Russia did not respect the Pashtun concept of Badal–revenge or justice. Imbedded in the practice of Pashtunwali, Badal mandates that an insult can only be righted by violence. As a consequence, Afghanistan blood feuds have lasted generations. Let’s not build more military bases in the middle of that. Armies cannot build schools, hospitals, and successful democracies in the midst of tribal cultures.