There is so much written about the horrific nature of war. I myself have never and don't ever wish to partake in that universal constant of history, but I greatly respect those who do so I don’t. The root of the conflict between soldiers and orders is that they aren’t considered citizens, when in my opinion they deserve the right more than anyone. The functional purpose for this separation between citizens and soldiers is clearly for the development of a strong military. All the things that go on during basic training could never happen to citizens without a court case, and the sacrifice of opinion and in some ways humanity only makes the soldiers ever nobler.
The military is clearly a tool, used to do great things, but not always positive things. If the personal opinion of every soldier were considered it would be the equivalent of a heavy-handed bureaucracy, and nothing would get done. Yet it is still disappointing that the bravest of us, the ones who actually fight to defend our freedom, can’t enjoy the spoils of their own war, if they even wanted to be there in the first place. The military is a tool and tools do not decide how they are used, but they also don’t have a voice, and our soldiers do.
The greatest thing about the modern phenomena of solider blogs is that soldiers can have their voices heard. Though still infantile, we can get an idea of how the soldiers themselves fell. Though they can’t complain to their CO’s and change things in that manner, they may just be able to reach the entire world, and ask the voters to empower someone who they believe will use the tool of the military more effectively. This is a new level of freedom for soldiers that strikes a great middle ground, and the restriction of this freedom would be tragic.
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The soldiers does have a voice on these blogs however; their restriction to only express them selves through these blogs is not going to make an active change for our current and future soldiers.
I completely agree. I think this is an insightful comment that really speaks to soldiers' freedom of speech. Its interesting when you think about it that soldiers used to rely on hand written letters, usually to friends and relatives, to get their ideas across. This neauvo concept of a blog allows soldiers' messages to be published on a grand scale and really allows for the facilitation of the spread of their ideas and feelings.
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