How Does One Decide to Declare War?

How does ONE decide to declare war? Hmmmm...

How does one decide to declare war?

Not a fight, or a battle, or skirmish, a WAR

Bombs on cities, children crying, dead, afraid

Blood running in the gutters, houses burned

Belongings carted off by looters and soldiers

Bits of blown up heroes in mass graves rotting

The stench and the suffering of thousands...

How does one decide to declare war?

 

Is it over a dispute with a foreign ruler?

Then, you destroy the people, and he lives

Crouched within a cave, cowering in fear

Carefully hiding himself while citizens suffer

Children who went out to play, never return

Carloads of travelers find the roadside bombs

The target laughs at your stupidity as you

Have just controlled his overpopulation for him

 

Is it because you want their resources too?

Soldiers and civilians' lives spent for oil or food...

Oh, I'm sure you'll deny that this is true

On up past the end, the bodies piled up

Only casualties of necessity for more more more

Obviously a cause for declaring war, it seems

Yet no one likes to say, "We fight for greed"

Instead, you say, "Golden opportunity"- same thing

 

Do you declare war to show you are strong?

Are you playing John Wayne, with your six-gun?

Then why don't you join up, hit the front line?

That's what you should do! Get your kevlar suit

Tank up on bullets and pack a submachine gun

Trusting the other troops to save their king

Just like in the days of old, the true rulers...

If you want a war, fight in it, and prove it's just

 

Do you think you'd declare war if you or your kin

Had to be the first onto the field, until all of you

Were stone dead lying on some foreign hill?

Widows left sobbing at a memorial in Washington

Windows dark where you used to live and dream

Why wouldn't you want to declare a war then?
Ah, no one is as important as you, no one's child

As vital as your own... only proving that life is not

Something that you deserve if you want this war

 

Where is the proof of your justifications? You know..

Weapons of mass destruction? The nuke-you-lar bombs?

Where are the mustard gas, the anthrax, and the plots?

The only plots I see are the burial plots of their men and ours

Dotting the landscape of what was the cradle of civilization

Now a no-man's land, where civilization is being torn asunder

It echoes through the night, across the world, and fear

Becomes new again, in the hearts of the underlings you keep

Who want to know what it is that makes one decide to declare

War

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Author's Note

I hate war in general, because generally it is fought for stupid reasons. Once in a while, there is a true justification, perhaps, but there are also usually other alternatives.

Reviews

[A.J. Smith]

Thank you for writing and sharing your thoughts on this, Constance. I spent 22 years in the military. My grandfather, my father, my brother, my brother-in-law...all served. As you say, there are times, rare circumstances, just causes when war is, regrettably, the only recourse left to right a wrong. I fear our elected leadership have failed to be good stewards of our most precious treasure, the lives of our young men and women in uniform. I'm not confident our national interests have been served well. I wonder if our nation has veered off the course toward greatness set by our founding fathers. History will be the dispassionate judge of that. But, for now, families, loved ones and friends will bear the grief, the cost of decisions made mostly by men who have never faced death or killing.

[ShadowWolf]

You have written your thoughts/concerns extremely well in this.

As AJ said there are those times when war is a necessity to "right a wrong", as is the case with WWII but even that one could have been avoided had the world stood firm rather than attempting to appease Hitler.
Unlike AJ I have no confidence in the leadership of this country for the past forty or so years because that so-called leadership as led us far astray from the "greatness set by our founding fathers." Too I fear with the next election this country will take the final steps toward destruction of all "our founding fathers" intended.