WAR AGAINST THE WAR

"Good morning Vietnam!" ... that was Robin William's voice, an unforgettable cadence in the 1987 comedy-drama film set in Saigon during the Vietnam War -- that's what I'm hearing as I'm thinking, worrying, wondering what to hope for.

My head's spinning with the opinions in the news on what we should do, could do, can't do -- what the generals want --what other wise men and women say.

I can't get certain facts out of my mind -- the fact that Britain lost two wars in Afghanistan in the 19th century and it's still haunting them -- that the Soviet-Afghan war in the 20th century was a nine year conflict that Russia lost -- that we're in our ninth year of our war -- that no one is sure what to do -- that strong, knowledgeable, wise men and women, guys I respect, are saying we cannot, must not lose this war.

What looms -- us versus them -- different concepts of heaven -- Christianity versus Islam. To me those different concepts are like iron gates, centuries old, endlessly high, high as my eye and mind can perceive beyond the clouds and stars.

I can't add to the words in the air, the powerful, logical conclusions based on real knowledge (as well as secret information). I'm just me, a single person, a small female, with arms out, trying to embrace whatever there is to hold onto, and hold onto my instinct, my sense of what's happening.

I want us to end the war.

The words -- we can't lose the war, can't stop the war, must not withdraw troops -- we must win this war -- are preventing us from saving ourselves.

Win! Lose! That's in games, where there are victors. We haven't won in Iraq, or fixed, changed, solved issues there, except temporarily, while we continue paying for it, losing millions? or is it billions? as we're saying we're changing them, helping them.

I can only think as me -- one small, little person, wanting me/us to survive, and, find another way, other ways to reach the enemy, And deal with him/them not as an enemy, but as people -- with eyes, noses, mouths, hearts, brains, bodies -- general physical construction like me. I want us to push into, and probe, and find out, and study, and connect, and communicate -- find a way to talk about the ideas, needs, feelings that created them as people, not as our foe.

Stop the war. Don't send more young men to die there.

Please, think into that, deeper, thoroughly, what it could mean and how the losing of the war would be a victory.