HUMAN RIGHTS AND WAR
It may be classed as one more case of armed violence in gun dense USA, but there is much more to the Fort Hood shooting in Texas on Thursday, than many would have us believe.
This is the second mass shooting on that base, the first having been in 2009. It does not require a medical genius to ascertain the fact that this violence among military personnel -- a macabre version of friendly fire -- is as a result of soldiers fighting battles that they have no ownership of.
Though the US adventure in Afghanistan was in the cause of the war on terror subsequent to the 9/11 attacks, most other American incursions have been for no reason at all.
Iraq is the most conspicuous case in point, but in Afghanistan as well, the original purpose of the military adventure is all but forgotten.
Contrast this to what happened here in this country and the way the war heroes have dealt with life after hostilities.
The warriors in Sri Lanka fought to save lives of brothers, husbands, sisters, and wives. They also fought to save the lives of fellow citizens who were under siege, being used as human shields.
The bottom line is that they had tangible ownership of the battles they fought. Sri Lanka did not put boots on the ground in strange lands, where the armed men did not know the terrain -- or who they were fighting against or what they were fighting for.
Also, there are no veterans in this country that are homeless. Hardly any have been known to suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
There is a connection between this sort of post war reality for fighters, and the fact that they may or may not go on shooting sprees targeting their own colleagues.
There is nothing humane about war, but yet, when battles are necessary they can be fought in ways that don't damage the sanity of the men on the frontlines.
Nobody would go to the UN Human Rights Council to enforce the economic rights of the war veterans who return home and eventually find that they are homeless or neglected. The Defence Secretary's top priority after the war was to ensure that war heroes were never left to their own devices.
There were no accolades at the UN HRC for this humane treatment of those who fought on the frontlines.
How many more mass shootings should occur before it is realized in the USA that soldiers are people too? If those who fight and those who are killed in wars are both considered expendable, it is not surprising that there are many war crimes that occur in the theatres of war that the US has been involved in.
These war crimes may have never been probed and would probably never be probed, but yet does the soldier have to be victimized as much as his victim in this story of unchecked impunity that is the ongoing saga of modern warfare involving the superpower in these days past Pax Americana?!
Irrespective of what happens in the UN HRC the moral high ground can rightfully be claimed by Sri Lanka on the fundamental issue of human gratitude. The treatment of war veterans can be dressed up in any kind of descriptive argot, but the bottom line is that it boils down to the issue of sympathetic treatment of people.
That, make no mistake is the ingredient that is lacking in bases such as Fort Hood where maladies such as PSTD are treated with drugs but not with empathy, just as there is no empathy in much of the USA for homeless war veterans.
How far ahead we are in this regard thanks to the efforts of those who know gratitude, such as the Defence Secretary! That should place Sri Lanka among the top tier of nations that are humane in real ways, and treat human rights in real terms, not as an ideal or an abstruse unattainable dream that's overworked in the textbooks.
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