Volume 43- No. 23
by lyle e davis Those of us who have been in combat zones know a bit about what war is like. We’ve seen it up close and personal. We’ve seen men die, we’ve seen them torn to shreds by bombs, booby traps, shrapnel from artillery fire, and their bodies ripped apart by shells from rifles and machine guns. We’ve seen a lot of blood spilled. We know war. There is always a heavy toll to be paid as a result of war. Doesn’t matter what you call it. You can call it a “police action” if you wish. It’s still war. You The Paper - 760.747.7119
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June 07, 2012
can call it “an undeclared war,” if you wish. It’s still war. And people still die . . . both military and innocent civilians. There is a terrible financial cost to war . . . but the even greater cost of war is life itself. You can generate more capital . . . more funding. You can sell war bonds. No amount of fund raising will ever bring back a son, or husband, or father, who was killed in war. We have a lot of both active dury and retired military families living in North San Diego County. Many of those families have lost a loved one to war. It’s a terrible price.
Just to give those of you who have not seen combat, who have not lost a loved one to war, some idea of that price, we decided to collect data from the wars the United States has gotten involved in. Get out your calculators and count along with us: War of 1812 Dates: 1812-1815 American soldier approx. 20,000
deaths:
Though it dwells mostly in the shadow of the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812 does have a special claim to fame: Its Battle of Baltimore (which took place in 1814) inspired Francis Scott Key’s “Star-Spangled Banner.” And the war had a salutary effect on U.S. politics as well. Americans were so
thrilled to defeat Britain a second time that their partisanship dissolved into an “Era of Good Feelings.” Franco-American War Dates: 1798-1800 American soldier deaths: 514 Relations between France and the United States soured when the United States patched things up with the British crown. In the throes of its own revolution and war with England, France resented America’s declaration of neutrality and began seizing U.S. trading ships. The neverdeclared Franco-American War (also dubbed the Quasi-War or the Half-War) prompted Congress to revive the country’s navy—although it was careful to authorize no more than 12 fighting vessels.
“War is Not Nice . . .” Continued on Page 2