Nationalism

A fish does not see the water and we do not see the air. It is so part of our environment, so fundamental that we don’t notice it. Like gravity, or the stock market and the effect of the price of a barrel of oil. It is accepted that these are part of our western lives. The rest of the world does not necessarily see it that way.
I was a literally a child at my fathers knee, trying understand what he was teaching in his high school history class. Like any child I was trying to understand the world I lived in, but the concepts were beyond my reach. Why was a revolution in France over a hundred years ago more important than a revolution in the US? We were the super power not them, how could the cheese eating surrender monkeys be mor important. At the time with his infinite patience, he replied simply “Nationalism”.
I am sure that there was an attempt to further explain that I never quite understood. Two decades later, I came to understand. It took stepping out into the water to see how air effected me. I had to go to Iraq in order to understand one of the building blocks of the world I grew up in. Maybe if I had traveled to the third world at a younger age I would have seen it earlier.
In my world the state, the nation was a given, an accepted thing like gravity. Even those who opposed the state wanted to change it, to run it themselves. There are a limited number of exceptions to this, but they are generally considered wing nuts. If I had had the personal experience to process one of my favorite authors I would have understood it. Ralph Peters was trying to explain to the US military in the 1990s that most of the third world does not take nationalism for granted.
Here the tribe, the clan, the religion is takes is the given. A person may want to take the tribe out of the state, but would never consider taking themselves from the tribe. I hope there are brave sociologists and social anthropologists who have a deeper understanding of this and are talking to our leadership.
A few weeks ago I was standing at an Iraqi controlled gate near COB Allalone. It is basically a US Army supplied Pick-n-Pull. A truck leaving did not want to stop. The driver gunned the engine, and the guard got out of the way. The response of my self and the PFC with me was predictable. It was demonstrated in no uncertain terms that to attempt to continue would result in the drivers death. A search of the vehicle revealed that they were trying to steal parts from the yard. This is unimportant.
What is important is that I felt perfectly justified in enforcing the laws of this state and my own: “You do not run check points” The trial and punishment is immediate. The Iraqi guard thanked me for not shooting the man who tried to run him down.
“It would be very bad.” The guard said.
I agreed with him, I would prefer not to shoot someone over stolen truck parts. Then it hit me when I was talking to the man who controlled the lot. It would result in tribal problems, clan problems. The rules of the tribes are more valuable, more important than the rules of the state.
The Iraqi Army paints their flag on everything, they are more compulsive about it than marines with the Eagle Globe and Anchor. This very well may be a deliberate attempt at fostering nationalism in the army. Like putting Napoleon’s eagles at the front of his regiments. Building an identification with the state through a symbol. Is there really that deep of strategy going on here?
The difference between nationalism and a cult of personality is that the image of a person is replaced with the image of a symbol of an idea. It can’t be that simple. Maybe I am over thinking the whole thing, and need to stop listening to philosophy audio books while on patrol and go back to Kim Harrison.

Privacy

The most valued thing in this war is privacy. The first casualty of a war zone is privacy. It could be worse we could be cramming 8 men into 6 man tents. Sgt Grandpa, and SGT Bulldog have the misfortune to be crammed into a space smaller than my old bedroom with me. The lower enlisted sleep four to a room in even less space. The drive for privacy quickly pushes soldiers to hang ponchos or poncho liners from bunks, and build rough wooden shelters from plywood and 2x4s.
We seek some measure of personal space, even if it is the area of a single mattress only notionally shielded from prying eyes. Laptop computers and headphones are a common courtesy so everyone doesn’t have to listen to your movie, or music. We live, work, eat and sleep together. The same faces day in and day out. There is bound to be friction. A little privacy is the lube that makes the machine work.
As I write this Bulldog is talking to his girl on VOIP while SGT G3 watches a rebroadcast of a football game. G3 is in the next room, separated from our room by 7’ high office walls, as the bunk beds are 5 feet high Bulldog and G3 effectively sleep next to each other separated by a half inch board. They both ignore the interference. Tolerance is another lube to keep the machine moving.
There is only one light switch for two rooms and five sergeants, when someone wants light or darkness they sing out and if there are no objections I hit the switch over my bed. Accommodation makes things work.
Shortly after we got here a error in the housing arrangements over in the lower enlisted quarters caused CPL ESPN to be kicked up to NCO quarters. Our room was selected. Instead we took a dead end hallway with just enough room for a bunk bed and room to get in and out of it and walled it off. ESPN is the only person under the rank of Sergeant First Class to have his own room and privacy. Innovation is the hallmark of the American soldier.
As I take wander talk to PFC Mighty Mouse I see ESPN hanging out with his old roommates and playing Xbox. He doesn’t spend much time in his private room.
Gandpa, Bulldog, G3 and Doc (the last man in our area) talk, share snacks and get a chance to bitch to our peers about ours seniors and subordinates. If I take a wander out to the back porch SFC Big Daddy is hanging out there shooting the shit with his platoon members. Up on the roof there are always guys hanging out, smoking and joking, and it is rare that anyone goes to chow or the PX alone. We are social animals made all the more so by our isolation form the country an environment that we grew up in.
Isolation is the grit that makes the machine break, more surely than enemy fire.

SSG Lifeguard just poked his head in to see if I want to go to midnight chow. See what I mean?