In a previous blog post entitled Homeward Bound: Journey form Afghanistan, I discussed the decline of American support for the war in Afghanistan in relation to the collective time that the troops have been deployed. One reader, however, expressed concern as to why American’s support for the war would shift. There are a number of reasons. As stated in last weeks post, one of these reasons is the unexpectedly long time period that soldiers have been overseas. Another reason is the media’s continued outpour of controversy involved with the war efforts. The most recent of such controversy being accusations that U.S. soldiers have made sport of murdering Afghan-civilians.The controversy first came to light after one of the five murder suspects, Adam Winfield, reported the incidents to authorities. According to Winfield, as recounted by David Griffin of CNN in the article entitled Army may have known in February about Afghan murder, the murders committed had been premeditated and were even bragged about after the fact. Griffin’s article also provides a video of Winfield’s Army interrogation in which he communicates the happenings of the murders to the interrogating officer. Since then, there has been increased media coverage on the topic and hearings to determine whether the suspects will go to trial have begun.
Jeremy Morlock is the first of the murder suspects to have had a hearing. In Hearing begins in alleged plot to murder Afghans, an article by the associated press, the proceedings of Morlock’s hearing are chronicled. The associated press puts forth more information about the case in statements that “members of the platoon mutilated Afghan corpses and even collected fingers and other body parts, and that some posed for photos with Afghan corpses.” This being said, how could Americans continue to support this war.
As Americans we trust our military to protect us from foreign threats, and build strong ties with others. We do not expect to be that foreign threat, that malicious entity that commits war crimes against innocent individuals. If war crimes like those stated previously are taking place at a time when we expect our troops to be helping Afghan civilians, then how can we continue to support the idea of soldiers remaining in Afghanistan. There is a line in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Night which reads, "Either you die the hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” Americans don’t want to be the villain of the world; therefore, support for the war in Afghanistan is waning.
