Sunday, August 23, 2020

Our Wars

   Mago Bill: Our wars. The U. S. has a lot of wars in its history, even in our very recent history as well as from 1776.        

                We do a lot of warring. I intended to write little essays about a few of the more obscure wars of the U.S.A., but have lost some of my motivation; still I may yet do so                
          
               The following is an introduction to my intention to write about some of our less known wars.
                 
                 As I write our union has lasted about 244 years. I find that of those years only six have been free of war. I also find that in a great many of those years we have fought more than one war year. I our 238 years of warring many of us have been killed and we have killed many. If we do not hold the record for average number of wars per year, we may soon do so.
 
                The years we have not warred are 1935 through 1940 and 1897. It may well be worth while to learn more about these years.
From 1899 to1934 we had mostly just "Banana Wars;" mostly not only. People of our neighboring countries of Central America may object to my word "just." Those Banana Wars were among the most traumatic happenings in their entire history. In those wars we stepped on their labor movement hard. The people of those republics have found it difficult to laugh about what we have called our Good Neighbor Policy. 
When taking a close look at historic near the U.S. it seems we have hated the people of Haiti the most for the longest time. That we have invaded Mexico only 13 times since 1837 makes it look like we love Mexicans more than we have hated the people of Haiti; but I digress. These doings mostly count as wars.
 
                There are doings related to our wars that are curious and peak my interest. For it is curious why we insist on killing one another when we could be arranging to protect ourselves from comet and asteroid rains, various virus, plagues, solar flares, rising sea levels, and the like. When I have said "we' here, I not only refer to you and I, our fellow citizens, and our fore bearers, but also those who find it convenient to war with us. 
My curiosity extends to wanting to know why part of our Civil War occurred at Gibraltar and why Mysore played a part in that same war. I'd even like to know why Sweden was our allie in our first Barbary War. What about the German Coast Uprising in the Territory of Orleans? Just why did we invade Canada? And like that. And you may agree, that our recent wars of say the last 20 or 30 years, have had their interesting points.
 
                I do not enjoy writing about the killing we do or about the deaths of many of our fine young men. In fact it causes me some very unpleasant feelings. I would like to act in an honorable and legal way to minimize early deaths and killings. Not an easy thing to do since so many of us have abdicated responsibility for the war machine we sponsor.
     
                I have a lot to learn but I do intend to be honest and factual as I write. I hope that you will correct any and all mistakes that you find on this blog. You are welcome to do so in the "comment" section just below.
 
                More to come, slowly.
 
RCS