In my lifetime the American military has paid little and expected much of its recruits. Both officer and enlisted are significantly underpaid, deployed to foreign lands to fight battles in defense of strangers (or sometimes for no reason at all). They have been clawed back into service against their will, jettisoned when they are no longer of value, and abandoned when they return home with needs.
We ask them to give their entire lives to the nation, then we also ask them to make that sacrifice out of our sight, because thinking of their plight or seeing its aftermath is too sad for the many Americans to contemplate.
Despite this, good men and women continue to volunteer. They know they will be underpaid. They know the promise of lifelong care is hollow. They know senior civilian and military leadership will likely send them to a faraway place and ask them to risk death, and they know that if they don’t come home alive their flag-draped casket will be delivered out of the camera’s view. They know all this, and they still volunteer.
Today, Donald Trump told a subset of those people that their services are no longer needed. A man who avoided the last mandatory call to service extended his middle finger to the current crop of those who would do what he would not. And he did not dishonor those who serve because he believes it is right, or because he believes it is just.
He did it because someone persuaded him that the stunt might cause difficulties for one or more members of Congress in their next election. He did it because the lives of those who would volunteer for the indignities we heap upon our soldiers and sailors are of little import to him — the lives he will ruin are just pieces on the game board of American politics.
I am truly sorry to be an American today. And I am sorry that anyone on the planet — let alone those who volunteered to stand up for a nation that treats them this way — would think Donald Trump’s political gamesmanship is a reflection of my values or America’s priorities. I am sorry.