IT IS US

May 29, 2004 - Pat Tillman was killed in Afghanistan. The Army announced that he was killed leading his section bravely against the enemy, suppressing their fire and taking the high ground. The Army awarded him the Purple Heart and the Silver Star. It came at the right time. With the body counts rising in Iraq and in the Afghan War that America forgot we had need of a hero and Pat Tillman was a real hero. He was a hero long before he got to Afghanistan. When America was attacked he sacrificed an assure future of wealth and comfort to become an American soldier. He was a Patriot with a capitol P. He did not find “other priorities” to avoid service when his country was under attack. He did not discover an “anal cyst” to keep him out of service nor a sudden interest in graduate studies. Neither did he join the National Guard, the ROTC or seek sanctuary in Canada. He did not find a sudden religious conversion to qualify him as a conscientious objector. He gave up his future and volunteered. That, and not the manner of his death, made Pat Tillman a hero, the kind of hero it is important that we remember on Memorial Day.

Today Pat Tillman became something else as well. The news broke that he was not killed by the enemy lurking in the Afghani hills. Instead we killed him ourselves. He was a victim of friendly fire. His platoon had been divided into two sections in what is known as a “ground assault convoy”. Tillman was in the lead group. The trailing section had lagged behind opening the interval between the two sections. There was an explosion and one section opened fire. Tillman led his section on the supposed enemy and was killed in the confusion. Two Afghani soldiers were wounded. There was no enemy and no enemy fire. The cause of the explosion that set the firing off has not been determined. It may have been a land mine or a remotely triggered explosive device, or even one of the thousands of cluster bombs that we dropped while we blasted that Stone Age country back to the Stone Age.

Today Pat Tillman is both a genuine hero and a symbol of the confusion that haunts America’s two endless wars in which we don’t know the enemy. We don’t know the enemy because the shadowy forces we fight on one day we equip and call our allies on the next. We declare it victory when we end a siege by turning the besieged city over to the enemy. We promise sovereignty and democracy on one hand and withhold it on the other. We declare victory after six week campaign and then fight on another year in what we call a peace. We announce that we are under siege and then call the American people to sacrifice in the name of Homeland Security by going on vacation and having fun.

None of that detracts from the heroism of Pat Tillman. The situation he faced was confused and he did what he believed was necessary to engage an enemy. The fact that the enemy he fought was a shadow does not alter the fact that he did so without hesitation and at the sacrifice of his own safety. It was in keeping with the patriotic sacrifice he had made to serve.

Pogo said it long ago. We have met the enemy and it is us.