The Speech That Military Recruiters Don’t Want You To Hear

I had hoped to speak to high-schoolers – I still do – but the six high schools nearest me either ignored my offer to speak or declined it.  “Do it for the kids,” they say when asking to raise your property taxes, but it’s beyond the pale to dissuade those very same kids from needlessly putting themselves in harm’s way?  Parents might have a different opinion, so here’s my speech:

Before we get into this, let’s discuss what most would label “a hypothetical.”  Tonight, I’m going to break into your home, point a gun at you, and rob you – all the while claiming that I’m not your enemy.  Your enemy, I’ll say, is elsewhere, and I don’t mean across the street but in a different country.  What will you do?  By a show of hands, will you fight back and protect those in your home by evicting me or even by killing me?  By a show of hands, who will thank me and travel to said country in search of the enemy, leaving those in your home vulnerable to me?  Anyone?  Nobody?  It sounds absurd, but for reasons that I’ll soon explain, you’ll understand that it’s more real than hypothetical.

Hello, I’m Casey Carlisle.  I’m a West Point graduate, and I spent five years in the Army, including 11 months in Afghanistan.  Some of you are thinking about serving your country, and most of you are asking yourselves, “Why am I listening to this guy?”  I’m glad that both of these groups are here, and I promise that my remarks will cause both groups to think differently about military service.

I was a high-school senior on September 11^th, 2001, sitting in class and stunned after hearing the principal announce that our country had just been attacked.  Why would someone want to do this to the greatest country on Earth?  I was also livid, and I wanted revenge.  I wanted to kill the people responsible for this atrocity, and my dilemma then was between enlisting in the military to exact revenge now or first spending years at a military academy before helping to rid the world of terrorists.  I chose the latter, so I didn’t deploy to Afghanistan until 2009.  My time there radically changed my views, which was uncomfortable, but, as with failure, discomfort breeds learning.

I learned that not only were we not keeping our fellow Americans safe or protecting their liberty, we were further impoverishing one of the poorest countries in the world.  I watched in disgust my alleged allies – the Afghan police – rob their neighbors while on patrol and in broad daylight via traffic stops.  Imagine getting pulled over, not for speeding, but because the cop hopes to rob you.  My enemy – the Taliban – didn’t do such things, which is why I ended up having more respect for them than for my mission or for those who were allegedly helping us accomplish it.  “Oh, but they’re horrible in other ways,” you might argue, and I’d agree; however, it’s much harder to kill an idea than it is to kill a person.  Killing someone who holds an idea that you find distasteful only helps that person’s loved ones accept that idea.  It turns out that killing someone for their ideas is a great way to spread those ideas.

Instead of dismissing me as an anti-American lunatic, consider the following.  In the year 2000, the Taliban controlled most of Afghanistan, and today, they control all of it.  This is just one of the reasons why I feel contempt for those who thank me for my alleged service.  Our ‘service’ was worse than worthless, and the people thanking me were forced to pay for it.  All of those who died there did so for nothing.  And the innocent Afghans who were displaced, injured, or killed during our attempt to bring democracy to a country that didn’t want it were far better off in 2000 than they are now.

To be clear, the desire to serve one’s country is noble, but we must first define “country.”  Serving one’s country is entirely different from serving one’s government.  They are not the same.  Serving one’s country is serving one’s family, friends, neighbors, and the land that they’ve made home.  Serving one’s country is serving one’s community.  Serving one’s government, however, is ultimately what everyone does when they enlist or when they take my path as an officer.  Who are these people in government that you’ll end up serving?  Are they your family, friends, or neighbors?  For the most part, they are not, yet, they are ultimately who will decide your fate while in uniform.  Whether they’re politicians or bureaucrats, they decide what serving one’s country entails, and, naturally, they’ll subordinate our country’s prosperity to their job security.  If given the opportunity, these people will not hesitate to send you to your death if it means scoring a measly political point against their ideological foes.  Serving one’s country in this context – reality – means serving these parasites.

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