Chris Kyle, the \u201cAmerican Sniper\u201d who Clint Eastwood has immortalized in his latest blockbuster film, is widely being heralded by die-hard Iraq War supporters\u2014i.e. neoconservative Republicans\u2014as an unqualified \u201cwar hero.\u201d\u00a0 Some thoughts:<\/p>\n
(1)Given that we ordinarily reserve the distinction of war hero<\/em> only for those whose cause we value or share, Kyle is a war hero only if<\/em> his cause was just.\u00a0 Were German and Japanese soldiers in World War II war heroes?\u00a0 After all, they too were fighting and dying for the sake of their respective countries?\u00a0 But if, in spite of putting their lives on the line for a cause greater than themselves, these soldiers are not <\/em>to be regarded as war heroes because that<\/em> cause was unjust, then neither is Kyle to be regarded as a war hero\u2014if the American cause in Iraq was unjust.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n And yet this is precisely what\u2019s in question: Was <\/em>the Iraq War just<\/em>?<\/p>\n (2)That Kyle killed some evil people is beyond dispute.\u00a0 But even if every single person of his 160 or so confirmed kills was evil to the core\u2014they may very well have been\u2014and even if, as I have no doubt, Kyle saved the lives of many of his comrades-in-arms, this still wouldn\u2019t warrant celebrating him as a war <\/em>hero.<\/p>\n Those media pundits on Fox News and on \u201cconservative\u201d talk radio who champion Kyle as a \u201cwar hero\u201d don\u2019t mean simply that he wasted bad guys and had other soldiers\u2019 backs.\u00a0 And they admit as much: Kyle was a war hero because he did all of this to protect our freedoms. <\/em><\/p>\n In other words, those singing hosannas to Kyle are to a man and woman the Iraq War\u2019s staunchest defenders. By praising Kyle as a \u201cwar<\/em> hero,\u201d a soldier who did as much as anyone to \u201cdefend our freedoms,\u201d their implication is clear: the Iraq War wasn\u2019t just a just <\/em>war; it was necessary <\/em>in order to, well, protect American freedoms.<\/p>\n (3)We need heroes, but hero-worship<\/em>\u2014and that\u2019s exactly <\/em>what we witness in this case with the Iraq War\u2019s staunch defenders and their obsession with Kyle\u2014can be dangerous.\u00a0 That this is <\/em>hero worship can be gotten easily enough by the refusal of the worshippers (idolaters?) to engage in civil discourse with anyone who doesn\u2019t share their own estimation of Kyle.\u00a0 Anyone who doesn\u2019t extol Kyle\u2019s virtues as a great American patriot and war hero is dismissed, usually angrily, as an ingrate, a coward, or even anti-American.<\/p>\n This is bad.<\/p>\n (4)And this is bad because Kyle cast his own character, and his own motives for promoting himself as \u201cthe most lethal sniper in American military history,\u201d into question.<\/p>\n Kyle, you see, told some brazen lies.<\/p>\n Upon his return to the states, Kyle said that he killed two would-be carjackers at a gas station in Texas.\u00a0 However, attempts to verify this with the local police have proven as fruitless as attempts to verify Kyle\u2019s claim that he was hired to shoot\u2014and, in fact, did <\/em>shoot\u2014(some 30 or so) armed rioters in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.<\/p>\n Both stories have been discredited by sheriffs and military personnel.<\/p>\n Yet it was Kyle\u2019s claim regarding his confrontation with Jesse Ventura that was <\/em>verified\u2014or should we say, falsified.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n Contrary to what some Kyle worshippers would have us think, one needn\u2019t be a fan of Jesse Ventura\u2014and I certainly am not\u2014to face the fact and embrace the truth that Chris Kyle lied <\/em>about knocking out Ventura in a bar, and he lied <\/em>\u00a0about Ventura loudly expressing his desire for the deaths of more American soldiers in Iraq.<\/p>\n Those in the \u201cconservative\u201d media who deny this are guilty of intellectual dishonesty and hypocrisy.\u00a0 Mike Gallagher is one host who really ought to know better.\u00a0 When the Eric Garner jury decided against indicting the officer in question, Gallagher rightly took to task those who pretended to know more than the grand jurors who spent months canvassing exponentially more evidence than anything to which the rest of us were privy.<\/p>\n But a jury of ten people spent considerable time evaluating Ventura\u2019s claim that he was defamed by Kyle.\u00a0 In spite of the enormous bar that Ventura\u2014a public figure\u2014had to hurdle in convincing the jurors that Kyle had \u201cactual malice,\u201d i.e. that he knew that what he alleged was false and\/or that he acted in \u201creckless disregard\u201d for the falsity of his allegations, Ventura ducked the odds and did it.<\/p>\n The jury awarded him 1.8 million<\/em> dollars in damages: $500,000 dollars for \u201cdefamation\u201d and the remainder for \u201cunjust enrichment\u201d (Kyle, it was determined, monetarily benefitted from defaming Ventura).<\/p>\n Kyle, here, acted neither honorably nor honestly.<\/p>\n None of this, of course, is meant to suggest that Kyle didn\u2019t act heroically while defending his fellow soldiers.\u00a0 Much less is it meant to suggest, as some self-styled deep thinkers in some quarters would have us think, that Kyle was nothing but a liar and, worse, a \u201cpsychopath.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet the man, who was doubtless damaged by both his own actions as well as the horrors that he witnessed in war, was flawed.<\/p>\n The Kyle worshippers\u2014the Iraq War\u2019s strident supporters\u2014shouldn\u2019t pretend that this isn\u2019t true, let alone significant, for in doing so, they reveal themselves to be dishonest, self<\/em>-interested ideologues.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Chris Kyle, the \u201cAmerican Sniper\u201d who Clint Eastwood has immortalized in his latest blockbuster film, is widely being heralded by die-hard Iraq War supporters\u2014i.e. neoconservative Republicans\u2014as an unqualified \u201cwar hero.\u201d\u00a0 Some thoughts: (1)Given that we ordinarily reserve the distinction of war hero only for those whose cause we value or share, Kyle is a war…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":399,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n