to wonder what's so heroic about being in the British army?

[poppylongstocking]

Both my brother in laws are in the army and spend 6 months at a time away from their wife & kids in a country we are under no direct threat from fighting a war which was started on dubious grounds. They are risking their lives, yes, but I don't see it as heroic, I see it as a bit stupid to be honest. I could understand the label 'hero' if we were under direct threat and having our homes bombed as in WW2, but it's very different nowadays, aibu?

i remember going from ascension to brize one december and arriving with really sore sunburn to inches of snow - that was bad enough lol. nothing like here though!

This deserves repeating (thank Shilly)

You asked "how could I know that not one of the reasons for going to war in Afghanistan is valid, if I don't know all the reasons"? Because not one of them could conceivably involve an existential threat to the UK, and that's the only reason that's valid. As I said earlier, the Afghan war has destabilised Pakistan, which is really bad news as that state could conceivably pose an existential threat to us, given the volatile mix of Islamists and nuclear weapons.

I like that song too kettle - green fields ?

networkguy - I think your post at 0413 was really cogent and summed up the ambiguity of this area really well. I am ex-serving and my DH is still in the RAF. I agree that recruitment needs to be moral, although would argue that in the last couple of years, through the images we have seen in the media, most of the pople signing up know a lot more of what they are getting themselves into then any other time in recruiting history tbh. Do I think we should be in the countries that we are? Probably not in the WAY that we are. These countries need nation building in a way that is appropriate to their history. To those who used the words 'stupid' and 'thugs', well, there are stupid thugs in nearly every large organisation and doubtless there are some in the military. I think the name calling reflects more on your narrow and prejudiced view of others - you seem to think becauise many young soldiers come from a background that isn't highly educated that they will automatically think and behave in a certain way. Shame on you.

Oh, and back to the OP. No, not everyone in the Army (or RAF or Navy) is a hero. There was an excellent article written by a soldier about how much he disliked the sugary coverage of the tabloids.(Will try and find it.) Many of them do a difficult and dangerous job, in the same way that an A & E nurse or a custody Sgt does. You may not agree with where they are right now, but trust me there may come a time where you really wish we had a effective professional standing army, so declaring your lack of respect for them because of your disagreement with the current politicians foreign policy is very short sighted.

WOW......you actually poated this question???? OMG.... well heres a question lets say it was your son who went to afganistan and died ....you will still say he isnt a hero?....
do you have feelings????

so yeah i do think your being unreasonable, and heartless......

Kettlecrisps - suicide bombers certainly ARE considered heroes within their own immediate community. Funny thing, perspective.

Thank you, Goat. Glad that it strikes a chord

those who have been posted to canada, can you say why?

i am assuming it is for training purposes? what do the canadians get out of it - is there a reciprocal arrangement?

Silly - the question is, has the afghan war destabalised Pakistan more than allowing an extreme islamist group to seize control of Afghanistan unchallenged would have done?

The more important question is whether our armed forces are having a positive effect overall NOW.

Kettlecrisps - could you clarify your point please?
("Loopyloops - name suits you very well.")

I am asking a very valid question. If the criteria for being a hero is fighting, being prepared to die for your cause or country (and as someone else added, knowing the danger and still going back), why are only the people doing that on our side the heros? Under that criteria, some people who our culture consider to be very wrong and bad indeed must be classified heros. I'm simply asking for people to rethink the terminology. Does this make me loopy (or a loop)?

could I ask something (genuinely)? If we feel that the men killed in the great slaughtering of WWI were heroes, is it because they were for the most part conscripted and had no choice in it and so many were pulled in? Is it the huge mass slaughter that makes us feel respect for them in that situation? Is that the real difference to Afghanistan today? Because IMHO there was no real reason for WW1. I may be thick here and happy to be corrected but I always felt WWI could have been averted at so many points in the build-up, it always seemed to me an unnecessary war (unlike WWII where it seems unavoidable to have to join the fight)

If the bulk of our young people were conscripted now and sent along with the professional forces to Afghanistan, would they then be heroes?

ZZZ - personally, I would feel sorry for them, and mourn their loss, but would only consider those in exceptional circumstances (rescuers of many others despite artillary fire etc.) to be heros.
Surely it does also depend on the cause of the war, as you say. If they were sent to stop the genocide in Sudan, for example, and were used as cannon fodder by our army (as they were in WWI), that would be a lot more meaningful than those in Afghanistan now. Again, this is only my opinion. I know there seem to be lots of people on this thread that seem to find it insulting that not everyone considers all British forces to be automatic heros.

TCNY -- an extreme Islamist group had control of Afghanistan for several years prior to our invasion and it was not destabilising of Pakistan. The conflict forged much stronger cross-border links between the Afghan Taliban and Pakistani jihadis, by giving them a present and common set of enemies.

While trajectory is important, so is the start point. The forces may be having a net positive effect now in Afghanistan, but we are still worse off than we were prior to invasion and Pakistan is in a much worse place than it was, thanks to our being there.

But we are where we are. How we got here is less important than what we do next.

Yes, TCNY, but we can acknowledge that we were wrong so that we don't start more unjustified and unwinnable wars in the future.

Sorry to anyone I have offended, it wasn't my intention
sunshineriver is right, the sentiment behind my post was more like:
AIBU to not like what the armed forces has become that it is now a load of people that we know going off to countries that we'd never heard of until all of this terrorist shit kicked off, rather than it being something that happened to our Grandparents and had no direct emotional ties with. Now that it is happening to people in my own family and I have to see the effect that it is having on my sisters knowing that their beloved DHs may not come home again makes me realise how awful war is and I do not like it and wish that things were different. I think maybe that if we were at war like we used to read about and it felt like my, and my children's lives were in immediate danger like during WW2 and we were putting our kids on trains up to the countryside, I may understand it more, but it does not seem fair that our armed forces are abroad fighting a war that we didn't start and the only times that we hear about it is when we are told about yet more soldiers killed in action.

For me this is a kind of abstract issue to think about and theorise about but having read about madwoman's dh who has brain damage and scarring as a result of his active servie and that others on this thread have relatives currently seeing active service in places like Iraq and Afghanistan and for whom they are obviously very worried, I feel it is kind of tacky of me to keep talking about it. I am sorry if I caused any of the posters on here offence. I didn't mean to.

I think poppy that a lot of us, maybe even the majority of people in the western world(myself included) don't understand what this war on terrorism is really like/about.

Can I just add, and leaving behind their wives & children in the process

Zzenagain I disagree, I think we should talk about about it partly because so many UK soldiers are being killed and maimed.

The worst thing we can do is say 'well our boys are there now so we shouldn't think about whether the war is justified or not'.

'OMG.... well heres a question lets say it was your son who went to afganistan and died ....you will still say he isnt a hero?....'

5f my son - god forbid - went to Afghanistan and died saving his comrades lives, or protecting civilians or or doing something above and beyond the call of duty then he would be a hero.

He would not be a hero if he died - as many soldiers do - in a road accident, or in some other hideous, ghastly but mundane way. He would have died doing his job.

Save to word for real heroes - like the VC winner I linked to earlier.

I accept that other people want to speak about it, just saying for myself it isn't sitting right anymore.

ZZZenagain - we must keep talking about it. It's important.

Fair enough Zzen.