I look at the picture of Wes and Meg Tucker, parents of Pfc.
Thomas Tucker, one of the soldiers recently kidnapped and slain in
Iraq.
I look at the picture of Wes and Meg Tucker, parents of Pfc. Thomas Tucker, one of the soldiers recently kidnapped and slain in Iraq. They are shown seated on the sofa in their Oregon home, just as, almost 10 years ago to the day, my cousin and her husband were when they faced news that their 20-year-old son was killed by a terrorist’s bomb at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia.
Ten years apart, the photos are nearly identical. The fathers look wan from unaccustomed emotional pain. The mothers’ eyes are closed, weary from the fear they felt from the time of the notice their sons were missing to when their deaths were confirmed, perhaps picturing their sons as they walked through their front doors a million times; from now on, they will see them only in dreams.
This loss in our clan had an incredible impact on our family. It was the impetus for our return from Texas. For my brother, it fuels his fire for his mission in Iraq. When I met my brother the night before he left for Iraq, I said, “OK, I just have to ask. You don’t have to, so why are you going?” He said he did have to go, that ever since Justin’s death, his work has been focused on catching terrorists like the ones who tore into our family.
And it’s why, despite the recent revival of proposals establishing a deadline for a pullout of U.S. soldiers from Iraq, he believes he and the others must remain there. Though my anti-war soul screams for an immediate pullout of soldiers everywhere, he said in a recent e-mail that such a plan is ill-conceived.
“First, a mandated deadline could cause a precipitous withdrawal that could turn into a route, which could – and in my opinion would – cause more U.S. deaths as the Iraqis on our side in this jump ship to save themselves and have no reason for helping protect us any longer.
“As for the Iraqis, tens of thousands of them will be condemned to very, very ugly deaths by an early withdrawal. There are many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who have cast their lot entirely with us, and are in the government, police, Army and intelligence services – men and women who would not only be slaughtered if we left, but their families too.
“So, the day any deadline comes for us to leave, they have to head for the borders and get out before we do, except for those few who somehow calculate that they can either switch sides or even keep the lid on somehow with us gone early. And we saw how well that worked in Vietnam. Here those friends of ours are pro-western, and believe in establishing a western-oriented democracy that will be a model for the Mideast and bring peace, prosperity and the rule of law and order to Iraq for the first time.
“They have no single enemy. This country is worse than the Balkans with factions of every shape and color trying to seize power, or at least maximize their influence. And many of them are the worst sort – mosques are used to run veritable charnel houses, with torture chambers and weapons caches in the basements. And unlike the Mafia, they don’t kneecap you and put you back on street as an example.
“We are finding charred bodies in furnaces, and huge dumps where hundreds of people, killed execution style and usually after torture, are found. Once you go into the torture chambers you don’t come out, unless rescued before they can get to you.
They start with power drills into the knees, preferably after calling your family or workplace so they can hear you scream. Then they drill into the ears, then elsewhere in soft spots. Sometimes they flay (skin them) people alive. And you know all about the beheadings.
“We are really fighting the forces of darkness. The worst is that Muqtada al Sadr mullah. While claiming religious leadership – and a HUGE following thanks to his father – he is more bloody than Hitler in his early years coming to power.
“We got here, for whatever reason. But now we are trying to birth a new country, one that is free and has the rule of law. And there are LOTS of Iraqis who want that, and who have committed their lives to it as well. But we have to get the baby able to walk on his own before we stop carrying it.
“Any artificial attempt by certain politicians to get a withdrawal before the Iraqis are ready to stand on their own – and they are getting there but it may take longer than those politicians want – will cause failure on the part of the new Iraqi government and military, and endanger all of us over here.”
A voice from the front lines to consider as our representatives debate their fate.
