Patriots, Americans, Children of God...

...heed these words.

lessthantolerant – though we will most likely be forced into a grim business, it’s important that we not enjoy it. Go look at the pictures and video from Boston. That’s what the sort of war that’s brewing here will look like – innocents bear the brunt of civil wars, and collateral damage is inevitable – while I am pretty sure no patriots would target a civilian social event, when shit gets real, accidents and collateral will happen. Women, the elderly, and children will die because of the direct actions of both sides in the fight.

Things are going to get despicably black, and whatever needs to be done, will be so – but it’s important that we not come to relish the black acts. We’ll have enough to answer for in the end as we stand before God, without having to justify blood-lust.

Ain’t nothing fun or glorious about what’s coming. After years of abuse, I know the desire to get some payback long deserved. Once the pot start boiling over, and reactions and results meet reality, it will quickly become apparent that “real” ain’t very pretty.

There won’t be any greatness to this. Just a lot of slaughter and suffering. By all parties. And it’s going to last a long time. The satisfaction of retribution fades. The jubilation over a victory calms. Guilt, pain, loss, these things are forever.

Don’t be too happy about what’s probably coming. I ain’t trying to dissuade anybody from paying liberty’s toll. But I won’ t be called to the table for blowing sunshine up anybodies assholes either. Not over this. This is reality. There is no riding off into the sunset and a happy ending.

War is the second worst word in the world.

Right behind “slavery.”

Misha's expansion:

You just won the thread, LC HempRopeAndStreetlight.

Pay attention, everybody, because HRAS just nailed it, right on the fucking head. Every word of that comment ought to be engraved in a brass plate and put in a prominent place wherever patriots gather. Not to demoralize, but to help understand the full gravity of the situation.

What we’re looking at, should it come to pass, is not a reason to be cheerful. It’s quite the opposite. There is no glory in bloodshed, there is no such thing as a “splendid little war”, and there is precious little consolation to be found even in victory, should that be granted to us. I’ll proceed in the following as if we will win, portraying the best case scenario. And that’s not pretty. If we lose, it will be worse.

War is sometimes, regrettably, necessary, but it is never desirable. It is not a consummation devoutly to be wish’d for, and one should never find pleasure in the thought of it. Because if one is capable of doing so, then one hasn’t understood the concept at all.

The second revolutionary war, or second civil war if you prefer, will be bloody. It will leave a lot of people dead. A lot of us writing here today will be among them. So will a lot of our loved ones. And a lot of innocent people who wanted no part of the fight but became casualties of it nonetheless.

Songs will, most likely, not be sung about us either. We’ll be numbers, statistics, just another butcher’s bill, and though those fallen for liberty will most likely be remembered fondly as a concept, as in “we thank those who fought and died for liberty” every anniversary of our victory, statues most likely won’t be erected in our honor, any more than the vast majority of those fallen before us are household names now. Some will be, to be sure, but most will not be.

So if it’s glory you’re after, you need to pick up another hobby.

Then there are those of us who survive. They might very well end up envying those who did not.

Because, again, there is no such thing as “a splendid little war.” Innocents will die, orders will be given and we’ll either be the ones giving them or the ones following them, that will lead to the destruction of people who never deserved to die. That is the nature of the beast. The enemy won’t be polite enough to place himself in areas where he can be safely and clinically wiped out without impacting the surrounding civilians, and we won’t always have the option of not striking anyways. In fact, most cases we won’t have that option at all.

So we will end up with innocent blood on our hands, and no amount of cheering that we got the bastards as well is going to make up for that.

As HRAS already said, jubilation that you just scored a hit on the enemy is temporary. Guilt, shame, remorse and hindsight, on the other hand, are not. They’re forever. And that’s a long, long time.

If what is happening leads to what increasingly looks inevitable, then that is not a reason for good cheer and “America FUCK YEAH!”, because all of us, no exceptions, will have a lot to answer for. Both to ourselves in the unlikely event that we survive and to G-d when we face Him.

I’m not trying to be a downer here, because we have to do what we have to do and slavery is not an option, it is worse than any alternative, but keep all of this in mind.

Grim resolve and determination is the order of the day if, Heaven forbid, it comes to that, we’ll do what we have to do as free human beings, but don’t delude yourselves into thinking that it will, in any way, be glorious.

Because it won’t be.

I can promise you that much.

Exactly right, brothers.  God help us all.