It was considered a tragedy when one of my own kin joined a high school program called Junior Reserve Officers Training in high school. That this program professes to not recruit children and in fact are barred from doing so in public high schools has been contradicted by former students who signed on for the war in Iraq in recent years. Some have served their time and now dedicate their lives telling the truth. They were in fact not only recruited while still minors in high school, but also were encouraged and rewarded (sometimes monetarily, per head) for recruiting other children.
The program is used in place of the physical education requirements we have in the U.S. and the commitment is said to be a very loose two year one. If a child wants out, they say, "No Problem", but then the regular high school staff raise a fuss and state they have no room in regular classes for anybody who wants out of JROTC. That is how they enforce the commitment.
The embedding of this program in public schools has drawn protests from parents and anti war groups. Entire regular schools have been shut down, their student body displaced only to reopen as Military Academies. Both the JROTC and the military academies are funded by the public as well as the respective arms of the military (also funded by the public) that run them. Its part of a larger privatization of public education plan better known as "school reform".
School closures are largely in ethnic or economic minority neighborhoods. The U.S. military has a disproportionate amount of these populations serving in the real military and recruitment bases are usually in very close proximity to high schools with large ethnic populations, something anti war protesters are trying to change.
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan was the mastermind that spawned these academies when he ran Chicagos public education system but other cities have followed this model proudly. They call it "opportunity" and "choice". One of the first things Obama stated as President was that he would be closing 5000 schools nationwide in order to "reform" them. This is just the tip of the iceberg. More closings will follow.
Americans are buying the school reform issues and sadly, sending their children to the military academies under the assumption that these academies are going to keep their kids out of street gangs, in the case of the ethnic and poor victims of the plan. I have news for these parents- gangs have made their way into the military, into the police force and other allegedly "safe" American institutions. They have legit branches. Our kids are in double jeopardy.
Make that triple jeopardy. Because the biggest gang of all- the neocon Zionists- are the leading force behind any supposedly "American" agenda. While Obama is hypnotizing his politically correct followers with plans to pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. has it's eyes on Iran on behalf of Israel, as we know, but to the ordinary American, its for our own good, to keep our American way alive (that this way collapsed, perhaps permanently,still hasn't fully sunk in to many, but all the more reason to support the militarization of our society).
Most Americans believe that Iran (the current proxy for Zionist genocidal rage) poses a danger to our nation. The War On Terror is a winning formula for the masters and we are its puppets. School reform via JROTC and military academies, is just one way we are being eased into the process of perpetual war.
Make no mistake, one day it will be your children coming home in body bags. And there will be nothing to be proud of, the sacrifice will not produce a safer world, but a more dangerous one.
While our children are being slaughtered, Israeli children grow up to fight an unarmed, occupied and imprisoned population. Safe and sound in comparison to what our own children will face. Our children will face war tribunals one day. Israeli children will not. We should be ashamed when we let our children don a uniform, even in the playtime that is JROTC.
My children will not fight for the U.S. of Israel. I will not hate on its behalf. Be clear about who the real enemy is. And if you are a patriot, start working towards leadership with American interests. Israel is a big boy now, a fully armed and dangerous psychopathic bully. Let Israel take care of its own dirty business all on its own. Leave our children out of it.
4 years ago
