Robert C. Koehler

The American military, which purports to be supporting women's rights in Afghanistan, could hardly be said to value women's rights in its own ranks. Rape has long been a side effect of militarism and war, and any discussion—let alone investigation—of it has long been avoided.

Volunteering to serve a murderous lie is not a rite of passage, it's a recruitment goal. For many, it's a step into hell. Real service is not a farce, and it involves more than limitless obedience to a medal-bedecked higher authority.

Eight trillion dollars have been surrendered to 20 years of high-tech killing and nation-wrecking, but this is hardly questioned. There's no accountability. The future that we want, the one that still includes humanity, remains an ideal.

The first step in ending war is seeing it for what it is. It's time to declassify the secrets and the lies.

Only when I stop knowing what I know do I see the world as it is, do I see it shimmer and pulsate, do I see it bleed wonder.

What gives political leaders the wherewithal to violate basic human values—established moral standards—and perpetrate the inhumanity of war?

Let us put an end to nationalism once and for all.

We can no longer create a wasteland and call it peace.