How much easier it is to surrender to the will of superiors, to merge into the anonymity of the group.如何容易得多，这是投降，到会的上级，融入不愿透露姓名的该集团。 It takes uncommon courage to resist military powers of intimidation, peer pressure, and the atmosphere of racism and hate that drives all imperial wars.它罕见的勇气，抗拒军事强国的恐吓，同侪压力，气氛的种族主义和仇恨驱使所有帝国的战争。

Silencing the Witnesses to War沉默的证人战争

War crimes are collective in nature.战争罪行是集体性质的。 Especially in wars based on fraud, soldiers are expected to lie - to their country, to their community, even to themselves.尤其是在战争的基础上欺诈，士兵预计的谎言-他们的国家，他们的社区，甚至是自己。 The silencing process begins on the battlefield in the presence of officers, power-holders who seek to nullify the perceptions and personal experience of troops under their command.该沉默的过程中开始在战场上，在在场的人员，权力持有人谁寻求废止的看法和个人的经验，部队根据他们的命令。

In his war memoir, Aidan Delgado describes attempts of his commanders to suppress the truth about Abu Ghraib.在他的战争回忆录，艾丹德尔加多描述的企图，他的指挥官镇压的真相阿布格莱布。 First his captain says the Army has nothing to hide, Abu Ghraib is just a rumor.首先，他的队长说，军队已没有什么要隐瞒，阿布格莱布只是一个谣言。 But then the captain continues: “We don’t need to air our dirty laundry in public.但当时的队长继续说： “我们不需要空气我们的脏衣服在公众。 If you have photos that you’re not supposed to have, get rid of them.如果你有照片，您不会有，摆脱他们。 Don’t talk about this to anyone, don’t write about it to anyone back home.” In the US military, the truth is seditious.不要谈论这给任何人，不写它向任何人返回家园“ 。在美国军事，真理是有煽动性。

Two years ago, Marine Sergeant Jimmy Massey published his riveting autobiography (written with Natasha Saulnier) in France and Spain.两年前，海洋警长麦梅西发表了他的自传中铆（书面与娜塔莎索尼耶）在法国和西班牙。 How the Marine Corps - through indoctrination and intimidation - transforms a homeboy from the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina into a professional killer who murders “innocent people for his government” is the subject of Massey’s unsettling, impassioned, Jar-head raunchy, and ultimately uplifting memoir, COWBOYS FROM HELL.如何海军陆战队-通过灌输和恐吓-变换一h o meboy从大烟山北卡罗莱纳州成为一个专业的杀手谁谋杀“无辜人民为他的政府”是的主题马西的不安，慷慨激昂，罐头黄色笑话派，最终向上的回忆录，来自地狱的牛仔。 (No US publisher has picked up the book. A Marine who speaks truth to power is not without honor save in his own country.) In Chapter 18, Jimmy describes a seemingly minor encounter with his captain. （没有美国的出版者，已拿起这本书。海事谁讲真理，电力也不是没有的荣誉保存在他自己的国家。 ）在第18章，麦描述看似轻微遇到与他的队长。 Here Massey gives us a look into the process of human denial in its early phase.马西在这里让我们看的过程中的人力拒绝在其早期阶段。

Massey has just participated in a checkpoint massacre of civilians.梅西刚刚参加了一个检查站，屠杀平民。 His sense of decency, his sanity, is still in tact.他的责任感，正直，他的理智，仍是在机智。 Like any normal human being, he is distraught.像任何正常人，他是悲痛。 The carnage of the war, the imbalance of power between the biggest war machine in history and a suffering people devoid of tanks and air power - the sheer injustice of it all - begins to take its toll on Massey’s conscience.大屠杀的战争，失衡之间的权力最大的战争机器在历史和受苦受难的人民缺乏坦克和空中力量-纯粹是不公正的这一切-开始采取收费对梅西的良心。

In the wake of the horrific events of the day, his captain is cool.在之后的可怕事件的当天，他的队长是很酷。 He walks up to Massey and asks; “Are you doing all right, Staff Sergeant?” Massey responds: “No, sir.他的各界人士多达马西和要求; ： “你做的所有权利，上士” ？马西回应： “主席先生，没有。 I am not doing OK Today was a bad day.我不这样做确定今天是糟糕的一天。 We killed a lot of innocent civilians.”我们杀了很多无辜平民“ 。

Fully of aware of the civilian carnage, his captain asserts: “No, today was a good day.”充分的认识到平民的屠杀，他的队长断言： “不，今天是个好日子” 。

Relatives wailing, cars destroyed, blood all over the ground, Marines celebrating, civilians dead, and “it was good day”!亲属哭，汽车被毁，血液都在地面上，海军陆战队庆祝，平民死亡，和“这是个好日子” ！

The Massey incident goes beyond the mendacity of military life.该梅西事件超越了谎言的军事生活。 It concerns the control, the dehumanization of the psyches of our troops.它涉及到控制，非人化的心理，我们的部队。

As one Vietnam veteran put it years ago: “They kept fucking with my mind.”作为一个越战老兵把它年前： “他妈的，他们不断与我心目中” 。

In 1994 Jonathan Shay, staff psychiatrist in the Department of Veterans Affairs, published a pioneering work on post traumatic stress – 在1994年乔纳森shay ，工作人员的精神科医生，在退伍军人事务部，出版了开拓性工作对创伤后应激- Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character 跟腱在越南：作战创伤和打倒的性格 . 。 According to Shay, who recorded volumes of testimony from Vietnam veterans, commanders routinely try to efface the perceptions and the normal feelings of compassion among American troops. 据shay ，谁记录册的证词，来自越南的退伍军人，指挥官经常尝试抹除的看法，和正常的感情，同情，其中美国部队。 Military necessity, including the ever-present need for political propaganda, determines what is perceived, and how it is perceived, in war. 军事必要性，其中包括不断，目前需要的政治宣传，决定什么是知觉，以及它是如何知觉，在战争中。

It was an extremely common experience in Vietnam, Shay writes, to be told by military superiors dealing with crime and trauma: “You didn’t experience it, it never happened, and you don’t know what you know.” And it was fairly common for traumatized soldiers to say to reporters: “It didn’t happen.它是一个非常共同的经验，在越南， shay写，会告诉军事上级处理犯罪和创伤： “你没有经验，这从来没有发生，和你不知道什么你知道” ，这是相当普遍，为受创伤的士兵对记者说： “这没有发生。 And besides, they had it coming.” Shay recorded the testimony of one veteran who, in great anger, describes the pressures to alter his perceptions of collective murder.此外，他们这来了“ 。 shay记录的证词，一位资深谁，在伟大的愤怒，描述了压力，改变他的看法，集体谋杀的罪名。

Ernest Hemingway’s brilliant short story, Soldier’s Home, published in 1925 after World War I, gives us insight into the reluctance of civilians to address the psychic needs of soldiers back from war.海明威的光辉短篇小说，士兵的家，出版于1925年第一次世界大战后，使我们洞察到不愿平民，以解决心理的需要，士兵回到从战争。

The simply told story is about a young man named Krebs who returns to his home in Oklahoma.简单的说，故事是关于一个年轻的男子名为krebs谁回报，到他家在俄克拉何马州。 At first Krebs does not want to talk about the war.在第一krebs并不想谈论战争。 But soon he feels the need to speak - to his family, his neighbors and friends.但很快，他觉得有必要发言-向他的家人，他的邻居和朋友。 But as Hemingway tells us, “Nobody wanted to hear about it.” His town did not want to learn about atrocities, and “Krebs found that to be listened to at all he had to lie.”但正如海明威告诉我们， “没有人希望听到关于它” ，他的城市并没有想要了解的暴行，及“ krebs发现，要听取所有，他不得不说谎” 。

There’s the rub.有摩擦。 His ability to assimilate into civilian life depended on his willingness to fabricate stories about the war.他有能力吸收融入平民生活，取决于他愿意编造的故事，关于战争。 Soldiers are not only expected to lie on behalf of the military during the course of war, they are also expected to participate in homecoming rituals that preserve the civilian fantasy of war’s nobility.官兵不仅是预期的谎言，代表军方的过程中，战争，他们预计也将参加在回家仪式维护平民的幻想战争的贵族。

In Hemingway’s story, the pressure to lie is so powerful, Krebs begins to manufacture stories about his experiences in battle - just to get along, just be able to lead a normal life.在海明威的故事，压力，谎言是如此强大， krebs开始制造的故事，他的经验，在战斗中-只要相处，只要能够带领过正常的生活。

Repression, however, is a major cause of mental illness and loneliness.镇压，不过，这是一个重要原因，精神病患者和孤独。 Krebs morale deteriorates. krebs的士气恶化。 He sleeps late in bed.他睡在床上晚。 He loses interest in work.他失去了兴趣，工作。 He withdraws into himself.他撤回到自己。

That’s all Hemingway tells us.这是所有海明威告诉我们。 It’sa quietly told story, all the more powerful for its understatement.这是悄悄告诉的故事，所有的功能更强大，为它的轻描淡写。

There is a connection between Hemingway’s war-informed fiction and real life.有一个之间的联系，海明威的战争小说和知情的现实生活。 As Shay notes, there is a tension between a soldier’s need to communalize shame and grief and the unwillingness of civilians to listen to troops whom they sent into battle.作为shay注意到，有一种之间的紧张关系士兵的需要公社化的耻辱和悲痛，并不愿意平民，听取他们的部队已进入战斗。 One Vietnam veteran told the following story:一个越战老兵告诉以下的故事：

WD Erhart, Vietnam veteran and author of Passing Time, never forgot the horrific episodes of his tour in Vietnam.迪士尼公司厄哈特，越战老兵和作者通过的时间，从未忘记可怕的事件，他的旅行团在越南。 In his first autobiography, he tells a friend about his speech at a Rotary Club.在他的首本自传，他告诉一位朋友对他的讲话在扶轮社。 “I even put on a coat and tie and went to the Rotary Club. “我什至把对一件外套和领带，前往扶轮社。 The Rotary Club, for chrissake.扶轮社，为chrissake 。 I laid it all out for ‘em. i奠定了它所有为'教统。 I told ‘em about search and destroy missions, harassment and interdiction fire, winning hearts and minds, all that stuff…Was I ever sharp that day.我说'在有关搜索和摧毁任务，骚扰和阻截火灾，赢得人心，所有的东西…是我以往任何时候都尖锐的那一天。

“Each generation,” writes Chris Hedges, “discovers its own disillusionment, often at a terrible price. “每一代人” ，写道：克里斯对冲“ ，发现自己的幻灭，往往在一个可怕的代价。 And the war in Iraq has begun to produce legions of the lost and the damned.” For our morally courageous veterans - for all of us, really, who seek forgiveness - only the truth can heal.和伊拉克战争已开始产生军团的失落和该死的“为我们的道德勇气退伍军人-对我们所有人来说，真的，谁寻求宽恕-只有真相才能愈合。

BlackCommentator.com Guest Commentator, Paul Rockwell, is a writer living in the Bay Area. blackcommentator.com客户评论员，保罗罗克韦尔，是一个作家生活在湾区。 He is also a columnist for他也是一位专栏作家 In Motion Magazine在议案杂志 . 。 Click点击 here这里 to reach Mr. Rockwell.达到先生罗克韦尔。