Let's talk about the US removing memorials for Afghanistan veterans.... - Belle of the Ranch

[TexasTowelie]

Well, howdy there Internet people. It's Belle again. So, today we're going to talk about the US removing memorials for Afghanistan veterans.

The flower boxes outside a US government building had 44 flags placed in them. The city maintains jurisdiction over the street, but the flower boxes were under the jurisdiction of the federal government. Residents of the city attached the names of people from their community who were soldiers and were lost fighting between 2002 and 2014 in America's long conflict in Afghanistan to the flags and put them neatly in the flower boxes.

Memorializing the fallen seems like it was just a bit too much for this administration. So, the flags were removed. I'm sure most Americans hearing this are probably pretty upset by this move. Here's the twist. The flags were put up in the city of Copenhagen outside the US embassy, and they honored Danish troops lost fighting in our war. It makes sense. Denmark had a higher per capita casualty rate than the US did in our war.

This happened with the backdrop of Trump saying that NATO allies “stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.” I have a whole video on Trump's claim, but just for the sake of clarification this did not happen. NATO troops did not avoid frontline service. After Trump's remark, he tried to walk the comment back with a half-hearted apology, but it was only aimed at the UK. I said at the time, that wasn't going to satisfy our allies.

Copenhagen's Mayor for Environmental Affairs--and if I don't have that title right, I apologize--there's not a lot of English coverage on this yet, said, “The flags marked in a very nice and quiet manner. the tremendous effort that the Danish soldiers deployed there made over several years.” She went on to call their removal disrespectful. That seems like an understatement.

I would imagine most Americans were picturing little red, white, and blue flags being removed. It's upsetting. Now, imagine if one of our allies requested our help, we provided it, then their president said, "We didn't really fight," then didn't apologize, then they removed little flags with the names of the fallen from outside their embassy. And all of that occurred after they implied they would seize territory from us, one way or another.

Americans get incensed when citizens in opposition countries burn a US flag. They get mad when US citizens do it. Now imagine an allied government removing flags with names of our soldiers who were lost fighting their war. An embassy spokesperson said there was no malicious intent behind removing the memorials.

Look, I find it incredibly hard to believe that the Marine Corps Embassy Security Group didn't know and didn't inform those who made the decision to remove them. Those guys notice when the same person walks by the building an unusual amount of times. I feel like they would have noticed more than 40 flags being planted in a security feature. If you don't know, those flower beds aren't really for decoration. They're physical security barriers.

Now, somebody is going to say, "See, that's why they had to be removed because of security." False. The flags don't interfere with their function. And beyond that, from what we've heard at time of recording, the flags were reinstalled after the massive outcry.

I cannot stress how much damage this administration is doing to US reputation and power. We have allied combat veterans from our wars protesting our embassy. These are people who literally fought for us. This happened at the center of US diplomatic efforts in the country. As a general rule, diplomats aren't supposed to insult an allied host nation.

Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.