WHEN YOUR BABY BROTHER GOES OFF TO WAR:

He’s putting himself in danger, and he says it’s his decision

(March 21, 2003)

I remember the day he was born–my baby brother, all red hair and squawking.

I remember his first birthday, him covered head to toe in chocolate cake.

I remember when he learned to swim, ride a bike, tie his shoes.

I remember the neighborhood bullies picking on him, and me bolting out of the house waving two kitchen pots and chasing them down the street.

I remember when he put the dog down the laundry chute, when he stopped believing in Santa Claus, when he was afraid of the basement, when he bought his first skis and his first car.

I remember when he took his first steps, when he learned how to drive and then how to fly.

I remember when he got his appointment to the Air Force Academy and when he graduated four years later, tossing his blue dress hat in the air as a Stealth bomber flew over the Colorado stadium.

Soon, I’ll remember the first time he went off to war.

A war I don’t believe in.

My instinct is to grab a couple of pieces of my heaviest Calphalon and run, screaming, in the direction of whoever is sending him into harm’s way.

President Bush? Saddam Hussein? Uncle Sam?

None of the above.

“I made this decision eight years ago,” my brother was saying on the phone Thursday. “I signed up for this. Being in the Air Force, I knew what I was getting into. It’s our job–and everybody’s got a job. I’m told to go someplace and to do something, and that’s my job. That’s me.”

He believes the war with Iraq is completely justified. It’s hardly the first time we’ve disagreed. He’s a conservative, and I’m a liberal. He likes speed metal. I enjoy folk rock. His idea of fun is hurling himself down the Swiss Alps at 80 mph with a waxed piece of plywood lashed to his feet. I prefer day spas and herbal wraps.

I believe war is always a failure, that diplomacy had not run its course in Iraq, that more harm than good will come from U.S.-led attacks on Iraq.

“I trust the leadership to be damn sure that this war is for a reason and it’s just,” my brother said. “Saddam wasn’t living up to what he was supposed to be doing. He’s a threat. He’s a threat to the stability of the whole region. He’s a direct threat to his own people. He’s murdered his own people, and he’ll do it again. Just like Milosevic and Hitler.

“This is something that needs to be done, that should have been done before. We’re in a position to do something, and we should.”

My brother understands that, while I don’t believe in the war, I do believe in him. I’m proud of what he does, and of who he is. I wouldn’t be any prouder if he had gone to art school instead of the academy and was having his first opening at the Whitney, instead of preparing to deploy to a war zone.

“A lot of times, it’s misunderstood,” he said, explaining that many of his colleagues see anti-war activists as opponents. “Some people out there might be anti-soldier, but the majority of people protesting the war don’t want us to go. I understand that people are behind us, and not against us.”

I remember when he was in grade school, and a kid in his class just wouldn’t let up on him. My brother is naturally passive, a sweet, kind person. But he has a limit, and the kid crossed it.

My brother decked the kid, made his nose bleed. The kid never bothered him again. But my brother felt awful. He didn’t want to hurt the kid.

Not much has changed in 20 years.

“People who say, ‘Go to war, and kick ass there,’ I want to know: Have you been there? Do you know what that means?” he said. “The people that don’t want war the most are the guys and girls who are going to go in there and fight it. We’ll go in there and kick some butt because it’s our job, and we’re fired up to do it. But nobody wants it.”

One thing my brother and I have always agreed on is that his life is squarely in God’s hands.

Just as it was when the training wheels came off his Huffy one-speed long ago.

“You pray to the Lord to watch your back,” he said, as much to remind himself as to assure me. “You trust the Lord to bring you in and out so you don’t have brain bytes invested in worrying.”

Knowing that so many people are praying for him–people who believe the war is unjust, those who tell him to “go kick some ass” and those in between–is a comfort to my brother. And it’s a comfort to me.

“It means a lot,” he said. “You know you’re not alone.”

Copyright 2003 Chicago Sun-Times, Inc.