The German Military Cemetery in Normandy

The German Military Cemetery in Normandy sits beside the highway that connects Omaha Beach with the Airborne Museum in St. Mere Eglise to the west. The German and American cemeteries are both somber green spaces providing a final resting place for soldiers, but they are very different.

The American Cemetery has a huge memorial statue with tall battle maps show the defeat of Germany after the historic invasion on the beaches below and across Normandy. All of the American headstones face west, toward home, in neat rows.

The 21,000 soldiers interred in the German cemetery are in double rows facing each other marked with flat stones. They circle a central monument to the soldiers, honoring their bravery and sacrifice. The place quietly honors courage.

It may seem obvious, but there are no maps, no flags, no explanations of why these men fought.  There no statues of Hitler, Himmler or any of the Nazi leaders. That cemetery along with the Holocaust memorials I visited showed me how perverse it is that Americans from the South still wave battle flags from the racist war they lost and fight to keep statues of the men who, if they were successful, would have my sons and every other person of African descent in America in chains today.

The South fought to defend the ugliest form of slavery in history, slavery for life with no way to buy yourself out and no hope of release. Greek and Roman forms of slavery in the ancient world were more humane. America was also the last western country to free the slaves, then quickly formed an apartheid region of America.  Since the apartheid state lasted for a hundred years after the slave owners lost their war, its creeping racism still infects American life.

The South not only segregated housing and water fountains, they segregated healthcare. One reason our healthcare system is so complicated compared to European countries is that any federal plan for healthcare in the 20th Century had to allow for hospitals and healthcare plans that were separate and quite unequal in the South.

The soldiers who fought for the South deserve honor as brave men who died for the rebellion they supported. But the Southern cause glorifies racism. In Germany you can't honor Nazism and Hitler. In Serbia there are no pickup trucks with Slobodon Milosovic's name stenciled on them. Nobody publicly honors ethnic cleansing.

Nobody should publicly honor the fight to keep other Americans in chains.

Israel: Everyday Life with Soldiers

Today two events convinced me that soldiers in Israel really are part of everyday life.  This afternoon I stopped at a coffee shop around the corner from my hotel.  The owner was sitting at an outside table with an Army sergeant and a rabbi. The owner is in his forties. The rabbi was older than me. The sergeant was not yet 25.

When I walked up to the counter inside to order a cappuccino, the sergeant made it. He had an automatic pistol clipped into the waist of his pants. A magazine was in the weapon. And he makes a very good cappuccino. He also made espresso for a woman who walked in.

After getting coffee for us, he went back outside and continued his conversation.

Tonight I ate dinner in a small food court where local vendors sell food and people eat at little tables or take out.  I sat with a plate of hummus, salad and chicken at a table with one chair.  A sergeant carrying a wicked looking Tavor assault rifle with a magazine in the chamber stopped next to my table.

The six-foot-tall sergeant dropped a big duffel bag and a backpack next to my table, smiled for a second, pulled out his phone, walked to the end of the room and had a very animated phone conversation with someone. He was clearly angry.  He held the phone with his shoulder, gestured with the one hand while talking and steadied the weapon with the other.

In America, the two kinds of people who would have an automatic rifle in a food court would be a security guard or the kind of jerk who needs to exercise his right to open carry. If either of those guys was yelling in his phone, I would have left the area immediately, then called 911.

But I looked around and no one seemed bothered at all. I kept eating and watched him. After a couple of minutes he calmed down. He ordered a sandwich, walked back towards me, put the sandwich in his pack, smiled again, picked up his gear and walked out.

Soldiers are part of life. They help their friends, they deal with problems and life goes on.

Israeli Defense Forces: What a Democratic Army Looks Like

The Israeli Army is what a democratic army looks like. I would have said that before setting foot in Israel, but after two train rides, two bus rides, and walking in both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, I saw an army that is of the people.

First, they are young.  I shared bus stops and train platforms with dozens of men and women somewhere around 20 years old at the most with backpacks, smartphones and automatic rifles.

They are also fit. I went to Iraq with a unit in which four in ten of the soldiers flunked the basic fitness test. All the Israeli soldiers I saw would bury me in a fitness test. And they should. Our all volunteer army cannot compel people, so they entice. And some people they entice are really not the kind of people who should be in the military.

They are part of Israeli everyday life. No one thinks it strange to see a young man sling his weapon under his arm so he can read a book while he waits for a train.  At one bus stop a young woman made a practiced move swing her carbine from her side to her front then holding the muzzle with her left hand she bent forward flipping her hair long over her head and brushing it. She then wrapped it into a ponytail. And her weapon was in her control the whole time.

The Israeli soldiers on the street are not like the knots of four French soldiers in combat gear and carrying assault rifles that patrol train stations and airports with their game face on. They are part of everyday life. They read, the laugh, take selfies, smoke. One woman I saw walking and both sip an espresso and smoke with the same hand.

The Israeli Army is a patriotic army. Everyone serves. Everyone makes some sacrifice. Some make every sacrifice. And just as in America before the Vietnam War, no one could run to be Commander-in-Chief of the nation after dodging the draft. That person could not run for anything. Benjamin Netanyahu, the current Prime Minister, was wounded in action in 1972, was part of a Special Forces team in the Yom Kippur War and left the military a captain with a distinguished record. From Truman to Eisenhower to Kennedy, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan and Bush 41, our postwar presidents were all veterans.