Duet of the Past

"I say in the clearest possible terms...all of this I have had to endure for something that I did not do. …[Victims' relatives ] continue to have my sincere sympathy for the unimaginable loss that they have suffered.”

- Statement from Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, the only man convicted of the bombing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie Scotland in December of 1988, upon his arrival in Tripoli, Thursday August 20, after his release.

"There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened that day in My Lai. I feel remorse for the Vietnamese who were killed, for their families, for the American soldiers involved and their families. I am very sorry."

- Former Lt. William L. Calley, Speaking to the Columbus Georgia Kiwanis Club, Wednesday August 18, 2009. These were his first public comments since his conviction for his role in the My Lai massacre in March 1968.

Within a day of each other two voices took us back to the terrors of the past.

Abdelbaset Ali Mohamed al-Megrahi, was the only person convicted for the bombing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie Scotland. 259 people on board, and 11 people on the ground were killed. Mr. al-Megrahi , has steadfastly maintained his innocence. He arrived in Tripoli, to a hero’s welcome after being released by Scotland.

Two days earlier, former Lt. William L. Calley, spoke at a meeting of the local Kiwanis club in Columbus, Georgia where he lives. He spoke about My Lai, and to everyone’s surprise, he answered every question asked. In March of 1968, then Lt. Calley, lead US troops into the village of My Lai on a search and destroy mission. Even though they had not come under enemy fire, Calley’s troops opened up on the villagers, killing over 500 men, women and children. He was convicted in 1971 and sentenced to life in prison. President Nixon commuted his sentence, and he served 3 years under house arrest.

Time marches on. The Lockerbie bomber is ill and frail. The young Lt. Calley of memory has turned into an owlish looking man, in his late 60’s with thick glasses and haunted eyes. One man has accepted responsibility and the other hasn’t. It is clear from his remarks that Calley is burdened by his actions. It is clear from his remarks that al-Megrahi is not.

Most people have forgotten about both incidents. The human and spiritual sacrifice made by the killers and killed changed nothing. We lost in Viet Nam, the carnage in My Lai having made little difference one way or the other. Despite Pan Am 103 falling from the sky the mid-east remains a stalemate with thousand more having died. Both incidents are faded memories of people of certain generations.

But both incidents have similar lessons to teach us today.

Both eras are in danger of being wrapped up in a warm fuzzy afterglow. A movie about Woodstock is coming out, which may whitewash away the darker elements that people at that time were trying to break away from. Like the musical Grease, and the TV show Happy Days, gave us a dreamy view of the fifties without segregation, McCarthyism and the cold war, so the Woodstock movie may wash away Viet Nam, Detroit, Newark, My Lai, JFK, RFK and MLK.

We look at 1988 as the golden era of Pax Americana. It was also the era of “Greed is Good,” which is the direct ancestor of today’s economic meltdown. 21 years later innocents are still being murdered over the need of a Palestinian homeland.

By wrapping these eras up in warm and fuzzy memories, we lose the warnings that they held for us. My Lai warned us of Blackwater. In both cases a group of armed men were put in a high pressure situation, fighting combatants who were both deadly and hard to identify. In those situations it is easy to see everyone as your enemy and every enemy as a target and not a person.

We also miss the lesson of what happens when a people become angry and powerless. The same anger and powerless feelings that planted a bomb in Pan Am 103 was also at the controls of four different jets on 9/11/2001. Those feelings are at the wheel of every truck bomb, and in the heart of every person who wears a jacket of explosives in a crowded market. Until that anger is addressed and the feeling powerlessness is resolved, people will still bomb innocents.

The final sad lesson is how numb we become to these horrors. I don’t think we are numb because bigger more awful things have happened, but because of the large number of smaller atrocities of over a long period of time. We have become numb to the human carnage, the widows and widowers, the orphans, the wounded.

We click past or flip the page on the latest truck bomb or suicide bomber. The story is almost a boiler plate, only changing the city, country and number of victims. It has become “normal” and we don’t notice it any more.

So the bombers climb in their trucks, and young contractors, and depersonalize the people they are facing, and gun them down for no apparent reason. My Lai warned of Blackwater, and Pan Am warned us of 9/11.

What do Blackwater and 9/11 warn us of?