Blurring the line between soldiers and hired guns

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Ruben Navarrette Jr. / Syndicated columnist


DALLAS — Many Americans seem to be passing through the Iraq war in a state of ambivalence.

In polls, they say they're glad that Saddam Hussein is gone, but they feel misled about the reasons for the invasion. They support the troops, but they have serious misgivings about administration policy. They're confident that the world is a safer place without Saddam, but they still expect more terrorist attacks here at home.

It wouldn't surprise me if what happened last week in Fallujah only winds up intensifying the ambivalence. Americans are right to feel outraged when we see televised images of four of our countrymen savagely murdered — bodies mutilated, burned, dragged through the streets and hanged from bridges like morbid trophies. We are right to want to dig in our heels and declare our determination not to be frightened off by thugs and ghouls.

The U.S. military did the right thing — indeed, the only thing it could do — when it sent more than 1,000 Marines to seal off the city in what it labeled Operation Vigilant Resolve.

But here's what I've been struggling with: The Americans who died on that dreadful day in Fallujah weren't U.S. soldiers. They were soldiers for hire.

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