It's our war too.

All Americans share responsibility for the actions of our government. We elect the officials and either support or condemn their actions.

We let George Bush and his neo-con cronies start an unprovoked war in Iraq. We stayed quiet even after we knew the rationale for war was a lie. We saw the videos of Abu-Ghraib. We didn’t demand our Senators and Congressmen stop the violence and abuse. We sat comfortably in our living rooms in front of the TV clicking our tongues over the awful things our government was doing as if it was out of our hands.

If our soldiers and mercenaries murdered innocent Iraqi civilians, they must be held accountable. If our military and intelligence personnel tortured and abused prisoners, they must be prosecuted. If the Bush Administration broke the law, they must face the consequences. We can’t pretend these things didn’t happen and blithely continue on with the rest of our lives. We let them happen.

So we must accept the responsibility for all the brave young men and women who were sent on a fool’s errand and returned home broken. We have an obligation to help make our veterans whole and return them emotionally intact to civilian life. We owe them that.

We allowed them to be sent to war.