Organized Lies

When do lies become unavoidable truths?

When the lie is intended to frighten?

When the lie has the potential to hurt?

When the lie is used to kill?

War, like life, is full of lies, some great, and some small. Each lie has a different consequence, while each of those consequences causes a ripple, a butterfly effect, and goes on to affect more people than the liar* (not necessarily one person or a person at all) intended.

Regardless of my opinion about the administration of George W. Bush, there is no denying the lies they fed us resulted in the loss of many lives. The term WMD has become a part of our vernacular and it is all because of a great lie.

In an article titled “Ten Appalling Lies We Were Told About Iraq”, the writer plainly states ten lies the Bush administration told the American public and the world about the situation in Iraq and then goes on to point out why they are lies and what the actual truth, if any, is behind what was said.

LIE #1: “The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program … Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons.” — President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002

Full Article

Tim O’Brien addresses lies in “The Things They Carried”, but for a different reason. His lies are used for different purposes, even though the lies are still contained within the body of war. Did he kill that young Vietnamese boy? Does it even matter?

“You can tell a true war story by the questions you ask. Somebody tells you a story, let’s say, and afterward you ask, “Is it true?” and if the answer matters, you’ve got your answer” (O’Brien 83).

Is there a right time to lie and a wrong time to lie? Maybe. Probably, in fact. But only if the ends justify the means. Only if the liar is smart enough to know the difference and only if the interests of others are put before everything else.

I think the end, as of now, shows an America left with a bitter legacy of lies–lies that have killed 4,261 members of the U.S. military and wounded 67,237, according to a recent article on Consortium News.

I think O’Brien was right in saying “…story-truth is sometimes truer than happening-truth” (O’Brien 179) but I think it only applies to certain circumstances. Happening-truth is always truer than story-truth when lives are lost in-between.