Jeff Edwards is a retired U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer, and an Anti-Submarine Warfare Specialist. He is currently working as a civilian expert consultant to the Fleet Anti-Submarine Warfare Command, the Navy's think tank for high-tech undersea warfare. His naval career spanned more than two decades and half the globe -- from chasing Soviet nuclear attack submarines during the Cold War, to launching cruise missiles in the Persian Gulf.
He puts his extensive experience as a Surface
Warfare specialist to work in his new novel,
TORPEDO.
In a plot that could easily be ripped from
today's headlines, TORPEDO combines an accident
at a nuclear power plant, an illegal arms
deal, and a biological warfare attack, to
ignite a crisis that could draw Western Europe,
the Middle East, and the United States into
all-out war. TORPEDO mixes the elements of
a classic sea chase novel with state-of-the-art
technology to create a cutting-edge Surface
Warfare Thriller.
[Have an opinion on this article? Go to the Discussion
Forum to sound off.]
By Jeff Edwards
It seems that everywhere I turn these days, I come across people who are deeply ashamed of the United States. Opinion columnists and activists are outraged by simple holiday greetings. They hold up the phrase 'Merry Christmas' as sad proof that our nation is locked in the clutches of some dark Orwellian theocracy. Apparently, the very presence of a nativity scene on the lawn of a courthouse amounts to ironclad evidence of religious oppression in America.
Military experts - many of whom have never served a day in uniform - are horrified by the so-called tactical blunders of our forces in Iraq. A lot of these Monday-morning quarterbacks have developed an America-can-do-no-right mentality that allows them to slap a negative spin on anything we undertake. If a skirmish leads to more enemy casualties than American casualties, we are accused of engaging in overkill, or wanton brutality. Should that same skirmish lead to more American casualties than enemy casualties, then our Intelligence is poor, or our troops are improperly lead, or they are improperly outfitted. When there are no significant casualties on either side (or a roughly equal number of casualties) the experts assure us that we are bogged down, and the Vietnam analogies begin to fly.
Documentary filmmakers paint our military personnel as either butchers, or the most pitiful sort of sheep - blindly following orders. If the Michael Moores of the world are to be believed, any national leader who orders military action is a megalomaniac by definition.
College students brand America as a nation of hypocrites, because we try to engender Human Rights in other countries, when we don't have perfect harmony and equality at home.
If you listen to these critics, you will discover that the American Dream is horribly broken. You will also learn that the only proper course of action is to hang our collective heads in shame at the utter failure of our nation to accomplish anything noble, or even worthwhile.
My response to that attitude is, frankly, not fit to print. I am not ashamed of America. Far from it, I am proud of this nation. I'm proud of our accomplishments. I'm proud of who we are, and what we do.
I'm not suggesting for a microsecond that the United States is perfect. We have our share of problems, perhaps more than our share. But the fact that we are not flawless does not give us license to lie down and quit trying. Our imperfections and inequities are not symptoms of abject failure, as so many columnists and reporters seem to believe. Instead, they are a call to action. They are our to-do list for the future: a blueprint for our nation's continued improvement.
Yes, there is corruption in our government, in our industry, and in our law enforcement systems. Many countries accept corruption as a natural function of everyday life. Americans do not. We treat corruption like a cancer: a malignancy that must be removed for survival and healthy growth. We actively search for corruption, and when we find it, we do our level best to cut it out. Cynics will tell you that big money, political clout, and police connections shield wrongdoers from the consequences of their actions. But Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling's millions could not protect him or his crooked financial empire. He may yet manage to avoid prison, but his ivory tower has been cast down and broken. Richard Nixon discovered the hard way that even the oval office cannot offer absolute protection from the wheels of justice. And there are more than enough dirty cops and judges behind bars to demonstrate that our society does not tolerate corruption among the ranks of law enforcement.
Naysayers are quick to point out that we have not eliminated prejudice and inequality from our country. They're obviously correct. But to have any meaning, progress must be measured over time. By way of example, let's take my imaginary friend Joe. When he stood on the scale this morning, Joe weighed 198 pounds. Is he gaining weight, or is he losing weight? To answer that question, you'd have to know what Joe weighed yesterday, and last week, and last month. In other words, to be useful, criticism must take into account the past as well as the present. You cannot tell how much progress we are making if you don't know how we were doing yesterday, last year, and twenty years ago. Do we have racial inequities in America? Of course. But we've made huge strides over the past several decades. Where our courts once codified the long arm of Jim Crow, the law now seeks to protect all citizens from discrimination. We work to educate the intolerant, and to foster inclusion, and celebrate diversity. I invite anyone who doubts our progress to look at photos from my early childhood, when 'Colored Only' signs still hung on restroom doors and water fountains. I was young, but I remember what it was like. We have a long way to go, but we've already come an incredible distance, and we continue to make progress.
