Where Have All The Flowers Gone?

My oldest daughter Crystal posted a story about flowers recently and it reminded me of the song. It was the "Summer of Love" 1969, right in the middle of the Viet Nam era police action. Pete Seeger wrote it and every pacifist singer or group sang it. Most memorable to me was Peter, Paul and Mary. Mary made the final lines of the song come alive, I thought. "Gone to grave yards, every one. ..... When will they ever learn." I think it was General Westmoreland that said, "It isn't much of a war but it is the only one we've got." The thought being that West Point graduates needed combat experience if they were to have any chance of becoming generals. Every graduating class needs a conflict to participate in, and it seems that one comes along every four or five years to fill that need. Korea, Viet Nam, Panama, Granada, Gulf war I and II and all the others in between and since. In a declared war you are there for the duration but in a police action you rotate out of the conflict every 18 months or so. If you were there, in harms way it was a war no mater what others called it. If you were responsible for sending other peoples sons and daughters to the zone it was anything but a war. Thank you, daddy and David, for serving and coming home alive. Thank you Justin for serving, I hope you never go to a war zone. It's not Memorial day or Veterans day but the song still brings a lump to my throat. Yes it does seem to be a never ending cycle. Flowers to girls to young men to soldiers to grave yards to flowers. What can we do to break the cycle