Tomas Young's Letter To George W. Bush And Dick Cheney Calls Out Obsession of Power and Responsibility of Many Deaths
United States war veteran Tomas Young wrote a letter addressed to former President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney on the 10th anniversary of the Iraq War.
In an excerpt of the letter Young wrote that was published on Truthdig, Young blamed Cheney and Bush for what happened.
"I write this letter, my last letter, to you, Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. I write not because I think you grasp the terrible human and moral consequences of your lies, manipulation and thirst for wealth and power. I write this letter because, before my own death, I want to make it clear that I, and hundreds of thousands of my fellow veterans, along with millions of my fellow citizens, along with hundreds of millions more in Iraq and the Middle East, know fully who you are and what you have done. You may evade justice but in our eyes you are each guilty of egregious war crimes, of plunder and, finally, of murder, including the murder of thousands of young Americans-my fellow veterans-whose future you stole."
Young was paralyzed in Iraq in 2004, when a bullet from an AK-47 severed his spine, causing him to never walk again, Truthdig reported. For almost nine years following the incident, Young would suffer a number of medical setbacks that allowed him to survive only with the help of extensive medical procedures and the care of his wife, Claudia.
Young volunteered his services to the United States when he enlisted in its military days after the 9/11 attacks that killed 3,000 men, women and children.
The then 22-year old from Kansas City, Mo. said in the letter that he wanted revenge against the country that struck the World's Trade Center. Instead, he said he was a victim of Bush and Cheney's greed and hunger for power.
In February, at a screening of the documentary, "Body of War," which Young is the subject matter; he told the audience that he planned to end his life in April.
"It's time," he told the audience over Skype, while seated beside his wife. "When I go I want be alert and aware."
As Young plans to no longer rely on the medical attention that keeps him alive, he wrote the letter, calling Bush and Cheney cowards, but hopes their time of reckoning is near.
"My day of reckoning is upon me. Yours will come. I hope you will be put on trial. But mostly I hope, for your sakes, that you find the moral courage to face what you have done to me and to many, many others who deserved to live. I hope that before your time on earth ends, as mine is now ending, you will find the strength of character to stand before the American public and the world, and in particular the Iraqi people, and beg for forgiveness," Young wrote.
Read The WHOLE LETTER HERE.