I don't think blaming the individual soldier is ever a fair choice. Most folks in the army aren't there by first or even second choice. the amount of pro military military people is shockingly low.

to say it another way:

veterans should never be ashamed they are veterans, the government and voters should be ashamed they're creating veterans.

Didn’t downvote you, but i assume that yes, most people here are able to understand that human life is complex, and that we should congratulate people whenever they’re doing something good.

Most people are, fortunately, also able to distinguish between a soldier, his army policy, and the regime ruling over that army at a given time.

I disagree that we should congratulate anyone whenever they do something good, no matter what they did in the past.

Would you blindly congratulate a participant in the Bucha massacre on the launch of their new app?

Would you congratulate a former ISIS member?

Surely even the most amoral person on HN would draw the line somewhere?

Was a soldier who was posted to Iraq morally inferior to a colleague who didn't get posted?

I mean, neither was her choice? Soldiers go where they are sent.

Or do you think people shouldn't join the armed forces of a country in case a future regime deploys them in a way they disagree with?

You're able to safely post that stupid comment because of soldiers and Pax Americana.

What does the iraq or afghan war have to do with pax americana? Was 2003 iraq a real threat to the global empire?

Where in my post did I say that?

If you do want to see my response about the endless wars:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34249354

But comment you replied to is about the 1A and the military that makes that possible.

So he can absolutely criticize or even boycott soldiers that invaded iraq, because they have 0 to do with pax americana, and did nothing to protect the 1A and the constitution anyways. I don't get how your comment makes sense otherwise

What’s stupid about it?

Because of the latter half of my sentence you ignored.

It's easy to highroad everyone when you sit back reaping the benefits of what others have done.

I’m not high roading anyone, I’m merely saying I prefer products not built by war criminals. I certainly don’t reap any benefits from what Matt and his fellow soldiers did in Iraq during their illegal war, and even if I did - does that mean I can’t talk about it?

Please lookup the definition of high roading.

But yes, you certainly can talk about your misguided views! And people can call out your misguided views as well!

All because of the 1A which is protected from outside forces with the strength of the US military.

Soldiers have little to do with policies such as the endless Middle East wars.

Your moral crusade should be aimed at the defense contractors and their congress buddies.

It's not the soldiers choosing proxy wars in Ukraine or the Middle East, it's congress.

Soldiers sent to war are not automatically war criminals, whether or not the war was legitimate. Your blanket statement suggests that a mechanic, chef, or nurse who was sent to Iraq was a war criminal. You are just wrong.

I think you calling someone a war criminal is way outside of what is legitimate on this forum.

Yes. I am not in a position to judge individual Russian or US military members without quite a bit more context.

I didn't downvote you but I think equating the Russian attack on Ukraine with the American war on Iraq is probably what earned you the downvotes. Especially because you seem to equate the too based on the extent and number of war crimes. Committing war crimes seems to be the norm, even an expectation in the Russian army. These also seem being denied and never investigated while they are pretty well documented. This doesn't seem to be the case with the US army. (Yes, they did happen, but they seem to happen at a much lower rate, more isolated cases and some of them actually get investigated officially and the perpetrators get sentenced.)

And then let's not forget that the American war in Iraq (and Afghanistan) has been ironically labelled as "democracy export" for a reason. Yes, it didn't work, yes it was probably a bad idea from the start, but at least it wasn't "autocracy export". Which the war on Ukraine is. The goal of the Russian leadership (read: Putin) has been to remove the democratically elected Ukrainian leadership and install a puppet government. This is a bit harder to support than the US narrative of toppling a dictatorship and help the people to start a democracy. (Again, even if the latter was doomed to fail.)

Sure, the Russian soldiers and society were also sold a nice (horror) story about the Ukrainian leadership (or maybe Ukrainians in general) being 'nazi'. You can hear in some captured phone calls from the early days of the war that the soldiers try to explain to their relatives that there are no 'nazis' there just normal people.

On I side note, I would use a product built by a Russian soldier who participated in the war if he made it clear that he didn't want to participate and didn't commit (or maybe even opposed/prevented committing) war crimes.