When I first read it, I was a bit perplexed. No one could be fond of war, after all. The older I get, and the more wars I read about, the more I come to believe that Gen. Lee had it right.

That's a hard point to grasp, especially today as we commemorate one of the most horrific scenes of modern warfare: D-Day, when Allied troops invaded France. We've all seen the movies, as frightened young men willingly marched into enemy fire on Normandy's beaches.

Yet people still like wars, which is why we fight so many wars that seem so unnecessary.

Soldiers like the challenge and the adventure. I read a Los Angeles Times article during the battle of Fallujah in which the interviewed Marines expressed extreme disappointment that they were not being allowed to go into the city and continue their firefight. They were excited to engage and kill the enemy.

Politicians like war because it gives them a chance to make bold pronouncements about stopping evil. Read any number of President Bush's post-9/11 speeches.

Before the terrorist attacks, Bush had no direction and was struggling with a less-than-resounding mandate. But since then, every word he utters is grandiloquent. Last week, at the Air Force Academy, he compared the (never-ending) war on terror with World War II: "Our goal, the goal of this generation, is the same. We will secure our nation and defend the peace through the forward march of freedom."

I'm not sure if the president would pronounce it correctly, but the word pabulum comes to mind.

Editorialists love war also. They get to pound their chests and call for the nation unifying on behalf of the New National Cause or for Supporting Our Troops. Sure beats writing about the local sewer commission. They get to call for sacrifice. And for honor. And for heroics. Not that they will be engaging in any of those activities personally.

Pro-war writers love to berate those who do not prosecute the war with sufficient gusto. "If you wanted to, you could easily make the case that America is retreating in Iraq," wrote Tom Donnelly in the Weekly Standard. "Under relentless attack in the press, with a nasty campaign fight on its hands, the Bush administration has moved from its natural defensive crouch to a position that at times looks fetal."

It's not just writers, though. There are plenty of people from all walks of life who, from the comfort of their easy chairs or sofas, love to see bombs dropping on The Enemy, even if many of those bombs drop on those who aren't enemies at all.

I have a rule. Always remember that in most any city under siege by military forces are 8-year-old girls playing with dolls and 12-year-old boys playing soccer. "They" are not all terrorists, you know. There are nursing mothers in their bedrooms and kids sitting in schools that are hit by errant bombs.

No one is "collateral damage." Everyone is someone's beloved son or daughter or mother or father.

I'm sure I'll be called names for pointing out such obvious facts.

After all, showing sympathy for a nation's supposed enemies is viewed by some as a sign of cowardice or moral weakness. We need to get them before they get us, or something like that. At least that's what many e-mailers tell me.

I brush it off. Wars make otherwise normal people say stupid things. It gives them license to blast the media as traitors for daring to cover the bad news rather than simply reprinting the Pentagon's press releases. It lets them forget that the justification for the current war on Iraq keeps changing each time the administration's last justification is proven false.

None of those facts really matters.

When the war is on, everything is black and white, everything is good and evil. Our side is always heroic, even though our side sometimes commits atrocities, and their side is always evil, even if many of them no doubt are simply fighting to repel a foreign army.

Some people go to Memorial Day and D-Day celebrations and cheer the talk about bravery and heroism and sacrifice and nationalism and freedom and democracy, without asking tough questions about whether the specific war being commemorated really accomplished all the things the politicians claim it accomplished.

They rightly commemorate U.S. war dead, but it would have been so much better if those men and women had not been forced to give their lives on behalf of a war, especially if that war was a needless one. That's my point.

Every year, some letter-writers complain that people spend Memorial Day having picnics rather than ... well, they never say what exactly we should be doing instead.

I have an idea. Next Memorial Day (or this weekend, as we commemorate D-Day) we can all spend a few minutes pondering this question:

If Americans are so willing to fight for "freedom" abroad, why do they so willingly let their freedoms slip away at home ... without a peep, let alone a battle or full-scale war?

Are we perhaps simply sheep, believing all the lies and half-truths our officials tell us about the threats to our safety and the need for the latest war to end all wars and the importance of letting government make ever more decisions in our lives?

Just asking.

Yes, many Americans have bravely fought in wars, some of which did have something to do with our freedom. But let's not get so caught up in the commemorations that we forget the essential point: There is nothing noble or wonderful about war.

In her column last week about D-Day, The Washington Post's Anne Applebaum, author of the fabulous book, "Gulag: A History," reminded readers that all wars have disturbing unforeseen consequences:

"The liberation of one half of the European continent coincided with a new occupation of the other half. The camps of Stalin, our ally, expanded just as the camps of Hitler, our enemy, were destroyed. Not that you would know it, listening to Americans reminisce about D-Day ... . Perhaps there is no such thing as an entirely 'good war' after all."

Perhaps that's why we should never get involved in a war that is not absolutely necessary.

Perhaps that's why many Americans - including many of us in the libertarian and conservative camp who voted for this president - are seething because of the Iraq debacle.