Donald Trump opened his mouth again. Stop me if you have heard this one before. This time, he decided to spit on the graves of a few hundred British soldiers. He told the world that NATO friends stayed away from the real fight in Afghanistan. He says they were a little off the front lines. It is the kind of thing you say when you think war is a movie and you are the only star. In his head, if the cameras are not on you, you are not actually doing anything.

The British politicians are losing their minds. They are very, very mad. They point to the 457 soldiers they lost. They point to twenty years of dust and blood in a place most of them could not find on a map before 2001. They want an apology. They want respect. They want Trump to admit they were brave. They are not going to get any of that. Trump does not do apologies. He does not do respect. He only does winning, and in his head, everyone else is a loser.

Let us look at the people involved here. On one side, you have a guy who thinks war is something you watch on a screen while eating a burger. To him, if you are not the loudest person in the room, you are not doing anything. He does not understand what a group of allies actually is. To him, an ally is just someone who should be telling him how great he is. If they are not doing that, they are useless. He thinks front lines are like the front row of a fashion show. If you are not in the seat he gave you, you do not exist. It is a very simple way to look at the world. It is also very dumb.

On the other side, you have the UK leaders. They are acting like this is a huge shock. They are acting like their honor has been hurt. Give me a break. You lost your honor a long time ago. You lost it when you followed the US into a war that had no plan and no way out. You sent those kids to die in the desert because you wanted to stay friends with the big kid on the playground. You wanted to be part of the Special Relationship. Well, this is the relationship. You get to do the work, and the big kid gets to tell everyone you did nothing.

British troops were in a place called Helmand. It was a nightmare. It was not off the front lines. In a war like that, there are no lines. There are just bombs in the road and people shooting from buildings. Every place was a front line. But Trump does not do details. Details are for people who read books or pay attention. He just wants to say he is the best and everyone else is weak. He treats war like a scoreboard. He thinks because the US spent more money, they were the only ones who really fought.

The UK politicians love this fight, though. Do not let them fool you. They are not actually sad about the insult. They are happy they have something to talk about. It makes them look like they care about the soldiers. They get to stand up and give big speeches about our brave boys. It is much easier to get mad at a mean tweet or a dumb comment than it is to explain why you wasted twenty years and billions of dollars on a war that the Taliban won anyway. They are using the dead to win points on the news. It is gross.

This is the problem with everything now. It is all a show. Trump is playing the part of the tough guy who does not care about anyone’s feelings. The UK politicians are playing the part of the hero who defends the nation’s pride. Neither side actually cares about the 457 people who died. They are just words on a page now. They are just tools to be used in an argument. The Right loves this because they think it makes the US look strong. The Left loves this because they can call Trump a monster again.

Everybody is wrong. The war was a mess. The exit was a mess. And now the talk about the war is a mess. It is just a bunch of rich people in suits arguing about who was the bravest while they sit in air-conditioned rooms. It is boring. It is tired. And it is exactly what we get for letting these people run things. They do not care about the truth. They do not care about history. They just want to be the one who gets the last word. Trump said something stupid. The UK got mad. The world keeps spinning toward the drain. It is just another day in this circus, and I am the only one who seems to want to leave.