In order to answer the question: Why Americans should support the troops, we have to first ask another question: What do we mean by "support."
In order to answer either of these questions we have to understand what the role of the military is in a democratic society. Very simply put, the role of US troops is to protect the Constitution of the United States. The Constitution, which protects the rights of all American citizens (and non-citizens) by defining the rule of law, also gives shape to a moral high ground that includes restraints on military force. From that lofty philosophical/spiritual position, we stand against all forms of aggression by politically resisting that aggression in ways that allow our adversary every opportunity to change course before they and, then, we resort to military force.
As Jeanette Rankin once said, "You can no more win a war than you can win an earthquake."
Because we place the highest value on peace, if war was a gunfight, we would be the side that waits for the other to draw first. In order to minimize our vulnerability we do everything we can to prepare ourselves to be the quicker, more accurate draw.
Out of the Nuremberg Tribunal, which applied world justice to those who started World War II: "War is essentially an evil thing ... To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."
From our high moral ground, we understand that we are vulnerable to first strike. Our opponent may be quicker and we may suffer before we assert the full power of our response. We accept that risk because we hold our Constitution and all that it represents above our own individual lives. Our warriors are willing to sacrifice themselves for their comrades and this great country and we do everything in our power to protect them as they are defending us: training, equipment, supplies, logistical support, excellent leadership, and right mission.
As our troops respond to aggression against us, they are protecting the democratic process, which is empowered in the Constitution. They are providing the quick shield so that we may collectively determine and, hopefully, support our country's course of action, a process that requires all of our participation. We support the troops by assuring that their mission and their actions in executing that mission adhere to the highest moral standards on this planet. If there is any confusion or doubt about the reasons for war or our role in its perpetration, then there will be discord in our democratically protected and required political discussion.
"My sincere view is that the commitment of our forces to this fight (Operation Iraqi Freedom) was done with a casualness and swagger that are the special province of those who have never had to execute these missions - or bury the results." - Marine Lt. Gen. Greg Newbold
Our representatives, in the White House and in Congress, are charged with the responsibility to make decisions and take action on our behalf, actions that support and adhere to the Constitution, including its limitations on aggression. We expect forthrightness and honesty. If we, the people, do not get that from our "deciders" then it is imperative that we stand up and make ourselves heard on behalf of the Constitution, and this democratic society, and to protect those who are in harms way from the possibility of wrong mission.
At first look, it seems easy enough to think that supporting our troops means cheering them on. But it is all too easy for those of us not in harms way to claim "support" for our troops just because we say we do. As the old adage goes: "Talk is cheap." Whenever we have fellow citizens in harms way it is imperative that all of us who are not in harms way do whatever we can to assure that the decisions that put our troops on the line adhere to the highest standards of human behavior as outlined in our Constitution.
In the case of our current war of aggression that has destroyed Iraq and its people, it is now clear that the President of the United States etc. not only violated our high moral standards but that they did so in a deceitful way. It is now clear that our government is using our troops to execute a mission that by its aggression is in direct violation of US and World Law (i.e., crimes against humanity) and that, despite its ever-changing, publicly expressed rationale, was not initiated in response to an imminent threat (the gunfighter was not ready to draw). Rather than protecting the Constitution and the people of the United States, this war is all about promoting the ideology and the profits of a small percentage of our citizenry. Because our government has violated the trust of our troops, it is our responsibility as citizens of this democracy to quickly get our troops out of harms way and to prosecute the self-serving, deceitful "deciders" who put them there in the first place. What we do to help Iraq put itself back together again is a discussion that must happen once our troops are safe.
This is how we support our troops.