[Rhodes22-list] political : marines in iraq...big al delete

[Herb Parsons]

3-4 years back, one of my daughters was was engaged to a marine who'd 
served two tours in Iraq (they later broke off the engagement). He 
brought home a raw video of a in "insurgent" being killed. He showed the 
raw video of the insurgent firing at a building with marines, AND at the 
location the from which the video was being shot. Both sides exchanged 
fire for several rounds. The rifle the insurgent had looked antique, and 
he was definitely out-gunned, but bullets is bullets, and old guns kill too.

He finally ran out of ammunition, and stood up from his crouching 
position. I couldn't tell for sure if it was a "Send me to Allah" 
moment, or just a confused guy not knowing what to do, but he didn't get 
to stand long. He was gunned down, and on his knees in a few short 
bursts. Firing stopped for a few seconds, then he moved a little, and 
they tore him up with bullets.

Then Mike showed me the media version of the same incident. It STARTED 
when the insurgent stood up. Watching that view, you saw an "unarmed" 
man (you had to look on the ground for his gun) standing up, getting 
shot down, moving again, and being killed.

I was disgusted. By the press.

We trained ourselves, as a nation, to make pariahs out of those that are 
risking their lives to devend our way of life. As a nation, we should be 
ashamed at best. At worst, we deserve what's probably coming down the 
road. When the best, brightest, and bravest decide that we're no longer 
worth it, we're in trouble.

Brad Haslett wrote:
> Herb,
>
> When the "puppy" story broke it reminded me of a story about my dad that was
> included in a book one of his unit members wrote about their experiences in
> WW2.  Dad and another Mid Western farm boy knew how to butcher, so when they
> had some down time (which wasn't often) they were known to 'liberate' a
> French cow and feed their fellow soldiers steaks.  I can see the USAToday
> coverage of it now: "US Soldier Brutally Hacks Cow In Small Pieces".
>
> Brad
>
> On Fri, Jun 13, 2008 at 4:33 PM, Herb Parsons <hparsons at parsonsys.com>
> wrote:
>
>   
>> John, the military hasn't changed that much, the capabilities of the
>> information age have changed. My step-father was an officer, had had
>> some pretty "interesting" stories about some of the discipline issues he
>> saw dealt with.
>>
>> The military, like any other organization, is going to have some bad
>> apples. For every one of those stories you hear about, there are
>> thousands of stories about good men and women doing their job.
>>
>> john Belanger wrote:
>>     
>>> i am a veteran. i served my country during the cuban missle crisis. we
>>>       
>> had lots of kids from all over and occassionally they got in trouble ashore.
>> but we did not have the kind of incidents that seem to be more and more
>> common in the services now. these two enlisted marines were punished for
>> their actions but only after a video surfaced, like at abu graib. what did
>> they get....suspension of their va benfits.....loss of opportunity to be
>> buried in a military graveyard? this #$%^%#$#@$ has to stop and someone in
>> authority has to go to jail. not just get separated or  passed over for
>> promotion. one incident like this puts our policy efforts back into the
>> stone age. i'm ashamed. john b
>>     
>>>       
>> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080612/ap_on_re_us/marine_youtube;_ylt=Av9MAiCYGAu1ET.1z93N5zqs0NUE
>>     
>>>
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