What about the troops?
POSTED BY: Causal
UPDATED: Wednesday, December 26, 2012 15:17
VIEWED: 12314
PAGE 6 of 7
Quote:
Originally posted by Causal:
Your link to the BBC article is compelling--it would clearly seem that that guy should be locked away. But you are reasoning from single instances (like the murder of the girl, to global guilt (all serving in Iraq are guilty of war crimes). I din't commit any war crimes, nor did anyone I served with. So again, I ask you: am I a liar?
"That guy"? You make it sound like it was a lone gunman. In fact there were five of them, who planned this atrocity in advance. They raped a 14 year old and murdered a five year old girl in cold blood. Five of them.
This is why I'm doing a succession of posts with 'single' instances. What I'm wondering is how many abused Iraqis will it to make you admit there's a problem, not with one or two bad apples, but with the entire structure.
You can read more about the attack here, along with details about the conditions the soldiers were living in:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/08/07/iraq.familyslain/index.html
If someone doesn't support the troops - that's their decision. I think it's often a misguided one but there you are. But when people like Bush and Blair come forward and boast about how they support the troops... how? By giving them inadequate equipment? By not providing decent lodgings (see above)? By hanging them those who have been wounded out to dry?
And personally, no, I don't think you're lying when you say you've not committed any war crimes. But that's purely because you seem an intelligent, together guy. Would you claim that about every soldier serving in Iraq?
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Quote:
Originally posted by SimonWho:
"That guy"? You make it sound like it was a lone gunman. In fact there were five of them, who planned this atrocity in advance. They raped a 14 year old and murdered a five year old girl in cold blood. Five of them.
Yes, they did. Five of them. I don't deny that those men did that. But gee, I wonder why we haven't heard about the crimes of the other 85 men in their infantry platoon? Where are the terrible stories of their torture, rape and murder? Why haven't we heard about that? I maintain that the reason we haven't heard about all those crimes is because they did not happen. Apparently, you're still not getting it. I think that every single person who commits a crime during their service in Iraq should be punished accordingly. What you seem to be refusing to hear (let alone acknowledge) is my point, which is this: while all of your examples are compelling, they do not establish universal guilt on the part of all American servicemen in Iraq. Do you know how many Americans are currently serving in Iraq? On the order of 160,000. We've been there for four years, so in addition to the 160K, there are probably at least that many who are not now there who've served in the past. That would put the number of Americans who've served in Iraq at 320K. Now, even if 10,000 of those had committed some kind of atrocity (which I believe is a vast exaggeration, but let's go with that for the time being) that means that for every one atrocity-committing soldier, there are 32 who did nothing wrong. If, as you seem intent on suggesting, the commission of war-crimes is so wide spread that greater than half of American soldiers have committed some atrocity, there would have to be an enormous amount of evidence for such abuse. So why is it that we haven't heard about all that crime? I'm sure that you will simply ignore this point and post yet another story of wrong-doing, but please try to answer next time.
Quote:
What I'm wondering is how many abused Iraqis will it to make you admit there's a problem, not with one or two bad apples, but with the entire structure.
It will take one hell of a lot more than you've given so far. Your half-dozen examples are far from establishing universal guilt of the American servicemen in Iraq.
Quote:
If someone doesn't support the troops - that's their decision. I think it's often a misguided one but there you are. But when people like Bush and Blair come forward and boast about how they support the troops... how? By giving them inadequate equipment? By not providing decent lodgings (see above)? By hanging them those who have been wounded out to dry?
Have you ever served in a combat zone? I'm not sure if you knew this, but there isn't exactly a Hilton on every street corner in Iraq. Sometimes, you have to make your home where you find it, even if it's not optimal. That's not the fault of the civilian leadership of the military, it's the reality of combat. That would be why training exercises often involve tents, shovels and mud.
Quote:
And personally, no, I don't think you're lying when you say you've not committed any war crimes. But that's purely because you seem an intelligent, together guy. Would you claim that about every soldier serving in Iraq?
Well, obviously, it's impossible to claim about every solitary one because clearly, crimes have been committed. On the other hand, I can confidently say that the vast, vast majority of US servicemen in Iraq served honorably. Apparently, you are now in the habit of insulting the intelligence of the American military, as well as its moral fiber. Again, obviously, not every single servicemember in Iraq is the picture of intelligence. But again, the vast majority are at least intelligent and together enough not to commit war-crimes.
And just out of curiousity, where are your reams of stories about atrocities committed by the Brits?
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I'm a pretty bright chap regardless of what you have to say about it brother. I don't disagree with you about aiming blame at the top, but to think that it's all Bushes fault is asinine as well.
The troops aren't evil and I never said they were. The troops ARE puppets, however. They are mindless puppets and yes-men who are not required to think for themselves and are actually punished for doing so.
Do I want to see Americans die in a bullshit war we have no fucking business in? Of course I don't. I don't get all giddy when I read about more of our boys and girls dying all the time, but I don't feel bad for them either. They chose to do a job and they knew that they were signing their own lives and ability to think for themselves away in the process. They are part of a machine that doesn't give a shit about them. They will get no tears from me.
If my brother was to die, that's a different story. That's why I said what I did about people you know and love in the millitary. Otherwise, fuck the administration, fuck the troops and fuck the war.
You should have titled this thread "The Troops Are Not Evil", if it was a rhetorical question to which you already knew the answer.
"A government is a body of people, usually notably ungoverned." http://www.myspace.com/6ixstringjack
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Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
I'm a pretty bright chap regardless of what you have to say about it brother. I don't disagree with you about aiming blame at the top, but to think that it's all Bushes fault is asinine as well.
The troops aren't evil and I never said they were. The troops ARE puppets, however. They are mindless puppets and yes-men who are not required to think for themselves and are actually punished for doing so.
Do I want to see Americans die in a bullshit war we have no fucking business in? Of course I don't. I don't get all giddy when I read about more of our boys and girls dying all the time, but I don't feel bad for them either. They chose to do a job and they knew that they were signing their own lives and ability to think for themselves away in the process. They are part of a machine that doesn't give a shit about them. They will get no tears from me.
If my brother was to die, that's a different story. That's why I said what I did about people you know and love in the millitary. Otherwise, fuck the administration, fuck the troops and fuck the war.
You should have titled this thread "The Troops Are Not Evil", if it was a rhetorical question to which you already knew the answer.
Here's my question: do you hold the American soldiers reponsible for the problems in Iraq? That's the question. I served there and in Afghanistan, and I want to know if you think that I'm partly to blame for the situation there? Would it be legitimate, for instance, to vent your anger at the situation at me, being that I'm one of the servicemen that fought in Iraq? That's what I want to know. Regardless of what you may think, I am not impugning your intelligence. You've ably proven that you have plenty of that, in a number of other threads. I want to know why American military forces don't deserve at least your gratitude for their service to the country. I'm not asking for you to throw a ticker tape parade. I'm wondering why it is that you would not be grateful that there are people willing to put their lives on the line in service to their country? Or is it the case that they only get that gratitude when you personally approve of the mission that they are asked to perform?
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Quote:
Originally posted by Casual:
I served there and in Afghanistan, and I want to know if you think that I'm partly to blame for the situation there? Would it be legitimate, for instance, to vent your anger at the situation at me, being that I'm one of the servicemen that fought in Iraq?
This is a very loaded question, at least from my perspective. I think that surely depends on an individual basis, as I am able to distinguish between people who would enjoy torturing prisonors or killing the "enemy" as opposed to someone like my brother, or I would imagine you, who find this deplorable. I also realize that when thrust into a life or death situation you're going to take him down without a thought if your own death is the alternative. I would never spit on a soldier personally.
I know you don't want to hear it, but yes, in a way I do hold the individual responsible partially for what we're doing to those people. I don't share the opinion that we are doing anything to help those people. If we lived in a Utopia, or at least a place where our Government wasn't trying to screw its own people and completely micromanage their lives, and we didn't have one of the highest murder rates in the world at the same time, I might think we were doing something to better their way of life. Things being the way they are, I can't imagine that life for them will be any better when we turn them into a Godless "Democracy" puppet state.
I've already said that I understand the dilemma of obeying the chain of command. If we had an millitary where soldiers were constantly questioning their orders and their superiors, it would have fallen apart a long time ago. Things are the way they are, in that respect, because that's the way they have to be.
So in this regards, no I don't blame the soldier. What are you supposed to do? Say fuck you to your superiors and orders and end up in the clink? Go AWOL and basically ruin your life and be on the run?
It's a very hard question here loaded with doublethink, because for every reason I can find to be angry with the soldiers there's most likely a reason why I should be greatful to them as well.
I think the biggest factor at play here in this is the fact that our own Government abuses its power here at home with its own people and is constantly amongst itself tooth and nail with our broken 2 party system. Not to mention the Cable NEWS shows that poison the minds of the people with a lot of garbage they didn't even need to know. Many people are seeing past the illusion that there is even 2 parties at all and that they are only there to give the average beat-down Joe the illusion of choice. This is a thought once only contemplated by conspiracy theorists, but like it or not, it is becoming much more mainstream now and will only worsen the longer this war goes on. How many times do I have to hear vote "the lesser of two evils"?
Bullshit!
Why can't we get another party or three in there? At least one that wants to go in and start repealing some of the laws which constantly restrict our freedoms and decision making and our supposed "Free Market"? Somebody who will do what it takes to remove illegal monopolies which are sprining up in all sectors of trade that are so in bed with either party that they don't even really try hiding it anymore. We've all let the Government into our own homes and they will never leave now. This happened when people started to believe that they had to rely on the Government as opposed to the Government simply being an institution to serve the people.
As they grow in power, they're even more free to make decisions, such as this war which effects all of our lives drastically, without the conscent of the people. It allows them to lie to us and spread propoganda and work us into such a rage, as the year after 9/11, that we're foaming at the mouth and want revenge so badly that it blinds us to the fact that we're allowing them to go after everyone else who wasn't even involved in 9/11 while we're there. Why do we allow i
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Whoa. Guess I didn't expect all of that.
Interestingly, you and I seem to have had a similar sort of a journey (though probably from different starting places). Prior to the Iraq war, I was very much a die-hard conservative Republican, waving the flag for W. and the War on Terror. But as I sat my ass in Kuwait, waiting for the go order, I just couldn't help but wonder, "What are we doing? We're preemptively invading another country?" It wasn't like Afghanistan. I had no qualms with that. The 9/11 attacks were planned out of there and Al Qaida was based out of there, and we even gave them a chance to give up bin Ladin. But in Iraq--sure, Hussien's a baddie, but an aggressive invasion? That's not the American way (pardon the platitude--but it ain't). But I did my duty and kept my guys alive, and they kept me alive, and we all made it back in one piece (thank God we were so lucky). But the longer the war went on, the more upset I became about it. We hadn't made the world safer. We'd just opened up the biggest terrorist training camp (aka the Iraq War) since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. So I started to think long and hard about President Bush. Now I was in intelligence, so I don't agree with the whole Bush-lied angle. But Bush is a fool? You bet. Bush is too much a hawk? Damned skippy. But the more I got to thinking about it, the more I realized that the Dems aren't really any different. On surface issues they look light years different. But they aren't really. They just want to hang on to power as long as possible. They just use different talking points to get and keep it. So now I'm in a situation where I don't really trust that the government has my best interest in mind any more. Not very comfortable, is it? So I can at least understand your ambivalence towards the military. The military is a branch of the government, and you don't quite trust the government, therefore maybe you shouldn't trust the military. Understandable, at least. I can at least envision a possible scenario where the military is used domestically in improper ways. I hope to God it never comes to that. But at the same time, those poor guys in Iraq just wanted the GI Bill or to learn a trade, or to get out of poverty or (yes) to serve their country. And now they're being asked to do a shitty job by that same government. My version of "support the troops" is this: 1) thank the ones who've served, 2) advocate for us to figure a way out of this mess so they're not being shot at any more. That seems to be the best kind of support we could offer.
For the record, I was a sailor--US Navy.
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Just to reiterate - I don't believe that all soldiers serving in Iraq are "evil" or guilty of war crimes. However I do believe that the behaviour of our troops in the country has had so many reprehensible incidents that the people of Iraq will hate us for generations. Remember it being marketed as a war of liberation? The attitude of the troops has put paid to that idea.
Quote:
Originally posted by Causal:
And just out of curiousity, where are your reams of stories about atrocities committed by the Brits? Or is it just us Yanks that aren't "intelligent" or "together" enough to turn to barbarism?
Oh, there's plenty of Brit stories out there. Check out the following video where British soldiers drag some children in off the streets and beat the crap out of them. Decide for yourself which one is more unsettling, the troops beating up defenceless kids or the cameraman screaming with delight as they collapse under the blows.
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-3884035267639445814
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Hey Casual. Yeah, a lot to read there I know. You asked a very legitimate question and considering everything that factors into my answer I didn't feel that I would be doing either of us any justice by giving you a few sentences for a reply. Frem said something about how minds like his in mine work in another thread and I think that he's pretty on the money. Rarely does my stance on any issue come from one or two other things, but more often a hundred or a thousand things happning at a time that I connect together. A lot of the time they seemingly have nothing to do with each other unless somebody points them out to you and does a good job explaining how they came to that conclusion. The hardest part about all that is I'm rarely ever able to get those points across to anybody in a digestible mannar, so I'm almost always arguing with somebody in here or rubbing them the wrong way. The only reason that it's any different in "real" life is that I tend not to delve so deep into issues when I'm face to face with people.
I usually am pretty good natured about it but the last couple of weeks I've been digging my heels in. I know better. I've read "How to Win Frineds and Influence People" and the number one rule is if you come at somebody combatively and arguementally they're never going to listen to anything you have to say, regardless of it's legitimacy. I've got some real heavy stuff going on with my family and it's kind of like a boil coming to a head. I know that's no excuse for some of my behavior in here though. I know that having served in the millitary yourself, this is a very personal topic to you and I think after a few of my posts earlier, you could have been well within your right to tear into me, but instead you calmly asked me the question in a different way and kept an open mind. I thank you and that's why I took the time to give you a real response.... that and I had a really slow day a "work" so I had a little more time to burn than usual. 
Anyways... I think I may have actually managed to get my point across here, which is a rarity, and I'm pleased to see that it looks as though we pretty much see eye to eye. One thing that I neglected to mention earlier that i feel needs to be said though is that I believe that our Veterans who are injured physically and mentally do not get the support they diserve. I think that, regardless of the validity of the "poliece action", it was particularly shitty how Nam vets were treated by the Goverenment and civillians alike when they came back home. It must have been a nightmare for them to come home and have civilians spit on them and the Government basically turn their backs on them after the loyalty they had shown and the sacrafices they had made. I can't really fault the civilians attitudes there up to a certain point for the reasons in the last post and scenarios like "Kent State", but when they came back and nobody was in there corner... well, I think you get the point. I'm glad that when they're coming back now they have friends to come back to and there's not the insanely high death count that there was in Nam.
My brother will be going to DC this year and plans on meeting up with some people from fff. I won't say who he is on fff because I think I got me a few people who don't care for me too much here and I don't want to associate him with that. He doesn't post in here, but I'll just mention that he is in the 76th. I haven't decided if I'm going to burn the vacation and the cash on the trip yet myself, but it does sound like fun. Thanks for serving, I'm glad you're back, and if I do make it to DC this year and you're there, I'll buy ya that beer I promised.
Simonwho - It is unfortunate, the stories that we hear about the behavior of our troops and the negative effects that will come of those actions. You mention it being "marketed" as a war of Liberation and I think that's a very valid point. Unfortunately, I think just the reverse is happening now. I do believe that these incidents are far and few between, at least much le
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Quote:Damn right. I've said before, and I'll say again. Support our troops by making sure we risk their lives ONLY as a last resort. Don't take their willingness, and the willingness of their families, to sacrifice themselves for granted. Go to war only when we would all do it ourselves. I think that was the intent of the Constitution in requiring Congress to declare war. It has to be something the overwhelming majority feels strongly about.
Originally posted by Causal:
My version of "support the troops" is this: 1) thank the ones who've served, 2) advocate for us to figure a way out of this mess so they're not being shot at any more. That seems to be the best kind of support we could offer.
Quote:No. Anthony's analogy is actually pretty good. Don't blame the waiters for the bad cooking.
Here's my question: do you hold the American soldiers reponsible for the problems in Iraq?
However, having said that, I wish there were more soldiers standing up against the war like Watada. I don't blame them for not doing it, but given the corruption of our government, I don't see how badly conceived wars are going to end without more protests from both citizens and soldiers alike.
I think about soldiers in the Israeli Defense Forces. They are quite frequently instruments of oppression, and sometimes it seems, quite voluntarily so. The government's policies and methods are intractable--there is no way anyone can change them. So some soldiers have taken it upon themselves to refuse to serve in the Occupied Territories. The list of "refuseniks" is growing.
This is not the desirable fix. But when the commanding powers are corrupt beyond repair, it ultimately falls to the soldiers to refuse to serve in immoral wars. Perhaps we aren't there yet, but I'm afraid we are approaching that scenario.
Edited to add: As much as I oppose this war and most wars, I absolutely have no tolerance for anyone spitting on a soldier or otherwise insulting or degrading a soldier. It is evil and cruel.
I used to work exclusively with Vietnam veterans and their families. For all the traumatic stress they suffered during war, the most painful and enduring traumas occurred when they returned "home" to spiteful hostility. They expect the enemy to be hostile. They don't expect their fellow countrymen to be vile.
No matter how wrong a war is, these soldiers put their lives on the line. No one should ever cheapen a sacrifice like that.
And another pet peeve. Our govt uses up these men and women, and then spits them out when they get home. It exposes these folks to unnecessary dangers for whatever reason (experimental vaccines, dioxin, the war itself), and then deny all responsibility when things go wrong. We don't have adequate services for our veterans, period. And I say we, because ultimately, WE allow our govt to do this to our veterans.
Can't Take My Gorram Sky
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Nullius in verba. (Take nobody's word.)
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Quote:
Originally posted by canttakesky:
I used to work exclusively with Vietnam veterans and their families. For all the traumatic stress they suffered during war, the most painful and enduring traumas occurred when they returned "home" to spiteful hostility. They expect the enemy to be hostile. They don't expect their fellow countrymen to be vile.
No matter how wrong a war is, these soldiers put their lives on the line. No one should ever cheapen a sacrifice like that.
Did any of those you treated confess to what would now be considered war crimes? Did you not think that if someone (as indeed many American soldiers were) actually did kill babies, that "spiteful hostility" is the very least they deserved?
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