Marines Sound Off About The Iraq War Options

[The_Bammo]

Damn! You're right on the money! They're both Captains! I'll send you the name of my friend, the Captain on the left, in a PM so the freepers that lurk here won't find out who he is and send him hate mail.

Sir, I am very impressed. Your knowledge of the Vietnam War is very extensive. It blows my mind.

And you're totally correct, you may even know this guy, or at least walked the same paths in Nam. The man on the left became a professor of history at a California college teaching both WWII and Vietnam history. And you're right that he was an avid Kerry supporter like you, ghostgovt, and I. He was totally against the Iraq War, from the get-go. He knew it was a big mistake because he had already learned the "Vietnam lesson" because he had been there, done that. Now, he's at college teaching students why Bush never learned that lesson.
And you're right again about him serving as an advisor with the ARVN in a SF outfit. I had never seen Silver Wings displayed above the right pocket like that, so I had to ask him what that badge was. I had never even seen one like it before.

Here's what he told me about that badge -
The silver wings on my right chest in the last photo are Vietnamese parachute wings, which I was awarded while serving with a Vietnamese Airborne Ranger unit.  You can wear one foreign badge on the right chest, and you always wear your host country's badge if you have one.

Da_n Big Sky very small world indeed. Both good officers with the Cav.

The Capt. is teaching at a college in Cal. - History as well. Good for him, he takes no sheet and tells it like it is.

As you can see on his JK support and anti "SHRUB" fiasco. Bet he even tells those college students to avoid the military - your only neocon cannon fodder.

Tell him you know "Bammo" from the East Coast - I'll send you my E Mail addy and you can forward it his way.

Will be good to here from that man again. Very small world indeed Bro' - Hang Tough ~

You know Bro' I might still have his e mail during the Prez campaign for Vietnam Veterans for Kerry. Hope I can find it! Got a few stories about whats going down here and elsewhere Big Sky.

[Morambar in TX]

Thanks to all of you for your service to our country. 

I wanted to make certain that everyone understands:  we don't put restrictions on posting in this forum.  Meaning, you don't have to be a veteran to post here; veterans' issues affect us all (many of us have military members or veterans in our families, after all).

That's my  ... carry on!

Ditto what Sandra said. Sorry, I'm not Mr. Marine, and no, I've never served in the Armed Forces, and as such, normally leave these discussions to those who have; they have the right and knowledge to comment on them that I generally lack.

I am, however, disgusted at the way the Commander-In-Thief has used the military and thrown them away. "Forward he cried, from the rear, and the front rank died." This is what we should expect from a man who supported NUKING Vietnam back into the Stone Age, but didn't want to drop the ordnance. Consequently, when I see (misworded) statements that he's "supporting the military" my righteous indignation kicks in.

[The_Bammo]

Thanks to all of you for your service to our country. 

I wanted to make certain that everyone understands:  we don't put restrictions on posting in this forum.  Meaning, you don't have to be a veteran to post here; veterans' issues affect us all (many of us have military members or veterans in our families, after all).

That's my  ... carry on!

No need to thank me for fighting in another fiasco.

Sandra, we were not wanted then - Nam Vets did not even put down they served in Vietnam on Job Applications-- if they did - they would not get hired. LOL Serious there Sandra - very serious.

The "Thanking Days" are past and history Sandra.

Personally, save that "Thanks" for someone that cares and buys that BS!

As far as "Carrying On" - save that BS for some wanna bee!

That there Sandra is the way I see it and the way it is! You Hang Tough ~

[The_Bammo]

Heart wanted to help

By John Doherty
and Alexa James
Times Herald-Record
jdoherty@th-record.com
ajames@th-record.com

New Windsor – In his last letter to Jennifer, his sweetheart since fourth grade, Joseph Tremblay worried he'd made a mistake volunteering to fight in Iraq.
"I wonder if coming here is following my heart. I know my place is there with you," he wrote.
Jennifer Coloni, Tremblay's fiancee, received the letter yesterday at home in New Windsor, a day after Defense Department officials notified her of his death.
Cpl. Tremblay was killed Tuesday night in Hit, Iraq, northwest of Baghdad. The Humvee he was traveling in was hit by a makeshift roadside bomb, according to Marine officials. He was 23.
"I can't write anymore, it's getting too dark," ended the letter, dated two weeks ago. "I love you so much and hope that you are happy and well. I will be home with you soon."
Jennifer sat on a couch in her fiance's boyhood home yesterday, clutching Joey's black sweatshirt, wearing his Marine Corps T-shirt and his socks.
"He went," she said. "Even though he had mixed emotions about (leaving) his family, and me."
He was remembered yesterday by his family as a 5-foot-6-inch bundle of contradictions: the baby of the family who worried over his big brother and protected his older sister, the ambivalent warrior dedicated to his brother Marines.
"He just wanted to make everything better for everyone else. He was always trying to make everything perfect," Jennifer said. During brief phone calls from Iraq, he told her the devastation was overwhelming.
He didn't know what to do. He wanted to fix it.
It really bothered him to see pictures of Iraqi children crying, he'd tell Jennifer, asking her to mail more candy. That way he'd have something to give them.
He died too young to resolve all the questions swirling in him, they said.
His heart led him to re-enlist in the Marines last year and be with the family he had found in the corps, she said.
Marine training had put steely muscle on his small frame and given him the inner glow of confidence. But he put little stock in politicians' talk of Iraq and ached to come home.
He was a teenage runner who used to jog three miles on a whim to visit Jennifer, but he didn't play high school sports. He had struggled to graduate high school but read the philosophy of Howard Bloom and Sun Tsu on downtime in Iraq.
The shy, reserved kid had a knack for comedy and once pondered trying acting. He was considering a career in social work or sales, Jennifer said, or maybe opening an auto window-tinting business.
"Joey really wanted to be a dad," she said, picking at the sleeve of his sweatshirt.
The toughness of the Marine reputation attracted Joey since junior high school, said his father, Lawrence Tremblay, a 53-year-old mechanic.
So, too, did the regimen and the fraternity of the corps: His parents divorced when he was 2, and his father wound up with custody of Joey and his older brother. "I'd be lying if I said (the divorce) probably didn't have something to do with it, his decision," Lawrence Tremblay said yesterday. "It was tough on him."
Joseph Tremblay signed enlistment papers even before completing the 1999 summer school session that would earn him his diploma.
He was discharged from active duty in August 2003, spending a four-year tour in Hawaii, Japan and Australia – missing combat in Afghanistan.
He came back to New Windsor. But after just a few months, he decided to join the Marine Reserves.
"I'll be honest," his father said. "I tried to talk him out of it."
He signed up anyway.
By this winter, his reserve unit was asked to volunteer for duty with the 3rd Marine Battalion's 25th Infantry Regiment.
"He told me, "If they ever ask me to go, I'm going,'" Jennifer remembered yesterday.
He had the choice between an immediate one-year tour and waiting a year to begin deployment: He chose to go immediately so he could start a family sooner.
On Feb. 22, Jennifer and Joey got engaged in Las Vegas, an unlikely leave destination for the homebody couple.
Before he shipped out, he sent Jennifer a dozen roses: 11 red and one white. He'd been sending her that signature bouquet since the sixth grade.
Iraq, she said, was not what he expected.
The wreckage of war unnerved him, she said, but he threw himself into work to help Iraqi children. There were 20-hour work days and then long stretches of boredom.
The couple had decided to relocate north of Orlando, Fla., where she has family.
"Whenever he called (from Iraq), he wanted to know where we were, how things were going," Jennifer said.
At the Tremblay house yesterday, neighbors who had not gotten the bad news yet tooted their horns hello. Relatives stopped by. As it got later, the phone began to ring more and more.
Like every young couple, she and Tremblay had planned a lot of things, even picking out names for future babies.
The couple wasn't blind to the danger he was facing.
"He gave me all the possibilities, this being one of them," Jennifer said.

http://www.recordonline.com/archive/2005/04/29/marine29.htm

[The_Bammo]

Was it murder? A US marine faces scrutiny



RALEIGH, N.C. – Some called Marine 2nd Lt. Ilario Pantano the "preppy marine," a charismatic Gulf War veteran-turned-Wall Street broker who cut his long locks and reenlisted in the Marines after several close friends perished in the Sept. 11 World Trade Center attacks.
Legions of supporters say the 33-year-old served with honor. "I'd have him for my son," says Rep. Walter Jones ® of North Carolina, one of Lieutenant Pantano's staunchest defenders.

Marine prosecutors have a different view of the officer's professional conduct. A year after he shot two terror suspects in the back during a tense search mission in Iraq, and laid a scrawled sign with a unit motto - "No better friend, no worse enemy" - on their bodies, Pantano this week is facing a military version of a grand jury at Camp Lejeune, N.C., on charges of premeditated murder.

The Pantano saga has become the first post-9/11 case of alleged murder in combat to come before the military justice system. Haunting to some for its echoes of proceedings that followed the My Lai massacre in Vietnam, the case is also dredging up difficult questions about the morality of combat and what can happen to soldiers when the fog of war clears.

"Just being on a battlefield isn't a complete license to do anything," says Michael Belknap, a professor at California Western School of Law and author of "The Vietnam War on Trial." "After all, the two people that he killed were shot in the back, and that certainly, most of the time, is not going to put the shooter in a good position."

The two men - Hamaady Kareem and Tahah Ahmead Hanjil - were stopped in their car as they were leaving an area in Mahmudiyah where homes were being searched. At first they were handcuffed. When reports came that soldiers had found explosives in the area, Pantano removed the handcuffs and ordered the men to search their own car.

"They quickly pivoted their bodies toward each other. They did this simultaneously, while speaking in muffled Arabic. I thought they were attacking me and I decided to fire my M-16A4 service rifle in self-defense," Pantano has said in his official statement. But some witnesses said he may have emptied 45 rounds into the men before leaving what fellow marines called a "death card." If convicted, Pantano could face the death penalty, though that's unlikely, experts say.

Already, the case has stirred a fiery debate about the murky nature of the Middle Eastern battlefield. For three weeks, Mr. Jones has spoken almost nightly about Pantano on the House floor. He has written two letters to President Bush asking for intervention. Pantano's cause has also been taken up by conservative talk-show hosts such as Michael Savage.

They claim that the prosecution implicitly limits soldiers' ability to make split-second life-and-death decisions - which affects morale and recruitment - all in the name of a 33-year-old who left his cushy stateside existence to take on terrorists in the dusty heart of Babylonia.

Jones has met with Pantano three times, including at a barbecue fundraiser near Camp Lejeune. Pantano's mother, Merry, has designed a website to gather support for the former Goldman Sachs energy trader, who, when he reenlisted, was making a six-figure income at his new company, Filter Media. He grew up on the streets of New York and earned a scholarship to the tony Horace Mann prep school. He and his wife have two young children.

"I do not believe that Lieutenant Pantano should be charged with premeditated murder for doing his job," says Jones. "This sends a horrible message to young men and women in uniform.... Those who have never walked in a marine's shoes should think long and hard before judging him."

After this week's hearing, Marine Maj. Mark Winn will decide whether to recommend a court-martial. Those who study ideas of America's "just war" theory in the Middle East say that if Pantano is court-martialed the jury that judges him will be appropriate: fellow combat-veteran marines.

"There's such a narrow line in those tense situations between an unnecessary use of force and self-defense that it almost defies anybody to draw that line precisely - and that's really where a court-martial can come in," says Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Roy Gutman, author of "Crimes of War: What the public should know."

The parallels to My Lai aren't so much in the action on the ground as in the reaction back home, historians say.

In that case, Lt. William Calley of Charlie Company was sentenced to 20 years in prison for his role in the killing of 535 Vietnamese civilians. Both sides saw him as a scapegoat, and the case - and charges of coverups - came to color the mythology of the Vietnam War. Now, there are lingering questions about a coverup in the Pantano case as well, since Pantano was once cleared of any wrongdoing by his immediate superiors and even received a glowing promotion report - all amid the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal.

"What disturbs me frankly about what Congressman Jones has had to say is it's very reminiscent of the kind of statements that were made by a lot of fairly ill-informed politicians with respect to My Lai," says Mr. Belknap. "A lot of this is starting to sound like echoes of that case."

Insurgents' infiltration of civilian populations have played into both cases. Although Calley was convicted, another defendant in My Lai, Capt. Ernest Medina, was found not guilty. Pantano's self-defense argument, say some, mirrors Medina's. Medina shot an unarmed woman who was lying on the ground, but testified that she was in the process of getting up and had a hand grenade. "To claim self-defense, you don't actually have to be in danger, you just have to reasonably believe you are," says Belknap.

There are deeper implications for the military as well. Around the world, amid satellite-borne propaganda campaigns, the case promises to affect how American soldiers are perceived by locals on the battlefield - one of the main struggles in Iraq.

"The [military] has tremendous incentives to be at least perceived as being fair and just," says Andrew Rehfeld, who studies morality and war at Washington University in St. Louis. "Being seen as aiming only at bad guys and not at any old person, they will garner more approval."

FOG OF WAR? Lt. Ilario Pantano has been charged with the premeditated murder of two Iraqis near Baghdad last April.

USA > Justice
from the April 29, 2005 edition

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0429/p01s02-usju.html

[big sky brad]

Thanks to all of you for your service to our country. 

I wanted to make certain that everyone understands:  we don't put restrictions on posting in this forum.  Meaning, you don't have to be a veteran to post here; veterans' issues affect us all (many of us have military members or veterans in our families, after all).

That's my  ... carry on!

Sandra, Tom just asked me if he could post in this thread because the topic is about Marines, not just about any of the men in all of the services who have fought over in Iraq.

He did this out of respect for me, Sandra.
He wasn't implying or trying to limit anyone's ability or desire to post in this thread about real Marines that were killed in Iraq last year.


But, I would like to get your opinion about what they did to Captain Royer.

Capt. Kelly D. Royer took photos of Humvees in which his men died. He was removed from command, accused of being "dictatorial."

He was removed from his command because he cared for his men.

What do you think about that, Sandra?

[Marine]

Sandra, Tom just asked me if he could post in this thread because the topic is about Marines, not just about any of the men in all of the services who have fought over in Iraq.

He did this out of respect for me, Sandra.
He wasn't implying or trying to limit anyone's ability or desire to post in this thread about real Marines that were killed in Iraq last year.
But, I would like to get your opinion about what they did to Captain Royer.
He was removed from his command because he cared for his men.

What do you think about that, Sandra?

I've served under a few officers who the description dictatorial would be an appropriate description.

The odd thing about brad's analysis is the accusation of being dictatorial would have had to come from a subordinate and would have to be collaborated, a very odd accusation if his subordinates perceived him to care about them.

It's also odd a Captain would get a charge leveled at him for being dictatorial, almost every martinet I served under was either a 1st or 2nd Leutinant; by the time a Marine officer is ready to be a Captain they have learned better "people" skills or they don't make it to Captain. I guess there is the possibility someone made the grade without developing the skills needed though.

Just 30 years of experience speaking.

[Marine]

U.S. Marine 2nd Lt. Ilario Pantano, left, walks to his Article 32 hearing with his wife, Jill Pantano, right, and mother Merry Pantano, center, on Friday, April 29, 2005, in Camp Lejeune, N.C. Second Lt. Ilario Pantano, accused of murdering two Iraqi detainees, worked zealously, but didn't carry that over into abusive behavior, witnesses said during a military pretrial hearing. (AP Photo/Sara D. Davis)

Witness Refuses to Testify in Marine Case

A key witness against a Marine accused of murdering two Iraqi detainees took the stand in a pretrial hearing Friday just long enough to refuse to testify, invoking his right to avoid incrimination.

Marine Sgt. Daniel Coburn testified earlier this week that 2nd Lt. Ilario Pantano had been instructed to release the men that the officer eventually shot in the back. But Coburn abruptly left the stand when he was told he was suspected of violating orders forbidding him from giving interviews to the media about the case.

Coburn told Marine officials prior to his appearance Friday that he wouldn't return to the stand unless he is granted immunity from prosecution. But military lawyers said that was unnecessary because they have no plans to charge Coburn. They indicated they will instead submit written statements he gave to investigators.

Pantano's lawyer, Charles Gittens, had argued that Coburn should be compelled to testify, and a failure to put him on the stand "makes this proceeding a sham."

Pantano, a former Wall Street trader who rejoined the Marines after the Sept. 11 attacks, has acknowledged shooting the men during an April 2004 search outside a suspected terrorist hideout in Mahmudiyah, Iraq. But he says he acted in self-defense when they moved toward him in a threatening manner.

The Article 32 hearing, the military equivalent of a civilian grand jury, will determine whether Pantano, 33, will face a court-martial. If convicted of murder, he could get the death penalty.

Coburn testified Wednesday that Pantano suspected the two Iraqi men of shelling his platoon, but was ordered to release the men. Coburn said he was looking away, under orders to scan the nearby area for threats, when he heard shots.

It was at that point that question were raised about his possible violation of orders forbidding him from giving media interviews. Defense lawyers had complained Coburn had given interviews about the case to ABC News, the Daily News of New York and New York magazine.

Other witnesses have heaped scorn on Coburn, a 10-year veteran, describing him as a weak Marine who's bitter about Pantano removing him from a leadership role within his platoon and making him a radioman, a job usually reserved for the youngest Marines.

They have described Pantano as a zealous, but not abusive officer.

More than a half-dozen Marines or former Marines who served with Pantano in Iraq praised him in testimony Thursday and Friday as an able leader who remained cool in combat, amiable with Iraqi nationals and protective of his troops. Pantano was so moved at one point that he broke down in tears.

Some witnesses testified that Pantano could be aggressive. One corporal who testified about two such incidents acknowledged under cross-examination that he never considered Pantano's behavior abusive.

http://my.ev1.net/english/news/newsarticle...bject=headlines

How about it boys; this fellow left a job making in the 6 figures to return to the Marines, everyone in his platton except one disgruntled Sergeant has nothing but admiration and praise for how he conducts himself and watches out for his men, he's been cleared once before of all of these charges, and no body here is raising hell over what's being done to him.

[big sky brad]

I've served under a few officers who the description dictatorial would be an appropriate description. 

Name one.

The odd thing about brad's analysis is the accusation of being dictatorial would have had to come from a subordinate and would have to be collaborated, a very odd accusation if his subordinates perceived him to care about them.

I didn't analyze anything.

Put in quotes those comments of mine about any analysis you believe I have made.

It's also odd a Captain would get a charge leveled at him for being dictatorial, almost every martinet I served under was either a 1st or 2nd Leutinant; by the time a Marine officer is ready to be a Captain they have learned better "people" skills or they don't make it to Captain.  I guess there is the possibility someone made the grade without developing the skills needed though.

Just 30 years of experience speaking.

Hogwash!

[The_Bammo]

Name one.
I didn't analyze anything.

Put in quotes those comments of mine about any analysis you believe I have made.
Hogwash!

Big Sky, those are definately things to ponder over--for sure!

You make a he_l of a case Bro', points well made from this doggies view! Hang Tough~

[The_Bammo]

Reflecting on war, past and present
By Richard Lodge / Editor in Chief
Friday, April 29, 2005

It was 30 years ago today when the last Americans climbed a ladder to a helicopter on top of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon and shut the door on a war that seemed like it would never end.

Three weeks ago when I put my hand against the cool blackness of the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C., the fact that almost exactly three decades has passed didn't occur to me.

Standing there, at the point of the "V" of The Wall, you can be overwhelmed by the names, row after row, tens of thousands of them. Each one belongs to a man or woman who died in Vietnam, their lives cut short in a war that left an open wound in our country that is still unhealed. Just think back to last fall and the presidential election if you have any doubt.

It's 30 years later and the Vietnam War is ancient history for the generations born since then. Mention to a teenager today the names of the last two Americans killed in Vietnam -- Marine Cpl. Charles McMahon of Woburn, just weeks shy of his 22nd birthday, and Lance Cpl. Darwin Judge, a 19-year-old from Iowa -- and you might as well be talking about the Civil War. It was a long, long time ago and we're fighting this generation's own war, one that is starting to seem endless, in Iraq.

When the U.S. finally pulled out of South Vietnam, the American death toll had topped 58,000. In Iraq, the total of U.S. war dead is nearing 1,600 and rising almost every day.

On a trip to a newspaper conference in Washington, I took an evening walk to the new World War II Memorial, then along the reflecting pool to The Wall, the Vietnam Memorial.

At the WWII memorial I walked among hundreds of school kids laughing and taking pictures of each other with the towering fountains spraying behind them. I wondered if my dad, a decorated Navy veteran in the South Pacific, would have wanted to visit this place of honor. We took trips when I was a kid, the six of us packed into a Buick station wagon. We drove from Indiana to Washington, D.C., one year, but that was to visit the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials and to tour the Smithsonian. It was long before the death toll in Vietnam was even making the evening news, and decades before the Vietnam and World War II memorials came to be.

Dad might have taken us to this new memorial to the war he fought, if time and death hadn't been so out of order for him. But he never talked about the war when he was alive so I had a hard time imagining he would ever have opened up, even at such a solemn and proud monument.

Years after he died, I found a box of letters in my mother's basement, stuffed with every piece of correspondence Dad sent home to his young bride from mid-1942 into 1944. He wrote about some of the horror, but he never spoke of it, at least to his kids.

In one letter, he described the day he pulled the blackened bodies of more than a dozen of his young sailors from the wreckage of his LST after a Japanese pilot, either driven by kamikaze, "the divine wind," or already dead at the controls of his flaming plane, slammed into the deck.

If Dad had lived long enough, he might have made the pilgrimage to the new memorial, joining the slow parade of aging veterans coming to remember, or maybe to find some peace.

I looked for my own peace at The Wall, the Vietnam Memorial. It's a place I visit whenever I'm in Washington, usually walking along in a crowd of youngsters who have come, with chaperones, to see the capital. My oldest brother's name isn't etched here, although memories of his injuries in Vietnam and his death from cancer in '83 come back to me in a flood when I'm at The Wall.

The adults tried to shush the kids as we neared the memorial, walking down the gentle sloped sidewalk that seems to sink into the ground, parallel to the black granite slabs. For all the criticism and outrage that young architect Maya Ying Lin's design -- it was a "black gash in the ground," some claimed -- brought in its early days, she created a beautiful tribute to the thousands who died. The walkway takes you into the center of the long, black "V" until you stand at the middle, the part deepest in the ground, where the sound of traffic and laughter is muffled and distant.

Thirty years ago today, America turned away from more than a decade of war and killing in Southeast Asia. In 30 years, when our children and grandchildren visit some new granite memorial to our dead from the Iraq War, how many names will they count? How deep into our country's soul will that gash extend? And will our wounds be healed?

http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/columnis...articleid=97254

[vfguenley]

[font=Times]No need to thank me for fighting in another fiasco. 

Sandra, we were not wanted then - Nam Vets did not even put down they served in Vietnam on Job Applications--  if they did - they would not get hired.  LOL  Serious there Sandra - very serious.

The "Thanking Days" are past and history Sandra.

Personally, save that "Thanks" for someone that cares and buys that BS!

As far as "Carrying On" - save that BS for some wanna bee!

That there Sandra is the way I see it and the way it is!  You Hang Tough ~ 

Right on Bro
we know "It Don't Mean Nothing"
Carry on Soldier

This post has been edited by vfguenley: Apr 29 2005, 07:05 PM

[Marine]

Name one.

You wouldn't know any of them brad, they were Marine Corp officers. Some of them left the Corp and some of them developed their skills and are still officers of Marines.

I didn't analyze anything.
Put in quotes those comments of mine about any analysis you believe I have made.

He was removed from his command because he cared for his men.

I guess if it wasn't analysis it might have been hyperbole, I was trying to give you the benefit of doubt.

Hogwash!

Be a little more specific brad, what part do you consider to be hogwash? Would you care to tell us how much experience you have working for and with Marine Corp junior officers, in what capacity and for how long.

[big sky brad]

You wouldn't know any of them brad, they were Marine Corp officers. 

How do you know that?

You don't.

Since you are not a Marine Corps officer, I suggest you try and limit your comments to the subject matter that you are trained at - farming.

The Marine Corp doesn't exist, Tex.
There is no such thing as Marine Corp.
Corp is an abbreviation for corporation.

Any 2-week old Marine recruit in boot camp would know that.

Be a little more specific brad, what part do you consider to be hogwash?

Anything you say about the Marine Corps.

The rest is just your uneducated opinion.

This post has been edited by big sky brad: Apr 29 2005, 10:21 PM

[Sandra]

I want to remind everyone of the rules of this forum:

The staff of CGCS wishes to express our gratitude to all members of the military who have served and continue to serve our nation proudly. We offer our best wishes and support to all family members of our service men and women serving overseas.

We simply ask our Veterans (and other members who visit this forum) to remember our CGCS forum rules when posting messages in this forum. Diverse viewpoints are expected and welcomed. Disparaging comments about others’ service to our country and personal attacks are not welcomed, nor should they be tolerated. Please remember that civility is the best way to achieve common ground.

Thank you – and welcome to the U.S. Military Forum!

Please pay special attention to the bolded text. Thank you.

[Marine]

Any 2-week old Marine recruit in boot camp would know that.

Where'd you go to boot camp brad? We've been asking you for about , what, three or four months? Then there was the Kerry/Edwards forum where you actually made the claim to be a Marine but wasn't able to answer a few simple questions a recruit with a week in the Corp would know. Remember the Gunny asking brad?

Since you are not a Marine Corps officer, I suggest you try and limit your comments to the subject matter that you are trained at - farming.

Actually I only have about 5 years experience farming and that was acquire after retiring from the Marine Corps. I guess if a person wakes up in a new world every morning it's easy to forget about thirty years experience in the Marine Corps.

Anything you say about the Marine Corps.

The rest is just your uneducated opinion.

Well it may be my opinion but it's based in 30 years of experience and as far as being uneducated I do have two Bachelor's degrees, one Masters degree, and am considered fairly fluent in a total of five languages.

[ghostgovt]

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/mar2005/ncar-m21.shtml

Iraq war veterans, military families hold protest in North Carolina
By a reporting team
21 March 2005

Alex Ryabov is a Marine veteran and cofounder of Iraq Veterans Against the War who took part in combat operations during the initial invasion of Iraq in March 2003. He said, “I joined the Marine Corps in 2000 just after a recruiter appeared at our high school. He used to call me repeatedly to urge me to join the corps. He gave me the usual sales pitch of how wonderful the Marine life would be with a chance for traveling all over the world. In addition I could also get help for college.

“My unit came back in May 2003 and already I was sick of the Marines from what we had done in Iraq. I had to hold myself from quitting outright, which would have subjected me to sanctions from the corps. After I got out, I went to a peace rally in June 2004. I was impressed at the fact that the opposition to the war extended to all age groups. I was already against this war, but what I saw at the peace rally had a big impact.

“After getting out of the Marine Corps I met up with Michael Hoffman (one of the main founders of Iraq Veterans Against the War) and discussed about our opposition to the war. I was also in touch with other veterans and we all then decided to state our opposition openly. We formed the IVAW and went public with our opposition during a Veterans Day march in July 2004. Since then we have attracted scores of members and supporters. We have visited wounded veterans at Walter Reed Hospital, where I estimate at least 70 percent are against the war. There is also widespread opposition among the troops currently deployed in Iraq.”

[Marine]

“I joined the Marine Corps in 2000 just after a recruiter appeared at our high school.

That would put the fellow at most to be 23 years old today. How many folks here remember how good their thinking was when you were 23?

Michael Hoffman isn't any older, it must be mighty heady for the two young fellows to receive so much attention for their views.

The people paying attention to them though I could do without.
http://www.socialistworker.org/2004-1/495/...gThemHome.shtml

[ghostgovt]

That would put the fellow at most to be 23 years old today.  How many folks here remember how good their thinking was when you were 23?

Michael Hoffman isn't any older, it must be mighty heady for the two young fellows to receive so much attention for their views. 

The people paying attention to them though I could do without.
http://www.socialistworker.org/2004-1/495/...gThemHome.shtml

I know how US Armed Forces wants to get ahold of young minds and bodies as soon as possible to mold them into their own style of a killing machine. Male minds at 19 are in a very formable state, as the thinking of a young man is naive and gullible to what his instant needs are in life are. He only wants to impress his peers and local 'chicks' in the quickest way possible for accomplishing that whether it be money/job or a uniform. A young man's wake up call in life usually occurs in the military and by the standards of which he's being used for. As they enter war and realize that they are occupying a country for the wrong reasons and becomes a part of a team that brings destruction while killing and maiming others (sometimes the 'declared' enemy or sometimes not). That is when such a young mind begins to search for the truth. That's not what the armed forces wants. Individuals are not to think for themselves, but to act on direct orders without question. Human nature (conscience) simply steps in and reacts otherwise despite what the armed forces demands. It's that conscience that takes over to do what's best for mankind. The armed forces/govt seeks control over others and individual thinking justifiably rationalizes.

[ghostgovt]

I consider this a 'real' marine. He's been there , done that (in the 'nam)... and knows what wrong wars means.


http://www.fairfieldweekly.com/gbase/News/...ml?oid=oid:6523

I spent 13 years in the Marine Corps. I fought my butt off there. Silver star. Purple hearts. Presidential citations. Marine Corps meritorious citations. I was a platoon commander for the last two tours. I was there for four tours over in Vietnam. I doubt I will be speaking up against this war. I'm not an activist. I'm very quiet. I paid a helluva price in Vietnam. I'm on 100 percent disability. PTSD. Physical injuries from gunshots to the arm, to the stomach, shrapnel to the head, to the leg.

But I fought so people could protest and demonstrate in the world and have their own opinions. I didn't like the protesters at all when I was in Vietnam. I was gung ho. It affected me because of what they were calling us. Not all of them. But we didn't know that. They were calling us babykillers and all that. I was following what I believed what was supposed to be the right thing. But the only way we came out of Vietnam was because of the protesters. They were the ones that ended the war. They deserve my medals as much as I got 'em. It wouldn't have been ended if they hadn't protested. I wouldn't have made it home.

—Don Judson, 60, of Woodbury

*******************************************************************

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...4-2004Oct9.html

For Marines, a Frustrating Fight
Some in Iraq Question How and Why War Is Being Waged

By Steve Fainaru
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 10, 2004; Page A01

ISKANDARIYAH, Iraq -- Scrawled on the helmet of Lance Cpl. Carlos Perez are the letters FDNY. After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York, the Pentagon and western Pennsylvania, Perez quit school, left his job as a firefighter in Long Island, N.Y., and joined the U.S. Marine Corps.

"To be honest, I just wanted to take revenge," said Perez, 20.

Pfc. Kyle Maio, 19, spots Lance Cpl. Carlos Perez, 20. Maio said he thinks U.S. officials are not being candid about Iraq because of upcoming U.S. elections. (Steve Fainaru -- The Washington Post)

Now, two months into a seven-month combat tour in Iraq, Perez said he sees little connection between the events of Sept. 11 and the war he is fighting. Instead, he said, he is increasingly disillusioned by a conflict whose origins remain unclear and frustrated by the timidity of U.S. forces against a mostly faceless enemy.

"Sometimes I see no reason why we're here," Perez said. "First of all, you cannot engage as many times as we want to. Second of all, we're looking for an enemy that's not there. The only way to do it is go house to house until we get out of here."

The Marines' opinions have been shaped by their participation in hundreds of hours of operations over the past two months. Their assessments differ sharply from those of the interim Iraqi government and the Bush administration, which have said that Iraq is on a certain -- if bumpy -- course toward peaceful democracy.

"I feel we're going to be here for years and years and years," said Lance Cpl. Edward Elston, 22, of Hackettstown, N.J. "I don't think anything is going to get better; I think it's going to get a lot worse. It's going to be like a Palestinian-type deal. We're going to stop being a policing presence and then start being an occupying presence. . . . We're always going to be here. We're never going to leave."

Several members of the platoon said they were struck by the difference between the way the war was being portrayed in the United States and the reality of their daily lives.

"Every day you read the articles in the States where it's like, 'Oh, it's getting better and better,' " said Lance Cpl. Jonathan Snyder, 22, of Gettysburg, Pa. "But when you're here, you know it's worse every day."

Pfc. Kyle Maio, 19, of Bucks County, Pa., said he thought government officials were reticent to speak candidly because of the upcoming U.S. elections. "Stuff's going on here but they won't flat-out say it," he said. "They can't get into it."