US Troops Deserting

[MaiLuk]

>>They're only doing what people do when their country is invaded.<<

 

Not too mention they are not happy about losing their monopoly on the political handouts.

[chuckwoww]

Who would be? I'm not taking sides...just trying to understand the motivations.

[MaiLuk]

>>We had drill corporals with a whole 6 months in the Army <<

 

LMAFAO! When i finished bootcamp i was accepted into OCS. But no slots available for 9 months. So they made me a drill fucking corporal and kept me at ft benning! After just 3 months in the army LOL. Fortunately i got a different assignment before the next cycle of recruits came through so i never had to degrade any of those low life enlistees haha.

[MaiLuk]

>>Is this attitude part of basic training? Where does it come from?<<

 

Actually they don't dehumanize the enemy in bootcamp, they do that to the recruits themselves.

[MaiLuk]

Well as you know there are lots of motivations for the jihadists. One thing about insurgencies is they don't just go away after a few years. No matter how many milestones or corners bush says we have turned.

 

The mujadeen in afghanistan fought against the soviets for 10 years. Only reason they stopped was because the soviets gave up and pulled out. They would have fought forever IMO.

[chuckwoww]

Yes I think degradation and hazing of recruits etc is standard practice in armies. It stops them from thinking too much.

 

Any idea how they get them hyped up for actual combat? I'm sure there's a rush of anger when your buddy gets killed but that must be hard to sustain over a long period.

[McBif]

Dunno what we're all arguing about: we're all agreed that the U.S. should be held to the highest standards, nay, to the standard of absolute perfection.

 

The Baathist/Jihadi insurgency on the other hand can massacre as many innocents as is in their power to do so. We yawn. Ho hum. They're just ragheads, what do you expect? And who cares?

 

Certainly not the Swedish nationalists, the Kerry supporters, the people whose very comfortable standard of living seems to be magically divorced from oil production, ad nauseum.

 

I suspect the average U.S. serviceman in Iraq is somewhat more moved by the sight of a gutted three year-old Iraqi girl than is the average "progressive" sneering at Bush over his New York Times at Starbucks.

 

Let's cut the crap. The Americans, like the Israelis, kill innocents by mistake or as an aberration. Their enemies do it as a matter of policy.

 

One last thing: It's often struck me reading "progressive" drivel on NP that ALL us pervs would be up against the wall lickity split if our leftist betters could put us there. Why kiss their asses?

 

So let's all hug. We sometimes forget that we all have more in common than we sometimes think.

[MaiLuk]

AF16 said:

Flashermac said:

<< Comparing what the allies did to conquer tyranny and ensure freedom in WWII to what they are now doing in Iraq which amounts to the invasion of another country on totally false pretences is an insult to those who died fighting for freedom in WWII. Can't you see that? >>

 

 

Maybe it is to the western allies. But do you think the folks in Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Hungary, Romania, Czechoslovakia etc were ecstatic to have Stalin replace Hitler? Was tyranny conquered and freedom ensured there???

 

The US and UK went into Iraq with good intentions. But good intentions aren't always enough.

 

No they did not have good intentions. Bush and his cronies had a philosophy that the US could do whatever to ensure US safety and the only threat towards the US were energy. China and other contries were making headway and there will be a problem with the supply of energy.

 

Thus Bush had to do something, which meant taking controll over energy in the ME.

 

How to achieve that? Bush thought that the US would do well in a situation where contries were democracies. Ecconomic warware and depandancies, so as a _ tool _ he attacked Iraq and tried to put inplace a US friendly government that would both be stable and friendly towards US interests.

 

In other areas he support dictators because that suits him best, but in the ME he tought democracy would work well, but his main goal were not democracy but access to energy.

 

An advanced form of highway robbary.

 

Bush belongs in jail.

 

I sort of agree with your analysis. The current administration is influenced by strategic thinkers. Hegemony in various places around the world depends on ME oil. So hegemony in the ME is necessary.

 

If democracy in iraq could be achieved, the oil industry in iraq could gain substantial influence over an elected government in the same manner as it is done in the US (so the reasoning goes). An Iraqi democratic legislature could also be influenced by other special interests such as US multi nationals. The same ones who would have earned $18 billion dollars courtesy the US tax payer to rebuild iraq.

 

And the remaining ME countries would have to play ball with the US or face a regime change. Such a threat "should" be credible in view of what just happened in iraq. A reasonable amount of hegemony in the ME would be achieved in the long term.

 

As it turned out, you have empire (this term has actually been used in recent years) running up against islamists and being stalemated.

 

The US is not ready to give up the 21st century. Any doubt about that just have a look at the US military budget.

[MaiLuk]

>>The Baathist/Jihadi insurgency on the other hand can massacre as many innocents as is in their power to do so. We yawn. Ho hum. They're just ragheads, what do you expect? And who cares?<<

 

We don't need marines doing what the animals are doing. BTW, the marine massacre is not getting much attention in the arab media so far.

[Evel_Penivel]

To state that innocent civilians have been killed, and on occasion even murdered, in Iraq, is hardly a revelation. That's happened in every armed conflict since Og the Caveman and his buddies raided the tribe across the valley. Every war involves horrible suffering for non-combatants, always has, probably always will.

 

But if anyone wants to put the villain's hat on the U.S., please answer the following question: In what armed conflict has one side taken more care to avoid civilian casualties that the U.S. has in Iraq?

 

I in no way condone the deliberate murder of civilians by U.S. military personnel. Those responsible for such acts should be severely punished to the limit of the law. But within the context of U.S. military activity, these are extremely isolated incidents. Again the question becomes, which military forces than those of the U.S. have a better record in limiting abuse of civilians?

 

Of course, you can wiggle out of these hard questions by proclaiming there shouldn't be any wars, that it was wrong to invade Iraq, and so forth. But there are wars and the U.S. did invade Iraq. The number of civilian casualties during the invasion phase was limited for a military engagement of that size, less than a tenth of the German civilians killed in the fall of Berlin alone in 1945.

 

During the occupation of Iraq, the vast majority of civilian murders have been committed by former Iraqi secret police and Baath party members as well as the foreign jihadis fighting with the insurgency.

 

EP