My oldest son met a soldier just back from Iraq

[Mari333]

and she drove a CO around in a vehicle...her words to my son are that there are over 150 attacks and skirmishes per day going on in the area she was in. Non stop. She said it's a nightmare.
And she has only 2 weeks off, is going back. Said the morale is shit there right now.
all they want to do is come home.
Dont expect the media to care.

[shockingelk]

1. soldiers always bitch

The point here though is that they never should have been in Iraq in the first place.

I wish good luck and peace for your son's acquaintance.

[oldhat]

2. FUBAR

http://newyorker.com/printable/?fact/040712fa_fact

Debbie watched the waitress clear our plates, then she leaned forward to tell about a night in July, after Carl’s return, when they went with some friends to the Afterhours Enlisted Club at Fort Benning. Carl had a few drinks, Debbie said, and started railing at the disk jockey, shouting, “I want to hear music about people blowing people’s brains out, cutting people’s throats!” Debbie continued, “I said, ‘Carl. Shut up.’ He said, ‘No, I want to hear music about shit I’ve seen!’” Carl listened to Debbie’s story with a loving smile, as though she were telling about him losing his car keys. “I don’t remember that,” he said, laughing. Debbie said, “That was the first time I heard him say stuff about seeing people’s brains blown out. Other times, he just has flashbacks—like, he sits still and stares.” Carl laughed again. “Really, though, I’m fine,” he said. Beside him in the booth, Debbie shook her head without taking her eyes from mine and exaggeratedly mouthed, “Not fine. Not fine.”

...

On the day we were talking, the Times ran a page-one story on Army snipers in Baghdad. A sniper who had killed seven men in a day was quoted as saying that he felt no remorse. “He’s got the thousand-yard stare,” Knox said, tapping the accompanying photograph with his index finger. “Go back and find him in fifteen years.”

[Media_Lies_Daily]

11. Was in the service with quite a few Marines who had the "stare"....

...one was my C.O., who had been an enlisted man with 2/9 in Vietnam. Captain Jimmy was a wild Irishman who was a natural-born leader, but he had some issues from that war. He told me quite a few things when he would get drunk, which was almost daily.

He told me how he had a VERY tough time adjusting to living indoors when he came back, and reacted badly to loud noises. He used his G.I. bill to go to college. When he got his degree four years later, he went back into the Marines as an officer...said the civilian world was much safer without him in it.

I had to pick him up early one morning at Camp Pendleton and found him passed out in full camouflage paint in front of his house with an NVA rifle he had gotten from Vietnam. I shook his foot to wake him up and I asked him what the heck happened. After he shook his head a few times and got his eyes focused, he told me he had had a flashback and had "gone on patrol" in the neighborhood (married officers quarters...yes, he had a wife and a daughter).

Jimmy wasn't the only soldier to come back from Vietnam with major problems, and now we're facing another wave of people with the same problems but without the same VA benefits.

[vetwife]

12. You are right......been there ..lived that !

The 1000 yard stare and caught between there and here. That is one terrifying feeling. These folks won't get access to VA like what we fought for the Nam vets. For only two years and then its over. PTSD (That is why its called Post)doesn't even really start in really bad for years. Did any one ever think, unless they get the help they need, we may all be at their mercy. I did. Been around enough vets on the line of destruction.

[InkAddict]

14. Never fear - after it's over, we can help in Centerville, Ohio

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=172x1063

:grr:

[Rebellious Republican]

15. Don't even get me started on the VA cuts, I can not understand how

some of my fellow vets can support this misadministration....

Bush Honors Veterans By Slashing Veterans Affairs Budget by $1 Billion
by James Boyne
Guest Commentator for Irregular Times
June 1, 2004

I read today in an article by the Associated Press that President Bush’s 2006 budget (if he is re-elected) has a provision in it that will cut funds for Veterans Affairs by 3.4% or roughly $1 billion. The total VA Budget is $28.7 billion a year.

Let’s put this in perspective.

Many (although not all) veterans are pro-Bush, pro-Republican, and pro-Iraqi war. They are patriotic in the sense that patriotism is often confused with "supporting your President in time of war no matter what." President Bush therefore can take advantage of this fact and can continue to cut the VA program with little regard about whether or not a majority of veterans will vote for him. A majority will. After all, he is the Commander-in-Chief and as Commander-in-Chief he gets to distribute a load of his P.R. and give a load of campaign speeches to orchestrated and controlled groups of our young men and women currently serving in the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines as well as prime time TV coverage at the War College. This plays well on TV on the nightly news and on the major newspapers’ front-page photos of President Bush.

In return for Veterans' lost lives, the sacrifices, the suffering, the dislocation, the burdens, the family disruptions and related family crises the President proposes a $1 billion cut in a $28.7 billion VA budget.

The only logic I could determine behind this significant budget cut is that the President needs more money to take care of his various fiscal messes: <Snip
http://irregulartimes.com/solvingveterans.html


VA officials say Bay Pines computer system may never work

Associated Press

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - The Department of Veterans Affairs now says the troubled $472 million computer system at Bay Pines VA Medical Center may never work correctly, documents show.<Snip
http://www.tallahassee.com/mld/tallahassee/8957023.htm

Another VA Official Involved In Bay Pines Problems Resigns
By RICHARD LARDNER [e-mail]
Published: Jul 14, 2004
http://tampatrib.com/News/MGBY1JQYMWD.html


Shaw & Wexler Question VA Budget Cuts
Washington, D.C.--Congressman E. Clay Shaw, Jr. (R-Florida) and Congressman Robert Wexler (D-Florida) today sent a letter to Togo D. West, Jr., Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), questioning the recent budget cuts at the West Palm Beach VA Medical Center.

"I am very concerned about the proposed budget cuts at the West Palm Beach Center. Our veterans deserve quality care. We cannot stand by and let funding cuts prevent them from getting the care they have earned in service to our country," said Shaw. "The amount of funding given to the hospital by the VA reflects a misunderstanding of the unique population dynamics of South Florida. The hospital cannot provide quality care and absorb these funding cuts."

"I am deeply concerned about budget cuts and misguided funding policies for veterans' programs at the federal and regional levels," Wexler said. "Veterans facilities around the country have been forced to compromise on the quality of treatment they provide to deserving veterans. The drastic cut of 70 employees at the West Palm Beach facility will necessarily affect the quality of care and reduce the variety of services that the Center can offer. Our local veterans deserve better than that." <Snip
http://www.house.gov/shaw/pr_1997_2001/pr_012899_vets.html

[fujiyama]

3. Being that

your son is over, has he mentioned whether the morale is any different since the 'handover' happened?

I was wondering if the morale is bad all over or just in that are your son's aquantence was in.

BTW, I wish your son and his aquantance the best of luck.

[Snoggera]

4. It has to take courage to go back there

after only two weeks away from the nightmare. I don't know how they do it. I imagine myself hiding for the next 10 years inside a hollowed out tree on a mountaintop if I faced that choice. Maybe not, but it sure sounds preferable to being in an area where there are attacks and skirmishes constantly.

I hope your family is doing better, and son in Iraq safe.

[The Backlash Cometh]

5. First post of the day.

<sigh> My heart goes out to our military men and women. When they return, they will have many, many stories to tell, and this time, we will be united with them and the media will have no excuse to hide their stories for 20 years. That's what happened with Vietnam. The soldiers returned and it took 20 years before a movie was made about Vietnam to bring out the harsh realities of that war.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

13. I'm an amateur historian, and it's interesting that it took almost 20....

...years for a movie to come out about Vietnam.

If you go back to the Civil War and look at the dates of the vast majority of first-person battlefield accounts, you'll find that it took about twenty years for those stories to be written, too. The same is true of just about every war we've had to fight.

I guess 20 years is about the time when certain memories become dulled enough to allow someone to talk about what they had seen and done in combat situations.

[The Backlash Cometh]

26. I don't think we'll have to wait that long for the Iraq War

stories. Mark that one up to our information technology. Thank you Gore!

[Don_G]

6. I Expected This

The same thing happened in Vietnam. The troops rotated home on leave or after their first rotation and started to tell their friends and family what the national media was leaving out.

Finally, when enough soldiers came home, the nation in general was told what was actually happening in Vietnam. That started the general support against the war among those stateside.

The first order of business is to evict Chimpy. He started this shit, won't listen to anyone and won't admit his mistake. As long as he's in office, he will keep the troops there and under his strict control.

Iraq needs the UN there as a peacekeeping force to allow them a chance to get their country back again.

[Wright Patman]

7. So you'd rather seen the UN troops

picked off by roadside bombs and ambushes rather than Americans. That's understandable, but not realistic.

There is no such country as the UN and the fact that there are only a few countries left in the coalition lets us know that the UN would not be able to assemble enough brain-dead soldiers to patrol the area.

Iraqis, rightfully and justly in my view, despise the UN just as much as they do the U.S. It was the UN, albeit under constant pressure from the Anglo-American bullies who are trying to rule the world, which subjected them to sanctions which killed at least 500,000 people, mostly children, over a 12+ year period.

[Don_G]

8. The People Need A Chance To Reclaim Their Country

They will never have the chance under King George and his hand-selected minions.

The mission of the UN is vastly different than that of the US and will have the support of the surrounding nations if only to bring peace and stability in the reigon.

[cmd]

9. The United Nations also include Arab countries

It is help from those nations that Iraq needs most. No one wants to see anyone picked off by roadside bombs and ambushes. A realistic solution has to be one that is negotiated by countries other than the US. We are responsible, however, for paying for the entire mess.

[Rebellious Republican]

10. And just how would you bring about a peaceful solution?

"There is no such country as the UN and the fact that there are only a few countries left in the coalition lets us know that the UN would not be able to assemble enough brain-dead soldiers to patrol the area."

Maybe there is a reason why, maybe they do not support Bush's war for profits, maybe they refuse to participate in an illegal and unjustified war.
Maybe if we have a president that wants to cooperate with the rest of the world and did not tell them to go fuck themselves, they might be a little more cooperative.They may be willing to go in to help stabilize the situation.
I am sure that you know how it feels to be hungry, sick, and living like an animal, scratching out a meager existence while living a day to day existence. Ya know, having to worry about meaningless things like trying to just stay alive from day to day.

Ever been to a worn torn country riddled with strife and pestilence? My guess is that you have not, I have!

Maybe the innocent people of Iraq, might like a little help.....

[vetwife]

16. I agree with Rebellious

You don't get a girl pregnant and then just leave her. That is what GW BUSH did. He got a Country in trouble. Several, including us. But, no other nation will ever listen to this lying piece of garbage in the white house again. IT is going to be an uphill battle for anyone but he is useless...First you have to gain credibility to get help and respect and then you have to prove you have sense enough to do the right thing. This jerk has neither. the Kerry administration will not have it easy but it will be better under his leadership. Troops on the ground does not have to be American troops but Bush is not going to get people in there because nobody trusts him in his quest for oil? Do you blame them? We are a humanitiarian country or used to be.....Never perfect but respected. We got to get this dictator out of our own office and go from there.

[Jacobin]

20. Your analogy only goes so far

When the inseminating boyfriend stays after the baby is born, and then proceeds to beat up his wife, torture the baby, and shoot the moms relatives indiscriminately, then it is time to leave.

We will never be welcome there. All attempts at "fixing" IraqNam will be scuttled by a nation that hates our guts.

The sooner we are gone, the quicker they can get on with fixing their own country.

[Rebellious Republican]

24. See post #23 N/T

[jonnyblitz]

17. yeah they want our help all right.

Can't you tell? geesh... :eyes: they want us the HELL OUT.

[vetwife]

19. I don't blame them..But they would like a little security too....

I agree...We should never have been there. And the best way to support our troops is to bring them home. But what in the world will stop other nations from coming over here and dropping bombs on us after this mess if we don' try and get some help in there. Not necessarily OUR MEN..but some Real countries, with Real Armies to help secure what we damaged. Otherwise Mr. Commander in Thief has left us wide open for an all out full scale attack from nukes or his own cluster Bombs from countries that are pissed off at us. We have to look responsible.....We need to start rotating troops home and get other countires to help, Not Iceland, Real countries, rotated in. That is the only saftey net we got !

As far as the analgy, if the boy beats her up, we would have our older brother or Dad beat him up or take him out or put somefolks in jail and make them pay. That is what is gonna happen to us and not all of us (I sure wasn't) was in favor of getting the war on there.
But the country has been destroyed by us and we won't get out of this unscathed unless we get real Countires involved. Even after we leave, this county is some kind of vunerable after what George did !

[Rebellious Republican]

23. You obviously need to read the entire thread, before interjecting

uninformed asinine assertions. The discussion was about getting the UN involved and that would include the ARAB members, not the US. Jeeesh!

:think:

[leesa]

22. You are misinformed. The US and Israel were the sole countries that

voted against lifitng the sanctions every time it was brought forth in the UN. The UN and the rest of the world wanted to lift sanctions. The US wouldn't allow it.

It ain't the UN trying to take over the world baby, open your eyes.

[Wright Patman]

25. If you are responding to me,

you need to read more carefully what I said. I will reprint the relevant paragraph below.

"It was the UN, albeit under constant pressure from the Anglo-American bullies who are trying to rule the world, which subjected them to sanctions which killed at least 500,000 people, mostly children, over a 12+ year period."

The phrase "Anglo-American" means the U.S. and Britain. Those are the two countries which kept the UN from lifting sanctions. I was not aware Israel was even allowed to vote in the General Assembly, but I know they are not now and were not then on the UN Security Council, which is the relevant decision-making body for imposing or lifting sanctions.

[Jacobin]

18. My son's driver's ed teacher has a son in IraqNam

He told his mom last week that they are not getting food delivered and have to rummage through garbage cans to get enough to eat.

She is FURIOUS. She voted for Smirk in 2000, and is encouraging everyone to vote for Kerry this time. Her son says that Iraqis "hate our guts" and use every opportune moment to shoot, blow things up, screw up whatever we are trying to do. He says they want us gone and that we will never ever be welcome there. He was for the invasion, but now says it is a lost cause.

[Kanary]

21. More people learning the hard way.

I guess I'm to the point of having a hard time feeling sorry for them.

They voted for it, I guess they live with it.

Kanary