Something disgusting you will not hear in the media in the USA....

[althecat]

It seems that the powers that be in the US military have decided that in order to deal with their Iraq soldier shortage they are going to activate the service corps in their tiny Pacific protectorates.. i.e. American Samoa, Palau, Micronesia...

We are talking about a tiny number of people here in gross numbers, and probably not the world's greatest soldiers. But in terms of the nations that they come from these young men are a vital resource... they are their future.

f***ers...

[quaoar]

1. Do you have

a link?

[althecat]

4. Some links

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/latestnewsstory.cfm?storyID=3577138&thesection=news&thesubsection=world

http://starbulletin.com/2004/07/20/news/story1.html

and there is an audio report here from the DNC

http://www.npr.org/features/feature.php?wfId=3621125

[lapfog_1]

2. Not that they should be doing this...

but Samoans are tough fighters... I wouldn't want to face
a squad of Samoan soldiers.

But I hope that this, like the other stupid call ups of retired
reservists (some over 50 years old), comes to an end. We are
sending into combat zones people who haven't been in uniform for
10 years, and who don't even do the weekend warrior national guard
thing. They don't have the training or physical stamina to survive
Iraq... and there ain't no "back areas" in Iraq.

[Joy Anne]

5. re call-ups

How about that retired colonel who volunteered for active duty after 9/11 and was so disgusted with the Bushco handling of the military that he changed his registration from Republican to Democrat and is now running for Congress from New Jersey?

That was an amazing speech.

[izzie]

3. I think they are just Americans from the Islands?

I knew a college Prof who taught in the Islands and one of his daughters married a young man. He was just like every one else I knew. Was a traffic controller after getting our of the air force.