Army of One ...

[Pale_Rider]

Here's a letter a citizen soldier in Iraq wrote to his congressman complaining the Army's slogan of "Army of One" is misleading and is a false advertisment. This impression is only reinforced by the military not adhering to promises to allow soldiers to leave when their tour of duty should have been finished.

http://www.congress.org/congressorg/issues/alert/?alertid=3924011&content_dir=ua_congressorg

"Army of One" is as ridiculous as "Mission Accomplished"
A message from a California "International" Guard soldier

October 20, 2003

As I write this letter in a rare bit of time off from guard duty at the Abu Ghreib Prison in Iraq, Elton John’s greatest hits are playing in my Walkman and I’m actually feeling pretty good. I look up at the frame around the cell window which is covered with pictures of my family (whom I haven’t seen in almost six months) and think to myself: What a wonderful life I have back home. Then, that ridiculous Army slogan “Army of One” comes to my mind and anger returns.

I’m really curious to know if whomever came up with the Army of One campaign knew at the time that it was false advertisement. If it were true, then for one thing a lot of the soldiers in my Guard unit, the 870th Military Police Company, should be allowed to ETS (leave the military on their originally scheduled date). We have soldiers here who are well over a year past their ETS dates! Those of us who have fulfilled our contracts should be able to leave the California “International” Guard now, but nope; instead we are being held against our will while regular Active Duty soldiers are allowed to ETS when their contracts are up. Our military ID cards say Active Duty, but why aren’t we treated the same? Why aren’t we treated as “One”? We are doing exactly the same work as regular Army, but with inadequate safety, transportation, and communications equipment and no ETS rights. What a morale booster that is for us Guardsmen!

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. There is more and more of this coming out

and it is only getting worst for the Guard troops