On March 29 2011 00:42 Offhand wrote: Ths US military doesn't do anything to protect me. The troops are on the line of fire, but not for reasons that concern my safety, or the safety of any other non-military Americans for that matter.
I dislike generalizations but numbers don't lie. The military is comprised primarily of middle-class WASPs with no where else to go. These are people who can't get into a college or have a decent job out of highschool.
I'm speechless at how ignorant this is. Amazing. I'm not saying, what you're saying is statistically incorrect, but the way you said it was disgusting. Not everyone has a mommy and daddy that can foot their 40,000 $ per semester bill, or cosign for their student loans. It's called upward mobility, and the post 9/11 G.I. bill is a great way to move up. Seriously think for like 2 seconds before you say some ignorant shit next time.
Yes, we live in a society where it's acceptable to trade violence for upward mobility. Think about that for a second.
Gee, that's convenient. You must not need to give yourself a leg up in the world, because you're already standing on everyone below you. But hey, whatever, pay your taxes, and you pay for my $1000/weekly medication, and my disability check, because I'm medically retired, and planning to enjoy my GI Bill. So it worked, and apparently our society DOES support it, including you, whether you like it or not.
I agree, there's really nothing I can do to stop it. Perhaps all that cash and benefits help you sleep at night. I'll take my student loans and moral superiority instead.
The solution is of course to kill military spending and make soldiers live by the same rules as the rest of civilization. But who the fuck am I kidding, that's not going to happen anytime soon.
You can't have world peace without a world government, and that would likely end up needing to be the worst military dictatorship at all. And feel free to claim your theoretical moral superiority, tell me, how exactly am I morally inferior to you? What war crimes did I commit? What crimes have I committed? What have I done against my fellow man? Can you name anything? No.
My job in Iraq was as a gunner in a Brigadier General's security detail. I rode along in case we got attacked, to be ready to defend my squad and the general. His job? He was inspecting the second wave of humanitarian projects to make sure the money wasn't falling through cracks as badly as the first round. I rode to schools, water treatment plants, power plants, and police stations.
Do I believe we should have been in Iraq to begin with? No. But I did a job there, was able to avoid being forced to kill any other human, DESPITE us being attacked several times on our way to check out those aid projects. Just because the politicians fuck up doesn't automatically make the soldiers worse people than you for doing their jobs. The fact that you seem to think so just shows you to be as ignorant and intolerant as the types that actually commit the war crimes.
You were in a country actively suppressing the local people for someone else's profit. Perhaps you didn't get your murder on and were there to just defend other soldiers. But your actions are no better then the people you support.
You weren't drafted, you entered the army willingly, no one forced you to support that agenda. Hope the benefits were worth it.
On March 29 2011 01:15 Offhand wrote: You were in a country actively suppressing the local people for someone else's profit. Perhaps you didn't get your murder on and were there to just defend other soldiers. But your actions are no better then the people you support.
You weren't drafted, you entered the army willingly, no one forced you to support that agenda. Hope the benefits were worth it.
Actually, I was actively helping the process of undoing what you're saying I was doing. As it turns out, the benefits are incredibly worth it. I volunteered to do a job, did it to the best of my ability, helped a bad situation get a little bit better for some of the people in it.
Can you say as much? What have you done to help those poor oppressed people? Protested on their behalf? I'm sure they can eat rhetoric. Have you sent money? I doubt it.
If you don't support either side, you can't claim the high ground, you're just a coward sitting on a fence hoping it never affects you personally.
The military is comprised primarily of middle-class WASPs with no where else to go. These are people who can't get into a college or have a decent job out of highschool.
Nobody is "protecting your country". Euro-American force in Irak and Afghanistan are invading armies, are there for wrong reason, and, as it has been proven many times, don't behave much better than their opponents. What's really easy and confortable is to say that theses guys were psychopaths and that the problem has nothing to do with the whole situation.
Just watch Fox News, like 3 minutes, and you get a good picture of what is really fucked up in the first place, of where the violence originaly comes from.
I would respond to this, but you're inability to form a coherent argument makes it difficult to do.
It's disrespectful to soldiers as a whole to group them together with these crazy people. They have an occupation that grants a larger amount of respect than most jobs. Whether or not you agree with their presence has no bearing on if you should support the individuals. They have a duty to serve their country and continue to make sacrifices that allow me to live the life that I live.
I agree with everything you said except the bolded part. Yes, the people in the armed forces are sacrificing a lot in order to serve and this is admirable of them, but tell me, in what way is the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan protecting you and allowing you to continue the life that you live?
I read alot of bad things in this thread and alot of accusations about why and how american soldiers are, which I think is half true and half bullshit. I think some people fail to remember that some of these men have been oversea's in iraq or afghan for many years sometimes 4+ in a combat zone alone. Now also remember this war is all about gorilla tactics, IED's VBIED's, suicide bombers and what not have been the main attack on ANY SOLDIER from ANY country that has served in these wars.
My first tour of duty was in 2003, and beleive me U.S. soldiers were not always the worse out on the road then and there were many country's involved. I, like many others signed up for the army because I wanted to make something of my life ( not because im iggnorant ) and when sept 11th happen I felt it was right to serve 4 years for my country. I am a type of person that likes to help people, I am very generous and always go out of my way to help others. I volunteered to go to guatemala and do some work, just to say im not racist or anything in anyway. After day in and day out being bombed on the roads, while you sleep motors raining down nightly ( mainly in 03-04 ) Seeing innocent civilians get blown up by these bombs over and over and your buddies too, and the biggest problem was. Who the fuck is doing this? well it's that same joe that looks like a regular civilian. After awhile this breaks you down because no matter who you are, you are scared everytime you step outside that wire and you don't know who or when something will happen.
Now i am not saying what these guys did is right, because it's not and I wouldnt tolerate it, but to put this name on every soldier is just bullshit when there has been 100's of thousands of soldiers that have gone over there. I will admit I have seen my fair share of bad shootings and I am not happy about it, I have been in shootings where innocent people preceived to be a threat, because they were just as ignorant as everyone else in this world. It's sad and I feel pain from my tours of duty every single day, when it was real bad I couldn't sleep. nightmares haunted me, my startle reaction was out the roof. Someone could tap my shoulder behind me and I would jump and be in a offensive position. Most my problems from the war still happen every week and it's been years. I like to think of it as a tolerance level and 90% prolly more, but I don't want to say everyone just can't or shouldn't be put through year's of this kind of war where there is no trust in the people you are trying to protect, there is no face on the man behind the trigger and the explosions just keep getting bigger and bigger.
When I was in, the military ignored most common signs of mental health problems, mainly PTSD.( Post Tramatic Stress Disorder ) I still fault them everyday for that, but I am hearing it is getting better( but obviously not ). I am working with the VA now and I will say that they are indeed also more aware of the problem and are trying to help. PTSD is something that is uncurable, it's all in the mind and you can't control how the mind think's and react's, but you can supress it with the use of therapy and maybe some medication might work but rarly does. There are 100's of thousands of claims for PTSD and lets also not forget TBI ( tramatic brain injury ) which many will think if your brain dead then whats it matter? well there are many different levels of TBI and they do mess with you mentally even though it was caused by a physical reaction.
btw i am 100% disabled veteran and I would hope just because of that many of you wouldn't look down at me and flame to hard, but i know it will come. Just remember my tolerance level is lower so i might get angry =)
On September 28 2010 10:00 SiguR wrote: Its sad that even when stories and videos like these surface, people still fail to realize how bias their usual perception of the world is. The civilians in countries currently occupied by the united states have been slaughtered like animals (or worse) quite often. The same goes for civilians in countries occupied by pretty much any other country. It amazes me that even after this sort of stuff surfaces, people still cling to their "our soldiers and society is more humane and 'good' than other societies of the past that have been in similar positions" mentality.
Most wars are brutal on both sides beyond comprehension for most people that have never actually experienced it. Saying this shit happens in every war situation doesn't justify it, however. It just shows that people need to be absolutely certain they want to go to war in the first place and are ready to accept the consequences. When you put kids into situations where they are purposely desensitized towards the value of human life, this sort of shit is going to happen. It's disgusting and it's wrong, but odds are, something similar is going to happen in most war situations.
It's disappointing to see the ignorant masses push for wars they dont understand and then cringe when they are forced to see that war involves more than what you see in most hollywood movies.
The solution is of course to kill military spending and make soldiers live by the same rules as the rest of civilization. But who the fuck am I kidding, that's not going to happen anytime soon.
It's already happening. Quite a bit actually... let's see in the last few months: -My housing allowance was reduced.
-Pay raise for the new year was only 1.3% which does not even keep up with inflation.
-Cuts to various education programs on my post. (I'm sure its army wide but can't confirm)
-My unit is probably going to lose our jump status because of budget cuts and the fact that its just not important as anymore given the current environment.
*edit* -Reduction in medical coverage.
-The army is currently in the process of Trying to cut 49,000 people by trying to "chapter" them out. Basically it's a process of catching a lot of the bad apples. Basically in my unit if you commit any offence that would normally result in a UCMJ article... you will be instantly chaptered.
and I just realized this is kind of off topic, I apologize.
Too much fighting about whether being in the military is justifiable or not. Personally, I do not have it in me to take a human/ most animal life (mosquitoes...well), and my morals are that I treat other people as humans, no matter from what social, economic, ethnicity etc. they come from.
I respect the soldiers that do serve in the military, as they too make sacrifices, although I do not always agree with policies that the military employs.
That being said, I cannot justify the killings that happened here. This is the result of a flawed system, that did not take responsibility for what happened, and is actively trying to downplay the role it had in the slaughter of innocent civilians. I am attending a American Revolutionary War class, and some events are quite under-told. I too would have my blood boil if some soldiers whom I have never seen in my life march in and shot my family and neighbors, all for the sake of sport? Or revenge killings, as what happens ever so often in war? (I read about a account of a British dragoon finding 5 severed heads on a shelf (the Tories/loyalists taking revenge on the Whigs/patriots vice versa.)
On March 29 2011 01:15 Offhand wrote: You were in a country actively suppressing the local people for someone else's profit. Perhaps you didn't get your murder on and were there to just defend other soldiers. But your actions are no better then the people you support.
You weren't drafted, you entered the army willingly, no one forced you to support that agenda. Hope the benefits were worth it.
Actually, I was actively helping the process of undoing what you're saying I was doing. As it turns out, the benefits are incredibly worth it. I volunteered to do a job, did it to the best of my ability, helped a bad situation get a little bit better for some of the people in it.
Can you say as much? What have you done to help those poor oppressed people? Protested on their behalf? I'm sure they can eat rhetoric. Have you sent money? I doubt it.
If you don't support either side, you can't claim the high ground, you're just a coward sitting on a fence hoping it never affects you personally.
The only mess you're fixing was the one you helped create.
Not going into the rest of your post because it's ad homonim bullshit.
On March 29 2011 01:15 Offhand wrote: You were in a country actively suppressing the local people for someone else's profit. Perhaps you didn't get your murder on and were there to just defend other soldiers. But your actions are no better then the people you support.
You weren't drafted, you entered the army willingly, no one forced you to support that agenda. Hope the benefits were worth it.
Actually, I was actively helping the process of undoing what you're saying I was doing. As it turns out, the benefits are incredibly worth it. I volunteered to do a job, did it to the best of my ability, helped a bad situation get a little bit better for some of the people in it.
Can you say as much? What have you done to help those poor oppressed people? Protested on their behalf? I'm sure they can eat rhetoric. Have you sent money? I doubt it.
If you don't support either side, you can't claim the high ground, you're just a coward sitting on a fence hoping it never affects you personally.
Jingle, buddy, if I were you I would quit responding to such blatantly hateful posts. Let that one stew in his own juices. I, for one, appreciate your service, and I appreciate that you brought sincere humanitarian motives to that service. It's very encouraging to hear.
The military is comprised primarily of middle-class WASPs with no where else to go. These are people who can't get into a college or have a decent job out of highschool.
So is Teamliquid.
Nobody is "protecting your country". Euro-American force in Irak and Afghanistan are invading armies, are there for wrong reason, and, as it has been proven many times, don't behave much better than their opponents. What's really easy and confortable is to say that theses guys were psychopaths and that the problem has nothing to do with the whole situation.
Just watch Fox News, like 3 minutes, and you get a good picture of what is really fucked up in the first place, of where the violence originaly comes from.
I would respond to this, but you're inability to form a coherent argument makes it difficult to do.
It's disrespectful to soldiers as a whole to group them together with these crazy people. They have an occupation that grants a larger amount of respect than most jobs. Whether or not you agree with their presence has no bearing on if you should support the individuals. They have a duty to serve their country and continue to make sacrifices that allow me to live the life that I live.
I agree with everything you said except the bolded part. Yes, the people in the armed forces are sacrificing a lot in order to serve and this is admirable of them, but tell me, in what way is the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan protecting you and allowing you to continue the life that you live?
Actually... In most war-time circumstances there is the threat of them invading america If we lose there in war X then the y country will invade us. Iraq is different, we invading them is a mistake. they didn't have the money or forces to fight back, let alone invade america. Peter basically says what the government fucked up in the first place:
You think people should be more tolerant towards murder? Let's look at cause and effect. Kill an enemy combatant = not murder. Kill an enemy civilian = murder. One of these breeds intolerance, for an action. Granted, a lot of people are focusing their ire horribly, but that doesn't mean the emotion behind the reaction isn't reasonable. Their aim just sucks.
Putting words into my mouth. I'm just pointing out how ironic it is people are condemning intolerance with more intolerance.. eg."rednecks" "religious nuts" etc. We should deal with these murderers appropriately and condemn their actions, but it would be a mistake to generalize calling the army incompetent or intolerant as that only breeds more intolerance.
Well I have been to afghanistan twice now, and there are a lot of soldiers that help the afghanis a lot, at the same time on my first deployment that was 15 months a month after getting out of airborne school I used to have this hate for all this people, because somehow I blamed them for me been there and every time a soldier got killed i felt like we had to kill all of them.
By the end of that deployment I realize how good some of this people are and how nice they are too but when all you see in the news is them killing american soldiers by the time you get there the only thing you have in your mind is payback and if you don't catch yourself you might end up doing something stupid.
also a lot of times the problems this soldiers have in the states specially married soldiers is worst than them been in the war.
On March 29 2011 01:15 Offhand wrote: You were in a country actively suppressing the local people for someone else's profit. Perhaps you didn't get your murder on and were there to just defend other soldiers. But your actions are no better then the people you support.
You weren't drafted, you entered the army willingly, no one forced you to support that agenda. Hope the benefits were worth it.
Actually, I was actively helping the process of undoing what you're saying I was doing. As it turns out, the benefits are incredibly worth it. I volunteered to do a job, did it to the best of my ability, helped a bad situation get a little bit better for some of the people in it.
Can you say as much? What have you done to help those poor oppressed people? Protested on their behalf? I'm sure they can eat rhetoric. Have you sent money? I doubt it.
If you don't support either side, you can't claim the high ground, you're just a coward sitting on a fence hoping it never affects you personally.
Just ignore the retarded troll. People here in the U.S. and across the world have very unrealistic viewpoints of war. You don't know what war is but until you are actually involved in that war you know nothing. I have been involved in one before and there is not a day that goes by that I can forget it. The type of combat involved in Iraq is nothing but urban fighting, where avoiding civilian casualties is impossible. What makes matters worse is that insurgents/militants use civilians as their cover when they do operations. No matter how hard you try not to hurt civilians, they always get hurt.
@Offhand it's not hard to take to easy path and blame it on a soldier, who volunteered to protect your interests and your ass. The ones you should blame are the politicians, not the soldiers. The soldiers go their to do their job, a job they volunteered for, blame the politicians who send them there, the ones you voted for.
Certainly, there are many soldiers that have done much good in the countries they are sent to war in. Much reconstruction and progress has been made, although unforeseen circumstances do happen. I am quite aware that civilians do get shot or killed incidentally. My only beef with this case is that these soldiers (the ones specifically in this case) were doing it to pass time, because they were bored, and some ignored their own morals and did what their commanding officers told them to do.
On March 29 2011 01:23 ReDDoG-TrEe wrote: I read alot of bad things in this thread and alot of accusations about why and how american soldiers are, which I think is half true and half bullshit. I think some people fail to remember that some of these men have been oversea's in iraq or afghan for many years sometimes 4+ in a combat zone alone. Now also remember this war is all about gorilla tactics, IED's VBIED's, suicide bombers and what not have been the main attack on ANY SOLDIER from ANY country that has served in these wars.
My first tour of duty was in 2003, and beleive me U.S. soldiers were not always the worse out on the road then and there were many country's involved. I, like many others signed up for the army because I wanted to make something of my life ( not because im iggnorant ) and when sept 11th happen I felt it was right to serve 4 years for my country. I am a type of person that likes to help people, I am very generous and always go out of my way to help others. I volunteered to go to guatemala and do some work, just to say im not racist or anything in anyway. After day in and day out being bombed on the roads, while you sleep motors raining down nightly ( mainly in 03-04 ) Seeing innocent civilians get blown up by these bombs over and over and your buddies too, and the biggest problem was. Who the fuck is doing this? well it's that same joe that looks like a regular civilian. After awhile this breaks you down because no matter who you are, you are scared everytime you step outside that wire and you don't know who or when something will happen.
Now i am not saying what these guys did is right, because it's not and I wouldnt tolerate it, but to put this name on every soldier is just bullshit when there has been 100's of thousands of soldiers that have gone over there. I will admit I have seen my fair share of bad shootings and I am not happy about it, I have been in shootings where innocent people preceived to be a threat, because they were just as ignorant as everyone else in this world. It's sad and I feel pain from my tours of duty every single day, when it was real bad I couldn't sleep. nightmares haunted me, my startle reaction was out the roof. Someone could tap my shoulder behind me and I would jump and be in a offensive position. Most my problems from the war still happen every week and it's been years. I like to think of it as a tolerance level and 90% prolly more, but I don't want to say everyone just can't or shouldn't be put through year's of this kind of war where there is no trust in the people you are trying to protect, there is no face on the man behind the trigger and the explosions just keep getting bigger and bigger.
When I was in, the military ignored most common signs of mental health problems, mainly PTSD.( Post Tramatic Stress Disorder ) I still fault them everyday for that, but I am hearing it is getting better( but obviously not ). I am working with the VA now and I will say that they are indeed also more aware of the problem and are trying to help. PTSD is something that is uncurable, it's all in the mind and you can't control how the mind think's and react's, but you can supress it with the use of therapy and maybe some medication might work but rarly does. There are 100's of thousands of claims for PTSD and lets also not forget TBI ( tramatic brain injury ) which many will think if your brain dead then whats it matter? well there are many different levels of TBI and they do mess with you mentally even though it was caused by a physical reaction.
btw i am 100% disabled veteran and I would hope just because of that many of you wouldn't look down at me and flame to hard, but i know it will come. Just remember my tolerance level is lower so i might get angry =)
I'd just like to say I really apprechiate posts like these (and posters like you) that can discuss a matter at hand in shades of gray, and not black and white.And no one in their right mind would look down at you.
On March 29 2011 01:15 Offhand wrote: You were in a country actively suppressing the local people for someone else's profit. Perhaps you didn't get your murder on and were there to just defend other soldiers. But your actions are no better then the people you support.
You weren't drafted, you entered the army willingly, no one forced you to support that agenda. Hope the benefits were worth it.
You forget that you too, have blood on your hands. Your food, your car, your house, every import has blood stains on it. The ground on which you walk is a giant graveyard. Your chap-ass shoes are made by kids who live hell everyday. Your shirt was made by an exploited worker who won't know much outside of the factory. Your Ipod is made in an oppressive country. The computer you're working on is partially made in a country whose' history is based on starving masses and the Tian an men massacre.
The situation of your country depends of its ability to maintain its superiority. Every men who lives a good western life lives in a bubble allowed by the other's suffering. And it has always been that way. Even those who tried to impose the beautiful ideal of communism ended up by repeating the same scheme.
Don't fool yourself on thinking you're not responsible. Your parents were responsible for what occurred in my country and latin America in the 70s, and you're responsible for your own government. And not only that, but you also profit from this system (student loans for example, but also every day shopping, peace and wealth). Like Sartre said, if you really disapprove, you can do something against it. Minding your own business is agreeing silently.
I'm sorry if the mods consider this off-topic but I really need to point out that very few people have clean hands and the position to look down on those who actually act towards a certain goal and certain values.
@All the posters who are/were in the military -- thank you for your service.
As for a good segment of the posters who pigeonhole soldiers as dumb and ignorant (a completely unfounded generalization, by the way~) -- I guess its very easy to call other people idiots when you have the power of anonymity, yes?
The situation of your country depends of its ability to maintain its superiority. Every men who lives a good western life lives in a bubble allowed by the other's suffering. And it has always been that way. Even those who tried to impose the beautiful ideal of communism ended up by repeating the same scheme.
Hint: you aren't exempt from this either.
You benefit just as much, or even more, from ~imperialism and shedding of blood~ as we do (that is, assuming your location is accurate).
EPT
