What happened to our Armed Forces this past decade?

p.s.s. Ah, now I see you've removed the "dirty filthy a**hole" part.

Did you get a sudden urge to take your moderator's job seriously?

Flip flop, flip flop....

 

If that's the case, why did you get so upset?

How is your asking me how many American casualties we take in Iraq will be enough to make me march any different from what I asked you? Both questions imply a disregard for American lives, do they not? You're such a hypocrite.

As far as your second comment, you're just showing the true extent of your ignorance. We had a good discussion going here, one in which I over and over again stated that I have no problems with protesters feeling the way they do and they have every right to have those feelings and express them.

Tell you what: If you stop telling lies about me, I'll stop telling the truth about you.

PLEASE put me back on ignore. I liked it much better that way. And try to keep your word this time. No "peeking" at my posts allowed.

 

The point about American lives reflects a sober reality that your disingenuous flag-waving cannot hide: war has costs in material and people and there are limits to those costs. The protestor's limit is 0.

You have faith in Bush you said. Therefore, you would never protest any decision he makes to send our children off to war. You have no limits.

Great philosophical consistency with you. You are willing to fight for the unborn but you have no reservations about expending as many lives in wars as pleases Bush, victory at all costs. You would never protest a war, no limits to cost and dead.

In what way have you volunteered your services in the War on Terror?

BTW I did not remove the comment about your being a filthy dirty body part involved in solid waste expulsion. Someone else did.

 

Fiery friends put a fresh strain on Anglo-US alliance

By Bronwen Maddox

Foreign Editor's Briefing: April 1, 2003

FROM Donald Rumsfeld, it was not surprising; from Colin Powell, it was astounding. The Secretary of State’s decision to accuse Iran and Syria of interference in the war just two days after the Secretary of Defence did the same suggests that this is further up the agenda than you might think for an Administration with an unfinished war on its hands.

The warning could backfire, strengthening the position of Iranian hardliners who claim their country is next on the hitlist.

But the real significance is the breach it heralds with Downing Street. It suggests that Washington will fall a long way short of the commitment to a Israeli-Palestinian “road map” that the Prime Minister wants — and needs. Blair promised backbenchers that he would extract this from the United States; a grudging President Bush, distracted by the adrenalin of imminent battle, more or less gave his commitment. If he breaks that promise, it marks real trouble for the relationship and for Blair.

Powell chose to make his remarks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Israel’s most powerful lobby group in the United States. The location of the speech in itself will be inflammatory to Arab countries already contemptuous of the Bush Administration’s claim to be fighting this war for their advancement.

Powell did take pains to say that Israel as well as the Palestinians must make sacrifices for the sake of peace. To an unsurprisingly partisan audience, he said that terrorism against Israel must end (standing ovation), but also that “settlement activity in the occupied territories must end” (mixed claps and boos) and that Israel must help “diminish the daily humiliation of life under occupation” (hisses).

Word for word, this is no more than a restatement of the Administration’s position, but it will confirm the widespread belief in the region that Iran and Syria are next on a “hitlist”. If deterrence was the point of this warning, it is a curious way to go about it. There are more direct and more private ways to deliver a message that either leadership is more likely to accept. The sheer publicity of the threats of “serious consequences” for any interference is more likely to enrage and provoke than deter.

The twin bombardment was news to America’s closest ally. Some British officials appear to have been startled by Rumsfeld’s attack on Friday; they were even more dismayed by Powell’s remarks on Sunday.

For a start, Britain has deliberately kept lines open to at least part of the deeply divided leadership in Tehran. British diplomats argue that Iran could be extremely useful in winning the Iraq war — adding that, as a matter of fact, it already has been, albeit in covert ways. Despite being labelled part of the “axis of evil” by President Bush more than a year ago, Tehran has worked steadily to help unseat President Saddam Hussein.

Like the US, it would like to see a Shia uprising in the south; like the US, it does not want to see a Kurdish one in the north (although events are moving at the moment to frustrate them on both counts).

Yesterday Kamal Kharrazi, Iran’s Foreign Minister, brushed off Rumsfeld’s specific accusation that Iran was backing Shia revolutionaries operating inside Iraq.

It is impossible to treat this as the unanimous statement of “Tehran”, given the depths of the divisions in the Government, but in tone, it was a reassertion of Iran’s studied neutrality.

If Iran won’t rise to provocation, perhaps the question rests there for now. But the implications for Blair are serious; the points of friction with the US are multiplying.

When a second UN resolution disintegrated, Britain pinned hopes on reconstruction, but it seems that American companies will have the edge, at least at the start. Yesterday the two Governments were at odds over the treatment of captured Iraqis; to Washington they are “illegal combatants” who should be sent to Guantanamo Bay; to London, they are regular prisoners of war. The deaths of British servicemen from friendly fire have brought a diffuse national unhappiness, not yet targeted on the US, but it could be. Now there is Iran to strain the alliance. After the fighting stops, Blair has now been alerted, there may be Israel, too.

 

What's disingenuous about supporting a war that I feel will make my country and fellow citizens even more secure? There are limits, undoubtedly. The difference is that I and others whom share the same view with see the necessity of going to war to protect further loss of American civilian life on US soil. Many of the protesters object only to loss of life, regardless of what side and what the big picture is.

Wonderful sweeping statement. And absurd. IF Dubya were to decide to invade Canada for example, solely because he was tired of Canadian accents, I'd be out there.

Tell you what, the minute an unborn fetus invades a neighboring country and decides to produce weapons of mass destruction to use either directly or indirectly against me, I'll join your point of view.

I wish I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you..... And I served my country in the Army. Have YOU ever been a member of the armed forces? Or is the extent of your contribution to our society limited to making phone pledges and exercising your right to free speech?

Hilarious! You, a "moderator," being moderated by another moderator! It's the Monty Dgabriel Flying Circus around here. Pssst, got a terrific job that you're eminently qualified for: UN Weapons Inspector.

And since I've answered your questions, let's go back to mine:
How many dead Americans in AMERICA will make you change your mind, dgabriel? Apparently 3,000 wasn't enough.

 

Marine who said no to killing on his conscience

Fighting not to fight

Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles
Tuesday April 1, 2003


The first American conscientious objector from the Iraq war will give himself up at a marine base in California this morning. He said he believed the war was "immoral because of the deception involved by our leaders".

Stephen Eagle Funk, 20, a marine reserve who was due to be sent for combat duty, is currently on "unauthorised absence" from his unit. He faces a possible court martial and time in military prison for his action.

"I know I have to be punished for going UA," Mr Funk told the Guardian in an interview before surrendering to authorities, "but I would rather take my punishment now than live with what I would have to do [in Iraq] for the rest of my life. I would be going in knowing that it was wrong and that would be hypocritical."

Mr Funk, who is originally from Seattle and is half Filipino, was approached by a recruiting officer last year. At the time, he said, he was depressed after dropping out of a biology course at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. He was working part-time for a vet and in a pet shop.

His family and friends were surprised by his decision, he said, because they had known him to have liberal political views and not to have been interested in the military.

"I wanted to belong and I wanted another direction in my life, and this seemed to offer it," said Mr Funk. "They told me I would be able to go back to school [university]." Recruits have their college fees paid once they complete their service.

"The ads make the armed forces look so cool - 'Call this number and we'll send you a free pair of boxer shorts' - and a lot of kids don't realise what's involved," he said. Although he graduated from the famously tough marine boot camp in San Diego and excelled as a rifleman during the 12-week induction period, Mr Funk said he had started to have doubts about military service during his training.

"Every day in combat training you had to yell out 'Kill! Kill!' and we would get into trouble if you didn't shout it out, so often I would just mouth it so I didn't get into trouble." The recruits were also encouraged to hurt each other during hand-to- hand combat training. "I couldn't do that so they would pair me up with someone who was very violent or aggressive."

Mr Funk said many recruits were envious of those who were being sent to the Gulf. "They would say things like, 'Kill a raghead for me - I'm so jealous.'"

As a Catholic who attended mass most Sundays during training, he eventually decided to take his concerns to the chaplain. "He said, 'It's a lot easier if you just give in and don't question authority.' He quoted the Bible at me and said, 'Jesus says to carry a sword.'

"But I don't think Jesus was a violent man - in fact, the opposite - and I don't think God takes sides in war _ Everyone told me it was futile to try to get out."

At shooting practice, although he scored well, the instructor told him he had an attitude problem: "I was a little pissed off and I said, 'I think killing people is wrong.' That was the crystallising moment because I had never said it out loud before. It was such a relief."

He became concerned about the reasons for the conflict in Iraq. "This war is very immoral because of the deception involved by our leaders. It is very hypocritical." He is opposed to the use of war as a way of solving problems.

"War is about destruction and violence and death. It is young men fighting old men's wars. It is not the answer, it just ravages the land of the battleground. I know it's wrong but other people in the military have been programmed to think it is OK."

Mr Funk, who is being counselled by conscientious objectors from the 1991 Gulf war, said he had gone public to try to dissuade other young people who had not thought through their reasons for joining the forces. "All they [the military] want is numbers. What I'm doing is really trying to educate people to weigh their options - there are so many more ways to get money for school."

He added: "My mum had a gut feeling it wouldn't work out." Although he does not know what punishment awaits, "it's a risk I'm willing to take".

This morning, accompanied by his lawyer and former conscientious objectors from previous wars, he will arrive at his home base in San Jose, change into his uniform and give himself up.

 

Let me get this straight: we're supposed to feel sorry for this moron because he: A) Enlists in the Marine Corps at a time when our country has been attacked and there is intense sabre-rattling going on in the international arena, and B) He's surprised when he discovers that the Marine Corps' job is to find and kill the enemy?

What did he expect? The free boxer shorts and a free college education and nothing from him, a VOLUNTEER, in return? .

What a pathetic fool, and how very appropriate that msfe should cut and paste this.

 

Sigh.

You are unhinged.

Bye.

 

Make that two pathetic fools.

Try answering the questions I've posed as I have to yours, instead of going off-track and attempting to bring in topics from other threads into the argument that only make you look ridiculous.