{"article":{"id":73281,"heading":"Gen.: G.I.s who rip leaders will pay","author":"C\/O Diogenes","created":"2003-07-19 14:49:29","modified":"2003-09-02 14:05:31","last_modified":"Tue, 02 Sep 2003 21:05:31","article":"

New York Daily News - http:\/\/www.nydailynews.com<\/a>

Gen.: G.I.s who rip leaders will pay

By HELEN KENNEDY

DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU

Thursday, July 17th, 2003

WASHINGTON - The military will punish demoralized soldiers in Iraq who are bluntly venting their frustration to reporters, the Pentagon said yesterday.

\"None of us that wear this uniform are free to say anything disparaging about the secretary of defense or the President of the United States,\" said Gen. John Abizaid, head of Central Command. \"We're not free to do that. It's our professional code. Whatever action may be taken, whether it's a verbal reprimand or something more stringent, is up the commanders on the scene.\"

This week's abrupt cancellation of homecoming plans for the Army's 3rd Infantry Division unleashed a remarkable and widespread flood of fury from troops who are hot, homesick and hunted by guerrillas.

\"If Donald Rumsfeld was here, I'd ask him for his resignation,\" Spec. Clinton Deitz of the 3rd Infantry's 2nd Brigade told ABC News.

\"I've got my own 'Most Wanted' list,\" said a 2nd Brigade sergeant. \"The aces in my deck are Paul Bremer, Donald Rumsfeld, George Bush and Paul Wolfowitz.\"

Many soldiers are openly asking why they are in a country that wants them out. They complain that their commanders have gone home. Frustration with the powers in Washington is a main theme.

\"I can guarantee you they've never stood out in a checkpoint in the heat of the day, day after day, full battle rattle, always wondering if today's the day somebody's going to shoot me. Do they even care?\" one soldier told a Knight Ridder reporter.

The 2nd Brigade, in the Persian Gulf since September, had been told it would be home by May, then July, then August. When the announcement came that the deployment was being extended until at least September and maybe beyond, \"you could hear a pin drop,\" said Sgt. 1st Class Eric Wright of the 64th Armored Regiment.

The Code of Military Justice bars officers from using \"contemptuous words\" against civilian or military leaders. Punishment is rarely stringent, said military law expert Eugene Fidell.

\"People always grumble in the trenches,\" he said. \"Typically, administrations are extremely well advised not to throw gasoline on the fire by creating martyrs.\"

The White House took no public offense at the soldiers' gripes. \"We know that they are making significant sacrifices,\" said spokesman Scott McClellan. \"We are going to do everything we can to support them and get them home as soon as we can.\" \n","contact":"","link":"","address":"","phone":"","parent_id":0,"mime_type":"text\/plain","summary":"If Morale is low casualties go up. Dispirited Soldiers, with no confidence in the Justness, or their cause are too mired in their own woes to be as vigilant as they need to be. It is also when atrocities are most likely to happen.","numcomment":18,"fileurl":"\/uploads\/","filesize":null,"article_url":"\/news\/2003\/07\/73281.php"},"attachments":[],"comments":[{"id":73282,"heading":"A Military Force...","article":"...stretched too thin and on alert too long becomes less and less effective as time goes on.\r\n\r\nAdd Sniper and Guerilla attacks and you have a group of angry young men with guns; scared, tired, and homesick.\r\n\r\nThis is not a recipe for success.","author":"Diogenes","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 14:53:22","modified":"2003-07-19 14:53:22","fileurl":""},{"id":73297,"heading":"War Crimes Tribunals: Bring 'Em On!","article":"USC Title 18, Section 2331, (Patriot Act, a new category) - "domestic terrorism" - has been created and means activities that:\r\n\r\n"involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State; appear to be intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population, to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion, or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping, and occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States."\r\n\r\nBush KNOWINGLY lied about Iraq's WMD to intimidate and coerce the public and congress to get his oil war in Iraq. Bush is, by definition of his own Patriot Act, a terrorist.\r\n\r\nMr. Bush, the country awaits your impeachment and free trip to Guantanamo. ","author":"Soldier","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 15:59:35","modified":"2003-07-19 15:59:35","fileurl":""},{"id":73302,"heading":"Congress shall make no law","article":"These soldiers must know, as military arms of the state, that they have first ammendment rights, and that no military code of conduct can take that away. It is written in the heart of our country, when will they ever learn. Maybe they should have spoken up sooner.","author":"mymicz","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 16:16:22","modified":"2003-07-19 16:16:22","fileurl":""},{"id":73304,"heading":"troops have nor rights?","article":" So the troops are suposedly there "fighting for freedom" but they have none themselves, nor do the Iraqis who are forbidden to "shout insults" and have "leaders" chosen for them by US generals. I wonder if this General Abizaid clown knows that George Washington bargained with rebellious troops who besieged his headquarters during the Revolutionary War because of no pay or supplies. I don't think they would have reacted very well if he told them they had no rights.","author":"Meyer London","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 16:31:23","modified":"2003-07-19 16:31:23","fileurl":""},{"id":73309,"heading":"Bring the troops home now","article":"How many more sweltering days can the enlisted take? Why did they rotate ALL of the officers out and not the enlisted? I guess the lower the pay, the more wear and tear you can take.","author":"Brian OConnor","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 16:56:09","modified":"2003-07-19 16:56:09","fileurl":""},{"id":73311,"heading":"B.O.H.I.C.A.","article":"We had a saying to cover it: Shit Flows down hill.\r\n\r\nWhat people who have never served in Uniform are really not aware of is that the Military Command Structure is basically the same as it was 5 Centuries ago.\r\n\r\nYou have the Priviledged Aristocracy: The Officer Corps.\r\n\r\nAnd the Peasants\/Serfs: The Enlisted Ranks.\r\n\r\nOr as the Military quaintly puts it: Officers and Men.\r\n\r\nAs you can see from the foregoing Officers rank above mere men (or women).\r\n\r\nThey get the best the Military can Provided. Everybody else gets the dirty end.","author":"Diogenes","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 17:28:29","modified":"2003-09-02 12:52:01","fileurl":""},{"id":73312,"heading":"To Mymicz","article":"Unfortunately there is an exception for people under Military Command written into the Main Body of the Constitution which exempts Military Personnel from those protections.","author":"Diogenes","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 17:33:28","modified":"2003-07-19 17:33:28","fileurl":""},{"id":73318,"heading":"Constitution","article":" Since when are Bush and company following the Constitution? Military tribunals? No Habeus Corpus? No lawyers? Lying to Congress? Stealing the election?\r\nBut when it comes to soldiers' rights, they are strict constructionists.","author":"Meyer London","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 18:11:17","modified":"2003-07-19 18:11:17","fileurl":""},{"id":73333,"heading":"you think its bad now","article":"Just wait till all these trained killers get home.\r\nThey're pretty pissed.\r\nShit tim mcvey was pissed too and look what he did.\r\nSUPPORT THE TROOPS\r\nBRING EM HOME TODAY\r\n\r\n","author":"systemfailure","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 19:48:05","modified":"2003-07-19 19:48:05","fileurl":""},{"id":73340,"heading":"McVey?","article":"you mean the OK bombing?\nCouldn't have done it. Inside job. More?","author":"Sheepdog","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 20:14:35","modified":"2003-07-19 20:14:35","fileurl":""},{"id":73342,"heading":"agreed, definately inside job","article":"no way that was a fertilizer bomb.\r\n\r\nbut he was willing to do it. and thats dangerous enough to warrant mention i'd say. and thats how the military works, and thats who's coming home here, pissed off at the government, the administration, and the system as a whole, and used to to shooting at people daily.\r\n\r\nI was reading somewhere about how they re-enter troops from the war and it was some really lame shit like two weeks at a government run resort or something. It made prominent mention of its miniputt course so you know it has to totally suck ass. That is their readjustment. Two weeks of miniputt at Casa De La Spookspook. \r\n\r\nWe are so fucked. The nation as a whole, the people, the youth... damn the youth really gets the worst of it. Guess it had to happen some time.","author":"matt","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 20:26:12","modified":"2003-07-19 20:26:12","fileurl":""},{"id":73345,"heading":"We are fucked","article":"But crisis brings about transformation. The question is how bad will it have to get before the comfortable TV watching, burger\nchomping underarm deodorant using (with all the soluble\ntoxic load ) toothpaste eating (with its toxic load ) and SUV driving rabbits get angry rather than frightened. \nThe fear industry (cops and the related reality shows that demonstrate the callus attitude\nof the law enforcement training and procedures or the slide by massacres the federal government visits upon the movements of resistance ) and the un named collective guilt we dare not look into the eye of, helps to cover the diseased and weeping national cancers of self serving blythe and reckless policy that fuels our cars and stocks the shelves in the supermarket. \nThe next 'event' will tell if the american spirit of rebellion still has a spark of life. I look around, however and see a herd in need of a cattle prod. Maybe it's on the way down the pipe. ","author":"Sheepdog","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-19 21:29:20","modified":"2003-07-19 21:29:20","fileurl":""},{"id":73371,"heading":"No, you are fucked","article":""But crisis brings about transformation. The question is how bad will it have to get before the comfortable TV watching, burger \r\nchomping underarm deodorant using (with all the soluble \r\ntoxic load ) toothpaste eating (with its toxic load ) and SUV driving rabbits get angry rather than frightened."\r\n\r\nThe rest of us will get along just fine.\r\n\r\nAre you actually against TV, hamburgers, deodorant(?!?!), toothpaste and SUV's? \r\n\r\nReally?\r\n\r\nWhat a fucking dimwitted fruitcake.","author":"fresca","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-20 00:56:43","modified":"2003-07-20 00:56:43","fileurl":""},{"id":73378,"heading":"Not only that...","article":"...he doesn't need Prozac. Imagine that. What does he think he is. Sane or something?\r\n\r\nROFL!!!!!!!!!!!","author":"Diogenes","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-20 01:09:34","modified":"2003-07-20 01:09:34","fileurl":""},{"id":73380,"heading":"not sure I'm sane, but thanks.","article":"No one needs the chemical cocktail that is deodorant, if you can get baking soda. Baking soda also works as a dental cleaner and the fluorides in toothpaste are neural toxins. Explains much in the way of american awareness. I don't eat beef or pork or chicken. If I didn't kill it, I wont eat it. Got a deepfreeze for elk\nhowever. Go ahead, buy all the useless destructive crap you want\nif it improves your self image. Chomp down those chemically enhanced meat products if you want. If you ever saw what goes on in a slaughter house you would be very tempted to be vegan, I assure you.\n\nLet's talk about officers a bit. I was asked to go to OCS but didn't want to, being the kind who only needed to get it over with and out. Three years is enough. I served under a few good officers who cared more about their men than rubbing elbows with the\nhigher rankers and flattering their stupid wives. These were guys you would take care of in a firefight. If they were good, they\nlistened to their NCOs (me) and wouldn't try to impress their\nsuperiors with heroics from their men. They were the ones who\nmade sure all the company was accounted for as if they were family when the noises died down. There weren't many of these. \n A good officer wouldn't want to leave without their men. Thank god I'm now a PFC.","author":"Sheepdog","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-20 02:02:44","modified":"2003-07-20 02:02:44","fileurl":""},{"id":73382,"heading":"ho hum","article":""If I didn't kill it, I wont eat it."\r\n\r\nRolling my eyes at such macho nonsense.","author":"fresca","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-20 02:19:56","modified":"2003-07-20 02:19:56","fileurl":""},{"id":73388,"heading":"fresaw appears not so fastidious...","article":"...perhaps a Road Kill afficianado?\r\n\r\nTo Sheepdog:\r\n\r\nYou're Welcome. Well let me rephrase that - you are as sane as I am. (Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!)\r\n\r\nI love Elk. Some of my fondest memories are Elk Sausage and Eggs for Breakfast at my Great Aunt's Place. She even had an old Push-Pedal Organ that traveled the Oregon Trail (with her Grand Parents) in a Covered Wagon.\r\n\r\nI do eat Store Bought Meat but I have gotten very finicky about who I'll buy it from. I have a store I go to that sells only Free Range, Hormone Free, Antibiotic Free Beef. It cost's a little more but then again it isn't quite as "Assembly Line". You get what you pay for. Trader Joe's Chicken is pretty good.\r\n\r\nI find though that I am eating more and more Vegetarian as the years go by.\r\n\r\nPFC huh? I outrank you then (just teasing) - I have zero commitments left to the Uniformed Services. I kind of regret not going Reserve when I got out though. I was going to but my local unit did not have an opening for an E-? and I did not want to give up a Stripe (I worked too hard for them). When they called me a year later I had gone completely Civilian and decided not to. Sigh! I would be eligible to Retire from the Reserves now.","author":"Diogenes","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-07-20 02:55:18","modified":"2003-07-20 02:55:18","fileurl":""},{"id":80448,"heading":"Hey this is great!","article":"Congrats, LA, I see you have upgraded your format to include the info on how much time you will expect to wait for a thread on a dial up.\r\n(ghost of Diogenes, must have brought this thread up- miss yer furious\r\nsense of justice-) so this was why I was getting that peculiar warning at the end of the page.\r\nGreat job people. I'll send ya some money.","author":"Sheepdog","parent_id":73281,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2003-09-02 14:05:31","modified":"2003-09-02 14:05:31","fileurl":""}]}