Military Nesties
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Al Jazeera English Op Piece on the Urinating Incident
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/01/201211572445109707.html
I found this really thought provoking.
I've seen a lot of military surprise homecomings. It wouldn't work on me. I always have my back to the corner and my face to the door. Looking for terrorists, criminals, various other threats, and husbands.
Re: Al Jazeera English Op Piece on the Urinating Incident
I have a lot of issues with its arguments however. I do not believe that Marines, Soldiers, Sailors, or Airman have it as difficult as they did in past wars. I just don't. Yes, people die, and I sure as hell believe they all have it harder than I do (or any civilian). But the comparison to Eugene Sledge, and those who were fighting day after day, in hand to hand combat, losing more than 7 people a day, with no such thing as guaranteed food, no chance for an entire deployment of getting to call or skype (AT LEAST WE HAVE SKYPE shoutout to MF) home, yeah, I'd wager it was a little easier to lose your humanity in that case. And leadership was still there, fighting to save it (from what I've read, which of course could have been revisionist).
Thoughts?
It's difficult to compare the circumstance soldiers (for a catch all phrase) have to endure in one war versus another war. You could argue back and forth all day that WWI and WWII soldiers had a clear cut, black and white enemy as opposed to OEF/OIF soldiers who are fighting the Taliban and insurgents and basically anyone else who is pissed off they are in their country and how this effects their reactions.
I commented the other day about Perry's remarks that what I think he was trying to get across was that these men have been put under some of the most extreme stresses a human can ever experience and for them not to be thinking clearly and do something like this isn't black and white. Do I think they should be punished to the extent of the law? Yes I do. But I also think they should receive a lot of mental health treatment.
(Don't take the above to mean I'm a Perry supporter...I still think he's a giant cartoon.)
I agree that things aren't as terrible as they were back then. However, there are still units who see hand to hand combat on a nearly daily basis. There are still instances of soldiers witnessing children as young as 2 and 3 years old being used as walking bombs. There is a town in Northern Afghanistan that my husband hates to go to because the men parade the young boys around town in make up and then rape them. My husband was on a raid one night when he went into a room with 6 or 7 naked men who were taking turns with 3 boys who were no older than 7. He has gone in houses were women were chained together. These are only the things he tells me. His nightmares are far worse. Do I agree with what those Marines did? No and neither does H. Do I get why they did it? Yep. The only people I know who are not wishing ill or severe punishments upon those Marines are other people who have been knee deep crap. It was stupid and they have done more harm than they could every begin to repair. They deserve some sort of punishment, but I don't think they should be ruined over it.
What would you say would be ruining them though? I don't think they should be in the Marine Corps anymore, for example. I think if they are screwed up enough to have done this that they need a lot of help, and I don't think they can be successful service members anymore.
And I don't think it's fair to say that I'm wishing ill on those Marines. I'm not. But they screwed up, they put people in danger, and they do deserve punishment and separation. Life ruining punishment? No. But separation for sure. I also don't think that all battle hardened Marines are understanding of this. I think some of them are probably angry about the recruitment this provides.
And SMW, my issue with Perry is that I don't believe he's defending the Marines to defend battle ruined service members. He's pandering to the people who say, "Piss on those Taliban f*ers", and that pisses (no pun intended) me the heck off.
I am absolutely convinced that Rick Perry doesn't have an ideal of his own. I don't think that he could honestly pick out anything that he believes in. He has been pandering to the public since Karl Rove convinced him to be a Republican. I can't take him seriously.
I was not talking about my POG H's opinion of this, as I have not discussed it with him. I have discussed it with an MC SF friend who has, literally, been knee deep in crap. He is pretty angry.
ETA: I realized this might sound hostile. I do not intend it that way. But I do think anyone put in danger by this behavior has a valid opinion.
A DD would only come from a court-martial, and it doesn't sound like anyone's leaning in that direction...yet, at least. I think we can have them mentally evaluated, possibly separate under a mental health condition (which is generally an honorable discharge), or possibly even with a general discharge for misconduct, but that's really rare without some 15s for an E (I speak only AF, have no clue how the MC handles theirs), and let the VA help them. I don't think we need to keep people on the payroll long enough to heal all their emotional issues. I admit, that sounds mean, and the issue is that getting VA help can take for.ev.er.
Without giving too much personal info away - would you explain what he is angry about? The actual act? Or the potential repercussions?
I agree with TX's first post and could not have phrased it better. Those I know in this community aren't angry - in fact, they are more or less understanding of the situation even though they would not do it. Does this make my H's life harder right now? Definitely. Is he or the other people he works with angry? No.
I will say that I never really understood the reference in comparing Iraq and Afghanistan to the Vietnam War until I went to Vietnam. I understood then that it may not be a jungle but the psychological warfare is just the same. H doesn't share very much about certain things but he opened up when we were walking around that day.
He thinks it was "irresponsible, childish, and immature, and gives Afghans another reason to look down on Marines". He said he would be really frustrated if he were currently operating in Afghanistan.
This whole thing reminds me of that Army Sergeant from that famous Rolling Stone article. The one who was inspiring his troops to desecrate the bodies of civilians. That's the kind of behavior that people who operate within the population don't need. And TBH, we don't know the MOS of these men. We don't know of they were SF. And if they were, then I'd expect more from them, because the personal experience I've had with those types does not lend themselves to this behavior.
From what I've seen, they were snipers.