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 Greetings! You are reading an article from The Mudville Gazette. To reach the front page, with all the latest news and views, click the logo above or "main" below. Thanks for stopping by! June 1, 2006 AmariyahBy Greyhawk"We love death. The U.S. loves life. That is the big difference between us." Many anticipate - some eagerly - that the Haditha incident will enrage the people of Iraq, perhaps even stir the rage of the oft noted and much broader "Arab street". Many are wrong. There are numerous reasons for this misjudgment, not the least of which is the inability to comprehend a culture that seemingly places more value on the physical incarnation of it's scriptures than it does on human life, that will rise up over cartoons of the prophet but accept the will of Allah when children are gunned down. And in Iraq above all live a people who interact with American soldiers on a daily basis, and long ago made up their minds whether they were angels or demons, or merely fellow human beings. To assume they will consider a few individuals as representative of the whole is to assign an undeserved ignorance to the mass of humanity, the equivalent of saying they aren't ready for the benefits of free society, or other arguments made all too often by those quite wrongly confident in their personal superiority to members of a lesser race, to children of a lesser god. But Osama was wrong too. They don't love death. But thanks to him they know it's face quite well - Baghdad's civilian death toll in the past three months is roughly 3,000, more than the US loses during three years of war. Not from attacks by US Soldiers and Marines, but in attacks by Osama's own: Harith says the insurgents began arriving in Amariyah after the deadly US assault on Fallujah in April 2004. The first jihadis sought haven with relatives, many of them former senior officers in Saddam Hussein's Army.""We decided it was safest to ignore them. They were leaving us alone." But that didn't last. "It rarely does. 0ne Sunni Arab neighbor had joined the insurgents, and explained their choices of targets, he says. "This guy told me that 'if we focus on the Americans they grind us into dust,' " says Aqeel. "So they prefer to hit the Iraqi police, Shiites, translators, people they think are too secular. That's easy for them."But Americans have moved back in, and according to the story, "Over the past few weeks, however, conditions in the area have improved." So perhaps there is yet hope for Amariyah. In America we will wring our collective hands in horror as we await further word on whether our boys killed two dozen innocents in Haditha. And that is right and good, and a luxury reserved for we who don't live in a cold world beneath a burning desert sun. Posted by Greyhawk / June 1, 2006 7:54 PM | Permalink 2 TrackBacksThe media feeding frenzy seems to be in full bloom now. Read More Captain, is that really you? They gathered around Sissy, each with a weapon displayed and on watch for trouble. Cassandra remained aloof and very much on guard. Yes, it's me. Sissy said calmly. The glow on her face belied her Read More 21 Comments |
November 26, 2010America@war [Greyhawk]
I think anyone who's ever pondered the "comment" option - once only available on blogs and bulletin boards, now ubiquitous on almost any web site - will appreciate this:
The so-called faculty of writing is not so much a faculty of writing as it is a faculty of thinking. When a man says, "I have an idea but I can't express it"; that man hasn't an idea but merely a vague feeling. If a man has a feeling of that kind, and will sit down for a half an hour and persistently try to put into writing what he feels, the probabilities are at least 90 percent that he will either be able to record it, or else realize that he has no idea at all. In either case, he will do himself a benefit. That's wisdom from the past, captured for posterity at the US Naval Institute, shared via the web on the institute's 137th anniversary. From their about page:
"The Naval Institute has three core activities," among them, History and Preservation: The Naval Institute also has recently introduced Americans at War, a living history of Americans at war in their own words and from their own experiences. These 90-second vignettes convey powerful stories of inspiration, pride, and patriotism. Take a look at the collection, and you'll see it's not limited to accounts from those who served on ships at sea, members of the other branches are well-represented. I'm fortunate to have met USNI's Mary Ripley, she's responsible for the institute's oral history program (and she's the daughter of the late John Ripley, whose story is told here). She also deserves much credit for their blog. ("We're not the Navy nor any government agency. Blog and comment freely.") We met at a milblog conference - Mary knew (and I would come to realize) that milbloggers are the 21st-century version of exactly what the US Naval Institute is all about. Once that light bulb came on in my head, I mentioned a vague idea for a project to her - milblogs as the 21st century oral history that they are. "Put that in writing," she said (of course - see first paragraph above!) - and here's part of the result. Shortly after the first tent was pitched by the American military in Iraq a wire was connected to a computer therein, and the internet was available to a generation of Americans at war - many of whom had grown up online. From that point on, at any given moment, somewhere in Iraq a Soldier, Sailor, Airman or Marine was at a keyboard sharing the events of his or her day with the folks back home. While most would simply fire off an email, others took advantage of the (then) relatively new online blogging platforms to post their thoughts and experiences for the entire world to see. The milblog was born - and from that moment to this stories detailing everything from the most mundane aspects of camp life to intense combat action (often described within hours of the event) have been available on the web... And et cetera - but since you're reading this on a milblog, you probably knew that. And you know that milblogs aren't just blogs written by troops at war, that many friends, family members, and supporters likewise documented their story of America at war online in near-real time, as those stories developed. The diversity in membership of that group is broad, the one thing we all have in common is the impulse to make sense of the seemingly senseless, and communicate the tale - for each of us that impulse was strong enough to overcome whatever barriers prevent the vast majority of people from doing the same. Everyone at some point has some vague idea they believe should be shared - we were the people who, from some combination of internal and external urging, found and spent those many half hours persistently trying to write it down. But where will all that be in another 137 years? Or five or ten, for that matter. That's something I've asked myself since at least 2004 - when I wrote this:
Membership in the ghost battalion has grown in the years since, and an ever growing majority of those abandoned-but-still-standing sites are vanishing. Have you checked out Lt Smash's site lately? How about Sgt Hook's? If you're a long-time milblog reader you know the first widely-read milblog from Operation Iraq Freedom and the first widely-read milblog from Afghanistan are both gone from the web. If you're a relative newcomer to this world you may never even have heard of them - or the dozens upon dozens of others who carried forth the standard they set down. If you have a vague notion that something should be done about that, (a notion I've heard expressed more than once...) then you and I and the good folks at the US Naval Institute are in agreement. Preserving the history documented by the milbloggers is just one of the goals of the milblog project, the once-vague idea that we're now making real. And it's a big idea, if I say so myself - too big to explain in one simple blog post, so stand by for more. Likewise, it's too big a task to be accomplished by just one person. So if you're a milblogger (and exactly what is a milblogger? is a topic for much further discussion on its own) I'm asking for your help. All I'll really need is just a little bit (maybe just one or two of those half hours...) of your time, and your willingness to tell the tale. We've already made history, it's time to save it. (More to follow...) Posted 4:02 PM | Permalink |
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The Mudville Gazette is the on-line voice of an American warrior and his wife who stands by him. They prefer to see peaceful change render force of arms unnecessary. Until that day they stand fast with those who struggle for freedom, strike for reason, and pray for a better tomorrow.
 
 
 Furthermore, I will occasionally use satire or parody herein. The bottom line: it's my house. I like having visitors to my house. I hope you are entertained. I fight for your right to free speech, and am thrilled when you exercise said rights here. Comments and e-mails are welcome, but all such communication is to be assumed to be 1)the original work of any who initiate said communication and 2)the property of the Mudville Gazette, with free use granted thereto for publication in electronic or written form. If you do NOT wish to have your message posted, write "CONFIDENTIAL" in the subject line of your email. Original content copyright © 2003 - 2011 by Greyhawk. Fair, not-for-profit use of said material by others is encouraged, as long as acknowledgement and credit is given, to include the url of the original source post. Other arrangements can be made as needed. Contact: greyhawk at mudvillegazette dot com  Tending Distant Far from hearth and home, watching What tales we'll tell When things grim Some distant sunset, vision fading Saluting fallen friends whose names - Greyhawk, Baghdad, December 2004 |
It's stories like these that need to be given to every American liberal and Leftist who still pretends to believe that the insurgency is a "freedom fighter" force, akin to George Washington and his Continental Army. These "freedom fighters" don't want freedom. They want Islamist fascism, enforced at knife point at the barrel of a gun, and anyone who stands in their way, Muslim or American or Iraqi or whatever, is going to be a target.
I'm not saying American forces are seen as friends by all Iraqis, but anyone who thinks the U.S. is the "bad guy" in Iraq, is fooling himself. It's the displaced Baathists, Sunnis, and their al Qaeda buddies who are doing the most harm to the Iraqi population as a whole. Again, it's not American troops who are car bombing crowds of kids in the market squares.
Haditha Reporter Was Jailed By US, Shares Name With Source
Fox is reporting more charges against Marines, not Haditha, not the pregnant woman, but a man around Baghdad. The charges have been prefered against approx. seven people, one Navy, the rest Marines. If we're going to start turning on our troops like we did in 'Nam, we need to bring them home. Osama is right, we're the weak horse.
Right. Like you really believe Anti-American sentiment could have been prevented from happening in Iraq and Afghanistan. And you can count whom is killing how many till the cows come home. Means jack.
Common Sense says the longer we are there the worse it will get. Bush and the Pentagon are talking "decades"? Hell you’ll be fighting boy scouts from Iowa before then.
We are the invaders. We are the foreigners, the ausslanders, the infidel. We will allways be attacked until we leave and the Arab's manhood is restored. Its the Arab way. Haven't you been watching the Israeli/Arab conflict for the past eighty years?
LOL
If Salmineo is correct then we should just ignore the ignorant Islamist and they'll only kill a few thousand Americans per year until they get the equipment to kill a few million a year. Meanwhile we do as we did in the 90's, sit back and pretend it didn't happen. Salmineo's thinking will get millions around the world, including members of the phony religion of Islam, killed when someone wakes up and drops a dozen or so big ones on some of the larger cities controlled by the terrorist religion. And someone will tire of the crazies killing day after day and wipe them from the face of the earth, you can take that to the bank.
"Haven't you been watching the Israeli/Arab conflict for the past eighty years?"
Eighty Years?
I find "We love death. The U.S. loves life. That is the big difference between us."
--Osama bin Laden ironic cuz. . . well.
the US is the best at delivering both.
80 years, hmmm...seems like only yesterday that Pharoah was chasing the children of Israel across the Red Sea.
Sorry SFC D, forgot about that. Was that before or after the temple at Aswan? Didn't someone publish a book about that at Alexandria? I think Begin recommended that one didn't he? The Israeli version of course. It's amazing how much time can be compressed into eighty years. Now, about the tags, do you need them Sal?
Sorry, I guess I should include them. /Sarcasm
History is so much fun when you get to create it.
I'm sorry, but everyone seems to be already conceding that the marines did bad and lied about Haditha.
We know that in places like Tal Afar that children were murdered, their bodies booby trapped to kill their parents who came to find them.
Has anybody considered that the Sunnis shot all the holes into the so-called civilians when they were corpses, drug their bodies out for photos, and are playing their game on our media?
Where's the forensic evidence that our rifles, and bullets killed these women and children?
Right now, I believe our valiant soldiers did as they say they did. The house came down and killed people.
The idea that a large group of well trained soldiers who had been especially careful in every action they had thus taken to protect civilians would suddenly go all My Lai, well, it just doesn't wash. I don't buy it for a second.
All the murders, the few, that have happened in Iraq were isolated and perpetrated by a very few men. Not whole squads. I trust the Marine training and ROE being adhered to.
I don't believe this atrocity happened at all according to the media.
Whose word do you want to trust in this. Sunni scumbags or American soldiers and officers?
Let's just wait for the truth to come out. I doubt the real facts will look anything like what the MSM is feeding us.
This is an incredible post; I hope it holds true:
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=20853_Haditha_Reporter_Jailed_by_US&only
Based on past stories, the present media frenzy can easily be a manufactured event that is only remotely based on truth.
Posted by SFC D at June 2, 2006 03:22 AM
Yeah, Eighty Years.
Search the Balfour conferance 1916. Then read about the Five Jewish terrorist organizations that murdered Arabs starting Ten years before WWII, and not in self defense either.
Split hairs if you like but the Jews took that land from the Arabs and made the Arab a second class citizen. Only a Jew could vote until the world forced Israel to give voting rights to non-jews in the late 60's. What, you thought these people were fighting without a cause? Man nobody could be that mad for that long for "no good reason".
I'm sorry, but Harry Truman made a mistake that we are sufering the effects from. He made that mistake just to win an election that Jewish own newspapers "missprinted" he would lose. So he recognized srael to get the American Jewish vote. Turned out he never really needed too because he won the "close election" by a Landslide!
Is there a weakness in our system involving the corporate/liberal or WTF media? You Bet!
Try something else. Get an old windows 95 version CD of Encarta and search this. Then check a newer version for windows 98. GONE! Erased from history. No Jewish terrorists no Balfour. Israel began because of WWII Nazi crimes, (which did have an effect). You will have to search hard cover books for all the facts and the facts are that the Zionists, (fundamentalist Jews) went down there and started stirring up crap right after the fall of the Ottoman Empire circa WWI.
Posted by SFC D at June 2, 2006 03:22 AM
Posted by Mike H. at June 2, 2006 03:46 AM
Pagans were killing Jews and Pagans were killing Arabs in Mecca. The Arab, and, the Jew are the same race, Carthinagan/Arab, just different tribes. Pharoah was of Nubian decent and Black. Though they/we are all mixed up now anyway.
So there old wise one, may I suggest you study beyond Charlton Heston Movies and some Baptist preacher.
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Sal,you're a good jew hater, and we should stipulate that fact. Just out of curiosity are you a muslim or a skinhead?
Posted by Mike H. at June 2, 2006 12:06 AM
OK. We've got big peckers. We are not afraid of name calling. Bring'em home! Dump Israel, let them fight it out themselves.
The Arabs will love us for it and we get uninterupted oil. Jews will bitch, but secretly love us cause they will nuke the crap out of Iran. Bet ya after the nukes fall and the Irainians are all dead in 30 minutes, the Arabs and Israelis will suddenly start getting along like the blood brothers they truly are. Tea anybody?
'
Posted by Scrapiron at June 2, 2006 01:07 AM
If the "Islamists" had the ability to kill "millions" of Americans they would have done it by now. There aren’t any magnets in Iraq sucking their iron heads there to fight. They could come here any time they want, Iraq or no Iraq. Whatever is keeping them away, will still keep them away, Iraq or not.
As for doing nothing in the 90's, you have to back to the eighties to count all the "doing nothings". Not to mention America arming Saddam and the Iranians. What, you forgot Olli North’s treason and Reagan's Public Apology?
This is a bi-partisan mess folks.
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Posted by Mike H. at June 2, 2006 06:22 AM
I'm not a Jew hater, you just want me to be one so you can diminish what I have to say, because what you have to say is party line stupidity. There are many Jews that believe exactly as I do. But you won’t find them on Fox news.
I'm an American. Save for courtesy, a persons religion is irrelevant to me. As long as their political priorities are American first.
If the "Islamists" had the ability to kill "millions" of Americans they would have done it by now.
What are you basing that on? So they will not keep trying now that you've stated this? We're all safe, in other words?
People like you who want to spread blame rather than do something to fix the problem are part of the problem and not the solution.
Person's religion is irrelevant? How about the 9-11 hijackers? Was their religion irrelevant?
Asinine.
Anything that doesn't re-inforce salmineo's (wasn't he a no-talent pretty boy from Philly or something?) preconceived notions is irrelevant. Responding to him is probably pointless, since he'll both miss the point (deliberately or thru ignorance) and respond with a non sequiter. Seems to keep him happy, though. I guess it doesn't take much to keep the blame-the-Jews types happy.
The left-wing appeaseniks (I refuse to play along with their fraudulent appropriation of the word "liberal") demand not justice, which the Marine Corps is in fact pursuing in a serious and disciplined manner, but inhuman perfection.
Apply this same standard (and the breathtaking lack of empathy that goes with it) to WWII and you get: "Let he who is without sin liberate Auschwitz."
"Pharoah was of Nubian decent and Black."
You know Sal, the fact that you make this a declarative statement when, at best it is heavily debated, says a bit about how much veracity we should ascribe to you. Science isn't an opinion, that's why it makes a good marker on someone's reliability as a source of information.