Mudville Gazette

October 10, 2007

Sh!tb@gs

Greyhawk

By way of explanation...

Given that the idea of former American troops becoming political party activists or expressing opposition to the war in Iraq really doesn't bother me (though I'll freely counter any false claims they might make in that capacity) I guess I should explain why I refer to the IVAW sh1tb@gs as IVAW sh!tb@gs.

Simple - while ostensibly "anti-war", the IVAW sh!tb@gs actually spend their time and energy accusing American soldiers of committing endless atrocities in Iraq and insisting that said atrocities are condoned and covered up by the US military. (See this link for details - and don't even bother arguing this point.) Regardless of what IVAW claims it is - that is what IVAW actually is. (To the point that Jesse MacBeth was a welcome and unquestioned addition - but that's another story...)

But (you might ask) given that abu Ghraib proves that American soldiers are capable of heinous treatment of the enemy in time of war, shouldn't such accusations be taken seriously?

Yes.

In fact, that's what disgusts me the most about the IVAW sh!tb@gs. In the abu Ghraib case, one soldier in the unit involved was outraged by his fellow soldiers' actions - and he came forward through proper military channels to get it stopped, investigated, and prosecuted. Don't be confused by the myth CBS drummed up when one of the guilty parties sent Mary Mapes his photo collection - the Army, not CBS, put an end to the actions of the soldiers at abu Ghraib. But (ironically due in part to the success of CBS in propagated that mythical version of the abu Ghraib story) the IVAW crowd is able to get away with claiming they were unable to get their chains of command to act against the atrocities they claim were perpetrated by themselves and their fellow troops.

Of course, listen carefully to their atrocity tales today and you'll find they don't actually specify exactly who did what and when - just vague stories of "soldiers" or "officers" or "units" that rampaged through Iraq leaving nothing but dead babies in their wake. (Under "orders" or "policy".)

This leaves us with only two conclusions regarding the IVAW -

1. They are telling the truth but are covering up for the actual people who committed, ordered, or covered up those atrocities.
2. They are lying.

Whichever the case may be, I know the military will respond to any actual actions on the part of soldiers - see "abu Ghraib" for example.

There may be some IVAW sh!tb@gs who are in my category one above. They are cowards, at best, and criminals, too. They disgust me more than those in cat two. But they are all, at best, shitbags.

If you should ever meet one of these gutless freaks, make him name names.

We who've served honorably in Iraq shouldn’t have to live with their lies, or wait 40 years for the truth.

Posted by Greyhawk at 10:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (12) |

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As one of the unnamed officers in these tales, I'd like to set the record straight. I killed lots of times. Male and female, young and old. I did it with wanton joy at times, but never with remorse. At times, the stench from the bodies became unbearable.

I've never given it a second thought until now... all those innocent lives! Hundreds... possibly thousands of lives.

Remorse? No way. Those houseflies were everywhere on the FOB.

--Chuck

Posted by Chuck at October 10, 2007 11:27 PM

Dear Chuck,

Too bad you couldn't post your picture, as well. I've always wanted to see a walking and talking shitbag!!! Since you claim you had the balls to commit wanton murder, would you mind giving us your name, rank, and outfit you did this with????

Posted by Pete Dawg at October 11, 2007 12:01 AM

"This leaves us with only three conclusions regarding the IVAW -

1. They are telling the truth but are covering up for the actual people who committed, ordered, or covered up those atrocities.
2. They are lying.

3. ???

Posted by R H Frost at October 11, 2007 01:23 AM

Pete Dawg, please read Chuck's last sentence more carefully.

Posted by MissBirdlegs in AL at October 11, 2007 02:04 AM

Pete,

Birdlegs is right. Chuck just wrote a piece of satire. It wasnt the most brillant joke, but he didnt mean to defame our troops.

You can check his blog to get an idea of where he is coming from. He actually has what I believe to be a picture of himself in uniform at the top. All of his posts are extremely supportive of his fellow soldiers and writes extensively about his time in Iraq.

Posted by Freedom Now at October 11, 2007 02:33 AM

Few days back, American Thinker published a piece I wrote about the Winter Soldier Investigation. In it I made a few connections between VVAW to IVAW.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/10/investigate_the_winter_soldier.html

I posted a link and excerpt at my own blog.
http://keohane.blogspot.com/2007/10/winter-soldier-investigation-and.html

Got a comment from a Clifton Hicks, who I knew from shinola. He likened not believing the WSI smear to being a Holocaust denier.

“The 1971 WSI was completely fabricated, those guys never did any of those crazy things, sure... and I bet the holocaust never happened either, we should "investigate" that one too! WSI wasn't about slandering soldiers or the military, it was about exposing the truth to the American people. They have a right to know, and we as veterans are obligated to inform them.”

Anyway, I looked about for who Clifton Hicks might be, and lo and behold – he’s got a bit of public history:
http://letthemenforceit.blogspot.com/2007/10/to-some-only-so-called-soldiers-can.html

and he’s IVAW:
http://www.ivaw.org/user/286

The thing I like the most about his bio at IVAW is the ‘we’, ‘we’, ‘we’, ‘we’...until he gets to the ‘I’ discharge as a conscientious objector. BTW, can anyone tell me how that works in an all volunteer force? I was enlisted back in the days of the draft, but I can’t recall anyone but draftees applying for that. You enlist in the army and suddenly realize you are conscientiously opposed to fighting? I don’t get a warm and fuzzy about conscientious objection when ‘the resistance began for me’ after he got busted in an Article 15.

Posted by Denis Keohane at October 11, 2007 03:21 AM

Some day, we might actually get up off our knees and pry or lips off the leftist PC propaganda spigot and try to pretend to stand up like men and face these traitors for what they are.

Issuing lies, distortions, falsehoods, etc etc during a time of war for the purpose of spreading defeatism, insubordination, reducing recruiting or otherwise simply to aid the enemy in their efforts to subjugate and destroy is, is not, never has been, and in a society with any hope of survival, never will be "just a difference of opinion".

It is betrayal most foul. No human society in the recorded history of man has ever tolerated such and survived.

Posted by Grimmy at October 11, 2007 07:37 AM

Heh - good catch on the "three" - my bad.

Posted by Greyhawk at October 11, 2007 10:20 AM

Oh. I thought three was "THERE IS NO... number three."

I'm guessing camel spiders and other creepy crawlies were victims of Chuck's genocidal campaigns as well. Oh the... er, entymology?

Posted by Patrick Chester at October 11, 2007 01:26 PM

Trackbacked by The Thunder Run - Web Reconnaissance for 10/11/2007
A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day...so check back often.

Posted by David M at October 11, 2007 03:31 PM

Please forgive me... I went to public school. I was late for reading comprehension that day because I couldn't get the condom on the banana.

Chuck... never mind. Oh, yeah thanks for your service. Boy do I feel like an ass... ;p

Posted by Pete Dawg at October 11, 2007 04:33 PM

I personally have not witnessed anything I would classify as an atrocity. If I saw an atrocity, I would report it.

That said, I know I saw a lot of things which were illegal. You had people encouraging war crimes. We had a sergeant major who gave an NCODP about how we were only required to stand up to war crime committers if we felt it was really, really important. No kidding, that he wasn't telling us to do anything illegal, but if we did he would completely understand. Then he read us a rousing speech by a man who had, in fact, committed war crimes to save his men.

We had people who self-identified with PTSD who were told to 'suck it up and NCO on'. Or that they didn't really have it, they were just a dirtbag.
Or that it wasn't a real injury or problem.

One first sergeant threatened to get someone locked up in an in-patient ward if they didn't shut up, even though he admitted he knew they weren't crazy.

The Army has a lot of problems, and a lot of leaders that are just now adjusting to the fact that the way they learned things from their fathers and grandfathers isn't the way it's done anymore.

I won't ever put these people's names out there-and I haven't even blogged about them, nor do I think I ever will. I definitely won't be giving testimony about it. Why? Because these things are wrong, sure, but they're not the level of wrong that people's careers need to go down in flames for. Quite frankly, it's not their fault they are the way they are. They're little-wrong. And I think that may be the case with other IVAW members-and to be honest, a lot of regular Army that aren't IVAW as well. People don't speak up for stuff that happens all the time, even if it is in fact wrong, because it's only a little bit wrong. Or they speak up, but just to someone in their chain of command. They don't go outside it.

I can see why people might not want to name the little guys who did things, believing they were doing what Top wanted or what they were told.

Also, I have to say, not every IVAW member is all "ATROCITY!" Because, well, there aren't enough atrocities to go around, other than the political atrocity, which really is no one in the military's fault.

Posted by Army Sergeant at January 9, 2008 04:24 AM

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