“He Believed The War Should Have Been Over A Long Time Ago”
Slain Soldier’s Mother Speaks Out

Vallejo native Christopher Rose is shown last month after being injured when his patrol’s Humvee ran over an IED bomb. Rose was killed this week by a roadside bomb in Baghdad. (Courtesy photo)

Though earnest about the Iraq War’s mission, her son had recently become depressed it had gone on for more than three years, she said. He believed the war should have been over a “long time ago,” she said. He was particularly sad because he went to Iraq to make a difference, but some Iraqi people did not want him to be there, she said.

7.7.06 By SARAH ROHRS, Times-Herald staff writer

Margarita Rose bears a mother’s grief and anger – her 21-year-old son, Christopher D. Rose, was too young to be a soldier and too young to die.

Killed Thursday by a roadside bomb in Baghdad, Christopher Rose, who grew up in Vallejo, was scheduled to return to the United States in October. He was sent to Iraq in December for his first tour of duty.

After serving his country, Christopher wanted to go school and become a police officer, said Margarita Rose, a Daly City resident.

“What a waste of his life,” she said in an interview Sunday.

“I’m very angry. I wish the war was over. I wish there was no war. How many young people have to die? That’s the saddest thing. They are just 19, 20 and 21. They are just starting their lives,” she said.

“They’re young kids,” she added.

Christopher Rose’s uncle, Benito Rose, Jr., said his nephew came to Vallejo often to spend time with family.

The young soldier grew up in a North Vallejo neighborhood and attended first, second and third grades at Cooper Elementary before his parents moved the family to San Francisco.

Speaking from the family’s current home in Daly City, Margarita Rose and other family members described Christopher Rose as a wise, mature and kind young man.

“Everyone who came into his life was touched by him. He brought out the best in people,” aunt Nora Rose said.

Christopher Rose had just spent two weeks with loved ones in May and was anxious for his tour in Iraq to be over, his mother said.

“We were very proud of him every day of his life. He was our hero,” she said.

Barely 18, Christopher Rose enlisted in June 2004 without first telling his family. Margarita Rose said her son’s decision to enlist was disturbing to the family. She said he wanted to go to Iraq to ensure that America would never again be bombed by terrorists.

Though earnest about the Iraq War’s mission, her son had recently become depressed it had gone on for more than three years, she said.

He believed the war should have been over a “long time ago,” she said. He was particularly sad because he went to Iraq to make a difference, but some Iraqi people did not want him to be there, she said.

Witnessing warfare had also taken its toll.

“He saw things he was too scared to tell me. They were too horrible,” she said. “It made him depressed. He didn’t want to talk about it.”

In joining the military, Christopher Rose followed a family tradition. His father Rudy Rose fought in Vietnam and his grandfather Benito Rose, Sr. fought in World II and the Korean War.

Christopher Rose was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 67th Armored Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, based at Fort Hood, Texas.

Though he was much younger than his two older sisters, Marianne and Lisa Rose, people often thought he was the eldest because of his maturity, his mother said.

After attending Riordan High School in San Francisco, he graduated from a Christian high school affiliated with Voice of Pentecost Church in San Francisco.

Good at math, he also loved art and liked to sing. He had diverse musical interests and particularly enjoyed singing along with Tom Jones and Wayne Newton, his mother said.

Benito Rose said the family would like to bury the soldier next to his grandfather in the Golden Gate National Cemetery in San Bruno.

Do you have a friend or relative in the service? Forward this E-MAIL along, or send us the address if you wish and we’ll send it regularly. Whether in Iraq or stuck on a base in the USA, this is extra important for your service friend, too often cut off from access to encouraging news of growing resistance to the war, at home and inside the armed services. Send requests to address up top.

IRAQ WAR REPORTS

Stryker Soldier Killed

July 12, 2006 FORT WAINWRIGHT, Alaska (AP)

A Fort Wainwright soldier was killed Wednesday in Iraq, a military spokesman said.

The soldier was killed by small-arms fire while conducting a mounted patrol in Mosul, said U.S. Army Alaska Public Affairs spokesman Maj. Kirk Gohlke.

The identity of the soldier, who was assigned to the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team based at Fort Wainwright, has not been released. However, the next of kin have been notified, Gohlke said.

Novi GI Succumbs To War Injuries

July 12, 2006 Edward L. Cardenas, The Detroit News

Michigan Army National Guard Sgt. Duane Dreasky, who suffered burns over 75 percent of his body during an attack in Iraq, died in a Texas military hospital after an eight-month fight for his life.

“He went out with so much dignity,” his wife, Mandeline Dreasky, said Tuesday.

“He fought and defied death four times. We had hoped that he would make it.”

Dreasky, 31, of Novi died Monday at the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio.

He had been living a life-long dream of serving his country when the Humvee in which he was riding near al-Habbaniyah, Iraq, was hit by an improvised explosive device on Nov. 21, 2005.

He was airlifted out of Iraq and ended up at the San Antonio burn center, where President George W. Bush toured on Jan. 1 and met with soldiers. Sgt. Dreasky, in bandages, tried to salute when Bush entered the room.

His death is the 88th from Michigan in the Iraq war, and he is the seventh soldier to die from Michigan Army National Guard Company B, 125th Infantry, based in Saginaw. The unit has suffered the highest number of casualties of any unit from Michigan that has served in Iraq.

He was also the last survivor of the five-man Humvee unit that was attacked on Nov. 20.

The shock of his death resonated beyond his family.

“He was a big imposing, somewhat intimidating person who loved kids and they loved him,” said Kim Anderson, whose son took martial arts classes from Dreasky.

“He just tried to make his family proud, and he definitely did that.”

In addition to his wife, survivors include his parents, Cheryl and Roger; sister Dawn Marie Harvey; grandmother Virginia Lach; grandparents, Duane and Dorothy Peterson.

Pekin Soldier Wounded By Roadside Bomb

July 12, 2006 PEORIA JOURNAL STAR, INC., PEKIN

A Pekin soldier is recovering from wounds he sustained after the Humvee he was traveling in Saturday was hit by a roadside bomb in Iraq, family members said.

Spc. Jason Kedzior has shrapnel wounds in his arm and suffered a concussion from the blast, which occurred as his convoy rolled past the bomb. His father, Scott Kedzior, also of Pekin, said his son’s Humvee was third in line and, after the first two vehicles went past, the bomb detonated.

Kedzior, 21, is assigned to Company D, 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, which is based in Ramadi, located in the Anbar province of Iraq. Ramadi is about 70 miles west of Baghdad and has been a hotbed of insurgent activity.

The company arrived in Iraq in late November and has lost five of its 73 soldiers, Scott Kedzior said.

“We’re very thankful it was minor injuries and that he’s safe,” Scott Kedzior said. “(Jason) said it’s not a big deal. He said ‘Dad, it’s really minor.’ He’s thinking about his friends who have been more seriously wounded than him.”

Jason Kedzior is a 2003 graduate of Pekin Community High School. He joined the Army in fall 2003.

Area Soldier Wounded

July 12, 2006 WJAC

The father of an Altoona soldier wounded in Iraq said his son has a long road to recovery.

Wednesday’s Altoona Mirror reported 23-year-old Jeffrey Reffner, an Army combat engineer, was badly injured one week ago when the Humvee he was riding in ran over a bomb in the ground.

Reffner suffered first and second degree burns to his face, hands, and arms. The blast also shattered his leg bones.

He is recovering in an Army hospital in Texas.

THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO COMPREHENSIBLE REASON TO BE IN THIS EXTREMELY HIGH RISK LOCATION AT THIS TIME, EXCEPT THAT A CROOKED POLITICIAN WHO LIVES IN THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU THERE, SO HE WILL LOOK GOOD.
That is not a good enough reason.

U.S. Marines study an aerial photograph during a night patrol in Ramadi, June 29, 2006. (AP Photo/Jacob Silberberg)

AFGHANISTAN WAR REPORTS

Two U.S. Troops Wounded In Yaqoobi

Jul. 12, 2006 Associated Press, KABUL, Afghanistan

An attacker in a car detonated a bomb near a U.S. military convoy in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday.

Two American soldiers were slightly wounded in the attack in Yaqoobi district, 15 miles east of Khost city, said Khost provincial Gov. Merajuddin Patan.

“The Taleban Has Influence In Almost Every District”

11 July 2006 BBC NEWS

Afghanistan’s southern province of Helmand is fast turning out to be one of the country’s most dangerous, with almost daily clashes between militants and foreign and Afghan troops.

More than 3,000 British troops have been deployed there since May, as part of a strengthened Nat force in the south aimed at tackling the twin threats of a resurgent Taleban and the country’s drug trade.

Helmand, with rocky mountains in the north and desert in the south, shares an open border with Pakistan and is said to produce nearly 20% of Afghanistan’s opium crop.

The last time British troops were deployed in Helmand was in the 19th Century, and they left after two disastrous wars.

Their experience this time is proving to be equally daunting.

The Taleban has influence in almost every district and there are some areas where they are said to be firmly in control.

In these areas they are seen as a real source of power, overshadowing the government, making villages there almost no-go areas for the security forces, particularly at night.

It is very easy for them therefore, to launch attacks against coalition forces and melt into the countryside.

Afghan Legislator Accuses U.S. Occupation Forces Of Deadly Attack On His Family;
“American And Australian Troops Were Responsible For It”

July 8, 2006 By CARLOTTA GALL, ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, July 7

A member of the Afghan Parliament on Friday accused the American coalition of opening fire on his family as they traveled by car in one of the most troubled provinces of southern Afghanistan, killing his brother-in-law and wounding five others, including his wife and two of his children.

Hajji Abdul Khaliq, a legislator from Oruzgan Province, said in a telephone interview that the shooting occurred Wednesday, and that American and Australian troops were responsible for it.

“My wife, my son, my daughter, my nephew and my wife’s brother were traveling with a driver from Oruzgan to Kandahar for a medical checkup at Kandahar hospital, when they were attacked by American and Australian troops from the top of a hill” in the middle of the afternoon, he said.

“The coalition were on the top of the hill and started shooting towards their car,” Mr. Abdul Khaliq said, “killing my wife’s brother, Abdul Baqi, and injuring my wife, my son, my daughter and my nephew.” His nephew and the driver were slightly injured, he said.

The family took cover in a ditch beside the road and lay on the ground for several hours, he said. The coalition kept firing on the car and after some time came to the scene, he said, but even when they saw the woman and children lying wounded they did nothing to assist them.

Lt. Col. Paul Fitzpatrick, a coalition spokesman, said that there had been only one report of coalition forces “engaging the enemy” in the region, and that it took place at night when “four Taliban extremists on foot” fought a patrol “far off the road.”

Colonel Fitzpatrick added that the claim that coalition forces were responsible for the attack on Mr. Abdul Khaliq’s family “could very well be extremist propaganda.”

[And there you have the motivation for every patriotic Afghan to take up arms and kill as many occupation troops as humanly possible. Not only do they kill and wound, they come up with this kind of dismissive, contemptuous lying bullshit, accusing the victims of their murderous Imperial occupation of being nothing but liars and “extremists.” Fine. As more and more Afghans take up arms to kill the Colonel Fitzpatricks of the world, he will have nobody to thank but himself, and his masters. The tragedy is that both ordinary Afghans and ordinary soldiers will pay the price for his arrogance. Unfortunately, this despicable piece of shit is likely to survive the war, being a well protected Colonel and all.]

A few hours after the attack, Mr. Abdul Khaliq said, villagers and friends of the family came to help them and took them to the hospital in Tirin Kot, about 11 miles away. He moved the family to a Kandahar hospital on Thursday, he said.

“An Enemy That Melts In And Out Of The Local Populace At Will”

11 July 2006 By Tom Coghlan in Kabul, Independent News and Media Limited [Excerpts]

Across the south, schools burn during the night. According to a bleak report released by Human Rights Watch today at least 200 have been destroyed in the past year and half. Their blackened shells, many of them new buildings constructed with foreign aid money, are visible from the ever more dangerous road south to Kandahar.

This summer, across the south of Afghanistan, the Taliban have returned.

And what was, until this year, characterised as an increasingly vicious “low-level insurgency” has become a war.

A palpable terror grips the south of the country, where overstretched Western forces battle an enemy that melts in and out of the local populace at will, and anyone associated with the foreigners or the central government is a target for violent reprisals.

Faced with collapsing security and insurgents who are flowing back and forth from safe havens in the tribal areas of Pakistan, the Western forces in the south are resorting to more extreme measures.

Yesterday, Operation Mountain Thrust, the 11,000-strong coalition offensive in the south, claimed to have killed another 40 insurgents in a strike on a house in Uruzgan. The two months since the start of Mountain Thrust have seen more than 600 killed in the south, the vast majority of them Taliban fighters.

But increasingly figures within both the Afghan government and international community are questioning whether killing such huge numbers of people is quelling the insurgency or simply fuelling popular resentment.

In May, the coalition dropped bombs in Afghanistan on no fewer than 750 occasions, more than the ordnance dropped in Iraq. On Sunday night, bombs were again lighting up the sky, amid a dull rumble in Ghazni province.

NOTES FROM A LOST WAR:
“Where The Taliban Are Not Openly Controlling Districts, They Have Set Up Shadow Administrations That Assume Power As Soon As Dusk Falls”

More alarmingly, the Taliban are no longer just in the south but have even moved into the province of Logar, 25 miles from Kabul. So confident are the Taliban that leaders of the once secretive group have started giving interviews on Afghanistan’s new US-funded Tolo television station.

July 09, 2006 Christina Lamb, The Sunday Times [Excerpts]

Last month saw 53 “TICs” — troops in contact, in other words under Taliban attack — and last week there were two nights during which all but one of the British bases and outposts in Helmand came under attack.

How did it all go so wrong?

Why does a senior British military officer talk despairingly of “military and developmental anarchy”?

From just a few hundred guerrillas last year, Mullad Dadullah, the Taliban commander, now claims that he has 12,000 men under arms in the southern provinces of Kandahar, Helmand and Uruzgan.

Where the Taliban are not openly controlling districts, they have set up shadow administrations that assume power as soon as dusk falls.

More alarmingly, the Taliban are no longer just in the south but have even moved into the province of Logar, 25 miles from Kabul.

Among their Afghan victims they particularly target police and their relatives as well as guards, road builders and interpreters for western contractors.

Last week an Afghan friend travelling from Kandahar to Kabul on a bus was shocked when a bearded passenger got up, walked to the front and replaced the music cassette that had been playing with a tape of Taliban chanting: “For the next 2? hours we all sat listening to this terrible stuff and nobody said a word. Two years ago that would have been unthinkable.”

So confident are the Taliban that leaders of the once secretive group have started giving interviews on Afghanistan’s new US-funded Tolo television station.

“People are scared when they see the Taliban on TV,” said Jamil Karzai, MP for Kabul and a nephew of the president. “Every day I get constituents coming and asking: what does this mean, are the Taliban coming back? We could never have imagined we would get in a situation where such a thing was conceivable.”

“We need to realise that we could actually fail here,” warns Lieutenant-General David Richards, British commander of the NATO-led peacekeeping force.

Karzai has repeatedly complained to the Americans about the bombers and the lack of cultural sensitivity of raids on the ground — doors kicked down in the middle of the night, male soldiers entering women’s quarters or taking in dogs which are considered unclean.

“How can we go in offering school sets and candy to people when the Americans have just bombed someone’s family or run over their daughter?” asked an exasperated senior ISAF officer.

Few Afghans see any difference between ISAF activities and America’s Operation Enduring Freedom. The result is that even in the mosques of Kabul, mullahs have started preaching that ISAF are “infidels here to destroy Islam”.

Against such a backdrop, it seems hopelessly I for the British to hope that locals in Helmand will differentiate between them and the Americans. At every meeting I attended, para commanders started off by telling local elders, “we’re British, not Americans”, an odd comment for such close allies.

At a shura or traditional meeting in Gereshk, elders complained about soldiers bursting into their women’s quarters.

“It’s not us, we’ve had endless cultural training about this,” said Major Paul Blair, the local British commander. “But of course they don’t see the difference.”

“You don’t even differentiate between Pashtuns and Tajiks, let alone different Pashtun tribes,” replied a local teacher. “Why should we?”

Back at the camp after this discussion we found that a convoy of Americans had arrived. They were laughing about running over some goats on the way in.

The greatest shock for me in the two-hour firefight in which I found myself in the village of Zumbelay, south of Sangin, was the cunning employed by the Taliban to outflank and surround us.

My memories of travelling with the [resistance] in the 1980s were mostly of chaos. I always felt that one of the reasons why the Russians found it so difficult to outwit them was that the Afghans had no idea themselves of what they would do next.

Last week was different. “They used the tactics we would use,” said Captain Alex Mackenzie, commander of C Company’s fire support group, when we finally escaped from the ambush.

Western intelligence on Helmand is also seriously flawed. “The British don’t have good field intelligence,” said Zia Mojadeddi, one of Karzai’s national security advisers.

“The past formulas do not work. You have to know every village and who is in the village, otherwise they are doomed to failure.”

THERE are few even among the most on-message British senior officers who do not privately concede that the mission in Helmand is two years too late.

Not only has the distraction of war in Iraq allowed the Taliban to regroup, but the British forces are telling locals that they have come to help the Afghan government at a time when the credibility of the Karzai administration is at an all-time low.

There has also been a lack of co-ordination and a focus on First World priorities such as gender rights rather than basic health or infrastructure. There has been an endless stream of American feminists intent not only on sweeping away the tyranny of the burqa but also on introducing western concepts of sexual equality.

Yet in a country where children regularly die of malnutrition, all the Afghan mothers I know are far more interested in food, clinics and security. Liberation can wait.

More than 1,000 NGOs have pushed up rents and put a lot of concrete blocks around their offices, but it is hard to see where else the aid money has gone.

Not a single new dam, power station or water system has been built in the five years since the Taliban fell.

Only one important highway has been completed. Kabul still has no sewerage system. Its streets remain piled high with rubbish and running with green effluent. Only 6% of the population has electricity and Afghanistan remains at the bottom of all social indicators.

There may be 5m children at school, as the politicians like to say, but many have their lessons in tents which they attend in shifts for just one or two hours’ tuition a day. This is not just in rural areas but also in Kabul where the Saluddin Ansari school has 3,700 children sharing a cluster of tents and one pit as a toilet.

“People just treat the children like garbage,” complained Asadullah, a Pashto teacher. “Every so often some foreigner comes by and says how shocking, but they don’t do anything.”

“The international community must start working better together to deliver,” warned Richards. “A quarter of children die by the age of five. Worrying about civil service reform and gender rights are really tomorrow’s problems.”

In recognition that development was failing, the so-called Afghanistan Compact was signed in London in February, agreeing that far more aid would be channeled through the Afghan government.

Contractors say this has simply resulted in widespread corruption, with ministries regularly demanding a “gift” of between 20% and 30% of a contract. One deputy minister refused a $120,000 armoured vehicle paid for by USAID, demanding instead the $230,000 model with the latest electronic windows and DVD player.

The irony is that there has been a private financial boom. Kabul now boasts shiny blue-glass office blocks. But officials say most of the new money is from drugs. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimates that Afghanistan earned $2.8 billion from opium production last year — more than it received in aid.

Rumsfeld Was Right!
He Called Afghanistan “A Breathtaking Accomplishment”
And So It Is:
[For The Afghan Resistance Fighting Him]

July 09, 2006 Christina Lamb, The Sunday Times [Excerpts]

By August 2002 Donald Rumsfeld, the US secretary of defence, was describing events in Afghanistan as “a breathtaking accomplishment”.

He pointed to Afghanistan as “a successful model for what could happen to Iraq if individuals were liberated, allowed to vote freely and to work”.

But while George W Bush and Tony Blair insisted on declaring Afghanistan a success — and a model for the pacification of Iraq, they apparently forgot one crucial lesson that the British had learnt years before.

“Unlike other wars, Afghan wars become serious only when they are over” were the sage words of Sir Olaf Caroe, the last British governor of North West Frontier Province.

Welcome To Liberated Afghanistan:
Where The Occupation Police Don’t Hunt For Criminals:
They Are The Criminals

June 6, 2006 By Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi in Mazar-e-Sharif for IWPR [Excerpts]

“More than 90 per cent of the police are corrupt,” said a Kabul businessman, interviewed while visiting Mazar-e-Sharif on a buying trip.

“Last year my shop in Kabul was robbed. After the robbery I found the identity card of one of the local police in my shop. When I brought it to the police station, the commander took it off me, and warned me not to tell anyone or else my life would be at risk.”

Mazar-e-Sharif resident Mohammad Rasul recalled how the police failed in their duties when armed robbers broke into his neighbor’s house in late March, “The robbers came at one in the morning and we called the police. They didn’t come for an hour, by which time the robbers had already killed a member of the family and fled.”

The owner of the house managed to detain one of the thieves, and handed him over to the police, said Rasul. But the man was released after a few days.

“The police are protecting robbers as they steal,” said Rasul.

“I find it funny when I hear that the national police are being trained,” said the Kabul businessman. “They can train them one thousand times but they’ll still be robbers.”

“The police are local militia commanders and members who have just changed their clothes,” said Mohammad Aalam Rahmani, a political analyst in Mazar-e-Sharif. “Now they will do robberies and looting wearing police uniforms.”

A policeman trained at the Balkh police academy accepted that corruption was common among his colleagues, but he pointed to the low salaries they get paid as the major cause. Most police make between US$50 and US$70 per month.

“The training has nothing to do with stamping out corruption,” he said. “Both trained and untrained police are fond of money.

“Salaries are too low, so police prefer money to law enforcement. They too have to make a living.”

TROOP NEWS

THIS IS HOW BUSH BRINGS THE TROOPS HOME:
BRING THEM ALL HOME NOW, ALIVE

A United States Army honor guard carries the body of Sgt. Terry M. Lisk, who was killed in Iraq, to cemetery services in Lemont, Illinois July 8, 2006. REUTERS/John Gress (UNITED STATES)

“I Cannot Conscience Taking Life Or Allowing The Lives Of My Troops To Be Taken While My Country’s Political Leaders Loot And Pillage Another Nation”

[Thanks to A, for forwarding from his friend.]

June 22, 2006

Senator Clinton,

Ma’am, I came across this two days ago and thought it might be of interest to you.

In a few weeks I will be commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the United States Army.

My oath is to defend the Constitution of the United States.

It is not to collaborate in a neoimperial enterprise or forceful market acquisition.

I cannot conscience taking life or allowing the lives of my troops to be taken while my country’s political leaders loot and pillage another nation under the guise of democratization.

This is criminal, plain and simple.

I would appreciate it if you or one of your staff would follow the link below to the report titled “Crude Designs” and respond to my email within the next week. [”Crude Designs” is reprinted at the end of this letter. T]

I will attempt to contact Senator Kerry and others if I do not receive a response from this office.

Good luck to your party in November- the future of two nations depends on your success.

Sincerely,
Dissenting Patriot

Crude Designs:
The Rip Off Of Iraq’s Oil Wealth

www.neweconomics.org/gen/z_sys_PublicationDetail.aspx?pid=215

Control of Iraq’s future oil wealth is being handed to multinational oil companies through long-term contracts that will cost Iraq hundreds of billions of dollars, according to a new report from PLATFORM, published with nef and War on Want in the UK.

Crude designs: the rip off of Iraq’s oil wealth, reveals that current Iraqi oil policy will allocate the development of at least 64% of Iraq’s reserves to foreign oil companies.

Iraq has the world’s third largest oil reserves. Figures published in the report for the first time show that the estimated cost to Iraq over the life of the new oil contracts is US $74 to US $194 billion, compared with leaving oil development in public hands. These sums represent between two and seven times the current Iraqi state budget.

The contracts would guarantee massive profits to foreign companies, with rates of return of 42 per cent to 162 per cent.

The kinds of contracts that will provide these returns are known as production sharing agreements (PSAs). PSAs have been heavily promoted by the US government and oil majors and have the backing of senior figures in the Iraqi Oil Ministry.

Britain has also encouraged Iraq to open its oilfields to foreign investment. However PSAs last for 25-40 years, are usually secret and prevent governments from later altering the terms of the contract

“Deserted By The Army They Once So Proudly Served”
Troops At Fort Carson Base Say The Army Is Ignoring PTSD Cases

Jul 12, 2006 (CBS News)

The 2nd Brigade Combat Team in Fort Carson, Colo., is training to go back to Iraq after experiencing some of the fiercest combat last year.

The unit lost soldiers at double the rate of other Army posts around the country, including Pfc. Sam Lee, who committed suicide at a Ramadi Army barracks.

“As he was going outside, that’s pretty much when I came in the room and saw him fire on himself,” says Pvt. Tyler Jennings.

“The second round actually came by and just missed my head and hit my weapon,” adds Pvt. Corey Davis. “So I had to use his weapon. And I mean I got it with his blood on it still.”

Jennings and Davis say that surreal scene, among many others, led to nightmares, flashbacks and anxiety attacks; classic symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

“I had panic attacks every time,” says Jennings. “And I had it all set up, I was going to hang myself.”

In the face of what some are calling an epidemic of PTSD in the military, nearly a dozen soldiers at Fort Carson told CBS News that their cries for mental health either went unanswered or they found themselves subject to unrelenting abuse and ridicule.

“I did the right thing, ‘cause I knew I needed help,” Davis says.

“A cry for help, and nobody hears it?”

“No, there was no answer.”

Today, Davis, like Jennings, has seen a once-promising career upended. Demoted to private for drug abuse, something experts say is a common coping mechanism for those suffering from the disorder, both face dishonorable discharges.

Both were forced to seek treatment off-base and have been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Like many soldiers, they feel deserted by the Army they once so proudly served.

WRITE AND PHONE PATAKI TO MAKE SURE URANIUM BILL IS SIGNED INTO LAW…

[Thanks to Anna Bradley, who sent this in.]

July 11, 2006

To: VFP and other veterans and their families:

The following letter from Elliot Adams about making sure the NY State Depleted Uranium bill gets signed this summer is critical. We are both writing and phoning the governor at 518-474-8390 to insure signing of A9116B and S6964A into law.

Jim Barlow, VFP Chapter 023

Pass this on…

Fellow vets,

With the NY State Depleted Uranium Bill we are now at the bottom of the 9th inning, we are 1 run ahead, and there are two outs.

Incredibly the bill has made it through both houses in one session of the legislature. We just need Governor Pataki to sign it.

We now need a hundred letters to Pataki from veterans supporting the bill.

The letters don’t have to argue the case, they should not bash the administration, they just need to be clear that you are a vet and that you support this legislation.

Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. But please try to get a letter sent quickly.

There is a draft letter below.

Elliott D S Adams
Nonviolence Training Coordinator, Veterans For Peace
PO Box 195
Sharon Springs, NY 13459
518-284-2048, 518-441-2697

*********************************************

INSERT YOUR ADDRESS

Governor George E. Pataki
State Capitol
Albany, NY 12224

INSERT DATE

Dear Governor Pataki,

As a veteran I urge you to support our National Guard members by signing the National Guard Testing and Task Force Bill, A9116B & S6964A.

Many veterans are still dealing with the Agent Orange poisoning and the symptoms of Gulf War Syndrome, this bill helps avoid doing a similar thing to our vets again.

I served [INSERT SOMETHING ABOUT YOUR MILITARY EXPERIENCE] and know how important this will be for the young New Yorkers returning from active duty in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Thank You

INSERT SIGNATURE

FORWARD OBSERVATIONS

Railroad Tracks

From: Dennis Serdel
To: GI Special
Sent: July 10, 2006

By Dennis Serdel: VFP #50, VVAW, Vietnam 1967-68 (one tour) Purple Heart Americal Div. 11th Brigade, UAW GM retiree, Perry, Michigan

Take another generation
slam their heads into helmets
squeeze their feet into combat boots
camouflage their humanity
and change them into animals.
It’s somewhat about the Holy Land
about the Second Coming.
Send them to a country
who’s world they can not understand.
Another senseless bomb explodes
jagged metal rips their flesh,
stitches crisscross
Adonis bodies
like a row of railroad tracks.
A roadside bomb crashes through
another vehicle of war,
never knowing where or when
drives another generation mad.
Vote for God for president
make fun of purple hearts,
let the USA Christian Taliban
brand crosses onto brains.
Watch oil turn into blood
another television show
preaching
kill for Jesus,
preaching kill for God
Bless America.

Endless Peace,
Dennis

The Nightmare Of The Dead Horse

From: Richard Hastie
To: GI Special
Sent: July 12, 2006
Subject: The Nightmare Of The Dead Horse

A year before I went to Vietnam, I did advanced medic training in Denver, Colorado.

I worked with many Vietnam vets who had amputations. I also witnessed shock therapy being done on very traumatized soldiers.

The drug of choice in those days was Thorazine.

Soldiers in pill bottles was a very common sight on the psyche wards.

I believe the number one cause of those emotional problems was, “ Political Incest.”

I came up with that diagnosis several years after returning from Vietnam.

I define Political Incest as the premeditated lying by the U.S. Government toward its own soldiers, for the cause of war profiteering.

Plain and simple, Lying Is The Most Powerful Weapon In War.

The Bush administration is committing war crimes against its own troops, let alone the Iraqi people.

While I was in Vietnam, I saw the rapid disintegration of American involvement in Southeast Asia. Not only was I seeing casualties being flown in by helicopters, but I was seeing the homicides, suicides, heroin addiction, and shootouts within my own unit.

The war in Iraq is going to take the same path of insanity as it did in Vietnam.

What the pro-war people in America know about war, you could stick in a damn thimble.

The war in Iraq is a dead horse, and that dead horse is going to haunt America.

You reap what you sow.

Mike Hastie
Vietnam Veteran
July 12, 2006

Photo from the I-R-A-Q (I Remember Another Quagmire) portfolio of Mike Hastie, US Army Medic, Vietnam 1970-71. (For more of his outstanding work, contact at: (hastiemike@earthlink.net) T)

What do you think? Comments from service men and women, and veterans, are especially welcome. Send to contact@militaryproject.org. Name, I.D., withheld on request. Replies confidential.

Three Guesses

July 9, 2006 By Andrew J. Bacevich, The Washington Post Company [Excerpt]

Who bears responsibility for these Iraqi deaths?

The young soldiers pulling the triggers?

The commanders who establish rules of engagement that privilege “force protection” over any obligation to protect innocent life?

The intellectually bankrupt policymakers who sent U.S. forces into Iraq in the first place and now see no choice but to press on?

For all the talk of Iraq being a sovereign nation, foreign occupiers are the ones deciding what an Iraqi life is worth.

And although President Bush has remarked in a different context that “every human life is a precious gift of matchless value,” our actions in Iraq continue to convey the impression that civilian lives aren’t worth all that much.

OCCUPATION REPORT

Amazing Discovery By Senator!

July 11, 2006 By Rick Maze, Army Times Staff writer

Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, a Senate Foreign Relations Committee member, said the chief problem is that Iraq’s new government “has no government capability.”

How It Is

July 12 (KUNA) Baghdad

Meanwhile, unidentified gunmen shot dead an unidentified man, where also a policeman was wounded by unidentified militants’ fire.

So Much For That Stupid, Lying Sovereignty Bullshit:
Iraq Government Asking U.N. For Authority To Arrest And Try U.S. Troops For Atrocities;
White House Says Go Fuck Yourself To Their “Sovereign” Iraqi Stooges

[Thanks to Mark Shapiro, who sent this in.]

Asked to respond to Michael’s remarks, White House spokesman Tony Snow dismissed that as a “hypothetical game”.

Jul 10, 2006 By Mariam Karouny, BAGHDAD (Reuters)

Iraq will ask the United Nations to end immunity from local law for U.S. troops, the government said on Monday, as the U.S. military named five soldiers charged in a rape-murder case that has outraged Iraqis.

In an interview a week after Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki demanded a review of foreign troops’ immunity, Human Rights Minister Wigdan Michael said work on it was now under way and a request could be ready by next month to go to the U.N. Security Council, under whose mandate U.S.-led forces operate in Iraq.

“We’re very serious about this,” she said, adding a lack of enforcement of U.S. military law in the past had encouraged soldiers to commit crimes against Iraqi civilians.

“We formed a committee last week to prepare reports and put it before the cabinet in three weeks. After that, Maliki will present it to the Security Council. We will ask them to lift the immunity,” Michael said.

“If we don’t get that, then we’ll ask for an effective role in the investigations that are going on. The Iraqi government must have a role.”

Asked to respond to Michael’s remarks, White House spokesman Tony Snow dismissed that as a “hypothetical game”.

OCCUPATION ISN’T LIBERATION
BRING ALL THE TROOPS HOME NOW!

Fallujah:
“Progress Has Also Been Slowed Because Remnants Of The Insurgent Force Still Operate In The City”

Though over $30 million has been spent on the city’s electricity grid, Ortiz said, available wattage may not increase because there aren’t enough power plants. U.S. officials have proposed at least another $30 million to improve the distribution system but none of it to build more power plants, meaning power levels will remain stagnant.

July 11, 2006 By ANTONIO CASTANEDA, Associated Press Writer

Clean water should flow to 80 percent of Fallujah’s homes this fall, and by summer’s end a planned wireless network will provide phone service and Internet access to thousands, a technological leap unimaginable just months ago.

But mounds of rubble litter the city, electricity is available only four hours a day, and an estimated 50,000 people still have not returned 18 months after Fallujah was destroyed in an American assault to wrest control from insurgents.

“By the end of the year, that’s when we’ll see the turnaround,’’ said Maj. Angel Ortiz of San Pedro, Calif., who oversees projects in the area for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. “After all these years of planning, that’s when it’s going to pay off in their eyes.’’

About 90 percent of projects have experienced delays, Ortiz said.

Tens of millions of dollars have also been allocated to projects whose impact won’t be immediately obvious.

Though over $30 million has been spent on the city’s electricity grid, Ortiz said, available wattage may not increase because there aren’t enough power plants. U.S. officials have proposed at least another $30 million to improve the distribution system but none of it to build more power plants, meaning power levels will remain stagnant.

Other parts of the city’s infrastructure have suffered because of power shortages. Many water pumps in the city rely on electricity to disperse water to homes. When a generator at one of the city’s largest hospitals recently broke down, engineers complained the entire facility was without power for over a day. Even an infants ward was left in the dark.

“The number one need is electricity. All other projects come after this. The electricity that we have now is not enough,’’ said Najim Abdullah, chairman of the Fallujah City Council.

Though many residents share generators or have bought their own, the cost of fuel has steadily cut into their income.

Residents often complain about compensation payments for damage suffered by homes during the 2004 fighting. Up to 25,000 homes were damaged or destroyed, said Abdullah, and about 70 percent of those payments have been made, he said.

But no money has been forthcoming for high-rise apartments, commercial buildings and industrial facilities, Abdullah said, noting that about half of public buildings such as schools and hospitals are still being repaired.

Progress has also been slowed because remnants of the insurgent force still operate in the city, although at a far lower level than the days when gunmen roamed the streets and insurgent commanders ruled.

Iraqi engineers said insurgents target U.S.-funded projects but have largely spared those funded by the Iraqi government.

“Last Chance” For Peace In Iraq, PM Says

[Thanks to PB who sent this in. He writes: MORE LIKE LAST CHANCE FOR THE PUPPET GOVERNMENT TO SUCCEED]

7.12.06 By Kristin Roberts and Ross Colvin, Reuters

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told Iraqis on Wednesday they had one last chance for peace as U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld held talks with Iraqi leaders on the escalating sectarian violence in the country.

OCCUPATION PALESTINE

Eight Israeli Troops Killed In Heavy Fighting

July 12, 2006 Debka.com & Ynetnews.com & By Amos Harel, Jack Khoury and Yoav Stern, Haaretz Correspondents & By Ravi Nessman, The Associated Press

Three IDF soldiers were killed Wednesday during a Hizbullah raid on Israel’s northern border, during which two soldiers were kidnapped [translation: captured] by the terror [translation: resistance] group.

Hezbollah said its guerrillas destroyed two Israeli tanks that attempted to cross the border into Lebanon on two different occasions Wednesday.

The abduction [capture] occurred Wednesday morning. Under loud explosions, which “rocked” the entire region, RPG shells were fired at an IDF Hummer jeep. Blood stains and a breach in the fence were discovered in the area.

On Lebanese territory the IDF conducted a ground chase after the kidnappers of the two soldiers, who were taken by Hizbullah members during the heavy fire.

Four other soldiers were killed as an IDF tank drove over a roadside bomb during the search for the kidnappers [translation: resistance fighters].

Preparations for the Hizballah kidnap [translation: military] operation were sighted well in advance at its border positions. The attack did not therefore come as a surprise.

Nonetheless the first IDF probe conducted after the attack found that a Hizballah commando unit transferred from its Baalbek base had managed to infiltrate the northern border, lie in wait for two Israeli Hammer jeeps patrolling the border, and blow them up at around 0900 a.m., injuring 6 soldiers, three critically.

After long moments, medical teams arrived and only then were the two kidnapped [captured] soldiers found missing.

The two Israelis were wounded either by mortar shells or rockets that slammed into Moshav Zarit.

One was lightly to moderately wounded and the second was lightly wounded. Two other people suffered from shock. The wounded were evacuated to a hospital in Nahariya.

MORE:

“The Soldiers In Question Were Captured On Lebanese Soil”

12 Jul 2006 By Hayan Charara Via John Spritzler, Anti-Allawi Group

Letter To President Bush From A Lebanese Under Israeli Attacks (Excerpts]

The reason Israel gave for striking civilian villages in Lebanon was the capture of two Israeli soldiers.

Israeli Prime Minster Olmert called the abduction “an act of war” by Lebanon. Mind you, Mr. President, that the soldiers in question were captured on Lebanese soil, and also that they were not captured by civilians nor the Lebanese army, but by Hezbollah.

It is odd that Prime Minister Olmert does not view the presence of a foreign army on another people’s soil as a precipitating action, especially when the army is Israeli and the soil is Arab.

Israel’s reaction—an all out onslaught against the civilian population—is not surprising. After all, it is strikingly similar to how it has handled the capture of an Israeli solider in the Gaza Strip.

That is, collective punishment.

Worse, the State of Israel expects the Lebanese and the Palestinians, or any other sovereign entity for that matter, to allow incursions by its military to go without incident.

[To check out what life is like under a murderous military occupation by foreign terrorists, go to: www.rafahtoday.org The occupied nation is Palestine. The foreign terrorists call themselves “Israeli.”]

IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE RESISTANCE
END THE OCCUPATION

DANGER: POLITICIANS AT WORK

Democrats All For Bush Spying On U.S. Citizens;
They Whining Because Nobody Told Them About It

12 July 2006 By Edmund L. Andrews, The New York Times

WASHINGTON, July 11: The Republican chairwoman of a House subcommittee said Tuesday that the Bush administration had failed to inform Congress adequately that it was sifting through a vast international banking network in an effort to track terrorists’ finances.

The lawmaker, Representative Sue Kelly of New York, chairwoman of the House Financial Services subcommittee on oversight, was joined by members of both parties in accusing the administration of being too secretive and unaccountable to Congress about the program. Its existence was disclosed last month by The New York Times and other newspapers.

Most Democrats on the panel said they would have supported the program if they had been informed about it in advance. But they complained that the administration had made the program more controversial by refusing most attempts at Congressional oversight.

Rumsfeld Wants U.S. Troops To Help Iraqis Fight Bush

July 12, 2006 ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

In a stuffy auditorium packed with several hundred soldiers, Rumsfeld told the troops he wanted to offer them a definition of ‘’what victory means.’’

‘’First and foremost it means helping the Iraqi people take the fight to the enemy.’’

“THE ENEMY” — IN ACTION (?):

Bush July 5, 2006. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

OCCUPATION ISN’T LIBERATION
BRING ALL THE TROOPS HOME NOW!

Telling the truth – about the occupation or the criminals running the government in Washington – is the first reason for Traveling Soldier. But we want to do more than tell the truth; we want to report on the resistance – whether it’s in the streets of Baghdad, New York, or inside the armed forces. Our goal is for Traveling Soldier to become the thread that ties working-class people inside the armed services together. We want this newsletter to be a weapon to help you organize resistance within the armed forces. If you like what you’ve read, we hope that you’ll join with us in building a network of active duty organizers.  www.traveling-soldier.org/  And join with Iraq War vets in the call to end the occupation and bring our troops home now! www.ivaw.net

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