Word War I:
[Thanks to Mark Shapiro who sent this in.]

The Chair Of The JCS Said It, Which May Be Reported

September 29th, 2006 RICHARD SISK and HELEN KENNEDY, DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS [Excerpt]

Then-Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers, who chafed in Rumsfeld’s endless meetings, called him “that son of a bitch” or “that asshole.”

“THAT ASSHOLE”
SecDef PCS: USDB, Fort Leavenworth

Sisu.typepad.com

IRAQ WAR REPORTS

13 U.S. Troops Killed In Baghdad In Last 3 Days:
Toll For American Troops The Highest In Baghdad So Far;
74 Troops Killed In Iraq In September:
Highest Monthly Toll Since April

[Thanks to Alan Stolzer, The Military Project, who sent this in.]

Oct 5, 2006 By Amit R. Paley, The Washington Post Company

BAGHDAD, Iraq

Thirteen U.S. soldiers have been killed in Baghdad since Monday, the American military reported, registering the highest three-day death toll for U.S. forces in the capital since the start of the war.

The latest losses — four soldiers who were killed at 9 a.m. Wednesday by small-arms fire — are part of a recent spike in violent attacks against U.S. forces that have claimed the lives of at least 24 soldiers and Marines in Iraq since Saturday, the military said.

Independent databases showed the three-day toll for American troops to be the highest in Baghdad so far.

“When you go into bad neighborhoods, you’ll have more attacks,” said Lt. Col. James A. Gavrilis, a Special Forces officer and expert on the Iraqi insurgency. “If we have more people in one area, there will be an opportunity.” He said enemy fighters “are reacting to an opportunity to attack.”

Seventy-four soldiers and Marines were killed in Iraq in September, representing the highest monthly toll since April, when 76 died, according to the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count.

Car And Road Bombs Hit Year High;
“The Trend Line Has Been Up Over The Last Couple Of Months”

Oct 4 AFP & AP

The past week has seen the highest number of car bombs and roadside bombs in Iraq than at any time this year, said a US military spokesman, and he warned the trend was rising.

“Last week we also saw the highest number of vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices this year,” said Major General William Caldwell, using the military terminology for car bombs.

“The number of improvised explosive devices was also at an all time high,” he added, referring to home-made bombs used by Iraqi insurgents and militias to target road traffic.

“The trend line has been up over the last couple of months.”

Four Soldiers Killed By Indirect, Small-Arms Fire

04 October 2006 Multi National Corps Iraq PAO BAGHDAD RELEASE No. 20061004

Four Multi-National Division Baghdad Soldiers died at approximately 9 a.m. Oct. 4 from indirect and small-arms fire northwest of Baghdad.

Two Marines Killed In Western Iraq

Oct. 5, 2006 Multi-National Corps Iraq PAO RELEASE No. 20061005-11

CAMP FALLUJAH, Iraq: Two Marines assigned to Regimental Combat Team 7 died Oct. 4 from enemy action while operating in Al Anbar Province.

Central Illinois Classmates Die In Iraq

Oct 04, 2006 WEEK-TV

Two young soldiers from Creve Coeur have died in Iraq in separate attacks.

Kristoffer Walker and George Obourn Jr, both 2004 graduates of East Peoria High School, died in Iraq this week.

East Peoria High School Superintendent Cliff Cobert said the two men had joined the Army together under the “buddy plan”.

The school is planning a memorial for Walker and Obourn Friday at the East Peoria Homecoming football game.

Schofield Soldier Killed In Fighting Near Kirkuk

October 5, 2006 Advertiser Staff & 10.4 KUNA

A Schofield Barracks soldier deployed to Iraq was killed Tuesday, Army officials in Hawai’i have confirmed. The Task Force Lightning soldier, who was assigned to the 3rd Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, was struck by enemy fire near Kirkuk, according to the U.S. Central Command.

Unknown gunmen opened fire and killed the US soldier and wounded four Iraqi civilians in the same incident on Tuesday.

A police source told Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) that a US Army patrol was attacked by a hand grenade as it passed in Al-Riyadh market in southwestern Kirkuk.

This is the fifth soldier to be killed on a new deployment to northern Iraq by more than 7,000 Schofield Barracks troops.

25th ID Soldier Killed Near Kirkuk

04 October 2006 Multi-National Corps Iraq Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory RELEASE No. 20061004-01 & KUNA

TIKRIT, Iraq: A Task Force Lightning Soldier assigned to 3rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, was struck by enemy fire Tuesday near Kirkuk and later died of wounds.

Unknown gunmen opened fire and killed a US soldier and wounded four Iraqi civilians in the same incident on Tuesday near Kirkuk, the US army declared in a statement on Wednesday.

A police source told Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) that a US Army patrol was attacked by a hand grenade as it passed in Al-Riyadh market in southwestern Kirkuk.

Roseburg Soldier Killed In Iraq

October 5, 2006 By Kristian Foden-Vencil, Oregon Public Broadcasting

PORTLAND, OR: A soldier from Roseburg has been killed in Iraq. The family of Private First Class Dean Bright says he was killed Wednesday, when a bomb exploded in a warehouse.

The family was told that Bright and other members of the 4th Infantry Division, were under attack from insurgents when the bomb went off. A number of soldiers were killed.

Bright was well known in the Roseburg area, having served on the Sutherlin City Council six years ago. He was also awarded the Bronze Star for valor last month — for risking his life rescuing a fellow soldier.

Bright’s family say he was scheduled to come home on leave around Thanksgiving, when they say he planned to remarry his wife.

He leaves two children: 9-year-old Jarrod and 6-year-old Maddie.

Baghdad Soldier Killed By Small Arms Fire

04 October 2006 Multi-National Corps Iraq Public Affairs Office, Camp Victory RELEASE No. 20061004-02

BAGHDAD: A Multi-National Division Baghdad Soldier died at approximately 3:15 p.m. Oct. 3 when terrorists attacked his patrol with small-arms fire in east Baghdad.

Sgt. Killed In Muhallah

Sgt. Joseph W. Perry, of Alpine, Calif., 23, died Oct. 2 in Muhallah, Iraq, when his mounted patrol came in contact with enemy forces using small arms fire during combat operations. Perry was assigned to the 21st Military Police Company (Airborne), 16th Military Police Brigade (Airborne), Fort Bragg, N.C. (AP Photo/U.S. Army, Fort Bragg, N.C.)

Soldier’s Fiancee Thinks Of How Life Might Have Been

September 28, 2006 Marilyn Tennissen, The Port Arthur News

Christina Verdejo just moved into a new home that she would be sharing with her fiancee when he returned from Iraq in November. She was planning to photograph every room as it looked filled with the couple’s belongings, and e-mail them to Edward Charles Reynolds, a staff sergeant in the U.S. Army.

“The house was empty when he saw it, but I never got the chance to take the pictures to send him because that’s when I found out what happened to him,” Verdejo said.

Reynolds, 27, who went by the nickname “Jay,” was killed Tuesday in Iraq when a bridge collapsed while his convoy was crossing. Reynolds’ vehicle rolled into a river, trapping him inside. He was rescued from the accident but died en route to a hospital.

Verdejo said she is relying on family, friends and her faith to get through this difficult time. She also continues to post messages on his MySpace site, even though she knows he will never read them now.

“He always said I was his angel, I guess now he’s my angel,” Verdejo said.

He loved football and fishing, she said, but more than anything else he loved family.

“He was a very, very sweet; very, very caring person,” Christina Verdejo, Reynolds’ fiancee said in a telephone interview.

Verdejo and Reynolds were planning to be married in Killeen on New Year’s Eve.

“He had three children (from previous relationships) and I have two kids, and he took care of all five like they were all his own,” Verdejo said. “When we were together it was 100 percent about family.”

Verdejo said Reynolds had been in active duty since graduating from Thomas Jefferson High School in 1997 and that he was on his second tour of duty in Iraq at the time of the accident. The tour that began last December was scheduled to end in November.

Reynolds had a love for the game of football, both playing it and watching it, she said.

He also loved to fish, Verdejo said, and when the couple made their last visit to Port Arthur in August he took her to Pleasure Island, a favorite fishing spot. “We saw other people there fishing and catching crabs and he was mad that he didn’t bring his fishing pole,” Verdejo said.

Verdejo said when Reynolds was deployed, she worried all the time at first.

“Really, I guess I never completely stopped worrying, but he was always very positive. He always told me that everything was going to be fine,” she said.

Then during the summer, Verdejo had some medical problems and it was Reynolds’ turn to worry.
“When I got sick, he was worried about me and wanted to come home,” Verdejo said.

When Verdejo’s medical problems were resolved, she said Reynolds was on top of the world.

“He said look at things now, we don’t have to worry anymore. He said that God had blessed us and that he had never felt happier or more fulfilled,” Verdejo said.

Services for Reynolds are scheduled for Oct. 7 through Gabriel Funeral Home in Port Arthur.

Slain Soldier Had Sought Duty In Iraq

Sept. 28, 2006 BY CHRISTIAN HILL, THE OLYMPIAN

Sgt. Velton Locklear III, who was killed in Iraq over the weekend, went looking for duty even when it didn’t call.

Locklear, a native of El Paso, Texas, was a member of the Texas National Guard but requested a transfer so he could serve in Iraq.

The Washington Army National Guard beckoned. Its largest unit, the 81st Combat Brigade Team, was mobilizing and needed more infantryman like Locklear. He and his family settled in Lacey on Brittany Lane Northeast, and he deployed to join his unit in the spring of 2004.

“He wanted to be out there where the action was,” said retired Army Sgt. Maj. Velton Locklear Jr., his father, during a telephone interview from his Texas home. “I guess that was one of his long-term goals: to participate in combat operations. Watching the news, seeing what was going on, you had all these young soldiers being deployed to either Iraq or Afghanistan, and he just felt he could better serve his country by serving in Iraq. It’s something he felt he wanted to do for his country, for himself and, more importantly, for his family.”

After returning from Iraq, he joined in active-duty and left Washington state in early 2006. He was assigned to the 3rd Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, in Hawaii and arrived there in February after receiving training. He deployed with his unit in August.

Locklear, 29, and another soldier, Pfc. Kenneth Kincaid IV, 25, were killed Saturday in Riyadh when an improvised explosive device detonated near the Humvee they were riding in.

He leaves behind his wife, Denise, and two boys: Nathan, 5, and Velton IV, 7.

Anyone who came in contact with Locklear loved him, his father said.

“He was a very kind, noble individual,” he said. “Never would say anything out of the way to anybody. Just a good person to be around. I’m honored to be his father, and I’m very, very proud of what he accomplished in the military even though he paid the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom and stability in this country.”

Fallen Soldier Wanted To Help Others

9/28/06 KCBD

A soldier with Lubbock ties has been killed in Iraq. The Department of Defense made that announcement Thursday. Staff Sergeant Jose Lanzarin was killed in Ar Ramadi, Iraq on Tuesday when an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle during combat. Lanzarin was 28-years-old.

Thursday, Lanzarin’s aunt told NewsChannel 11 her nephew always wanted to help others.

“He always had that dream of going to fly helicopters, he would say, to save lives, he would say,” said Silvia Lanzarin.

She say her nephew Jose was born in Del Rio, but moved to Lubbock to attend elementary and junior high school. Silvia says Jose finished high school in Abilene, and then joined the armed services.

“We were proud of him. We were very proud. He was just concerned about the main people who were suffering, like for example, in Iraq. He was always compelled with the children basically. We suffer, he would say, and they suffer too. Not everybody’s bad,” said Silvia.

Silvia tell us Jose met his wife in Germany. She says the couple did not have any children because Jose wanted to wait until after his service was complete.

“The saddest part here is that he only had two months, so he could finish with his contract, he was done with his duties, and he had a lot of dreams, a lot of things to do. He goes, hang on, it’s only two more months. It’s going to be okay. I’ll be home for good,” said Silvia.

“I thank every single one in Lubbock for your prayers. May god bless every single one that has their loved ones where ever there’s a war going on,” added Silvia.

Jose Lanzarin was with the 2nd Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment, 1st Armored Division out of Baumhold Germany. The family is still finalizing arrangements for his burial.

Francestown Soldier Injured In Iraq

Lt. Scott Quilty, 26, a UNH graduate, had his right arm amputated below the elbow and his right leg removed below the knee.

Oct. 4, 2006 By STEPHEN BEALE, Union Leader Correspondent

Lieutenant Scott Quilty, a native of Francestown, was injured in Iraq Sunday night when an improvised explosive device was detonated while he was on a dismounted patrol with the Army platoon he led.

As a result of his injuries, Quilty, 26, had his right arm amputated below the elbow and his right leg removed below the knee, according to his father, R. Scott Quilty, who said he had not been told where in Iraq the attack had occurred.

“He had only been there six weeks and they have been moving him around,” Quilty said today in an interview. “He didn’t have any permanent station at the time.”

Quilty said that his son was initially taken to a hospital northwest of Iraq and then transported to a military medical facility in Germany on Monday. He is scheduled to arrive at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. within a day or two.

His family was first informed of his injuries early Monday morning, Quilty said. In the afternoon, he spoke with his son for the first time.

“He was pretty concerned about his platoon,” Quilty said. “He didn’t know exactly what had happened to him at that point.”

“He assured me that he would be OK,” Quilty added.

Quilty graduated from Conval High School in Peterborough in 1999, enlisting as a private in the Army. He graduated with a degree in political science from the University of New Hampshire in 2004, where he had participated in the Army ROTC, earning the rank of second lieutenant.

British Mercenary Killed

2006/10/04 BBC NEWS

A former Scots Guards soldier has been shot dead in Iraq while working for a private security firm.

Darren Bull, 34, from Preston, Lancashire, was escorting UN convoys across the Falluja region when he was shot on Friday, his partner confirmed.

Mr Bull served in the Scots Guards for five years, and worked as a bouncer at the Yates pub in Preston city centre before taking the job in Iraq last year.

U.S. Mercenary Killed

October 4, 2006 KING5.com

SEATTLE: A former Seattle Police Department officer who left his job to go to Iraq was killed on Tuesday after arriving there only Saturday.

Major Guy Barattieri was an Army Reservist, but was working as a contractor when he was killed. Friends say he had been to Iraq several times before.

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 FOR THE NOVEMBER ELECTIONS.
That is not a good enough reason.

U.S. soldiers from Alfa company 1-17 regiment of the 172th brigade watch their Stryker armored vehicle being towed out of a ditch in eastern Baghdad. Oct. 3, 2006. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

NOTES FROM A LOST WAR:
“Many U.S. Soldiers Say Their Biggest Problem Is That Local People Are Not Helping To Identify Militiamen”

10-05-06 PATRICK QUINN, Associated Press Writer [Excerpt]

‘’Securing Baghdad … won’t win. But losing Baghdad will lose,’’ [Pentagon analyst Anthony] Cordesman says. ‘’If they lose, Iraq is likely to slip into a major civil war.’’

Many U.S. soldiers say their biggest problem is that local people are not helping to identify militiamen.

‘’Unless you catch (them) in the act, you’re not going to catch them at all,’’ said Staff Sgt. Justin Nelson, 26, of Stockton, Calif.

‘’The main thing that you think about when you take someone in is: How’s the public going to take this?’’

AFGHANISTAN WAR REPORTS

2 Canadians Killed In Afghan Attack

The attack occurred in the Panjwaii district, which had largely been cleared of Taliban insurgents in recent weeks as part of Operation Medusa. [Another silly reporter.]

October 4, 2006 CBC News

Two Canadians were killed and five other soldiers injured in southern Afghanistan, military officials said Tuesday.

The soldiers were involved in a road construction project 20 kilometres west of Kandahar at about 4:50 p.m. when they came under attack from a handful of insurgents armed with rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles.

Canadian military officials identified the dead as Sgt. Craig Paul Gillam and Cpl. Robert Thomas James Mitchell, both members of the Royal Canadian Dragoons based in Petawawa, Ont.

Gillam was a native of South Branch, a small community in the Codroy Valley on Newfoundland’s west coast.

Mitchell lived in the Niagara Falls area, but grew up partly in Owen Sound, Ont. His parents still live there.

“They were members of the surveillance troop … a reconnaissance squadron,” said Col. Fred Lewis, deputy commander of the Canadian contingent in Kandahar. “They were conducting vehicle checkpoints and observation posts at the time.”

Two of the injured are in serious but stable condition. All were evacuated to Kandahar airfield, the main coalition base.

“Almost immediately other forces responded to it, treated and medevaced the casualties, and carried on with the operation,” said Lt.-Col. Omer Lavoie, the ground-level commander of Canada’s fighting force. [With a commander who says “almost immediately,” you know you’re fucked”]

The attack occurred in the Panjwaii district, which had largely been cleared of Taliban insurgents in recent weeks as part of Operation Medusa.

U.S. General Says Afghan Resistance “Not Terrorists But Insurgents”
“Enormous Sympathy Among Their Pashtun Ethnic Kinsfolk”

Oct 6, 2006 By Ricardo Grassi, Inter Press Service [Excerpts]

Perhaps the most accurate description of the Taliban is the one given by NATO commander General David Richards. In July, soon after arriving in Kabul, he said that the Taliban were not terrorists but insurgents.

With 41,000 US and NATO troops fighting the “war on terror” and no political plan to lead the country out of corruption and the drug business derived from poppy farming, the country is beginning to shows signs of disintegration.

The Taliban, who have vowed to topple the Karzai government and drive out the foreign forces that support it, have enormous sympathy among their Pashtun ethnic kinsfolk who straddle the rugged Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

TROOP NEWS

NO MORE:
KEEP THEM ALL HOME NOW

Capt. Travis Carpenter, of Georgetown, Ky., a member of the Battery C. 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery hugs his son, Hunter, 2, at the Kentucky Army National Guard departure ceremony in Bardstown, Ky. Oct. 5, 2006. The group will provide convoy security and force protection while stationed in Iraq. (AP Photo/Patti Longmire)

“A Whopping 79 Percent Of Americans Favor Allowing Gays To Serve Openly In The Military”

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

10-02-06 By Gene C. Gerard, Politicalaffairs.net [Excerpts]

Last month the Bush administration announced that Marine Corps Individual Ready Reservists are being recalled to duty. This is due to a shortage of soldiers who are willing to serve additional tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.

There are similar shortages in the Army and the National Guard.

Yet the Armed Forces saw an 11 percent increase last year in the number of soldiers who were discharged simply because they were gay. Perhaps never since the inception of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” has there been a more glaring reason to abandon this misguided military policy.

According to newly released Pentagon figures a total of 742 service members were discharged last year for being gay. That’s an increase over the 668 soldiers discharged under the policy in 2004. Since 1993, when the policy was implemented, approximately 11,000 military personnel have been discharged for being gay.

Last year the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the nonpartisan investigative office of Congress, released a report on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

The report found that the military had discharged more than 300 language specialists who “had…skills in a foreign language that DOD had considered to be especially important.” And the GAO report determined that nearly 800 military specialists, including those in intelligence, analysts, divers, and combat controllers were discharged, despite holding “an occupation identified as critical.” While the discharge of all soldiers since 1993 is troublesome, this is particularly the case regarding Arabic language experts.

The report by the 9/11 Commission acknowledged that the government’s inability to translate Arabic communications quickly and efficiently contributed to the terrorist attacks of 2001. Yet no less than 55 Arabic language specialists have been discharged because they were gay.

It takes years of intensive study to master Arabic languages. Given these demands, it’s not surprising that few service members are willing to commit themselves to learning these languages. For the military to fire 55 of these dedicated specialists is foolish. It places our military personnel serving in Iraq and Afghanistan in greater danger, because they lack sufficient translators.

Many Americans no doubt agree with C. Dixon Osburn, the executive director of Servicemembers Legal Defense Fund, an organization that advocates on behalf of gay soldiers, when he recently said, “No American cares if the person who thwarts a plot to blow up an airplane is gay. We care that our nation is secure.”

In fact, most Americans do agree.

A Gallup poll taken earlier this year found that a whopping 79 percent of Americans favor allowing gays to serve openly in the military.

And although Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is unwilling to reconsider the policy, an increasing number of former defense and military officials support reversing the ban. Former Secretary of Defense William Perry, Former Assistant Secretary of Defense Lawrence J. Korb, Admiral John Hutson, USN (Retired), and Claudia Kennedy, the first woman in Army history to achieve the rank of Lieutenant General, have all called for an end to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

Former Lt. General Kennedy called on Congress this summer to end the ban on gays serving in the military. She argued that, “The Army teaches its soldiers to live by seven values: loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, and courage. Tell me: which is only found in the heterosexual population?”

WRONG

“After keeping about 138,000 service members in Iraq for the past several months, the U.S. had 147,000 troops in Iraq as of Sept. 14, the highest number in more than a year.” Army Times, 10.9.06

A Letter From A Blind Major

Spc. Jarrod Nordby, of Charlie Company, 4-23 Infantry Regiment, 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, between missions near Rabea’a, Iraq, on June 27. The bulk of the 172nd Brigade was still in Iraq when Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld last month extended their deployment. Overall, the brigade has about 3,900 troops. (AP Photo/U.S. Air Force, Sgt. Jacob N. Bailey)

“Weapons Safety Under Fire”

Letters To The Editor
Army Times
October 02, 2006

A photograph [above] of a soldier assigned to the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team is shown on page 8 of the Aug. 28 Army Times.

The specialist is resting with his head on the butt of the weapon and the muzzle-bore in the dirt.

I sure hope he cleaned his weapon and cleared the bore before going on his next combat mission.

Once more, we see how basic weapons handling and weapons safety is ignored. This violation could result in a weapons malfunction when firepower is needed, and thus, unwarranted casualties.

Maj. Doug Rokke (ret.)

[First, the Maj. mentions “dirt”, implying earth or soil, which could plug the weapon. The surface is, obviously, paved. One may see scratches on the surface of the paving. Duh. Second, more to the point, that’s what comes to the Majors’ mind when he sees this photo? Nothing about the soldier, the human in the uniform? He’s blind to that too. The Major might as well be expressing his views of some piece of machinery as risk of malfunction. Typical. T]

The Idiot General Back Again Babbling More Bullshit

Oct 5, 2006 By Amit R. Paley, The Washington Post Company [Excerpts]

Army Maj. Gen. James D. Thurman, commander of the Multinational Division Baghdad, said two weeks ago that attacks against U.S.-led coalition forces in Baghdad had reached an average of 42 a day, with about six causing casualties or equipment damage, up from 36 or 38 attacks.

“Why are we seeing an increase in attacks?” he said. “Well, we have twice as many forces operating throughout the city now.

“We’re challenging the anti-Iraqi forces where they live and operate.”

[Even the British generals fighting Washington and Light Horse Lee weren’t silly enough to call them “anti-American forces.” This lump of shit doesn’t have the brains to command both of his feet, assuming that he can find them with a flashlight on a clear day. T]

IRAQ RESISTANCE ROUNDUP

Assorted Resistance Action

October 04, 2006 Xinhua & (KUNA) & 05 Oct 2006 Reuters

Three traffic policemen were wounded when two coordinated explosions went off in a central Baghdad neighborhood on Tuesday, a well-informed police source told Xinhua.

Unidentified militants opened fire yesterday at a house that belongs to a senior official in the Iraqi army in Al-Maftoul village in southwestern Kirkuk, the source added. No injuries were reported among the residents of the house, the source said.

Moreover, unidentified guerrillas launched a Katyusha rocket at an Iraqi army center and observation tower in Kirkuk but no injuries or damage were reported, the source added.

The road connecting Kirkuk and Tekrit is called now “road of death.” It has witnessed assassinations and killing operations by militants

Guerrillas killed a policeman in Falluja, police said.

Police Brigadier Shaaban al-Obeidi died of wounds he sustained in a roadside bombing near his convoy on Wednesday in the town of al-Baghdadi, in Anbar province between Ramadi and Haditha, police said.

Guerrillas killed a police officer in a drive-by shooting in Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.

A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol wounded two policemen in Mahmudiya, about 30 km (20 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.

IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE RESISTANCE
END THE OCCUPATION

FORWARD OBSERVATIONS

“A Generation Ago, Many Soldiers Challenged What Their Government Ordered Them To Do”
“An Important And Poignant Film That Can Speak To Any Generation”

John McMurtrie, San Francisco Chronicle

Whether politicians have learned anything from the so-called lessons of Vietnam is debatable. The men and women now serving in Iraq may be best suited to answer the question.

A generation ago, many soldiers challenged what their government ordered them to do halfway across the world, and their words and actions resonate to this day. “Sir! No Sir!” — a powerful and eye-opening film that documents their experiences — makes no mention of today’s unpopular foreign invasion, but it doesn’t have to to get its message across.

Decades have passed, yet the recollections of soldiers who refused to fight in Vietnam are vividly captured in the documentary. Louis Font, who graduated from West Point with honors, recalls how his parents cried when he decided not to fight in the war — he became the academy’s first graduate to do so in any war. “But I told them, ‘You always taught me to do what is just, to do what is right,’ “ he says. “And I really felt that I was doing the right thing.”

Countless soldiers weren’t even aware of a GI resistance movement when they decided to disobey orders, showing just how universal their sentiments were. The Pentagon estimated 500,000 “incidents of desertion.”

The film’s director, David Zeiger, helped organize anti-war demonstrations during the war, and he makes impressive use of archival footage to document the scope of the GI movement. In addition to the resistance of African Americans, viewers learn about the key roles played by underground presses and coffeehouses.

Also prominently featured is the Presidio 27, a group of San Francisco prisoners who made headlines when they were brought up on mutiny charges. A dozen or so veterans are interviewed in the film, and Jane Fonda defends her still-controversial involvement in the anti-war movement.

“Sir! No Sir!” is far from a dry rehashing of what may seem for some like ancient history. Driving guitar rock and lively editing add to the film’s urgency.

The voices of the veterans alone, however, make this an important and poignant film that can speak to any generation.

Sir! No Sir!:
At A Theatre Near You!
To find it: www.sirnosir.com/

The Sir! No Sir! DVD is on sale now, exclusively at www.sirnosir.com.

Also available will be a Soundtrack CD (which includes the entire song from the FTA Show, “Soldier We Love You”), theatrical posters, tee shirts, and the DVD of “A Night of Ferocious Joy,” a film about the first hip-hop antiwar concert against the “War on Terror.”

Do you have a friend or relative in the service? Forward GI Special 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 or write to: The Military Project, Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657

“When, One Wonders, Will Mutiny Begin Among The Troops In Iraq?”
“Sooner Or Later, A Unit Won’t Go Up The Hill Again. Then It Will Be Over”

[Thanks to Dennis Serdel, Vietnam Veteran, who sent this in.]

October 2, 2006 by Fred Reed, LewRockwell.com

When, one wonders, will mutiny begin among the troops in Iraq?

Recently I talked by email about the war with Jim Coyne, an airborne-infantry friend who served two tours as a gunship door-gunner in Viet Nam and then made a career in journalism. I asked, “Do they (I meant the officer corps, the official military) actually believe the optimistic twaddle this time around? Do they really not know what is happening?”

Jim’s response: “In my opinion, they really don’t know; they may not even want to know on some level. You know as well as I, these are mission-oriented folks; can do folks; failure and its introspective handmaidens are not options to them. And in a tactical mission-oriented world our military doesn’t really fail very often; in a strategic military/political world such as the Mideast and Iraq, however, we simply cannot win.

“Again, as in Viet Nam, the career officer corps salutes and marches toward the sound of battle. Eventually however (and it won’t be long now) it’s the grunts who will begin to revolt, first in small ways (as in the 101st in late 1968, “No sir. We are not going up that hill again.”) and then, quickly thereafter (As in 1973, “Fuck you, asshole.”)

By that time the media may get wind of things and spin it exponentially out of control. That’s what I think.”

So do I.

We have two sharply differing versions of Iraq.

One comes from the professional officers. It holds that the military is making progress and the insurgents losing ground. The Iraqi people love us and want the benefits that we will bring them. The increasing attacks by insurgents are signs of desperation. Things seem bad only because the media emphasize the negative. The officers see light at the end of the tunnel. The body counts are great; the bad guys can’t much longer take the pounding we are giving them. Onward and upward.

The other view comes from enlisted men (and from a lot of reporters before being edited to say whatever the publisher believes). These assert that the Iraqis hate us and we, them; that the insurgency is growing in strength, that we are not making progress but going backward, that our tactics don’t work and we can’t win.

The pattern is so common in recent wars as to be routine. The enlisted men know that the US is losing.

The officers do not know it, or refuse to know it.

This will eventually have consequences.

When men die pointlessly in a war they know cannot be won and that means nothing to them, when they realize that they are dying for the egos of draft-dodging politicians safe in Washington, they will revolt.

It happened before.

It will happen again. But when?

Next year, I’d guess.

It is important to understand that officers and enlisted men are very different animals.

For example, enlisted men do things (drive the tank, repair the helicopter) whereas officers are chiefly administrators.

But the important difference is psychological.

Enlisted men are blue-collar guys or technicians. They carry little ideological overburden. They want to fix the tank or finish the field exercise and then go drink beer and get laid.

Above all, they are realists.

If the new radio doesn’t work, or Baghdad turns out to be a tactically irresolvable nightmare, the enlisted guys feel very little urge to pretend otherwise.

This is why officers do not like reporters to be alone with the troops.

And they seriously don’t.

The standard response of the officer corps is that the troops cannot see the Big Picture. (Unless of course the enlisteds say what the officers want to hear, in which case their experience on the ground lends irresistible authority).

But the Big Picture rests on the Little Picture.

If a soldier sees slow disaster where he is, and hears the same thing from guys he meets from everywhere else in the country, his conclusions will not be without weight.

Sooner or later, on his third tour with a pregnant wife at home and seven friends killed by bombs, he will say, in the crude but expressive language of soldiers, “fuck this shit.”

By contrast, officers can’t conclude anything but the positive. There are several reasons.

Career officers, first, are politicians. You don’t get promoted by saying that the higher-ups are otherworldly incompetents.

An officer’s loyalty is to his career, and to the officer corps, not to the country or to his troops.

If this sounds harsh, note how seldom an active-duty officer will criticize policy, yet when he retires he may suddenly discover that said policy resulted in unnecessary deaths among the troops. Oh? Then why didn’t he say so when it would have saved lives?

There is a curious moral cowardice among officers.

They will fly dangerous missions over Baghdad, but they won’t say that things aren’t going well. They don’t go against their herd.

Further, and I want to say this carefully, officers often are not quite adults.

They can be (and usually are) smart, competent, dedicated, and physically brave, and some are exceedingly hard men. But there is a simple-mindedness about them, an aversion to the handmaidens of introspection, a certain boyishness as in kids playing soldier. A lot of make-believe goes into an officer’s world. Enlisted men, grown up, see things as they are. Officers are issued a world by the command and then live in it.

Note the heavy emphasis of the military, meaning the officer corps, on ritual and pageantry. It is adult kid-stuff.

Three thousand men building a skyscraper just show up, do their jobs, and go home.

The military wants its men standing in squares, precisely at attention, thumbs along the seams, with brass perfectly polished. It wants stirring music, snappy salutes, and the haunting tones of taps, “Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full, sir.”

This is justified as necessary for discipline. It isn’t. A gunny sergeant has no difficulty maintaining his authority without the hoop-la

Officers remind me of armed Moonies.

There is the same earnestness, the same deliberate optimism-by-policy.

Things are going well because doctrine says they are.

An officer is as ideologically upbeat as Reader’s Digest, and as unreflective. This is the why they don’t learn, why the US is again flailing about, trying to fight hornets with elephant guns.

“Yessir, can do, sir.” Well, sometimes, and sometimes not. It is not arrogance, more like a belief in gravitation.

And so we hear phrases that embody the eternal precedence of oo-rah! over realism:

“There is no substitute for victory,” or “The difficult we do immediately; the impossible takes a little longer,” or “Defeat is not an option.”

But sometimes it is an inevitability.

I think Jim is right.

Sooner or later, a unit won’t go up the hill again. Then it will be over.

What do you think? Comments from service men and women, and veterans, are especially welcome. Send to contact@militaryproject.org or write to: The Military Project, Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657. Name, I.D., withheld on request. Replies confidential.

Casualties Not Counted

From: Mike Hastie
To: GI Special
Sent: October 03, 2006
Subject: Casualties Not Counted

Casualties Not Counted

How many children have lost their parents
in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Mike Hastie
Vietnam Veteran

Photo and caption 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)

OCCUPATION REPORT

U.S. OCCUPATION RECRUITING DRIVE IN HIGH GEAR;
RECRUITING FOR THE ARMED RESISTANCE THAT IS

Foreign occupation troops from U.S. Alfa company 1-17 regiment of the 172th brigade trash an Iraqi citizens’ home in eastern Baghdad Oct. 3, 2006. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

There’s nothing quite like invading somebody else’s country, busting into their houses by force, and trashing everything they own to arouse an intense desire to kill you in the patriotic, self-respecting civilians who live there.

But your commanders know that, don’t they? Don’t they?

“In the States, if police burst into your house, kicking down doors and swearing at you, you would call your lawyer and file a lawsuit,” said Wood, 42, from Iowa, who did not accompany Halladay’s Charlie Company, from his battalion, on Thursday’s raid. “Here, there are no lawyers. Their resources are limited, so they plant IEDs (improvised explosive devices) instead.”

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

DANGER: POLITICIANS AT WORK

Bush Urges Using Woodward’s Book As Alternative Fuel Source
Burning Book Could Wean U.S. From Middle Eastern Oil, President Says

October 2, 2006 The Borowtiz Report

In a nationally televised speech last night, President George W. Bush urged using State of Denial, the new book by Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward, as an alternative fuel source by burning millions of copies of the book.

The president, who in his State of the Union address in January declared that the United States was “addicted to oil,” said that by burning the entire print run of the Woodward book the U.S. could once and for all end its dependence on Middle Eastern petroleum.

“For some time, our nation has been looking for a cheap, plentiful alternative to Middle Eastern oil,” Mr. Bush told the nation. “I have personally burned one hundred copies of Bob Woodward’s book and I can tell you that it burns cleanly and efficiently.”

While many Republicans in Congress applauded Mr. Bush’s suggestion to use Mr. Woodward’s book as an alternative source of energy, Professor Davis Logsdon of the University of Minnesota warned that State of Denial, while a national bestseller, was not a renewable fuel source.

“Burning Bob Woodward’s book is not a long-term solution to America’s energy problem,” Professor Logsdon said. “When all of the copies of State of Denial have been burned, what then?”

Responding to Professor Logsdon’s criticism, White House spokesman Tony Snow offered this response: “Colin Powell has a book coming out next week.”

Elsewhere, announcing his plans to enter rehab, former Rep. Mark Foley (D-Fla) said, “I am grateful for the support of all my friends, especially the ones on MySpace.”

Received:

“A Big Thank You”

From Billy Kelly, Vietnam Veteran

A big thank you to Mike Hastie, Dennis Serdel, and other regular contributors among the “old” guys.

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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