[antimedia] antimedia: Our modern military seems hell-bent....

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Posted by antimedia:
Our modern military seems hell-bent....
http://www.antimedia.us/posts/1179073561.shtml


   ....on [1]eating its young. I haven't written anything about an
   incident in Afghanistan, because I was withholding judgment until more
   facts were known. It was another of those sensational stories that
   make our military look bad -- a suicide bomber attacks a military
   detachment with a VBIED and our troops react by (supposedly) wildly
   shooting everything that moves.
   Setting aside the fact that our military received intensive training
   in muzzle discipline (and Special Forces troops even moreso), the
   facts, as presented in the press, made our Marines look really bad.
   Turns out, [2]the facts have been twisted again (and please do go read
   the entire story and consider donating to help these Marines), in an
   effort to paint our men in as bad a light as possible. And our own
   military is an accomplice to the crime, sending an investigator with
   zero combat experience to ferret out the facts of a complex ambush
   scenario. (For example, when he couldn't find any enemy brass at the
   scene he concluded that no one was firing at the Marines. The thought
   that the enemy had cleaned the scene to prep for the media apparently
   never crossed his retarded mind.)
   Fortunately, the men involved have a powerful advocate on their side,
   Ilario Pantano.

     Three years ago, I was leading Marines in Fallujah. Two years ago,
     with lawyers that many of you helped pay for, I walked into a
     courtroom at Camp Lejeune to face off against prosecutors in a
     fight for my life.
     Today, I am back in the fight, and ask for your help in defending a
     team of true American heroes. Drawn from the elite ranks of âForce
     Recon,â the hand-picked men of Marine Special Operations (MARSOC)
     are literally the best of the best, and instead of being honored
     they are being investigated for simply doing their job. Our
     commandos became the latest victims of rushed judgment and
     political posturing when they were accused of using âexcessive
     forceâ to defend themselves during a suicide car-bomb triggered
     ambush targeting the Americans because some purportedly innocent
     Afghanis got caught in the cross-fire. But that day on March 4,
     2007 in the town of Bati Kot, Afghanistan, our Marines became the
     victims of more than just suicide bombers, they were caught in the
     teeth of a thoughtfully engineered media ambush that has ensnared
     them, and by extension the U.S., in the Talibanâs fight to wrest
     control of Afghanistan from the Karzai government.

   Ilario was another Marine charged with murder for simply doing his
   job. After the facts came out, he was found innocent of all charges.
   But you have to wonder how long this craziness can continue before our
   young men and women begin choosing never to serve in the first place.
   Perhaps that's been the goal all along?

References

   1. http://www.soldiersperspective.us/2007/05/11/afghanistan-injustice/
   2. http://euphoricreality.com/2007/05/10/ilario-pantano-asks-for-help/