Lily
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Post by Lily on Jan 14, 2012 18:57:53 GMT -5
This is probably not the popular viewpoint, and it certainly isn't politically correct, but one must view an incident such as this in context. These marines have been living under terrific strain and constant threat of injury or death from those same terrorists. The normal rules of civilised behaviour cease to apply. There's no such thing as a civilised war. The terrorists are from the same groups that blew up the World Trade Centre and murdered thousands of innocent civilians. They are also responsible for those horrific videos of defenceless American citizens being beheaded. How do you expect the marines to feel about them? Further, if it weren't for someone being stupid enough to take a video of it, nobody would be any the wiser. You can rest assured that far worse things have gone on in battlefields around the world, since time immemorial. Mutilation of the enemy dead is commonplace. Peeing on them pales by comparison. www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/13/us-marines-identified-video-courUt-martial?newsfeed=true |
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Richard
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Post by Richard on Jan 15, 2012 3:14:28 GMT -5
This is probably not the popular viewpoint, and it certainly isn't politically correct, but one must view an incident such as this in context. These marines have been living under terrific strain and constant threat of injury or death from those same terrorists. The normal rules of civilised behaviour cease to apply. There's no such thing as a civilised war. The terrorists are from the same groups that blew up the World Trade Centre and murdered thousands of innocent civilians. They are also responsible for those horrific videos of defenceless American citizens being beheaded. How do you expect the marines to feel about them? Further, if it weren't for someone being stupid enough to take a video of it, nobody would be any the wiser. You can rest assured that far worse things have gone on in battlefields around the world, since time immemorial. Mutilation of the enemy dead is commonplace. Peeing on them pales by comparison. www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/13/us-marines-identified-video-courUt-martial?newsfeed=trueThe thing they did that was so horrible was to embarrass their government. What they did was wrong on a personal level. I feel sorry for them and how they view human life. War is inhumane, and for anyone to point out any specific inhumane aspect of it to be more significant than another, is idiotic. Uncle Joe understood a sad reality: "You kill one person it's a tragedy, you kill ten thousand people it a statistic." The more our governments fail us, the more they demand in the way of authority to exercise their will. We are a generation of idiots. Rant over.  |
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BlueLotus
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Post by BlueLotus on Jan 15, 2012 3:43:24 GMT -5
I think it is sad that even living under the conditions they have been living in they have lost touch with their humanity. It makes the rest of us look bad. If you want to convince a population that you are not monsters you don't go taking a leak on their dead bodies, and you most def do not record it! This was wrong on so many levels...
First the people who started the fight IE the terrorists, then the soldiers for not having a stop and check point that the rest of us have. Then the news media for running with it all day every day for the world to see. I'm all for transparency but in this case I think it would have been best dealt with by the CO of the people involved. Transparency does not have to equate to stupidities on every level.
And yes Rich,
People are for the most part mentally disabled.
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Richard
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Post by Richard on Jan 15, 2012 3:47:44 GMT -5
You are either up too late, or too early BL if you live on the east coast.  |
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BlueLotus
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Post by BlueLotus on Jan 15, 2012 4:44:51 GMT -5
Atlantic bound love, and yeah a bit of both... Its like 5 am I have been sick so slept most of the day, woke up and now can't get back to sleep. But I'm usuly up by 4-5 am anyhow.
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john
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Post by john on Jan 15, 2012 10:39:42 GMT -5
What many do not understand is the only way a soldier, Marine, etc can survive combat psychologically/emotionally is to dehumanize the enemy. You are, after all, killing human beings, and it’s easier to accept that if you dehumanize them. Sometimes the enemy is so barbaric, it is very easy to dehumanize them. Find a friend that has been tortured to death and your attitudes change. This has always been true of any war and any generation. US Marines did not often take prisoners during WWII because they shot surrendering Japanese. If the US had the same sensitive attitude about not offending the enemy during WWII, we would have had half our fighting men behind bars and would have lost the war. My late father, who fought in the Pacific, told me of a US soldier who used a quad-mount 50 cal. Browning machinegun rig to rake a column of Japanese prisoners, killing more than 100. Nothing was done. No reports, no charges. This soldier would often shoot an entire magazine from a Thompson submachine gun into an already dead Japanese soldier. He hated them. This man later committed suicide. That is what war does to people.
The Brits paid a bounty to islanders for left ears cut from dead Japanese soldiers. They often had dozens of ears strung on wire around their necks. US Marines collected gold teeth from dead Japanese soldiers. Like I mentioned, if we were fighting that war today, we would lose.
What they did was stupid on many levels, but try to keep everything in perspective. These are very young men in most cases, sometimes young women, and they are in a hell created by governments. I think they should be allowed to leave the military and be left alone! They are talking about putting them in military prison. Our leaders are the ones who should be put in prison for creating this hell. What will happen is these Marines will be used to cover politicians’ and military officers’ butts, and their lives will be ruined. What a shame. Makes me want to pee on a few politicians.
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Richard
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Post by Richard on Jan 15, 2012 16:10:57 GMT -5
What many do not understand is the only way a soldier, Marine, etc can survive combat psychologically/emotionally is to dehumanize the enemy. You are, after all, killing human beings, and it’s easier to accept that if you dehumanize them. What they did was stupid on many levels, but try to keep everything in perspective. These are very young men in most cases, sometimes young women, and they are in a hell created by governments. I think they should be allowed to leave the military and be left alone! They are talking about putting them in military prison. Our leaders are the ones who should be put in prison for creating this hell. What will happen is these Marines will be used to cover politicians’ and military officers’ butts, and their lives will be ruined. What a shame. Makes me want to pee on a few politicians. Yes. That is why they are trained to see other humans as targets, not people. The only reason they are going to be made examples of is because of the embarrassment caused to politicians. I agree about the politicians. |
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Lily
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Post by Lily on Jan 15, 2012 20:49:06 GMT -5
What many do not understand is the only way a soldier, Marine, etc can survive combat psychologically/emotionally is to dehumanize the enemy. You are, after all, killing human beings, and it’s easier to accept that if you dehumanize them. What they did was stupid on many levels, but try to keep everything in perspective. These are very young men in most cases, sometimes young women, and they are in a hell created by governments. I think they should be allowed to leave the military and be left alone! They are talking about putting them in military prison. Our leaders are the ones who should be put in prison for creating this hell. What will happen is these Marines will be used to cover politicians’ and military officers’ butts, and their lives will be ruined. What a shame. Makes me want to pee on a few politicians. Yes. That is why they are trained to see other humans as targets, not people. The only reason they are going to be made examples of is because of the embarrassment caused to politicians. I agree about the politicians. And this is so unfair, when you stop to consider that many other marines have probably done the exact same thing and worse. The only difference being they weren't stupid enough to film the event and then post it on the Internet. OMG!!!  Now here is some food for thought. Had this been the other way around and the Taliban had been filmed peeing on US casualties, would there be the same amount of (hypocritical) righteous indignation? I tend to think not. Because the politically correct are notoriously anti-West. Everything we do is bad. Can you imagine the hoopla if US marines had sawed off a Taliban's head the same way the Taliban did to US citizens, and then posted the vid on the Internet? The politically correct are also anti-military. Yet every freedom they enjoy they owe to the armed forces. It's all down to who has the superior firing power. A country without a strong military presence is doomed. |
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Lily
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Post by Lily on Jan 15, 2012 21:01:30 GMT -5
The Brits paid a bounty to islanders for left ears cut from dead Japanese soldiers. They often had dozens of ears strung on wire around their necks. US Marines collected gold teeth from dead Japanese soldiers. Like I mentioned, if we were fighting that war today, we would lose. There is no such thing as a politically correct war, or a "limited" war. That was what worked against the US in Viet Nam. You can't send your troops out to face the enemy with one hand tied behind their backs. While the enemy has no such shackles or scruples. Thank goodness all that foolishness hadn't yet been adopted in the Second World War. Or, we'd all be doing the goose step now. As for the treatment of the Japanese by the Allies, all I can say is no wonder. Considering the extremes of abuse meted out to prisoners of war by the Japanese. To say they were sadistic is an understatement. My God, they were actually crucifying people. |
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Lily
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Post by Lily on Jan 15, 2012 22:45:29 GMT -5
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BlueLotus
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Post by BlueLotus on Jan 16, 2012 0:28:26 GMT -5
I wish ladies ran the world.... There would be far less wars for sure. |
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Richard
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Post by Richard on Jan 16, 2012 2:29:41 GMT -5
I wish ladies ran the world.... There would be far less wars for sure. Oh God no. Then we'd be at the mercy of the monthly cycle. Women are meant to be obedient. Just ask my wife Just don't tell her I said that. |
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BlueLotus
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Post by BlueLotus on Jan 16, 2012 6:29:48 GMT -5
Hey I never said y'all could not wear the pants in the house... I'm just telling you we will tell you when you may put them on! |
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Post by bubblegum91 on Jan 16, 2012 6:41:46 GMT -5
@ Richard Lol, don't worry, your secret is safe with us.  As for the situation at hand, apart from being a little gross, it pales in comparison to the stories we were told in history class. And I'm sure there are so many more horrors our brave men and women in the defense force endures that went/go unreported. I say, cut them some slack. |
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Lily
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Post by Lily on Jan 24, 2012 21:01:58 GMT -5
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