"Women get flustered under fire. They're too fragile, too emotional. They lack the ferocity required to take a life. They can't handle pain. They're a distraction, a threat to cohesion, a provocative tease to close-quartered men. These are the sort of myths you hear from people who oppose the U.S. military's evolving new rules about women in combat. But for women who have already been in combat, who have earned medals fighting alongside men,
the war stories they tell don't sound a thing like myths"
[more inside]
posted by zarq
on Apr 25, 2013 -
49 comments
Final Salute. Between 2004 and 2005, "Rocky Mountain News reporter Jim Sheeler and photographer Todd Heisler spent a year with the Marines stationed at Aurora's Buckley Air Force Base who have found themselves called upon to notify families of the deaths of their sons in Iraq. In each case in this story, the families agreed to let Sheeler and Heisler chronicle their loss and grief. They wanted people to know their sons, the men and women who brought them home, and the bond of traditions more than 200 years old that unite them. Though readers are led through the story by the white-gloved hand of Maj. Steve Beck, he remains a reluctant hero. He is, he insists, only a small part of the massive mosaic that is the Marine Corps."
The full story ran on Veteran's Day, 2005 and won two Pulitzer Prizes: one for
Feature Photography, another for
feature writing in 2006. A nice single-page version of one section:
Katherine Cathey and 2nd Lt. James J. Cathey (
via.) The Rocky Mountain News closed in 2009.
[more inside]
posted by zarq
on Oct 12, 2011 -
12 comments
"... Al Qaeda was forcing local affiliates (or at least its Iraqi one) to sustain themselves financially. If local groups must make their own money, governments and counterterror operatives can use Al Qaeda’s need to raise money - often using illicit means and pressure against local citizens - against the organization. That kind of counterterrorism would look less like war, and more like careful police work against what amounts to a criminal syndicate or mafia." [
Inside Al Qaeda’s hard drives]
posted by vidur
on Jul 17, 2011 -
47 comments
Last year, the unofficial Dean of the White House Press Corps,
Helen Thomas, spoke about the State of Israel on camera.
(Previously) Her
replies:
"Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine," and that the Jews
"can go home" to
"Poland, Germany and America and everywhere else," sparked media
outrage, prompted her to issue an apology and
retire. After months of being out of the the public spotlight, she has now given
her first long-form interview, which will appear in the April issue of Playboy Magazine. In it, she explains what she meant, tells us how she would like to be remembered and expands upon her positions regarding Israel, Jewish political influence, Presidents Bush and Obama, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
posted by zarq
on Mar 22, 2011 -
224 comments
" No matter what happens now the Islamists will have beaten both of the superpowers -- first the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, and now the United States in the
heart of Islam. The impact of that in Islamic civilization is going to be enormous. We have made bin Laden a prophet: His organizing concept for Al Qaeda was "The Russians are a lot tougher than the Americans. If we can beat the Russians, then we can eventually beat the Americans." "
Rolling Stone assembles a panel of military and history experts on the state, and future, of Iraq.
posted by four panels
on Mar 14, 2007 -
113 comments
The private war of women soldiers. "Last year, Col. Janis Karpinski caused a stir by publicly reporting that in 2003, three female soldiers had died of dehydration in Iraq, which can get up to 126 degrees in the summer, because they refused to drink liquids late in the day. They were afraid of being raped by male soldiers if they walked to the latrines after dark."
posted by Sticherbeast
on Mar 8, 2007 -
187 comments
While there have been many posts on Mefi of blogs written by those affected by the Iraq War, I have not seen this one posted. No matter your stance on the war, your opinion of American soldiers, or the amount of other Iraq war blogs you've read, all I ask is that you
at least read these few entries. I've used too many words already, when the journal does more than enough to speak for itself.
A Soldier's Thoughts. (via) [more inside]
posted by wander
on Feb 7, 2007 -
13 comments
US Military Papers open fire on Rummy. Tomorrow, the Army Times -- and all other Military Times papers, including Navy and Air Force Times -- will run an editorial calling for Donald Rumsfeld to tender his resignation or be fired, due to his gross incompetence in handling the Iraq quagmire.
posted by lazaruslong
on Nov 5, 2006 -
70 comments
In 2001 America
destroyed the Kabul offices of al-Jazeera with two smartbombs; officials said it was an accident. In 2003 America
destroyed the Baghdad offices of al-Jazeera with missiles; officials said it was an accident. Now, two British civil servants are on trial for leaking a memo revealing that Bush intended to bomb al-Jazeera...
at their headquarters in allied Qatar.
posted by Pretty_Generic
on Nov 22, 2005 -
155 comments
A surprise from Al Gore: I came here today because I believe that American democracy is in grave danger. It is no longer possible to ignore the strangeness of our public discourse . I know that I am not the only one who feels that something has gone basically and badly wrong in the way America's fabled "marketplace of ideas" now functions.
How many of you, I wonder, have heard a friend or a family member in the last few years remark that it's almost as if America has entered "an alternate universe"?
I thought maybe it was an aberration when three-quarters of Americans said they believed that Saddam Hussein was responsible for attacking us on September 11, 2001. But more than four years later, between a third and a half still believe Saddam was personally responsible for planning and supporting the attack.
posted by Shanachie
on Oct 6, 2005 -
80 comments
A distinction between “old” and “new” wars is vital. “Old wars” are wars between states where the aim is the military capture of territory and the decisive encounter is battle between armed forces. “New wars”, in contrast, take place in the context of failing states. They are wars fought by networks of state and non-state actors, where battles are rare and violence is directed mainly against civilians, and which are characterised by a new type of political economy that combines extremist politics and criminality... I argue in this article that the United States viewed its invasion of Iraq as an updated version of “old war” that made use of new technology. The US failure to understand the reality on the ground in Iraq and the tendency to impose its own view of what war should be like is immensely dangerous and carries the risk of being self-perpetuating. It does not have to be this way. Iraq: the wrong war - Mary Kaldor writes of what was happening in pre-invasion Iraq, what happened thereafter and what the alternatives were. Well, there is always
Exit strategy: Civil war. And on that, note this:
Kurdish Officials Sanction Abductions in Kirkuk--a city from which, I am afraid, we will hear more and more as time goes by.
posted by y2karl
on Jun 15, 2005 -
20 comments
Now here's an interesting story. And well worth the read. It mentions some disturbing facts - he reloads and starts shooting again - but is still sympathetic to our hero. Of course if you compare it with
this...
"nothing to see here folks, keep moving right along!" Oh, and is "frought" a word?
posted by milkwood
on Apr 18, 2005 -
25 comments
Whereas, in the past, national power was thought to reside in the possession of a mighty arsenal and the maintenance of extended alliance systems, it is now associated with economic dynamism and the cultivation of technological innovation. To exercise leadership in the current epoch, states are expected to possess a vigorous domestic economy and to outperform other states in the development and export of high-tech goods. While a potent military establishment is still considered essential to national security, it must be balanced by a strong and vibrant economy. 'National security depends on successful engagement in the global economy,' the Institute for National Security Studies observed in a recent Pentagon study.Regarding
Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Petroleum Dependency by Michael T. Klare, here is an
excerpt from the book and here is his most recent article--
Oil and the Coming War With Iran. Well, at least he has been consistent--consider
The Geopolitics of War,
Wars Without End,
Oiling the Wheels of War, and
Imperial Reach from his
articles for
The Nation alone. Here is an excerpt from his previous
Resource Wars and here is
Scraping the bottom of the barrel and
Bush-Cheney Energy Strategy: Procuring the Rest of the World's Oil. Well, as to his position on current events, I don't think we need to draw a picture here.
posted by y2karl
on Apr 13, 2005 -
52 comments
While the proverbial road to hell is paved with good intentions, the internal government memos collected in this publication demonstrate that the path to the purgatory that is Guantanamo Bay, or Abu Ghraib, has been paved with decidedly bad intentions. The policies that resulted in rampant abuse of detainees first in Afghanistan, then at Guantanamo Bay, and later in Iraq, were product of three pernicious purposes designed to facilitate the unilateral and unfettered detention, interrogation, abuse, judgment, and punishment of prisoners: (1) the desire to place the detainees beyond the reach of any court or law; (2) the desire to abrogate the Geneva Convention with respect to the treatment of persons seized in the context of armed hostilities; and (3) the desire to absolve those implementing the policies of any liability for war crimes under U.S. and international law.
Regarding the
Torture Papers, which detail
Torture's Paper Trail, and, then there's
Hungry for Air: Learning The Language Of Torture, and, of course, there's
( more inside)
posted by y2karl
on Mar 14, 2005 -
97 comments
Freedom's Defenders or Politicians' Pawns? No pretense of protecting Americans’ freedom went into the decision to enter into the
Spanish-American War. It was out-and-out imperialism and nothing more. Veterans of that war may have helped to liberate Cuba , Guam , Puerto Rico , and the Philippines from Spanish rule; but those same veterans then turned around and rammed the jackboot of the U. S. military into the faces of those they had just liberated. Hundreds of thousands of Cubans and Filipinos, who had thought they were being freed only to find out they had merely exchanged one colonial master for another, were killed in their own independence-from-Uncle-Sam movements. When they finally did throw off direct U. S. rule, they were then saddled with dictators of Uncle Sam’s choosing. No credit for the defense of Americans’ freedom can be granted to veterans of this war.
Compare to this:
Gunning For Saddam
We report, you decide indeed...
posted by Elim
on Mar 6, 2005 -
23 comments
Virgins talk about sex. Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly,
marines gotta kill the enemy. I think
'Flippant' is an accurate term from the Vice Adm. But most of the flak
this monk is catching is from folks who say how killing the enemy "should" be. He's been called a
psychopath, but it seems to me his emotional investment belies that.
So do we then want robots? The civilian issue of why or where or when to fight aside - do we have the right to derogate how a soldier feels about doing his duty?
posted by Smedleyman
on Feb 5, 2005 -
101 comments
Documents: U.S. condoned Iraq oil smuggling Documents obtained by CNN reveal the United States knew about, and even condoned, embargo-breaking oil sales by Saddam Hussein's regime, and did so to shore up alliances with Iraq's neighbors.
The oil trade with countries such as Turkey and Jordan appears to have been an open secret inside the U.S. government and the United Nations for years.
posted by Postroad
on Feb 3, 2005 -
28 comments
Thanks for the memories ..."I know it’s a fallacy * That grown men never cry
Baby, that’s a lie * We had our bed of roses
But forgot that roses die * And thank you so much..."
posted by growabrain
on Jan 28, 2005 -
10 comments
LAWs instructions for starting criminal procedures against Bush Today in Vancouver, Lawyers Against the War filed torture charges against George W. Bush under the Canadian Criminal Code. The charges were laid by Gail Davidson, co-chair of Lawyers against the War--LAW, under provisions enacted pursuant to the U.N. Torture Convention, ratified by both Canada and the United States. The charges concern the well known abuses of prisoners held by US Armed Forces in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba. The charges were accepted by the Justice of the Peace and referred for a hearing to decide whether Bush should be required to appear for trial. The Attorney General of Canada's consent is required within eight days for proceedings to continue, and the question of Bush's diplomatic immunity will have to be resolved by the court.
posted by sunexplodes
on Dec 1, 2004 -
66 comments
Former Bush ghostwriter confirms Bush had plans for Iraq in 1999. Herskowitz said that Bush expressed frustration at a lifetime as an underachiever in the shadow of an accomplished father. In aggressive military action, he saw the opportunity to emerge from his father’s shadow. The moment, Herskowitz said, came in the wake of the September 11 attacks. “Suddenly, he’s at 91 percent in the polls, and he’d barely crawled out of the bunker.”
posted by RavinDave
on Oct 28, 2004 -
37 comments
Confirming the Obvious: "A Knight Ridder review of the administration's Iraq policy and decisions has found that it invaded Iraq without a comprehensive plan in place to secure and rebuild the country... The Bush administration's failure to plan to win the peace in Iraq was the product of many of the same problems that plagued the administration's case for war, including wishful thinking, bad information from Iraqi exiles who said Iraqis would welcome American troops as liberators and contempt for dissenting opinions." Just in case anyone you know is still pretending this administration had the slightest idea what it was doing after "Mission Accomplished."
posted by jscalzi
on Oct 16, 2004 -
11 comments
If America were Iraq, what would it be like? Private armies totaling 275,000 men; platoons of Christian Soldiers Militia holed up in Arlington National Cemetery; the grounds of the White House constantly under mortar fire; the Secretary of State, President, and Attorney General all assassinated in the past year; and the Air Force routinely bombing Billings, Flint, Philadelphia, and parts of LA and DC to destroy "safe houses" of "criminal gangs."
posted by johnnydark
on Sep 27, 2004 -
34 comments
Calling the 'cleaner' - like Harvey Keitel, who has both played a 'cleaner' and
become one in real life, Zbigniew Brzezinski now moves in to rectify the mess.
"The present policy - justified by falsehoods, pursued with unilateral arrogance, blinded by self-delusion, and stained by sadistic excesses - cannot be corrected with a few hasty palliatives."
posted by troutfishing
on May 30, 2004 -
16 comments
In policy reversal, US signals possible acceptance of theocracy in Iraq Bringing democracy to the area...Ladies: do we have some surprises in store for you. Is Iran to be the model? "The United States signaled its readiness to put up with an Islamic theocracy in future sovereign Iraq, with Secretary of State Colin Powell saying the US administration "will have to accept" any government created as a result of free and fair elections there. ..."
posted by Postroad
on May 16, 2004 -
25 comments
Implications of a 4-Star Command in Iraq. In an small press release, it was recently announced that Iraq *may* be getting a 4-star general, but *not* to replace the current 3-star military commander of that nation. So what difference does a single star make?
"...In other words, the Defense Department is putting forward the idea of another regional command
because it anticipates the possibility of intensifying combat operations throughout the region. The war in Iraq might be coming under control, but from the standpoint of the Defense Department,
the end of the Iraq campaign is the preface to follow-on campaigns."
posted by kablam
on Jan 20, 2004 -
14 comments
France, stung by Libyan WMD deal, admits US policies showing results Ok. Agreed. You don't like Bush. And the French government does not like Bush. But here is what the French now say about Libya: [...] The media, which have long criticised the US war and invasion of Iraq, grudgingly allowed that that conquest had borne fruit in terms of putting pressure on other countries Washington considers "rogue states" or part of an "axis of evil"[...]
posted by Postroad
on Dec 22, 2003 -
72 comments
Senators were told Iraqi weapons could hit U.S. U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson said Monday the Bush administration last year told him and other senators that Iraq not only had weapons of mass destruction, but they had the means to deliver them to East Coast cities.
If this is true, is he in trouble for saying it?
posted by bas67
on Dec 17, 2003 -
32 comments
Anybody see this coming? The United States has asked Israel to check the possibility of pumping oil from Iraq to the oil refineries in Haifa. The request came in a telegram last week from a senior Pentagon official to a top Foreign Ministry official in Jerusalem.
posted by FormlessOne
on Aug 25, 2003 -
28 comments
