Showing posts with label Troop Training. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Troop Training. Show all posts

6.01.2007

In Bush's Constant Warmongering, We Do Unto Others As We Most Fear They Could Do Unto Us

So we can dish it out, but we can't accept that it be served to us? Isn't "Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto Us" part of the Bible? Donald Rumsfeld, then Secretary of Defense and the crazed leader of the Pentagon/Defense Department, only thought he walked on water.

From TPM Muckraker:

Many of the controversial interrogation tactics used against “war on terror” detainees in Guantanamo, Iraq and Afghanistan are similar to strategies the United States feared its worst enemies would use against captured soldiers during the Cold War.

Time magazine catches this connection in a recently declassified report, "Review of DoD-Directed Investigations of Detainee Abuse,” that has received little media coverage.

The same potential enemy tactics the U.S. military trained forces to face during the Cold War became interrogation strategies used on enemy combatants.

You know how badly this will work; we've already seen it with the grisly and gruesome deaths (by torture, by decapitation/beheading) of some soldiers and aid workers.

Bear in mind that, while U.S. Attorney Greed4all er.. Alberto Gonzales called the Geneva Conventions "quaint", these rules about combat and treatment of the enemy was developed in large part to keep American soldiers safe. But we can't demand better treatment for our men and women GIs than we afford others.

4.25.2007

The Best Iraqi Army American Taxpayers Can Buy And Insurgents Can Kill

As part of his "surge" (aka "escalation) in Iraq, President George W. Bush is using $41 billion (at least, that's all he has requested so far) to recruit and train members of the "new" Iraqi Army.

For argument's sake, let's for the moment put aside these small but weighty details:

  • We've been trying to create an Iraqi military for several years now and it hasn't exactly worked
  • Scads of Iraqi soldiers - and their colleagues, the Iraqi police - are frequently killed the day they register OR the day they graduate (or anytime in between)
  • These same uniformed Iraqis frequently see their homes and families badly injured or outright destroyed in retribution for their "loyalty" to the Bush occupation
  • Iraqi civilians and experts tell us that those Iraqi soldiers/cops who DO survive seem to be aligning themselves with torture and death squads

With these nasty, bloody details aside, consider this: for a force of just 40,000 Iraqi soldiers, this means American taxpayers will shell out about $350K to train and prep EACH and EVERY one of these soldiers.

Sound odd to you?

And, mind you, I haven't even factored in here all the graft and sweetheart contracts that adhere themselves to each and every single operation the Bushies become involved in with Iraq. In other words, the total per head fee could end up much higher (maybe a half million per, at the very least) and the number of trained (and surviving) soldiers might show up as far lower.