We have heard repeatedly how successful our Afghanistan campaign has been after thousands of dead Americans and hundreds of billions of dollars. That does not exactly fit with the announcement yesterday that the U.S. military will now longer allow U.S. forces to do joint field operations. This is not because of the threat of the Taliban but the Afghan soldiers themselves who have been regularly shooting their American allies at checkpoints and operations.
Afghan soldiers have shot NATO soldiers 36 times this year and killed 51. Most of the dead and wounded are Americans. The latest were four American and two British troops killed by their brothers in arms.
Notably, the U.S. admits that only 10 to 25 percent of the attacks are the result of enemy infiltrators. The rest are simply Afghan allies who view the U.S. as more dangerous than the Taliban. I wonder who gave them that idea . . .
Source: CBS
The U.S. forces are now there to do what they always do, support the operations of the 1% out on Highway 61, and we do what we always do, pay our taxes to pay for making the plutocrats more and more wealthy as they live off the government dole (our tax dollars):
(Secret Afghanistan Underground, quoting NY Times 9/8/12).
Another reason to leave Afghanistan now!
Dredd:
my prediction: we leave Afghanistan and the Russians or Chinese get exclusive rights to those minerals and we pay the Afghans money to pay the Chinese and Russians to build the infrastructure necessary to exploit those natural resources.
Then we pay top dollar on the world market for the minerals and oil that we paid the Afghans who paid the Russians or Chinese to build the pipelines, roads, bridges, mines and processing facilities necessary for production. The Chinese or Russians make bank and the US tax payer pays the Chinese for selling us titanium which we already paid for and we still owe them huge interest payments on our debt.
Why do we keep electing people from Harvard, Yale, Princeton and other Ivy League schools? The elite are why we are where we are today. They have totally screwed up our country and their arrogance about it is breathtaking.
I am tired of working so some Ivy League m@therf[]cker can make bank at my expense.
F[]ck Obama, f[]ck Romney, I am voting for Gary Johnson. Enough of this crap.
Bring all our soldiers home….. all of them from every country… its getting old… lets take the money spent over in the mid-east and feed the children that are starving here in the United States… lets worry about our needs here in the United States… let them all worry about themselves….. they have been killing each other for thousand of years and will be for another thousand years…. the government here in the United States won’t be straightened out in my life time… how sad……. power….money…control… is what its all about…. my son was in Iraq for 14 months off and on… wish he would have never gone in the military or the United States Army… I learned a lot about our United States Army when my son went into the Army… wow changed my views on lot of things…. What have we learned in 40 years from the Vietnam war ??? nothing… we still can’t take care of our soldiers when they come home…. they spend all this money to train them to kill …but can’t take care of them when they come home…how sad … you see it on the news everyday… Of course the Feres Doctrine has been in effect since 1954 that protects the government so these soldiers don’t have any recourse and can’t get a lawyer to go after that one doctor that is pumping drugs into some soldiers or who has had his rights violated… sorry I don’t think the United States Army is above the law…. no matter what… I was shocked to hear some of the stories about the United States Army when the war broke out in 2003 going across the desert in Iraq… never thought the United States Army would run out of food and water for our soldiers… its all so sad….. the drugs they were pumping into our soldiers back in 2003 and 2004… who knows maybe its still going on…. the fights between our on soldiers over there… crazy… I would never encourage my son to go into the military again….. they just don’t take care of them… so many have been tossed away like a piece of trash when they come home… its in the news all the time…. just my thoughts… I’m sure everyone has a story or may disagree … we all have our opinions….just saying…..
The entire exit strategy has just collapsed overnight as one of the key dependencies of a well-trained Afghan military is now impossible. It is well past time to admit a grievous error and head for home before the helicopters have to land on the rooftops.
Friendly fire results in being dead either way….. Now, why are we still there?
Well said Bron…………………………..bring them all home…….
Billie:
yes, everyone of them. I hope your son is OK. I quit believing we did the right thing in 2005. I wish I would have figured it out sooner.
We never learn from our own history and we never learn from history in general. I have a book on my kindle about the British and the Afghan wars back in the mid 1800′s. nothing has changed. I could write a book on the American experience by changing some names around using that book.
All one of those idiots in the Bush Administration had to do was read that book and see what happened to the British. So much for an Ivy League education. I bet none of those “elites” has ever read the Qur’an either.
No doubt, Bron. These arrogant asses always think that they’re smarter than those in that history. And/or that the U.S. is so exceptional that those historical lessons don’t apply to us; because, you know, we’ve learned those lessons and we’ll do it right this time. It’s all very exasperating and maddening.
ONLOOKER:
yes, it is. The people need to start running things, we have given the politicians way too much leeway. We have also believed their siren songs for too long.
Bron,
The Russians have already been defeated in their attempt to take Afghanistan. If tptb in China have paid attention to history they won’t bother.
The US had no business going in there in the first place. It had nothing to do with Osama bin Laden. There were attempts to hand him over but, nooooo, he was an excuse. The US military was poised to go in before 911 because the oil companies have wanted the Caspian Sea pipeline for decades.
Obama kept his campaign promise of stepping up the hostilities in Afghanistan and going into Pakistan. Now it’s time for him to make a new promise and keep it before the election: bring the troops home now.
Bron 1, September 18, 2012 at 8:03 am
Dredd:
…
Why do we keep electing people from Harvard, Yale, Princeton and other Ivy League schools? The elite are why we are where we are today. They have totally screwed up our country and their arrogance about it is breathtaking.
I am tired of working so some Ivy League m@therf[]cker can make bank at my expense.
F[]ck Obama, f[]ck Romney, I am voting for Gary Johnson. Enough of this crap.
==================================================
Your frustration seems to be quite reasonable in these premises.
So…you guys think…we should leave Afghanistan? I’m inferring a subtle soupcon of frustration, here.
Bron, I agree w/ you about the Ivy League mafia, but do have a few trepidations since that was Richard Nixon’s rant also.
bob kauten:
you are a brilliant guy if you can divine that level of subtlety.
nick:
nixon was a moron too, he was so smart he thought he was incapable of making a mistake. Wage and price controls? come on, those are right out of the Harvard economics department.
Poor Jimmy Carter, nixon screwed up the economy and Carter gets the blame. Then Reagan blames Carter and is very effective in doing so, he gets elected, the moral majority and the neocons take over and the rest is history. We now have a financial and foreign policy sh!t storm all because Reagan was elected and picked Bush as his VP because nixon had wage and price controls based on harvard economics.
It all goes back to some Ivy League moron no matter how you look at it. Wilson WWI, Roosevelt WWII, Kennedy Vietnam, Bush I GWI, Bush II GW II.
Come on, can it be any more obvious? Who was behind the Federal Reserve? Every bad thing done by this country or to this country is the result of an Ivy League education.
Do you think an auto mechanic would care if Sadam had power in Iraq? Do you think a welder would have cared about communist incursion into Vietnam? Or if he did do you think he would not have used nukes or bombed the north to their knees and ended it in 6 months?
Do you think a cook would have told Patton not to invade Russia and kick the sh!t out of Stalin?
Series: Glenn Greenwald on security and liberty at the Guardian, today)
“Unlike Afghan leaders, Obama fights for power of indefinite military
detention
Obama lawyers file a breathless, angry appeal against the court ruling that invalidated the NDAA’s chilling 2011 detention law
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Glenn Greenwald
Glenn Greenwald
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 18 September 2012 10.52 EDT
Jump to comments (58)
Bagram airbase
Bagram airbase was used by the US to detain its ‘high-value’ targets during the ‘war on terror’ and is still Afghanistan’s main military prison. Photograph: Dar Yasin/AP
In May, something extremely rare happened: a federal court applied the US constitution to impose some limits on the powers of the president. That happened when federal district court judge Katherine Forrest of the southern district of New York, an Obama appointee, preliminarily barred enforcement of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the statute enacted by Congress in December 2011 with broad bipartisan support and signed into law by President Obama (after he had threatened to veto it).
That 2011 law expressly grants the president the power to indefinitely detain in military custody not only accused terrorists, but also their supporters, all without charges or trial. It does so by empowering the president to indefinitely detain not only al-Qaida members, but also members of so-called “associated forces”, as well as anyone found to “substantially support” such forces – whatever those terms might mean. I wrote about that decision and the background to this case when it was issued.
What made Judge Forrest’s ruling particularly remarkable is that the lawsuit was brought by eight journalists and activists, such as former New York Times reporter Chris Hedges, Daniel Ellsberg, Noam Chomsky, and Birgitta Jónsdóttir, who argued that their work, which involves interactions with accused terrorists, could subject them to indefinite detention under the law’s broad and vague authority, even for US citizens on US soil. The court agreed, noting that the plaintiffs presented “evidence of concrete – non-hypothetical – ways in which the presence of the legislation has already impacted those expressive and associational activities”. The court was particularly disturbed by the Obama DOJ’s adamant refusal to say, in response to being asked multiple times, that the law could not be used to indefinitely detain the plaintiffs due to their journalistic and political activities.
Last week, Judge Forrest made her preliminary ruling permanent, issuing a 112-page decision explaining it. Noting that the plaintiffs “testified credibly to having an actual and reasonable fear that their activities will subject them to indefinite military detention”, she emphasized how dangerous this new law is given the extremely broad discretion it vests in the president to order people detained in military custody with no charges:
forest ruling
The court also brushed aside the Obama DOJ’s prime argument, echoing the theories of John Yoo: namely, that courts have no business “interfering” in the president’s conduct of war. After acknowledging that the president is entitled to deference in the national security realm, Judge Forrest dispensed with the Obama DOJ’s claim with this vital observation: one that should be unnecessary but, in the 9/11 era, is all too commonly ignored:
forest ruling 2
In other words: while the president is entitled to deference in his conduct of war, he’s not entitled to wield the power to order people, including American citizens, indefinitely imprisoned in military detention. Regardless of how he claims he intends to exercise this power, the mere act of vesting it in him so chills the exercise of first amendment and other protected rights that the constitution can have no meaning if courts permit it to stand.
In response to this ruling, the Obama administration not only filed an immediate appeal, but they filed an emergency motion asking the appeals court to lift the injunction pending the appeal. Obama lawyers wrote a breathless attack on the court’s ruling, denouncing it as “vastly troubling” and claiming that it “threatens tangible and dangerous consequences in the conduct of an active military conflict” and “threatens irreparable harm to national security”.
The Obama DOJ also objected that the decision “was entered against the president as commander-in-chief in his conduct of ongoing military operations, is unprecedented and exceeded the court’s authority”: how irreverent. And they argued that the broad detention power claimed by President Obama “has been endorsed by two presidents [meaning him and George W Bush], by the [rightwing] DC circuit in habeas litigation brought by Guantánamo detainees, and by the Congress in Section 1021(b)(2).”
I’ve written at length before about why indefinite detention is so dangerous, and why a statute such as the NDAA – which purposely (as the court here found) leaves open the question of whether it applies to US citizens – is one of the most pernicious laws enacted in some time. I won’t rehash that here, but I do want to make two points about the Obama administration’s new fight in defense of this law.
First, the Obama administration’s unhinged claim that Judge Forrest’s ruling imperils national security gives the lie to the central excuse for the NDAA: namely, that it does not expand the president’s detention powers beyond what is already vested by the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force (AUMF). Judge Forrest’s ruling leaves the 2001 AUMF in place and did not purport to nullify any prior decisions applying it. Therefore, if the NDAA does nothing that the 2001 AUMF did not already do – as Obama defenders relentlessly claimed to justify his signing of this odious bill – then it cannot possibly be the case that Judge Forrest’s ruling harms national security, since Obama already has all the detention power he claims he needs under the 2001 AUMF.
The reality is that the NDAA did indeed wildly expand the president’s detention powers beyond what the 2001 AUMF provided. In contrast to the 2001 AUMF – which empowered the president to act against a relatively narrow category: those “he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on 11 September 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons” – the NDAA empowers him to act against a much broader range of people: not only those who perpetrated 9/11, but also “associated forces”, and not only those who are members of such groups, but those who “substantially support” them.
While the Bush and Obama DOJs have long absurdly interpreted the 2001 AUMF to apply to this broader range, and while some courts have accepted that interpretation, the law itself vested no such power. The NDAA did. That is why civil liberties groups such as the ACLU denounced Obama’s signing of it so vociferously, and it is why the Obama DOJ is so horrified, obviously, by the prospect that it will be invalidated: precisely because it so drastically expands their detention power. Both the court’s ruling and the Obama DOJ’s reaction to that ruling prove that the NDAA does indeed provide the president with significantly enhanced authority of indefinite detention.
Second, to see the sorry and wretched state of liberties in the US under President Obama, let us look to Afghanistan. The US is currently attempting to turn over to the Afghan government control of the lawless prison system the US has long maintained in Bagram and other parts of that country. But that effort is running into a serious problem: namely, the US wants the prisoners to remain there in cages without charges, but the Afghans are insisting that indefinite detention violates their belief in due process. From an Associated Press article Monday headlined “Afghans reject US-favored administrative detention”:
“An Afghan judicial panel ruled Monday that administrative detention violates Afghan law, potentially thwarting a US plan to hand over Afghan detainees that American officials believe should continue to be held without a trial.
“President Hamid Karzai’s office announced in a statement that a top-level judicial panel met earlier in the day and decided that the detention of Afghan citizens without a court trial ‘has not been foreseen in Afghan laws’ and therefore could not be used.
“The US government has long held Afghans captured in operations inside the country without trial, arguing that they are enemy combatants and therefore can be detained for as long as their release might pose a danger to the international coalition …
“A US official confirmed that the transfer of detainees had paused because of the dispute.”
Is that not amazing? On the very same day that the Obama DOJ fights vigorously in US courts for the right to imprison people without charges, the Afghan government fights just as vigorously for basic due process.
Remember: the US, we’re frequently told, is in Afghanistan to bring democracy to the Afghan people and to teach them about freedom. But the Afghan government is refusing the US demand to imprison people without charges on the ground that such lawless detention violates their conceptions of basic freedom. Maybe Afghanistan should invade the US in order to teach Americans about freedom.”
Someone brought up our helicopter retreat from the embassy rooftop in Vietnam. Thanks for that.
If I remember we wanted to leave about 100,000 troops in Iraq. Purpose? There are, I believe, ca 10,000 contracts personnel left there now.
I must both thank those here who express righteous outrage against our hypocritical wars. I do not think, in spite of George II obvious proof of the contention, that all Harvard, etc, graduates are defective in reeasoning. They have reasoned very well in support of their cause, have they not? But our cause, is not their cause.
And thanks to Jill for bringing this factual summary by Greenwald to our attention. The idea that Afghanistan will teach us due process of law is of course a good summary of this nightmare. The crimes that are committed in our name” And potentially on USA media personnel and who next?
And lastly, am I incorrect in noting that the usual critics of the “medieval muslimes” are not here today, so far that is.
Nor or any of the regulars. Are they clustered on some other thread? Perhaps, but I wonder what that would be? When we are stymied for the umpteenth time since Vietnam.
Where is Messpo and his drone strategy? I do not blame him at all. But miss his viewpoints on this dilemma.
Where is MikeS speaking against the “roll of drums”?
Etc, etc.
Bron,
Good points….
The latest were four American and two British troops killed by their brothers in arms.
==============
Buy the oil from the Russians.
Has everyone forgotten the Ron Paul video where was depicted a foreign army coming into Texas, and how we would react to the deeds which our army are doing in Afghanistan and formerly in Iraq. This is not my endorsement of Paul, but I thought the analogy was telling.
Would we join up, bought as we were, with our Chinese “comrades in arms” to kill American citizens who foought for their freedom to choose which stupid politician and which stupid policy which suit us to support.
Would we be surprised that some of these American impressed (?) soldiers would tire of serving our Chinese invaders, and take action for our American cause.
Seems to agree with how I see this “brother in arms” BS.
With all due respect to Matt, but I can’t buy it.
Maybe he was joking. ??? I usually miss those things.
With all due respect to Matt, but I can’t buy it.
Maybe he was joking. ??? I usually miss those things.
==========================================
Do you want oil, or not? You’re not going to build a pipeline through Afghanistan and Pakistan. They will keep bombing it. The only way you’re going to get oil from that part of the world is if the Russians do it.
I have said this before. There is more fossil fuel energy in the form of coal in the continental United States than all the known oil reserves on the planet.
Last Friday Camp Bastion was attacked by 3 heavily armed teams of attackers wearing American uniforms- they killed 2, wounded 19 and did 200,000,000$ worth of material. It’s the last act in a dramatic uptick in violence against American/NATO forces.
There is a 30 sec commercial and it starts out as a story about what Romney isn’t campaigning on/talking about but it’s a good update from Maddow:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#49067862
Matt,
Just for kicks. Isn’t the Caspian just a short overland bit to the Black Sea, which in turn is open to the Mediterranean? (Haven’t checked Google Maps yet.)
So, WTF do we want to pipe it over PakAf territory?
Answer me that please.
ID707,
I think you already have the answer.
Well, yeah, getting a pipeline through Azerbaijan might be tough, and Georgia is no better.
So remains the Russian alternative. I concede we should buy.
I don’t like swimning, so I suggest we let the coal lie there it is for now.
idealist707 1, September 18, 2012 at 5:07 pm
I don’t like swimning, so I suggest we let the coal lie there it is for now.
============
It’s been there for a long time. It isn’t going anywhere unless we dig it out. Use the oil instead.
When there isn’t any oil left, we still have the coal.
What do the Saudi’s have when there isn’t any oil left? Sand.
Dredd,
The U.S. forces are now there to do what they always do,
When I got skin in the game, I pay attention to the game. When the skin comes home. I pay 90% less attention. This is true, it is not balanced. This is simply human. I am disgusted with my internal values clock. When the skin is home, I sigh with relief. I am talking out of my hat, yet truly.
I am for a draft. Numbers, birthdates and names…period. let the occasional 0.1%er skin be there. The occasional congressmans blood be there. The occasional Wall st. master flesh be there. Then equality will ring.
A country that buys protection, is slave to the treasure that buys its freedom. Our treasure in the US is money. The masters supply it, and our youth is its fodder./ …..Not the masters youth/….. the serfs youth./
. Serfs are expendable, the masters have the ability to buy lots of our common youth,
…Both sides have the same ability.
Youth, individual dreams, and justice for the commons are trampled.
The name of liberty and freedom in this country is manipulated for the benefit and enhancement of the Uber Lords .
Peace to humanity, will begin with knowledge and respect for humanity. Not some isolated 0.1% of us.
( Bron )
Thank you for asking about my son….
My son is Ok… but it has been nation wide news about my son…The Movie…with Tommy Lee Jones… The Book…News Week….48 hours mystery…G.Q. magazine ….Playboy magazine…Army Times… UPI out of Washington…. my son was going across the desert back in 2003 as a gunner on a Bradley and sniper.. sad to say all that death really messed with his head… the soldiers from the 3rd ID infantry found him in the tent and he had taken many pills that the Army had been prescribing to him… he was on suicide watch for 72 hours … a RN signed a form to send him to the mental hospital in Germany… no way the commander in charge of the 3rd ID said NO he is going home with the 3rd ID he is a hero……
My son came home July 7, 2003 and was being escorted by MP’s to the hospital at Fort Benning… scared me…I didn’t know what was wrong with my son…. my husband and I and my son’s dad all sat at the emergency room for 6 hours and he got a 5 minute evaluation over the phone by a Child psychiatrist and he released him…well I though my son is going to be with me for the next 4 days he will be OK… and he was proud soldier and man… he didn’t tell me that he tried to take his own life in Iraq… I could see this darkness about him and I made him promise me to please go to the hospital first thing Monday morning… we dropped him off at the barracks on a Sunday afternoon at 3:00pm and my husband and I headed back to Florida…
My son’s car got stolen while he was gone… his fault he didn’t take it to the proper compound to be locked up and someone stole it out of the parking lot….
That Monday morning I tried calling my son and couldn’t reach him… I didn’t hear from my son until November 7th at 11:15 am in the morning when his dad called me from Ocala…. His dad told me that my son had been arrested for Murder… when in fact he went back to Fort Benning and turned himself and the other three young soldiers in ….
You may have seen this on the news… the media was camped out at my doorstep for 3 days …. Back in Iraq these 2 soldiers were caught raping a 12 or 13 yr old girl at Baghdad airport… the soldier that caught them was going to turn them in…they came after him in Iraq and cut him all up… it followed them back to the States… and these 2 soldiers came over to Kelly Hill at Fort Benning to pick up the soldier and take him out to party… and my son said hey man can I catch a ride… it went down hill from there…. Alberto Martinez stabbed Richard Davis 33 times 4 miles outside the gates of Fort Benning…. and my son was present… it went down hill from there…..
I was law enforcement in Florida and my husband was law enforcement he was killed 5 years ago…. I went to Georgia to be close to my son and was state investigator in Atlanta….
did my son do some wrong doing…yes he did… they all ran and the body laid there 2 months… my son went AWOL along with one of the other soldiers and the one that murdered him got out of the Army and went back to Calf. to the gang he belonged to… My son went back to Fort Benning and turned himself in and the others and he was the DA star witness and was on the stand for 5 hours telling the truth about that night… he pointed to them all and said we are all guilty… My son told me that truth would set him free…. as long as I was law enforcement and my late husband we never saw anyone walk into the Sheriffs office saying please arrest me I have just murdered someone or raped someone…. I have never see that happen.
This changed 5 family’s lives forever…Alberto Martinez and Mario got life in prison plus 15 years and Woodcoff got 9 months in jail 5 years probation and is no longer a felon… my son got slammed with 20 years… and its been 9 years… we never know where life is going to take us… my son is a good man and my only child… if I could trade place with him I would…I have lived my life and I want to him to have his…
So I might piss off some people…. but I say Shame on the United States Army for not taking care of these Soldiers coming home from Iraq… and the drugs they were pumping into my son was just crazy…. I have 28 pages of medical records that my son smuggled back from Iraq… they are devastating to read… 48 hours showed a few of them on the show they have aired 5 or 6 times ….. they diagnosed my son with PTSD he has demons still today…and he won’t get the proper help he needs until he comes home I hope in 3 or 4 years… we do the time together every weekend…
Needless to say I’m a mother that is not happy with the United States Army or our government…. for not taking care of my son when he came home from Iraq…. he gave 110 percent of himself to the Army and was E5 the war really messed with his head… hell it would mine… all the death he saw over there… he did about 14 months off and on…
Fort Benning was out of control back in 2003 and 2004 they shut down Kelly Hill because the soldiers had guns and grenades in there lockers and in the trunk of there cars… crazy…. hell I got death threats back than and was told don’t come near the base…
9 years have gone by and I’m I am still at it ….trying to get things straight with my son’s DD214 and have met so many nice people through this tragedy…. If I was granted one wish …it would be bring back Richard Davis… to his family it was there only son also… no one won in this …all so sad all way around…. so am I angry at the Unites States Army you bet I am…. these soldiers go to war and give it there all…. and come home and the United States Army tosses them away like a piece of trash…well these young men they did…. Fort Benning closed there doors and moved people around so no would would talk to anyone… it was crazy back than… sad sad day…
I love my son and he is my best friend…. its just what mothers do…. well this mother anyway… I will be at it until the day I die to make sure he is OK and had a life when he comes home….
Everyone has to make sure there loved ones are OK when they come home because the United States Army will not…. they spend all this money to teach them to kill but can’t take care of them when they come home…. That is why I say bring all our soldiers home from every country…. NOW just my story…I am sure there are many out there…just watch the news…
A loving Mother………
Once again…. the JOKE is on US, because we elect STUPID leaders….
Once upon a time there was a nation known as the Soviet Union. They had large armies and essentially won the war against the Germans in 1939-1945. Then they had a sphere of influence behind what is called the Iron Curtain. In the seventies they invaded one of the Stan countries called Afghanistan. We in America made it our business to stir up resistance and paid and encouraged such groups as the Muslim Brotherhood to run them out. The Soviets, for all their ill deeds, did do some things like encourage secular life and advance the status of women. Then the Soviets leave. The Soviet Union dissolves. 9/11 comes along. We invade. Not our sphere of influence. Gotta go. The Muslim Brotherhood is smiling. Can we not pay the Russians to go back and resume some control in this particular Stan country?
Bonnie,
It got deathly quiet after your comment. I can understand why if it is due to the terrible picture you give us.
Let me thank you for sharing it with us. My words are not adequate so wiil be silent.
Until politicians, plutocrats, and the one percent are prepared to send their children, then war should be outlawed. How will we protect ourselves? That can be solved too, but only if there is a will.
Just wondering how many people know that every year around November 12, 13, 14, about 17 thousand people protest outside the gates at Fort Benning??? Columbus Georgia…. been there and seen it…I asked someone there a few years ago what are you all protesting?? He told me they are tired of Fort Benning bring men and woman from other country’s to train them to fight and kill….. so they can go back to there country and kill our military when war breaks out…. how crazy is that… and they have been protesting for about 15 years now…and about 20 to 40 get arrested every year…for crossing the line and going on to the base…. I was shocked….
Bring our Military home…. All of them… let them all work out there own problems…. we have enough problems here in the United States that our Government can’t get straight…
money …..Power….control…is what its all about…. Just Saying
Billie 1, September 18, 2012 at 9:23 pm
( Bron )
Thank you for asking about my son….
My son is Ok… but it has been nation wide news about my son…The Movie…with Tommy Lee Jones… The Book…News Week….48 hours mystery…G.Q. magazine ….Playboy magazine…Army Times… UPI out of Washington…. my son was going across the desert back in 2003 as a gunner on a Bradley and sniper.. sad to say all that death really messed with his head… the soldiers from the 3rd ID infantry found him in the tent and he had taken many pills that the Army had been prescribing to him… he was on suicide watch for 72 hours … a RN signed a form to send him to the mental hospital in Germany… no way the commander in charge of the 3rd ID said NO he is going home with the 3rd ID he is a hero……
My son came home July 7, 2003 and was being escorted by MP’s to the hospital at Fort Benning… scared me…I didn’t know what was wrong with my son…. my husband and I and my son’s dad all sat at the emergency room for 6 hours and he got a 5 minute evaluation over the phone by a Child psychiatrist and he released him…well I though my son is going to be with me for the next 4 days he will be OK… and he was proud soldier and man… he didn’t tell me that he tried to take his own life in Iraq… I could see this darkness about him and I made him promise me to please go to the hospital first thing Monday morning… we dropped him off at the barracks on a Sunday afternoon at 3:00pm and my husband and I headed back to Florida…
My son’s car got stolen while he was gone… his fault he didn’t take it to the proper compound to be locked up and someone stole it out of the parking lot….
That Monday morning I tried calling my son and couldn’t reach him… I didn’t hear from my son until November 7th at 11:15 am in the morning when his dad called me from Ocala…. His dad told me that my son had been arrested for Murder… when in fact he went back to Fort Benning and turned himself and the other three young soldiers in ….
You may have seen this on the news… the media was camped out at my doorstep for 3 days …. Back in Iraq these 2 soldiers were caught raping a 12 or 13 yr old girl at Baghdad airport… the soldier that caught them was going to turn them in…they came after him in Iraq and cut him all up… it followed them back to the States… and these 2 soldiers came over to Kelly Hill at Fort Benning to pick up the soldier and take him out to party… and my son said hey man can I catch a ride… it went down hill from there…. Alberto Martinez stabbed Richard Davis 33 times 4 miles outside the gates of Fort Benning…. and my son was present… it went down hill from there…..
I was law enforcement in Florida and my husband was law enforcement he was killed 5 years ago…. I went to Georgia to be close to my son and was state investigator in Atlanta….
did my son do some wrong doing…yes he did… they all ran and the body laid there 2 months… my son went AWOL along with one of the other soldiers and the one that murdered him got out of the Army and went back to Calf. to the gang he belonged to… My son went back to Fort Benning and turned himself in and the others and he was the DA star witness and was on the stand for 5 hours telling the truth about that night… he pointed to them all and said we are all guilty… My son told me that truth would set him free…. as long as I was law enforcement and my late husband we never saw anyone walk into the Sheriffs office saying please arrest me I have just murdered someone or raped someone…. I have never see that happen.
This changed 5 family’s lives forever…Alberto Martinez and Mario got life in prison plus 15 years and Woodcoff got 9 months in jail 5 years probation and is no longer a felon… my son got slammed with 20 years… and its been 9 years… we never know where life is going to take us… my son is a good man and my only child… if I could trade place with him I would…I have lived my life and I want to him to have his…
So I might piss off some people…. but I say Shame on the United States Army for not taking care of these Soldiers coming home from Iraq… and the drugs they were pumping into my son was just crazy…. I have 28 pages of medical records that my son smuggled back from Iraq… they are devastating to read… 48 hours showed a few of them on the show they have aired 5 or 6 times ….. they diagnosed my son with PTSD he has demons still today…and he won’t get the proper help he needs until he comes home I hope in 3 or 4 years… we do the time together every weekend…
Needless to say I’m a mother that is not happy with the United States Army or our government…. for not taking care of my son when he came home from Iraq…. he gave 110 percent of himself to the Army and was E5 the war really messed with his head… hell it would mine… all the death he saw over there… he did about 14 months off and on…
Fort Benning was out of control back in 2003 and 2004 they shut down Kelly Hill because the soldiers had guns and grenades in there lockers and in the trunk of there cars… crazy…. hell I got death threats back than and was told don’t come near the base…
9 years have gone by and I’m I am still at it ….trying to get things straight with my son’s DD214 and have met so many nice people through this tragedy…. If I was granted one wish …it would be bring back Richard Davis… to his family it was there only son also… no one won in this …all so sad all way around…. so am I angry at the Unites States Army you bet I am…. these soldiers go to war and give it there all…. and come home and the United States Army tosses them away like a piece of trash…well these young men they did…. Fort Benning closed there doors and moved people around so no would would talk to anyone… it was crazy back than… sad sad day…
I love my son and he is my best friend…. its just what mothers do…. well this mother anyway… I will be at it until the day I die to make sure he is OK and had a life when he comes home….
Everyone has to make sure there loved ones are OK when they come home because the United States Army will not…. they spend all this money to teach them to kill but can’t take care of them when they come home…. That is why I say bring all our soldiers home from every country…. NOW just my story…I am sure there are many out there…just watch the news…
A loving Mother………