Veterans Speak Out
« Previous EntriesA Vets Blog, “Army of Dude”
Sunday, March 2nd, 2008A year later and this is what we have to show for it. A year later and we care about the survival of each other more than a fledging democracy in the Middle East. To officers and officials influencing policy, our goal is to stimulate the economy and prop up competent Iraqi Security Forces. To the unwashed enlisted in the muck, we’re just trying not to get blown to fucking bits. A year later and we have realized finally: we’re biding time until the next unit comes to replace us. That’s it. Rotate in, rotate out. A year’s worth of sore backs, twisted ankles, near death experiences, shootouts, blown up buildings, fires, mangled corpses, dead kids, dead soldiers, cold desert nights, hot desert days, shit covered boots, trash filled streets, unfulfilled dreams, stagnant aspirations and murdered futures.
Robert Loria, Opposes the surge
Saturday, February 16th, 2008Wounded veteran, Robert Loria talks about the surge in Iraq.
Related Post
Injured Troops suffer financially
Camilo Mejia, War Resister
Saturday, February 16th, 2008Hear war resister, Camilo Mejia talk about why he refused to return to Iraq.
WAR is a racket, it always has been. by Smedley D. Butler, Marine Major General
Friday, February 15th, 2008“For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out.” It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.
A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small “inside” group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes. In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.
Regaining my humanity by Camilo Mejia
Friday, February 15th, 2008If you join the military and find yourself fighting in a war you don’t believe in, you could go to jail, like Camilo Mejia did.
Camilo Mejia spent more than 7 years in the military and 8 months fighting in Iraq. While he was on a furlough from the war, he realized he could no longer justify fighting in Iraq. He applied for Conscientious Objector status, but was denied. At first he refused to return to his unit, but then he turned himself in. He went to trial, and was convicted of desertion on May 21st 2004 by the U.S. military and was imprisoned. Mejia was released from prison on February 15th 2005, and is now speaking out against the war.
Advising My Students on Marching to War
Friday, February 15th, 2008By Kirk Stapp, Friday 24 June 2005
After a marine or army recruiter visits Mammoth High School, students frequently ask me questions about my military experience in Vietnam. Eventually, these conversations lead to a single question: Should I enlist?
Advice can carry a heavy burden in shaping a seventeen-year-old’s future: employment, culinary school, a community college, a UC, a tour in Iraq, an amputated leg, a lifetime full of nightmares, cancer from the hundreds of tons of depleted uranium used in US and British munitions, a flag-draped coffin.
Injured Iraq Vets Come Home to Poverty
Friday, February 15th, 2008Injured Soldiers Returning from Iraq Struggle for Medical Benefits, Financial SurvivalBy BRIAN ROSS, DAVID SCOTT and MADDY SAUER Oct. 14, 2004
Following inquiries by ABC News, the Pentagon has dropped plans to force a severely wounded U.S. soldier to repay his enlistment bonus after injuries had forced him out of the service.
Army Spc. Tyson Johnson III of Mobile, Ala., who lost a kidney in a mortar attack last year in Iraq, was still recovering at Walter Reed Army Medical Center when he received notice from the Pentagon’s own collection agency that he owed more than $2,700 because he could not fulfill his full 36-month tour of duty.
Johnson said the Pentagon listed the bonus on his credit report as an unpaid government loan, making it impossible for him to rent an apartment or obtain credit cards.
Injured Troops Suffer Financially
Friday, February 15th, 2008For Injured U.S. Troops, ‘Financial Friendly Fire’ Flaws in Pay System Lead to Dunning, Credit Trouble
By Donna St. George, Washington Post Staff Writer, October 14, 2005
His hand had been blown off in Iraq, his body pierced by shrapnel. He could not walk. Robert Loria was flown home for a long recovery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where he tried to bear up against intense physical pain and reimagine his life’s possibilities. The last thing on his mind, he said, was whether the Army had correctly adjusted his pay rate — downgrading it because he was out of the war zone — or whether his combat gear had been accounted for properly: his Kevlar helmet, his suspenders, his rucksack.
But nine months after Loria was wounded, the Army garnished his wages and then, as he prepared to leave the service, hit him with a $6,200 debt. That was just before last Christmas, and several lawmakers scrambled to help. This spring, a collection agency started calling. He owed another $646 for military housing.
Herold’s War, A homeless Iraq vet asks for respect
Friday, February 15th, 2008Originally published by Guerilla News Network
Jan. 10, 2005 By Anthony Lappé, GNN
Pfc. Herold Noel wasn’t expecting a parade. But when he and his fellow soldiers from the Army’s Expeditionary Unit 37 arrived home from Iraq in Hinesville, Ga. they got what one might call less than a hero’s welcome. Waiting for them as they deplaned were local police officers. In their hands were lists of names of soldiers with outstanding warrants, mostly for traffic and parking tickets left unpaid while off fighting the war.
“I had a couple [of unpaid tickets],” Noel recalls. “I told my family to meet me in the parking lot and I went out the side door.” According to Noel, several soldiers were hauled away in cuffs as their families looked on. The scene was an ominous sign of things to come.
Homophobia
Friday, February 15th, 2008Discrimination against gays, lesbians and bisexuals is not only intense within the military, it is official policy.Witch hunts to kick lesbian and gay personnel out of the military continue. Since the so-called “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy was introduced, the pace of forced discharges has actually increased. Violence and threats against those suspected of being gay are routine.
Ronald Chapman thought the Army would provide him with a career. What he found instead was antigay harassment and physical abuse. Ronald had a rough life growing up. His parents divorced when he was 3. He was put into foster care at 4, and his foster mother booted him out at 19 for being gay. But Chapman had a plan to seek deliverance from life’s cruel disappointments. He would join the Army, serve his country, and see the world.
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