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What can we provide for our Military?
gap1916
Member Posts: 4,977
I know this has come up before. If you have a friend, relative, loved one who is put in harms way, what can we provide for you or your loved one? I beleive it is that time again. [8D]
Comments
Stop Congress from ripping away their healthcare benefits and taking away the military retirement system.
When those two items are removed you won't have to worry about mailing some goodies to the sandbox....because no one will go.
You know....what today's military really needs is more than a box of cookies or some other goodie mailed to them while they are in the sandbox.
Stop Congress from ripping away their healthcare benefits and taking away the military retirement system.
When those two items are removed you won't have to worry about mailing some goodies to the sandbox....because no one will go.
folks... politics has even degenerated our military!!! I dont know what else it takes to get people of their dirty couchs...
Im telling you buy ammo... When our system poops on the working man, and the military mans' back its time for change... and change is comming! You mark my words; The weather is no longer Americas' friend.
Here's your new uniform:
Sickening isn't it? I wonder if it's still made by Propper International in Latin American sweat shops and Puerto Rico like the current BDU's.
What I am trying to say is America doesn't need to be sending goodies to folks in combat. American's need to stop Congress from screwing those that fight and die for the country.
Someone needs to file a lawsuit against George Bush for activating 8,000 National Guard troops and paying them with Federal money to give administrative assistance to the Border Patrol. That role is not what the military is there for.
Anyone going to send those Guard troops a care package? Why not..there are on a pointless crusade just as those that are in Iraq.
Those that have been there know.
That is correct. And this post-Vietnam era fawning and doting on American troops like they are children makes me puke. You know what they need? They need to get hard; as hard as the enemy, preferably harder. They need to master marksmanship and maintenance of their weapon and love it. They need to master the bayonet and love it. They need to stop whining and stop accessorizing and accoutrementing like clerks working at some friggin' SOF boutique. They need to take a lesson from ROK Marines and concentrate only on doing what they're told and kicking *. If I was Emperor, I'd fly each wide-* trooper out of Iraq and put her on the border with Mexico. For those remaining in Iraq and Afghanistan, I'd dump their TV and iPods and Internet service and phone calls and trips home, and rescind every friggin "You-were-there-and-you-had-a-heartbeat-so-here's-another-gratuitous medal" awarded since the war started. Maybe if we at home stopped forming these pansy-* support groups and started demanding verified body counts the troops would get home a hell of a lot quicker.
Too soft, yes were are. There is a big difference between the World and the Real World' 90% do not understand what the real world is. Then again that is what we do. We seperate the masses from the world and the real world.
Well, in the real world we have good people dying over there every day. Maybe if the enemy feared our troops more than they desired to go join Allah, we'd all be better off. I have no doubt that the insurgents there see how our troops live and act and take comfort in it.
You are a wise man.
So DWS, when are you going over to the sandbox?
Is this tedious retort supposed to be some kind of rejoinder to my statements? I did two tours in Vietnam. How many did you do?
It doesn't make a sh_t to me, because the question is "What can WE do to help our guys and raise their morale?" A good question and a good motive, gap1916.
One thing that I think is probably really good, and pretty easy to do is participate in the "Boresnakes Program".
Check out my topic and click on the link to find out the real skinney.
Down one path we follow his assertion that the military needs to be toughr and more of a threat. To be honest, I never though of that. We used to be the biggest baddest kid in school and I guess the perception is that we now have the coolest skateboard and a really groovy haircut. I remember, in the days following the Rodney King beating, thinking that it would seem to be a great deterrent to crime if more criminals thought they would get the crap kicked outta them if they trangressed. I personally believe that fear and intimidation work better at the level that most criminals exist than do reason and logic. Please note that I am not a LEO and willingly defer to thier opinions about my previous statement. I imagine that the intellect shown here by many of our LEO posters would indicate that there is far more to being a cop than aggression and brute force.
Whew, I wandered a ways away on that. Let's see if I can reign it back to topic.
The same applys, I imagine, to DWS' assertion that the military just plain old needs to be more intimidating.
As for the second path of this thread.
Those kids there in the "sandbox" need our support. Politics aside. Those men and women are there, doing what they are told, as best they can. They don't need our rhetoric or POTUS'. They need cookies. My Pop, a R&I Sgt in WWII, was a pure tough guy. He will readily recall that there were many times when all he wanted while he was slogging through the snow, or sitting in a foot of water in a hole somewhere, was to know that someone cared enough about him to make him some cookies.
So, listen and think about what DWS said. Act on it. Write your congressman. But, in the mean time, send cookies.
Well, personally I think DWS is full of sh_t, as usual. There were old WWII veterans back in the sixties that were always harping about how much tougher and better soldiers and sailors were than the Vietnam era personnel. There are all kinds in the service nowadays and there were all kinds back then.
It doesn't make a sh_t to me, because the question is "What can WE do to help our guys and raise their morale?" A good question and a good motive, gap1916.
One thing that I think is probably really good, and pretty easy to do is participate in the "Boresnakes Program".
Check out my topic and click on the link to find out the real skinney.
I find it amusing when some squid whose likely only combat experience is swabbing decks on a rolling APA while "Up Periscope" is playing on the fantail presumes to put words in my mouth. What is even more laughable is this squid's confusion between actual need and his own errant need to provide it; that, like piping music into a barn so cows will give more milk, troop morale is not to be improved by my prescription but by his provision of boresnakes and bon-bons and jammies with feet. Fair enough. Take comfort in the knowledge that when the troops are trying to decide between Burger King and Dairy Queen or are suffering yet another night of unpredictable Internet access and MTV on a too-small plasma TV, your gesture of patriotism will make all the difference in the world.
YEP!
When you're deployed away from family and friends for a year at a time(sometimes for your second or THIRD rotation), it really helps out when you get a "care package". It don't matter WHAT is in it(soldiers really can get about anything they want over there), the important thing is, they know someone back here gave enough of a crap about the soldiers to take the time to scribble a "hey how are you?" note on a card and send it over. Sometimes it can make a difference to a young soldier that just saw his buddy wounded by an IED and who KNOWS his old lady is screwing around on him while he's over there.
DWS, it doesn't matter what the soldier is doing over there. If he is in a cushy area and has all the luxeries of home, he still aint home. His family isnt there, he may not have seen his kid born(hell he may not even know if it's his kid or not). Bottom line is, the soldier, sailer, marine, airman is away from his family. If recieving something in the mail from back home brings that guy closer to home for 5 minutes while he reads it, then who are you to take it away from him or to crap all over it on Gunbroker while you sip a cold one?
Bottom line is, the soldier, sailer, marine, airman is away from his family. If recieving something in the mail from back home brings that guy closer to home for 5 minutes while he reads it, then who are you to take it away from him or to crap all over it on Gunbroker while you sip a cold one?
Likely because he is similarly sipping a cold one. Likely because the point is not to feel closer to home for 5 minutes but to get home 5 minutes sooner. The point is that the days of care packages as welcome relief from hardtack and C-rats is long over; that the comfort and availability of goods and services in today's "combat zones" rival those of many small American cities. That what is needed is not a gratuitous albeit well-intended more of the same, but a honing of skills and a hardened resolve to reduce the amount of time they have to stay. I remember getting a care package addressed "To A Marine In Vietnam" for Christmas, 1967. In it was a can of dog food and a plastic spoon and a note saying "Eat, you f'in animal". That did more for lifting my morale than any horsedip box of cookies ever could. Fact is, the troops have all the crap you'd care to send and in spades. You want to send a letter of support, by all means; but do not think for a moment that sending handi-wipes or a fruitcake is not tantamount to sending ice cubes to Alaska. My point is that war is a horrible business and the more distractions there are from it and the more comfortable it is, the more dangerous it becomes, precisely because of the momentary, illusory perception of respite it brings.
Well, I don't agree with any of what you said and I doubt anyone else does either. Just because you got your feelings hurt while you in "the nam" don't mean you should be spewing the crap you are.
I would like you to say some of that stuff to some folks I know that have been over there 3 times. I believe you would probably change your story.
Just because you got your feelings hurt while you in "the nam" don't mean you should be spewing the crap you are.
Do you have a reading deficit? My feelings were not the least bit hurt. Just the opposite. As for crap, unless you take up and argue an opposing view I'm afraid that what you say is crap don't mean a friggin' thing.
quote:
I would like you to say some of that stuff to some folks I know that have been over there 3 times. I believe you would probably change your story.
PUH-LEEZE. I have talked to plenty of returnees, Matt45 included. My nephew is an Army captain serving in Afghanistan and we email regularly. But like mpolans and frogbert, your wrongly suppose a difference of opinion is some kind of argument, and this despite the fact that you have no personal knowledge base from which to draw. If my description of the creature comforts in Iraq and Afghanistan is incorrect, kindly point out where and I will tell my nephew and Matt45 that they are liars. Else, do not think for a moment that your pouting and hand-wringing is any substitute for a reasoned opposing view.
Still, I must admit, I fell a grudging admiration for the ____,
(enter your own favorite rude terminology here). Back in the fray, he was probably the one most likely to "save your *, the hand that reached out and grabbed you at the last possible moment".
And, (never start a sentence out with the word and) He makes a real strong point. The reputation for strength deters agression.
Now, to straighten out the perception that I would recommend that the troops should be pampered to distraction, endangering them.
My suggestion is bore snakes, which is a tool that seems to work to better keep their rifles clean and on the ready, according to their own opinions. NOW, WHAT THE H_LL IS WRONG WITH THAT, YOU ROCK-HEADED, MUD-SLUGGING OLD JAR-HEADED g#^!!^##!!#!&.....
My suggestion is bore snakes, which is a tool that seems to work to better keep their rifles clean and on the ready, according to their own opinions. NOW, WHAT THE H_LL IS WRONG WITH THAT, YOU ROCK-HEADED, MUD-SLUGGING OLD JAR-HEADED g#^!!^##!!#!&.....
Nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong with $5000 Dragonslayer armor or silk, high-rise camo briefs in lieu of the just-serviceable standard issue stuff, either. But I suggest that the keeping clean of the M16 and all its variants over the past 40+ years has infinitely more to do with the person cleaning it than the tool used. In other words, the standard issue M16 cleaning kit is perfectly adequate to the job, unless, of course, five minutes of that job can be saved by using a bore snake, thus allowing you more time with that honey over in Supply or a better chance to own the remote at the NCO lounge.
I dont think being any tougher would help our soldiers get home any quicker. If we could just turn them loose and let them start killing people it would be a lot easier.
The fact is that just as in VietNam, the nature of our mission precludes our really getting tough with the situation. It was easy to get tough with the japs on Iwo Jima, but harder in Vietnam when you had wonder just who you were protecting and who was trying to kill you.
In Iraq the mission is nation building, not nation conquering. Our troops have no choice but to sit on their * playing video games until some raghead pops out of the desert and takes a shot at them or detonates an IED.
Why should insurgents fear us when they can just wait us out? The politicians are the ones who have gone soft or crazy, take your pick. It's the strategy that's breaking down, not the troops.
I did not intend this to be a pissing contest. I was hoping to get some good realistic ideas as to what we can do if anything to make it better. I can not be there today. I am here and would like to make it better there. My 2 cents [8D]
My cousin was in Tikrit for more than a year with the 278ACR. I sent him copies of Small Arms Review and other gun magazines. Also microwave dinners and pre-paid phone cards. I think the Boresnake is a good idea. maybe it will save a few minutes time, maybe it will just releive the boredom having some new tool/toy to play with.
DWS, I would think your expereince in VietNam would help you understand more clearly the situation in Iraq.
And the presumption here, of course, is that you do and I don't; that it is rather the mission and not for lack of wanting or trying that our troops are not collecting ears and ripping throats out with their teeth; that in lieu of anything else one can think of to do to better one's combat skills and kill more of the enemy, one should play video games and master lip-synching tunes off the latest Pink and 50 Cent CDs; that the insurgents and Iraqi people think nothing less of our purpose or resolve by our comforts and incessant whining as every day their country becomes far more deadly than when Saddam ruled it. Okay, fine. Have it your way. Oh, and here's a rush: As for toughness in Vietnam, we couldn't make a pimple on a dead VC's or NVA's *.
quote:Originally posted by mpolans
So DWS, when are you going over to the sandbox?
Is this tedious retort supposed to be some kind of rejoinder to my statements? I did two tours in Vietnam. How many did you do?
Great, so you have experience to share and can lead by example! So when are you heading over?
quote:Originally posted by DancesWithSheep
quote:Originally posted by mpolans
So DWS, when are you going over to the sandbox?
Is this tedious retort supposed to be some kind of rejoinder to my statements? I did two tours in Vietnam. How many did you do?
Great, so you have experience to share and can lead by example! So when are you heading over?
I take it your answer is "none"? Big surprise.
quote:Originally posted by hughbetcha
DWS, I would think your expereince in VietNam would help you understand more clearly the situation in Iraq.
And the presumption here, of course, is that you do and I don't; that it is rather the mission and not for lack of wanting or trying that our troops are not collecting ears and ripping throats out with their teeth; that in lieu of anything else one can think of to do to better one's combat skills and kill more of the enemy, one should play video games and master lip-synching tunes off the latest Pink and 50 Cent CDs; that the insurgents and Iraqi people think nothing less of our purpose or resolve by our comforts and incessant whining as every day their country becomes far more deadly than when Saddam ruled it. Okay, fine. Have it your way. Oh, and here's a rush: As for toughness in Vietnam, we couldn't make a pimple on a dead VC's or NVA's *.
The presumption is that you do know more about this subject than you care to acknowledge. There's plenty of reasons our troops are not collecting ears and I'll bet it has more to do with the sheet that would hit the fan than it does with the guys being afraid to cut somebody's ear off.
The media doesnt help. When that marine was filmed shooting a supposedly wounded insurgent in Fallugha (who might have had a grenade or enough strength left to shoot an AK) the liberals were raising hell.
I'd say it never hurts a soldier to improve his killing skills, but then again there's nothing like killing to make you a better killer. Until they change the mission in Iraq, there's just not going to be enough killing to go around. There's nothing wrong with our troops performance that a good strategic plan wouldnt cure.
quote:Originally posted by mpolans
quote:Originally posted by DancesWithSheep
quote:Originally posted by mpolans
So DWS, when are you going over to the sandbox?
Is this tedious retort supposed to be some kind of rejoinder to my statements? I did two tours in Vietnam. How many did you do?
Great, so you have experience to share and can lead by example! So when are you heading over?
I take it your answer is "none"? Big surprise.
I'm not the one trying to justify my insulting of the men and women currently serving their country based on my past personal experience. So I take it you're not going? Big surprise.
No knowledge base?? [:D] My friend, I've been to Iraq. As a matter of fact, I have 2 jumps in Iraq. I've been deployed plenty of times to many different countries and you think I don't know how a soldier feels? You're reaching now old man.
I never said your description was incorrect. I just think a soldier would like to hear from home. That's all I said
quote:Originally posted by DancesWithSheep
quote:Originally posted by mpolans
quote:Originally posted by DancesWithSheep
quote:Originally posted by mpolans
So DWS, when are you going over to the sandbox?
Is this tedious retort supposed to be some kind of rejoinder to my statements? I did two tours in Vietnam. How many did you do?
Great, so you have experience to share and can lead by example! So when are you heading over?
I take it your answer is "none"? Big surprise.
I'm not the one trying to justify my insulting of the men and women currently serving their country based on my past personal experience. So I take it you're not going? Big surprise.
Yes, and it's always the stay-at-homes, the never-wents, who cheer loudest from the sidelines as other people's sons and daughters march off, confident in their belief that a box of cookies will work wonders to show how much they really care. Meanwhile, hero, as for you taking what I have stated as an insult to our fighting men and women, I suggest you take it up with them, as those I know do not seem to have a problem agreeing. And as for me going to Iraq, well, I already fought for my country so that forty years later some other poor guy can send his kid off to do the same and likely with same result, with you waving him on at the airport and planning his first batch of homemade cookies. Well, aren't you just the little patriot, though?
No knowledge base?? [:D] My friend, I've been to Iraq. As a matter of fact, I have 2 jumps in Iraq. I've been deployed plenty of times to many different countries and you think I don't know how a soldier feels? You're reaching now old man.
Airborne? No wonder a moist towelette and box of cookies goes a long way with you.
DWS, It certainly looks as if y'all is "Dancin with the sheep" now...[;)]
I think you should enter this in the non sequitur contest that mpolans, frogbert and hughbetcha have going. You won't win, but the more entrants the better.
Reckon I'll jest keep watchin'...lotsa 'tards lately...[:X]
I take it back. I'd say this one puts you in the running.
It's been rumored y'all do your own colonoscopy...[:0]
Bring it on l'il poop...[:X]
You're doin' fine on your own, Law. I haven't seen this depth of conceptual grasp since Pa Kettle caught Ma Kettle doin' eight-count burpees in the corn crib.