GQ_jumper

I wasn't disagreeing with your point specifically I was just commenting about how difficult it really is to get a good sampling in a place like Iraq. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Minot. I think that alone disproves your point.Quote No, you're absolutely right, I haven't personally been through countless knee-jerk reaction inventories after something was misplaced, i have no idea how these things work. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Psssst.... Dan....nudge nudge. She's cute, but I don't date white girls, everyone knows that History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Yes, but I think you miss my point. Let's account for all the nukes NOW and worry about the peripheral later in the 60 day report. Quote As the article said the 60 days is because of all the sub-components, the major end items(nukes) are already acounted for, with the exception of incidents like the one that caused this inventory they are always accounted for. It's not like someone looked into a warehouse and said "wow, could've sworn we had more missiles in here last night, guess we'll wait for the next inventory to confirm". It's all the odds and ends like the fuze heads which were shipped out that take so long to account for, no one is wondering if there is a missing nuke and waiting 60 days for an answer. The sub-component list for things like this are insanely long, setting up the layout for the inspection takes more time than the inspection itself! History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

It's still far too dynamic an environment to consider it an accurate cross section. al Anbar province is massive, Ramadi is four times the size of Fallujah. If surveys were conducted in 2005-2006 time frame, they didn't get accurate results. Quote I agree, the attitudes from one end of the country to the other are far to different to really get a nationwide poll thats accurate. If they perhaps broke the polls down by provinces and ethnic groups that would shed a lot of light on why exactly we aren't welcome in some areas History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Late into my third trip we moved into an area of Iraq that had been largely untouched by CF since the invasion. It was known for being a collection of AQ hideouts but no units were willing to operate in such a remote area. When we started engaging all the locals to see what we could do for them to encourage them to help us they turned over basically everyone that had been on the target list in that area and avoiding capture for 3+ years. The target list was almost completely erased in under 2 months, they knew these people were there the whole time and wanted them out but were afraid to do anything on their own. They were thrilled to have us in the area, I honestly can't remember ever rolling into an area where the locals didn't want to help us and didn't like having us around. We have the ass to take care of the situations that the local IP's are hesitant to deal with themselves and we have the logistics to help better their situation. I'd venture to guess that the majority of those polls are taken right in the middl of Baghdad where AQ is making an effort to lash out at innocent civilians in an effort to turn them against us. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

I suppose you're referring to that? I guess you assume the poster's "temper tantrum" somehow involved relations with Iraqis? How do you know this? Did GQ fill you in privately? If not, then you're making a tall assumption that his "temper tantrum" affected our relationship with Iraq or Iraqis somehow. My point was that anyone can fuck up and then self correct. We've all done so but, as was said, it seems you and your young protege are making a lot of snap judgements from the safety and security of your comfy computer stations without knowing too many facts. I appreciate the effort but don't go out of your way to defend me, some people don't have the ability to comprehend how being deployed could possibly get under someones skin every once in a while. Remember, the stress of a classroom resembles combat better than any other job out there, including actually being in combat History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Kickin in the wrong door has nothing to do with being infantry, any MOS can be sent to the wrong objective. A properly trained police force? what constitutes that? I know you have a military background and have been around long enough to know better than that. Regardless of how lightly we want to tread when conducting operations the fact still remains that we are in combat and when you're moving into a village that's known for being an AQ stronghold even if you are just going to try to apprehend one person you still send a unit with enough ass to handle anything that can pop up. What leads you to believe that a "properly trained police force" makes better assessments also? that's starting to sound like the kind of statements often made by the armchair QB's that have never seen combat but insist they know exactly how every situation should have been handled, I know you have more experience than that. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Of course. A provocative dick is saying something you don't want to hear. But the right to free speech, fortunately, does not depend on who is a "dick" and who is a hero. Everyone gets free time. But tresspassing is not a right, and even if they are pathetic threats of placing a recruiter in a birdcage it is still a "threat" and they have no right do that. Protesting outside the recruiting station is one thing, but setting foot in the station to cause trouble is biting off more than you can chew. If you are asked to leave and refuse the put up a fight when they try and remove you a few bumps, bruises, and cracked ribs are your own fault. And no you are not a hero, you're a jackass. I guarantee that all the recruiters in that town have already gotten directions from the CO of that recruiting battalion telling them how to handle themselves with protestors simply acting like idiots, but once they cross the line into getting physical inside the station the recruiters have the same right anyone else has to defend themselves. If someone just walked up on your property protesting you and threatening to drag you off your property and lock you up would ou simply ignore them Bill? Or would you make an attempt to defend yourself? History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

we have gone from a "how many died today" type reporting to nealy no reportingQuote the "how many died today" type of reporting only worked to hurt our efforts in Iraq. Counting casualties is no way to determine the success or failure of an operation. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

The BBC has also recently published a survey to mark the war's fifth birthday. Full report at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/...raqpollmarch2008.pdf and summary at http://news.bbc.co.uk/...dle_east/7299569.stm Quote I don't put much weight in the complaints of the Sunnis, they have no one to blame for their small amount of activity in the new government but themselves. when the governemnt was first stood up they refused to take part because they were no longer in power, they acted like little 10 year olds who didn't get their way so they took all their toys home from the sandbox. And now they are trying to elbow their way back in because they've realized that if they don't play nice with others they get nothing but they are having trouble doing so because all the parties have already been put in place. They are one of the minorities in Iraq and have to accept that fact and learn to play nice or they'll never get anywhere. And honestly, most of the time when you hear their reason for being unhappy with the way things are going its hard to take them seriously. Once again it sound like a child crying about not getting their way anymore. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Hahahaha, that's fuckin funny, we had all of those hanging up in our ops room on this last deployment, they were my motivation to NOT be like that Of course I almost turned into the FOBBIT when I was grounded from going on missions for two weeks cause I threw a temper tantrum and punched out a couple windows I still have the pic of what it did to my hand! History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Not that I wouldn't mind plucking the fucker's eyes out with toenail clippers. Quote Nah, Vlad the Impaler had it right History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

The fundamental flaw with expecting 11B's to be able to control any area in Iraq is they simply dont have the training, cultural awareness or language skills to do so properly. Soldiers shouldn't need those skills however they are fundamental to a Police Force. Quote I have to disagree with you on that, the basic "policing actions" needed to deal with the violence and key AQ figures in the area are easily handled by the 11B's. Language training is something that very few throughout the military possess, on my last team we only had two arabic speakers and we got along fine, every unit out there has terps to handle that part. The cultural awareness training has improved by leaps and bounds in the last few years, so for day to day interations with locals the 11B's are on par with anyone else. And when it comes to dealing with issues at a village or tribe level, the "hearts and minds" aspect of it, CA plays a big part and the infantry officers responsible for that area have the diplomatic skills to keep things moving in the right direction. For the threat level we deal with over their you wouldn't want anyone but the infantry going out in the villages to deal with whats going on out there. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Not at all. I've been making an active attempt to not hijack threads if at all possible. The topic of discussion and the topic of the thread were sufficiently different to justify the new thread, IMO. I guess I can understand that, nevermind then History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

You seem to have a hard time understanding what people are trying to imply in their posts and try to make things mean something other than what they were supposed to, or you just intentionally overlook it so you can further your own argument. Either way starting an entire thread just so you can publicize your argument with one poster is a bit childish wouldn't you say? History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Somewhwere my mom has a pic of me nekkid with the pistols/gun belt and cowboy boots. Quote Strange there's plenty of pics like that of me floating around too, only mine are really recent History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

edit: As it happens, I was out there around that time too; doing my old job. And it was quite the opposite of a REMF. Now now vortex, we don't call them REMF's anymore, they're FOBITs History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Or how about when a chick shows you really attractive photos on an online dating site, then when you meet her in person, you find those photos were taken forty pounds earlier? or how about almost every girl I've ever slept with who claims I'm only the third person they've ever slept with? On that same note, I'd like to know who those other two guys are that keep beating me to the punch, if I could get one step ahead of them I'd be rolling in virgins History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Sending them unnecessarily in harm's way is not a good way to support and honor them, though. Quote Off in the distance Kallend wintesses a thread being posted in support of soldiers, he quickly grabs his laptop and dashes to the nearest starbucks to pull everyone in a happy place down into his dark world, how dare they have a positive outlook on something, they need to be set straight. This thread had nothing to with politics Kallend, there are good people out there in the worst of places, please do us all a favor and resist the urge to taint it. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

I would like to know HOW the hell a political discussion area on a Skydiving site.. continually draws so many fucking right wing wuffo fucknuggets Its like there is a right wing stink that draws them here buzzing around and annoying us or something Quote Cause the bitching, whining and temper tantrums of the left are so much less annoying. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

You're so easy!Quote ddduuuuuhhhhhhhhhh History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Kid volunteered for his third tour, you donn't know how many I have seen trying to get out of their second, or even first. why can't we have more guys like him? History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dems cater to the "poor me" groups, the ones that feel that the rich are obligated to support them. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower

I think it's called a change of lifestyle discharge, I've always heard the stories but never witnessed it happening. Either way, much respect to that guy for stepping up to his comittment, all the turds trying to duck out of combat could stand to learn a lesson from him. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. --Dwight D. Eisenhower