Mandatory reading, if you have the stomach for it.
The New York Times found 121 cases in which veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan committed a killing in this country, or were charged with one, after their return from war. In many of those cases, combat trauma and the stress of deployment — along with alcohol abuse, family discord and other attendant problems — appear to have set the stage for a tragedy that was part destruction, part self-destruction.
Three-quarters of these veterans were still in the military at the time of the killing. More than half the killings involved guns, and the rest were stabbings, beatings, strangulations and bathtub drownings. Twenty-five offenders faced murder, manslaughter or homicide charges for fatal car crashes resulting from drunken, reckless or suicidal driving.
About a third of the victims were spouses, girlfriends, children or other relatives, among them 2-year-old Krisiauna Calaira Lewis, whose 20-year-old father slammed her against a wall when he was recuperating in Texas from a bombing near Falluja that blew off his foot and shook up his brain.
A quarter of the victims were fellow service members, including Specialist Richard Davis of the Army, who was stabbed repeatedly and then set ablaze, his body hidden in the woods by fellow soldiers a day after they all returned from Iraq.
All this and no WMD…no link to 9/11.
oh, dammit. The destruction goes on and on.
There was a story in Saturday’s NYT on killings of fellow servicemen by army vets in Colorado Springs.
It’s spelled “Killing.”
.
“There is no doubt in my mind that we will succeed. There is no doubt in my mind that when history is written, the final page will say, ‘Victory was achieved by the United States of America for the good of the world’.”
US Military Deaths in Iraq at 3,922, and the fighting goes on. Total number Iraqi deaths from invasion in March 2003 through June 2006 in IFHS Study: 151,000 deaths
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
The perpetual question: puppet or delusional?
A delusional puppet, perhaps. A horse’s ass, definitely.
In any case, why this sudden concern for history?
‘History, I don’t know. We’ll all be dead.’
My immediate reaction was of the Killitary controversy that flared up over the summer. The diarist used terms like “mass murderers” and “serial killers” so it’s a little different language, but the thesis is the same: There seems to be a much higher rate of violent behavior among Iraq veterans. And here are two responses for those who jump immediately from that to “you hate the troops”:
In short, it gets laid at the feet of those who claim loudest to support our men and women in uniform.
Have you ever smelled the aroma of burning flesh? Have you ever seen the partially decapitated body of a piece of collateral damage? Have you ever watched as youe “team members” ransacked the home of a family in the middle of the night and taken away a member of that family? Have you ever really wayched the faces of the men and women right after they have returned from one of their “patrols” in a war zone?
Well, witnessing that and then reading your posting seems so consequential that I am shocked that anyone doesn’t see the connect. This is one of the leading products of a neverending war. This is simply the beginning of the coming plague.
And yet, there is no true active anti-war structure and there is no true congressional support for an end to this horror. And, when one of the leading candidates for the presidency says publically that he has no reservations about a US military presence in Iraq for a hundred years, where is the outcry?
Puleeeeeeez, Its Superbowl time! Its “pay the Christmas Bills” time! Its the “what new pharma product time”! Its the “what new SUV” time! Its the “my vote doesn’t count”time!
So, why the surprise? Whats a 121 Vet Killings in a population of 300 million? Big Deal!
I was thinking the very same thing, Bill. If only they-the ones not familiar to the consequences of war- could only experience one day of war at it’s highest!
One would simply be sickened to the core of ones’ soul.
I am not surprised at this. This very same thing happens after vets return from war….. Only the ones who are not familiar with shit, as it happens, are surprised. Those of us who have experienced this well, we are not at all surprised. The smell of blood or a crispy critter or the puke from ones own body is illuminating as to the stench of war, let alone the loss of friends or the stench of said circumstances. The simple feeling of helplessness and hopelessness Plain and simple as it is. Vets never get the rehab to migrate back to the normal living of life…NEVER!!!!! They do not simply have the support system that is required to bypass the bad horrors of war or the recurrent thoughts of said war. Oh, Bill I could go on and on. I do understand.