Category Archives: Wall of Shame

Yet another reason to bring them home TODAY!

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  By Bouhammer | December 12, 2012 - 6:56 pm | , , , ,
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The draft handbook offers a list of “taboo conversation topics” that soldiers should avoid, including “making derogatory comments about the Taliban,” “advocating women’s rights,” “any criticism of pedophilia,” “directing any criticism toward Afghans,” “mentioning homosexuality and homosexual conduct” or “anything related to Islam,” according to the Journal.

Yes there is a new handbook being considered for our soldiers in Afghanistan that tells them to ignore some of the most basic human rights and values we as a sane western society adhere to, pedophilia.

I have written about this and many other atrocities conducted by the Afghan security forces that our soldiers have to deal with and struggle with in how to react. Now the Center for Army Lessons Learned has seriously drafted a handbook telling soldiers that speaking up about these and other “taboo” things in the Afghan lifestyle is why the forces we have been embedded with for 10 years are all of a sudden turning on us an trying to kill us.

The draft of the newest Army handbook seems to suggest that ignorance of Afghan culture is to blame for deadly attacks by Afghan soldiers against the coalition forces, according to The Wall Street Journal, which got a peek at the 75-page document. But its message of walking on eggshells around the locals is not going over well with U.S. Marine Gen. John Allen, the top military commander in Afghanistan.

Do they think our soldiers just recently started these practices? I was there FIVE years ago and I admonished Afghan soldiers for homosexual acts and drug use on missions, beastiality, and pedophilia among many other acts of indecency and unprofessionalism. There were green on blue acts back then but DOD and ISAF were not tracking them. They didn’t officially start that until 2009. However I never felt threatened by an Afghan for talking to them about these things. They only time I or anyone on my team felt threatened is when we tried to correct an act by an Afghan which put the lives of US soldiers, Afghan soldiers, Afghan civilians at risk or compromised a mission. Not every time these things happened, but some times when they did.

I am encouraged to see that Gen. Allen thinks this handbook is crap too.

“Gen. Allen did not author, nor does he intend to provide, a foreword,” said Col. Tom Collins, a spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan. “He does not approve of its contents.

As long as he holds his ground and is not forced by the administration to allow this handbook then maybe there is a chance this will never see the light of day. Regardless this just shows how disconnected some senior leaders in our military have become, along with other “experts”.

Whoever authored this handbook and approved it, needs to have their teeth kicked in and then sent to Afghanistan to live among the locals for a few months. Then I would like to see how touchy-feely and PC they would like to be.

They next thing they are going to say is that we should not talk bad about, cuss out, or say anything derogatory about the Taliban as it may upset them and encourage them to try and kill us.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/12/12/proposed-army-manual-tells-gis-not-to-insult-taliban-speak-up-for-women/#ixzz2EssTkYCx

I guess DOD does not recognize OPSEC anymore.

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  By Bouhammer | September 24, 2012 - 12:13 am | , ,
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I wonder at what point did OPSEC get thrown in the trash in the interest of political fodder. Our fathers and grandfathers who have fought before us must be having fits or turning over in their graves for those who have left us.

We might as well be yelling to the enemy that they should attack now because we are the at the lowest level of combat readiness in two years.

 

Going out of his lane, way out of it

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  By Bouhammer | September 12, 2012 - 6:52 pm | , , ,
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In the military we have a saying “stay in your lane”. What it means is don’t stick your nose in someone else’s business. Stay in your lane and focus on doing your job and what is required of you, not worrying about someone else.

I have told my boys so many times that “if you worry about yourself as much as you worry about someone or something else then you would be squared away and never be in trouble.” In fact I have actually told many soldiers that too.

So here is an example of a guy who I have met and interviewed in person (and is someone I really liked and respected at one time) going way out of his lane….

The top U.S. military official has asked a Florida pastor to pull his support of an anti-Islam film that may have played a role in inciting protesters who attacked U.S. diplomatic posts in Libya and Egypt.

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, spoke with Terry Jones by phone Wednesday morning to voice his concerns.

“In the brief call, Gen Dempsey expressed his concerns over the nature of the film, the tensions it will inflame and the violence it will cause. He asked Mr. Jones to consider withdrawing his support for the film,” Pentagon spokesman Col. Dave Lapan said.

He is the friggen Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, so his focus should be on talking to the members of the military, DOD Civilians, Congress and the President…NOT a private citizen.

A couple of weeks ago he stepped out of his lane and out of line by saying former and retired military members should not be talking about politics. Apparently he missed the memo that said once your service is done you can say whatever the hell you want. Most in the military community chalked that up to him just trying to appease his boss, The President, and keep his job.

However calling this pastor has nothing, and I mean NOTHING to do with his job. If anyone, it should have been Secretary of State Clinton that made the call, not a military general.

In fact if as a Four-Star General he really believes the attacks yesterday have anything to do with some little film trailer on You Tube and not connected to the anniversary of 9/11, he needs to put his stars on the desk and walk out out the door, because he is not smart enough to have that job.

That pastor has every right guaranteed every American citizen to say what he wants. In fact he didn’t even make the film from what I understand, he is just supporting it. If idiots in this country can wear valorous medals and pretend to be war heroes and degenerate snot-nosed in-grateful hippies can walk on and burn the flag, and the Westboro Church inbreds are free to protest military funerals and spread hate, then I think this pastor can say whatever the hell he wants.

Like I said I liked and respected Martin “I think I am Frank Sinatra” Dempsey at one time. However over the last two weeks he is spoken out of his “fourth point of contact” just one too many times for me to have any more respect for this guy.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/12/joint-chiefs-chairman-urges-pastor-to-withdraw-support-anti-islam-film/#ixzz26IWKfNu7

Today’s Dumba$$ of the day Award

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  By Bouhammer | July 16, 2012 - 10:07 am | ,
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I hope I don’t have to do one of these a day, as that would be very depressing. But for today, this guy wins the Red Forman* Dumbass of the Day Award.

A Navy pathologist has been reassigned to an administrative position for letting his children handle the brain of a deceased Marine Corps sergeant while his wife took pictures in their home.

Read the whole story at http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2012/07/navy-marine-sergeant-brain-pathologist-kids-hold-brain-reassigned-071312w/

 

* Red Forman was the father figure in one of my favorite sitcoms, That 70′s Show, who made “Dumbass” a mainstream and half-acceptable word to say.

Why is the media afraid to call it like it is?

  By Bouhammer | May 11, 2012 - 3:58 pm | ,
2 Comments

I have watched a disturbing trend for a while and it has been eating away at me. At first I thought maybe it was just one biased, or inconsiderate editor, then I figured maybe it was just the stupid MSM not knowing what they were saying. However I have seen this trend happen so many times that I now realize this is intentional, but I am not sure why they are doing it.

Take a look at these headlines and story snippets

Marine killed in Afghanistan by person wearing Afghan army uniform

A Marine from Camp Pendleton has been killed in Afghanistan, fatally shot by someone wearing an Afghan army uniform, the Department of Defense announced Monday.

Sgt. John Huling, 25, of West Chester, Ohio, was killed Sunday in Helmand province. He was an explosive ordnance disposal technician assigned to the 7th Engineer Support Battalion, 1st Marine Logistics Group, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, from Camp Pendleton, Calif.

“The incident is under investigation,” the Department of Defense said.

The individual in the Afghan army uniform opened fire on U.S. troops in the Helmand province community of Marjah, a onetime Taliban stronghold.

Link to story at http://www.stripes.com/news/marine-corps/marine-killed-in-afghanistan-by-person-wearing-afghan-army-uniform-1.176619

Man wearing Afghan National Army uniform kills American soldier, official says

A man wearing an Afghan army uniform shot dead a U.S. service member in the east of the country, one of two NATO troops killed on Friday, military officials said. The Taliban took credit for the attack.

Also Friday, the U.S.-led military coalition offered condolences to the families of Afghan civilians who were killed in airstrikes earlier this month.

The shooting was the 15th incident this year in which Afghan soldiers or insurgents disguised in military uniforms have turned their weapons on foreign troops. The killings have increased the level of mistrust between the U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan partners

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/05/11/attacker-in-afghan-uniform-kills-nato-trooper/?test=latestnews#ixzz1uakuc7LA

What is even more disturbing that in a story about how the military is under-reporting these incidents, they still word things the same way.

The military is under-reporting the number of times that Afghan soldiers and police open fire on American and other foreign troops.

The U.S.-led coalition routinely reports each time an American or other foreign soldier is killed by an Afghan in uniform. But The Associated Press has learned it does not report insider attacks in which the Afghan wounds — or misses — his U.S. or allied target. It also doesn’t report the wounding of troops who were attacked alongside those who were killed.

Such attacks reveal a level of mistrust and ill will between the U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan counterparts in an increasingly unpopular war. The U.S. and its military partners are working more closely with Afghan troops in preparation for handing off security responsibility to them by the end of 2014.

In recent weeks an Afghan soldier opened fire on a group of American soldiers but missed the group entirely. The Americans quickly shot him to death. Not a word about this was reported by the International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF, as the coalition is formally known. It was disclosed to the AP by a U.S. official who was granted anonymity in order to give a fuller picture of the “insider” problem.

Read the story at: http://civiliancontractors.wordpress.com/tag/us-soldier-killed/

Do you see the trend that has been disturbing me? Every time an Afghan security force member turns on us or our coalition, they are not listed as Police member or Army soldier but as Afghan in Uniform or Someone wearing a uniform.

However the second one of our warriors is alleged to have done something like pose with bodies, pee on bodies or murder civilians they are called out, many times identified, convicted not only in the press but essentially by our military and civilian leadership who race to give apologies and tout they will “investigate and punish to the fullest extent of the law”.

Why is that? Why are our brave soldiers who lose it, snap, make bad judgments, or whatever essentially crucified in the public arena while the soldiers and police of Afghanistan are never held accountable and always referred to as some “Afghan” in a uniform.

I don’t like it, not one bit and it makes me hate the media that much more.

This is it, BRING OUR TROOPS HOME NOW!

  By Bouhammer | May 7, 2012 - 8:57 am | , , ,
14 Comments

I have had it, I have been pushed beyond any patience or consideration I could humanly posses for the policies and strategy in Afghanistan. I have been wanting to blog for several months that is is time time bring our troops home.

Afghanistan has had us in their country for over ten years and with US Forces (mostly Army National Guard) embedded with and mentoring, leading and teaching their forces right about 10 years now.

As I have stated many times on this blog and in interviews, we would need to be in Afghanistan until around 2020 for us to make a difference there. However now we have year after year of a more restrictive Rules of Engagement (ROE) being put on our forces, Afghan forces turning on our US and coalition forces and murdering them, and a military strategy that seems to be more about not offending people than killing the enemy. I was at a point where I was saying “that’s it, we are done”.

However, a story broke today that pushed me over the edge.

As part of an effort to quell violence and ensure peace with the Taliban, the United States for several years has been secretly releasing high-level prisoners from a military prison in Afghanistan.

According to the peace deal, insurgent commanders or local elders have promised to reduce violence, or cease fighting altogether, if certain insurgents are released from Parwan, The Washington Post reports.

However, the deal is a gamble as the freed detainees are generally notorious fighters who would not have been released under the legal system for military prisoners in Afghanistan.

U.S. officials have asked these prisoners to promise to give up violence, and if they are caught attacking American troops, they will be detained once again.

However, officials have not said that those who have been released under the program have later returned to attack U.S. and Afghan forces again.

The insurgents released through the secret program are the only detainees at Parwan who are able to circumvent the prison’s judicial review board.

The releases have come amid efforts to end the decade-long war through negotiation, which is a central feature of the Obama administration’s strategy for leaving Afghanistan.

Those efforts, however, have yielded little to no progress in recent years. In part, they have been stymied by the unwillingness of the United States to release five prisoners from Guantanamo Bay, a gesture that insurgent leaders say they see as a precondition for peace talks. (more…)

We would be glad to leave

  By Bouhammer | April 19, 2012 - 4:24 pm | ,
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The president of Afghanistan asked the United States to leave the country sooner following the publication of photos of soldiers posing with bodies.

President Hamid Karzai issued a statement Thursday calling the behavior shown in the photographs “inhumane and provocative,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

Karzai said he wants to see an “accelerated and full transition of security responsibilities to Afghan forces so Afghanistan can take over its own destiny, and thus no such things can be repeated by the foreign forces in Afghanistan.”

The Taliban also issued a statement Thursday, denouncing the “gruesome acts” depicted in the photos.

“Some Afghan hirelings … posed in the photos, at their masters’ orders, to scorn the remains of martyrs,” the statement said.

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2012/04/19/In-wake-of-photos-Karzai-asks-for-speedy-departure/UPI-11981334852352/#ixzz1sWHmDNlo

Hey Karzai (that is Pashto for douche), we would love to. But I think you would like to stay in power for longer than next week. Because if we were to leave tomorrow that is about as long as you would stay in power before being dismembered in public in a traffic circle in Kabul.

By the way, I have lots more to write about these photos that the LA Slime released. Look for that post soon.

So now we don’t trust our troops?

  By Bouhammer | March 14, 2012 - 9:43 am | , ,
5 Comments


In a sign of the nervousness surrounding Mr. Panetta’s trip, the Marines and other troops who were waiting in a tent for the defense secretary to speak were abruptly asked by their commander to get up, place their weapons — M-16 and M-4 automatic rifles and 9-mm pistols — outside the tent and then return unarmed. The commander, Sgt. Maj. Brandon Hall, told reporters he was acting on orders from superiors.

“All I know is, I was told to get the weapons out,” he said. Asked why, he replied, “Somebody got itchy, that’s all I’ve got to say. Somebody got itchy; we just adjust.”

So I wonder what DA civilian blowhard got the nervous tick and couldn’t trust the same troops who lay their lives on the line every day and have done it on multiple tours. I can maybe understand this for the President, but the SecDef is the boss of this troops. What an utter sign of disrespect for our young men and women.

Shame, Shame, Shame…

 

Read the whole story at http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/15/world/asia/panetta-visits-afghanistan-following-massacre.html

 

Apologizing

  By Bouhammer | March 13, 2012 - 10:01 am | ,
1 Comment

I feel for the families of these 16 Afghan people. I also feel for the families and friends of our soldiers who have been murdered.

I am sure leadership of this country also feels bad for the families, in fact I know they do. Secretary Panetta, Clinton and President Obama were tripping over each other to be the first to apologize to the people of Afghanistan.

Almost like President Karzai did to….oh wait, yeah he didn’t apologize once for any of the near 100 US service members killed by Afghan security forces since the start of this war. He definitely hasn’t done it in a public forum in the last couple of weeks. Instead he let the ignorant and ill-informed people of Afghanistan violently protest, destroy parts of his country and wound and kill Afghans and American soldiers for several days before he said a thing.

Joyriding or Theft?

  By Bouhammer | March 6, 2012 - 9:35 am | ,
1 Comment


Two Army vehicles equipped with highly classified technology used to jam deadly roadside bombs were stolen from under the noses of soldiers on a military base in Afghanistan.

The vehicles — both black up-armored Toyota Land Cruisers outfitted with life-saving CREW Duke electronic jamming systems — vanished in January from Camp Eggers in Kabul, according to a notice on Army Criminal Investigation Command’s website.

The vehicles would be “priceless” to an enemy, who might attempt to reverse-engineer the jammer or use the vehicles to launch a Trojan horse-style attack, said Christopher O’Gara, a former official with the national security division of the Defense Criminal Investigative Service and a retired Reserve colonel.

Oh this is just GREAT news, NOT! Of all the things to lose, they lose two DUKE systems and the vehicles they were in? On Camp Eggers of all places, which has almost as many field grade officers as the Pentagon. So which idiot didn’t lock up the keys?

Two key fobs that belonged to the vehicles were stolen from the supply room of the 26th Maneuver Enhancement Brigade, Base Support Group, on Jan. 7, and sometime between Jan. 7 and Jan. 8, both vehicles were stolen.

(more…)