Military Training

[Marblehead]

One of the other medics I deployed with recently killed himself. We are constantly shown suicide prevention videos and power points, because of the rising numbers. A few months ago we had to have a "stand down" from training because the month prior had the highest suicide rate in the entire history of the military.

 

I suggest you just leave the topic alone, since you don't actually know what you're talking about anymore, being retired.

 

No, I will not leave the topic alone and I will not allow others here to speak negatively about my military and its personnel.

 

If a person commits suicide it is their fault, not the military's. If they can;t handle the pressure they never should have joined in the first place. That is why I am so much against the all-voluntary military. Many of those who enlist are not of the best quality, you know. All the serivces had to cut back on qualifications in order to get enough people to join. Even when I was still active I saw my prefession being reduced to something an eighth grader could do. So sad.

 

So don't be blaming the military for the weakness of individuals. Blame the individual. I fyou can't take the heat stay the f*** away from the fire.

 

Peace & Love!

[ralis]

Here is part of my argument backed up by facts.

 

http://luis.impa.br/guerra/nuremberg.html

 

Bush and America's Willing Executioners Would Be Guilty at Nuremburg

 

By Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman

 

If he launches an attack on Iraq without the approval of the United Nations Security Council, George W. Bush will be guilty of crimes on par with those committed by the infamous Nazi leaders who were tried at Nuremburg in 1948, after World War II.

 

The law is clear. At Nuremburg, American, British, French and Soviet jurists used international conventions, legal precedent and a global moral consensus to establish a code of conduct deemed the standard for all nations.

 

Key was the "crimes against humanity" prohibition stemming from the conscious slaughter of six million Jews, leftists, gypsies and others by the Nazi fanatics.

 

But also crucial was the ban on unprovoked attack by one nation against another. The explosive fuse that set off World War II was the September 1,1939 Nazi attack on Poland, which was unprovoked by any stretch of the military imagination. By all accounts it was an act of aggression and conquest, which led ultimately to as many as 50 million deaths over the next six years.

 

Article VI of the Nuremburg Charter defines "Crimes Against Peace" as "planning, preparation, initiation or waging of war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties . . . or participation in a common plan or conspiracy . . . to wage an aggressive war.

 

A week before the unprovoked Nazi assault on Poland, Hitler promised his generals he would provide "a propagandistic reason for starting the war". He then justified a "preemptive" strike based on lies about a non-existent Polish Army attack against Germany.

 

The Nazi attack date had been set for more than a year. "The victor will not be asked afterwards whether he told the truth or not," Hitler told his generals. "In starting and waging a war it is not right that matters, but victory."

 

After Hitler's deceptions were revealed at Nuremburg, the surviving Nazis based their defense on the claim of "preventative war," claiming a need to protect Germany from a pending Polish attack. They were the last, until Bush, to use that rationale.

 

It didn't work. For this attack, ranking Nazi commandants, starting with Hermann Goering, Hitler's Number Two, were convicted and sentenced to death. That charge and that alone was deemed sufficient to warrant hanging.

 

Unless Saddam Hussein launches an attack on the United States very soon, any American attack on Iraq without UN approval would be on a legal par with the Nazi attack on Poland.

 

A key US argument, that Iraq was somehow linked to the September 11 terror attacks, has been definitively dismissed. In the eighteen months since, all credible evidence points to intense hostility rather than cooperation between Al Qaida and Saddam Hussein. Colin Powell, arguing in front of the UN, failed to prove any cooperative connection.

 

Iraq has been ordered to disarm by the United Nations, whose legal legitimacy was essential to the 1991 campaign that drove Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait.

 

Thus far, there is no United Nations consensus that the Iraqis have definitively failed to comply with the terms of that defeat to an extent that would justify a renewed military attack, one that would inevitably involve civilian casualties.

 

With no claim to having been attacked, George W. Bush has instead argued that his war on Iraq would be "preemptive," meant to prevent Saddam from launching a future war. But Iraq has not attacked anyone in more than 12 years and two-thirds of the country is under a no-fly zone. Thus Bush is merely resurrecting the preventative war doctrine invoked by the Nazis before their Nuremburg hanging.

 

In 1953 President Dwight Eisenhower, the former Supreme Allied Commander, dismissed the idea of a preventative war against the Soviet Union. "All of us have heard this term 'preventive war' since the earliest days of Hitler," he said. "I don't believe there is such a thing; and, frankly, I wouldn't even listen to anyone seriously that came in and talked about such a thing."

 

George W. Bush has now added to the list of pre-war demands a "regime change" by which Saddam Hussein would give up power. Bush then proposes rebuilding Iraq along democratic lines.

 

But Nazi functionaries at Nuremburg also received stiff sentences for approving essentially the same totalitarian statutes that now appear in the Homeland Security, Patriot I and Patriot II Acts authorizing secret arrest, detention and "disappearances" of American citizens without legal recourse or public notification. At Nuremburg, such laws were recognized as a form of state terror.

 

The embrace of such laws in America casts serious doubt on the Bush Administration's real willingness to install democracy anywhere else.

 

When the Nazis attacked Poland in 1939, no one envisioned that just eight years later Germany would be leveled and its all-powerful reichmarshalls would be tried and sentenced under international law.

 

Such a vision seems less far fetched today. America's current military might has prompted the Bush Administration to frame its proposed war in terms of a "crusade" against "evil." But military action against Iraq is guaranteed to inflame the passions of 1.2 billion Muslims. The proposed war is explicitly opposed by the Pope. International support is extremely limited. The US itself is deeply divided, with its economy in serious trouble.

 

The diplomatic campaign for this attack has been handled with all the wisdom and foresight of madmen lighting matches in a room full of gasoline. There is no reason to expect a military campaign would be handled any better.

 

It is clear from the precedents at Nuremburg that any American attack on Iraq without United Nations approval would be illegal under international law. It is also clear that the inevitable civilian casualties resulting from such an attack would qualify as crimes against humanity.

 

And sooner or later, the American perpetrators of such an attack and related crimes might well find themselves standing trial before some sort of Nuremburg-style international tribunal.

 

Given such circumstances, the guilt of George W. Bush will not be in doubt. But the guilt of subordinates giving supporting orders, and of soldiers and functionaries carrying them out, will also be a given.

 

The Nuremburg court, including its American judges, repeatedly ruled that those who "only followed orders" in committing atrocities were guilty of crimes against humanity.

 

Those willing Americans executioners who "only follow orders" in perpetrating this illegal attack on Iraq should understand that they stand to be found just as guilty as the ones giving those orders.

 

And that one way or another, sooner or later, that guilt will demand payment.

Edited August 20, 2010 by ralis

[Marblehead]

Oh, agreed!!! My sincere apologies to sensible Muslims, who are most cetainly in the majority! I truly did not intend to tar the entire population with the brush that rightfully applies to only a small group. My point, though, is that this small group has existed since Day One and that they find their own justification directly within the Koran & Hadith.

 

Yes, your post were valid. And I know that we oftentime gereralize when speaking but I just think it is unfair to generalize regarding things like this. Not all Germans were Nazis. Many Germans hated the Nazis. But most could do nothing about it because it was the Nazis who had the guns and the license to kill.

 

Peace & Love!

[Marblehead]

I don't care what organization sanctions it. It is still illegal!

 

 

ralis

 

 

Hehehe. Okay. That's an opinion. And believe it or not, I agree with you. But reality kicks me in the butt and I sometimes have to throw my opinion aside for a while.

 

Peace & Love!

[Maddie]

And that one way or another, sooner or later, that guilt will demand payment.

 

 

Which is what I was pondering in our national karmaic debt? I wonder how this will play out for the United States when this karma bill comes in the mail.

[Marblehead]

Here is part of my argument backed up by facts.

 

I have no arguement with what you have said about Iraq.

 

The beginning of the Vietnam War was basically the same stupidity and illegality.

 

Peace & Love!

[Brian]

...

[Marblehead]

Which is what I was pondering in our national karmaic debt? I wonder how this will play out for the United States when this karma bill comes in the mail.

 

Actually, I am not looking forward to this. Both Vietnam and Iraq were very bad wars for the US. And Yes, I think we are already paying.

 

Peace & Love!

[Aetherous]

Edit: once again I'll attempt to leave this topic alone.

Edited August 20, 2010 by Scotty

[voidisyinyang]

Sorry! Didn't mean to ignore your point! (Seriously! I had intended ot add a second paragraph and then, well... Just forgot. :%)

 

I think there is a good bit of validity to what you are saying here! Not sure if "kharma" is really the right word but it seems pretty close -- motivations shine through and affect future interactions either positively or negatively. The US entered that war primarily because it was dragged into it by economic forces (and by Germany's blunder of asking Mexico to invade the US and then foolishly allowing the letter making this request to fall into the hands of a US newspaper, thereby forcing Roosevelt's hand) but then claimed moral high ground, while Germany's motivations were totally transparent and (in addition to the attrocities committed) these motivations influenced the treatment of Germany after the war.

 

The US should never have invaded Iraq or Afganistan while claiming it was in self-defense (regardless of the veracity of WMD claims or Taliban training camps) and much of the world reacted badly to that.

 

If you want to learn about the background to World War Two -- why the U.S. entered -- then read this book

 

http://www.picknettprince.com/books/friendlyfire/friendly.htm

 

Friendly Fire (2004) strips away the wartime propaganda that seamlessly became accepted 'fact', revealing the intrigue and treachery between - and within - the nations that were ostensibly on the same side, the Allies of the Second World War.

 

Incredibly, the administration of American President Franklin D. Roosevelt actively encouraged the conflict between Britain and Germany, while the relations between Britain and America were characterised by suspicion, mistrust and a struggle for post-war supremacy.

[Marblehead]

Marblehead, you've officially pissed me off.

 

Hehehe. It's not the first time and it probably won't be the last.

 

We both have our opinions. Mine are just as valid as yours are. And, of course, your are just as valid as mine are. We just don't agree all the time. Sometimes I don't even agree with myself. Oh, I also piss myself off sometimes so don't feel too special because you are by far not the first to be pissed off by me.

 

But really, you shouldn't allow discussions such as this to become personal. That is a flaw.

 

Peace & Love!

[voidisyinyang]

Here is part of my argument backed up by facts.

 

http://luis.impa.br/guerra/nuremberg.html

 

Bush and America's Willing Executioners Would Be Guilty at Nuremburg

 

By Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman

 

If he launches an attack on Iraq without the approval of the United Nations Security Council, George W. Bush will be guilty of crimes on par with those committed by the infamous Nazi leaders who were tried at Nuremburg in 1948, after World War II.

 

The law is clear. At Nuremburg, American, British, French and Soviet jurists used international conventions, legal precedent and a global moral consensus to establish a code of conduct deemed the standard for all nations.

 

Key was the "crimes against humanity" prohibition stemming from the conscious slaughter of six million Jews, leftists, gypsies and others by the Nazi fanatics.

 

But also crucial was the ban on unprovoked attack by one nation against another. The explosive fuse that set off World War II was the September 1,1939 Nazi attack on Poland, which was unprovoked by any stretch of the military imagination. By all accounts it was an act of aggression and conquest, which led ultimately to as many as 50 million deaths over the next six years.

 

Article VI of the Nuremburg Charter defines "Crimes Against Peace" as "planning, preparation, initiation or waging of war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties . . . or participation in a common plan or conspiracy . . . to wage an aggressive war.

 

A week before the unprovoked Nazi assault on Poland, Hitler promised his generals he would provide "a propagandistic reason for starting the war". He then justified a "preemptive" strike based on lies about a non-existent Polish Army attack against Germany.

 

The Nazi attack date had been set for more than a year. "The victor will not be asked afterwards whether he told the truth or not," Hitler told his generals. "In starting and waging a war it is not right that matters, but victory."

 

After Hitler's deceptions were revealed at Nuremburg, the surviving Nazis based their defense on the claim of "preventative war," claiming a need to protect Germany from a pending Polish attack. They were the last, until Bush, to use that rationale.

 

It didn't work. For this attack, ranking Nazi commandants, starting with Hermann Goering, Hitler's Number Two, were convicted and sentenced to death. That charge and that alone was deemed sufficient to warrant hanging.

 

Unless Saddam Hussein launches an attack on the United States very soon, any American attack on Iraq without UN approval would be on a legal par with the Nazi attack on Poland.

 

A key US argument, that Iraq was somehow linked to the September 11 terror attacks, has been definitively dismissed. In the eighteen months since, all credible evidence points to intense hostility rather than cooperation between Al Qaida and Saddam Hussein. Colin Powell, arguing in front of the UN, failed to prove any cooperative connection.

 

Iraq has been ordered to disarm by the United Nations, whose legal legitimacy was essential to the 1991 campaign that drove Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait.

 

Thus far, there is no United Nations consensus that the Iraqis have definitively failed to comply with the terms of that defeat to an extent that would justify a renewed military attack, one that would inevitably involve civilian casualties.

 

With no claim to having been attacked, George W. Bush has instead argued that his war on Iraq would be "preemptive," meant to prevent Saddam from launching a future war. But Iraq has not attacked anyone in more than 12 years and two-thirds of the country is under a no-fly zone. Thus Bush is merely resurrecting the preventative war doctrine invoked by the Nazis before their Nuremburg hanging.

 

In 1953 President Dwight Eisenhower, the former Supreme Allied Commander, dismissed the idea of a preventative war against the Soviet Union. "All of us have heard this term 'preventive war' since the earliest days of Hitler," he said. "I don't believe there is such a thing; and, frankly, I wouldn't even listen to anyone seriously that came in and talked about such a thing."

 

George W. Bush has now added to the list of pre-war demands a "regime change" by which Saddam Hussein would give up power. Bush then proposes rebuilding Iraq along democratic lines.

 

But Nazi functionaries at Nuremburg also received stiff sentences for approving essentially the same totalitarian statutes that now appear in the Homeland Security, Patriot I and Patriot II Acts authorizing secret arrest, detention and "disappearances" of American citizens without legal recourse or public notification. At Nuremburg, such laws were recognized as a form of state terror.

 

The embrace of such laws in America casts serious doubt on the Bush Administration's real willingness to install democracy anywhere else.

 

When the Nazis attacked Poland in 1939, no one envisioned that just eight years later Germany would be leveled and its all-powerful reichmarshalls would be tried and sentenced under international law.

 

Such a vision seems less far fetched today. America's current military might has prompted the Bush Administration to frame its proposed war in terms of a "crusade" against "evil." But military action against Iraq is guaranteed to inflame the passions of 1.2 billion Muslims. The proposed war is explicitly opposed by the Pope. International support is extremely limited. The US itself is deeply divided, with its economy in serious trouble.

 

The diplomatic campaign for this attack has been handled with all the wisdom and foresight of madmen lighting matches in a room full of gasoline. There is no reason to expect a military campaign would be handled any better.

 

It is clear from the precedents at Nuremburg that any American attack on Iraq without United Nations approval would be illegal under international law. It is also clear that the inevitable civilian casualties resulting from such an attack would qualify as crimes against humanity.

 

And sooner or later, the American perpetrators of such an attack and related crimes might well find themselves standing trial before some sort of Nuremburg-style international tribunal.

 

Given such circumstances, the guilt of George W. Bush will not be in doubt. But the guilt of subordinates giving supporting orders, and of soldiers and functionaries carrying them out, will also be a given.

 

The Nuremburg court, including its American judges, repeatedly ruled that those who "only followed orders" in committing atrocities were guilty of crimes against humanity.

 

Those willing Americans executioners who "only follow orders" in perpetrating this illegal attack on Iraq should understand that they stand to be found just as guilty as the ones giving those orders.

 

And that one way or another, sooner or later, that guilt will demand payment.

 

 

Ralis this is obviously true - but keep in mind that Nuremberg itself was set up -- the legal framework -- was set up BEFORE WWII -- after World War One - by the uncle of the Dulles brothers -- Robert Lansing, Secretary of State -- to favor the Germans backing and funding the genocide of the Armenians by the Turks:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Splendid-Blond-Beast-Genocide-Twentieth/dp/1567510620

 

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Genocide/Splendid_Blond_Beast.html

 

p20

War crimes and crimes against humanity thus emerged at the Paris Conference as a pivotal issue, both in symbolic and practical terms. This was more than simply as important judicial matter; it became a focus of a wide-ranging debate over what sort of society Europe would build in the wake of the war [WW I].

p23

Edward House, presidential advisor about Secretary of State Robert Lansing

"He believes that almost any form of atrocity is permissible provided a nation's safety is involved."

When House asked Lansing who should best determine the level of atrocity appropriate to protect the nation, Lansing replied, "the military authorities of the nation committing the atrocities." Thus, the leaders of the armed forces accused of committing a crime should be the final judge of whether the act was justified in the interests of the nation.

p25

International law [secretary of State Robert Lansing contended] regulated relations among nations; it had no jurisdiction over what a state chooses to do to its own people.

 

Originally, a second international trial at Nuremberg was to focus primarily on the activities of German finance and industry during the Third Reich. The "industrialists trial," as it was called at the time, was widely regarded as of equal importance to the prosecution of the Nazi and SS high command. Hermann Abs and other major bankers were important targets, at least judging from the recommendations made by U.S. war crimes investigators at the time.

But Justice Jackson vetoed this plan, declaring in the autumn of 1945 that the United States would refuse to participate in any further international trials of German defendants and would instead hold separate prosecutions on its own. These trials became the "Subsequent Proceedings" organized under the leadership of General Telford Taylor.

... Taylor's three U.S. trials of [of German] industrialists lasted slightly more than a year altogether, resulting in nineteen convictions and fourteen acquittals. The U.S. judges tended to be hostile to the prosecution, particularly in the Friedrich Flick case. The court "was apparently unable to feel that offenses by industrialists fell into as severe a category as when committed by a common man," as noted legal historian John Alan Appleman put it.

Flick's successful defense depended directly on the social dynamics of international law and of genocide. Flick beat all but one of the slave labor and plunder charges, because three prominent U.S. judges concluded that the director and owner of a corporation should not be held accountable for slavery and looting by his companies, unless the prosecution could prove that he personally ordered each particular crime to be carried out. Without proof of that type, every bit of ambiguous evidence had to be interpreted by the court in favor of the individual defendants, namely Flick and his circle of executives.

Worse, the Flick case established a legal precedent for a corporate defense of "necessity"-a close cousin to the defense of acting under orders-that went beyond even what Flick had argued on his own behalf and that contradicted many aspects of the earlier ruling on this issue by the International Military Tribunal. Amazingly, the legal precedent left by this series of trials seems to be that a nineteen-year-old draftee accused of war crimes cannot successfully plead that he was acting under orders, but the owners and directors of multi-billion-dollar companies can.

Edited August 20, 2010 by drewhempel

[Brian]

...

[Brian]

...

[voidisyinyang]

I've done quite a bit of research on the topic, actually, and I've found that most books on the subject (well, every one I've picked up, actually) are either intentional distortions or unintentional parroting combined with superficial research. I have't read THAT one, though, so I'll have to add it to my list!

 

(FWIW, the coverage of the US Civil War is even worse!!!)

 

The Civil War was because the industrialists of the North created tariffs against British machine imports and so the British in retaliation created tariffs against Southern U.S. exports.

[Brian]

...

[Aetherous]

wwwoooooossaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhh... Edited August 20, 2010 by Scotty

[mantis]

Glad to see not everyone in this thread is a peace love and happiness-esque hippie

 

Master Nan Huai-Chin

 

Nan studied social welfare at Jinling University (now merged with Nanjing University) and later went on to teach at the Central Military Academy in Nanjing. In the late 1930s at age 21 years of age, Master Nan became a military commander at the border regions of Sichuan, Xikang, and Yunnan during the Second Sino-Japanese War.[3] There, he lead a local group of 30,000 men against the Japanese invasion.[4]

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nan_Huai-Chin#Early_life_and_military_career

 

An enlightened Buddhist master, who would've thought!!

[The Observer]

Don't join the military with ideals of spiritual advancement. All "govern-ments" going back to the rise of civilization have been corrupt, materialistic and blood thirsty...just do your research on who's really at the top of the pyramid and come to your own conclusions.

Edited August 20, 2010 by The Observer

[Marblehead]

 

 

wwwoooooossaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhh...

 

Yes, I did see the personal insult before you deleted it. Sad that you had to get that low.

 

And yes, I think that killing civilians without just cause is criminal. It is these kind of actions that cause so much negativity toward the military.

 

So you go ahead and think that what you and your team did was within regulation but I will assure you that in the eyes of the people you killed you were very wrong for being on their property destroying their land. That is why they went out to chase you away.

 

Peace & Love!

[mantis]

Don't join the military with ideals of spiritual advancement. All "govern-ments" going back to the rise of civilization have been corrupt, materialistic and blood thirsty...just do your research on who's really at the top of the pyramid and come to your own conclusions.

 

You're right, I'm sure we where all better off when we where clubbing ourselves to death for no real reason.

[Marblehead]

Glad to see not everyone in this thread is a peace love and happiness-esque hippie

 

Master Nan Huai-Chin

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nan_Huai-Chin#Early_life_and_military_career

 

An enlightened Buddhist master, who would've thought!!

 

Thanks for the relief.

 

Peace & Love!

[Marblehead]

You're right, I'm sure we where all better off when we where clubbing ourselves to death for no real reason.

 

That is so ironic, isn't it?

 

Peace & Love!

[Aetherous]

Edited August 23, 2010 by Scotty

[Marblehead]

What? Calling you a civilian? That's what I consider someone who is at no risk for deploying, and who wants to debate about the military. I don't care about your veteran status.

 

And I don't give a fuck if I'm banned for this. That would be good, because I need a breather from this topic.

 

The reason I deleted it was because I'm trying to live a life where I don't get so angry...where discussions on the military don't bother me so much. I'm also trying to get over being so pissed at you for insulting the honor of my dead friend, but it might take a while.

 

I agree that it was wrong, but to the military it was actually right. Our higher ups gave us a wink and a pat on the back. The Apaches that flew over us to assess the damage congratulated us. Everyone on the mission was happy and thirsty for more.

 

This was my whole point in the first place...the military isn't a good organization, and the soldiers aren't any good either.

 

Okay Scotty,

 

First of all I DO NOT want you to get banned. In my opinion there is no reason for any such action. We got into an emotional discussion and you were having problems dealing with it.

 

It doesn't matter to me one way or another if you respect my veteran status. I am very proud of my service and I never intentionally wronged anyone in any country where I was stationed.

 

Yes, you should find a way to deal with your anger. It will eat up your insides and I am speaking from experience.

 

I am very sorry that you lost a friend over there (or wherever). And I can understand your anger. But I do not accept it. I will not accept it.

 

I have lost friends too so I know what it is like. But that doesn't change anything for those of us who made it through a combat deployment. We have a life to live and we need to let go of those things that are eating us up from the inside out.

 

That is one of the reasons for the suicides the Drew was talking about. They didn't know how to let it go and get on with their life.

 

And I know that the culture of killing is becoming much more acceptable, not only in the military but in civilian life as well. People don't respect themselves so they have no respect for others either. It is sad that you had to go through all that but it is now history and that's not where you need to live your live.

 

But I will still defend the military services of my nation and that is just the way it is. But you need to be right for me to defend you. I will not defend what I feel is wrong.

 

And it is okay if you are pissed off at me. I caused you bad and negative memories. It wasn't my intention but merely part of this entire discussion.

 

But after all is said and done I still wish you:

 

Peace & Love!