The Tulsa Peace Fellowship's Counter-Recruitment Update/Digest, for April 2011

[Tony Nuspl]

Truth in Recruiting - "Don't Believe the Hype!"


Lead Story from the past month's news:
Amputations and genital injuries increase sharply among soldiers in Afghanistan

quote:
"I've seen these types of injuries before. What I haven't seen is them coming in over and over and over again."

~John B. Holcomb, a trauma surgeon at the University of Texas at Houston and retired Army colonel

page 1 stories:

file under: flyboys committing war crimes
NATO Kills Nine Children in Afghan Air Strike
--Provincial Police Say Children Were Collecting Firewood

quote:
“Finally we found the dead bodies. Some of the dead bodies were really badly chopped up by the rockets. The head of a child was missing. Others among the dead children were missing limbs. We tried to find the body pieces and put them together. As it was getting late, we brought down the bodies in a rope bed. We buried them in the village’s cemetery. The children were all from poor families; otherwise no one would send their sons up to the mountains despite the known threats from both insurgents and Americans.”
~Ashabuddin, a shopkeeper from Manogai, a nearby village, whose nephew Khalid was among those killed

file under: military solutions are really just more problems
Obama's Surge in Hostilities Leads to Record Civilian Deaths in 2010 Afghanistan
--Gen. David Petraeus blamed for high toll across the Central Asian Nation, due to over reliance on air power

file under: the reckoning for a president's foreign misadventure
Afghans protest over child deaths in NATO raid
--hundreds took to the streets of Kabul, burning an effigy of President Obama and condemning the air strikes.

featured op/ed
Dear Congress: Study War Some More
--contrary to the refrain of the iconic African-American spiritual, it makes sense for legislators responsible for it to study war

 

featured song/video of the month:
"Ain't Gonna STUDY WAR NO MORE"

featured op/ed
Army Mafia
by Ray McGovern, veteran CIA analyst with 27 years experience
--If the Mafia comparison strikes you as a tad over the top, perhaps a trip down memory lane may prove instructive.

file under: military censorship, or just CYA?
Marines Boot Social Media Pioneers From Afghanistan After Facebook Freakout

featured new documentary:
Louder Than a Bomb
--protest voices from America's youth

UPCOMING MOVIE at CIRCLE CINEMA, TULSA
		4/9-LOUDER THAN A BOMB

side bar:
Bomb specialist killed en route to disable an IED: another roadside bomb detonated unexpectedly
--Improvised Explosive Devices, or IEDs, are roadside bombs that are often deadly
--Dead soldier was active in JROTC in high school

file under: bringing the war home
Female GIs struggle with higher rate of divorce

file under: chronic pain suffered by soldiers
Weight Of War: Soldiers' Heavy Gear Packs On Pain

file under: militarization of immigration
The DREAM Act as Military Draft
--an op/ed piece by VAMOS Unidos Youth

facts & figures:
In December 2010, the bill was defeated 55–41 in the Senate. 

TPF comment: The failure of the legislation was not necessarily a bad thing, from a counter-recruitment perspective.

Page 2 stories

file under: what?! there are rules during wartime?
Soldier gets hard labor, discharge in Afghan war case
--convicted of beating a fellow soldier, while in Afghanistan

related story:
Soldier's murder trial may omit whistle-blower claim
--Army prosecutors want the murder trial to unfold without any mention the soldier once acted as a whistle-blower to try to expose such crimes.

file under: Clown 'Captain of the Enterprise'
Navy Officers Face Censure Over Lewd Videos on Carrier
--captain of the ship actually starred in the sexually-explicit entertainment; his career now ended

file under: ghouls in the military
Military Practice to Bury Heart and Brain Separately, 2 & 1/2 months later
--Valley family forced to bury their daughter twice

quote:
"Jan. 2 we got a call from the casualty officer wanting to know what we wanted to do with her heart and brain. I was devastated. I buried her thinking she was in one piece."
~Linda Gillam, grieving parent, after her daughter's death, and re-burial.

sidebar: follow up on tragedy on base
Court martial recommended for Fort Hood shooting suspect
--shooting spree at Army Base in Texas killed 13 people and wounded 32 others on November 5, 2009

file under: gays in the military
Sailor says Navy punishing him for sleepover with male sailor
--Petty Officer Stephen Jones says he fell asleep with another sailor while watching television

file under:  honoring the uniform, just a cover for taking bribes
U.S. Sailor is charged with espionage; he attempted to sell classified information
--22-year-old handed over documents in exchange for payments


Backpage stories

US Backs War Crime Tribunal for 1st Time
-- The U.N. resolution against Libya marks the first time that the United States has given its support to the International Criminal Court, in a remarkable turnaround

file under: Peter Principle at work
War Sec'y Gates says to Flyboys: Get Used to Drones, Cargo Runs, not Dog Fights
--The future for Air Force cadets involves "sitting in trailers operating slow-flying drones" and other boredom, rather than what flyboys prefer.

facts & figures:
The U.S. military bureaucracy prepares only for the wars it wants to fight, not the ones it’s likely to confront, a clear sign of incompetence.

file under: alternatives to war
Japan’s Culture of Peace: Reflections on Constitutional Antimilitarism
--Article 9 of Japan's Democratic Constitution, the peace plank, is defended by more than 7,000 autonomous Article Nine Associations (A9As) networking across the country

quote:
"Of course only a small number of U.S. citizens have come to realize that we, too, have a fundamental human right to live in peace."
~Benjamin A. Peters, Ph.D., a political theorist at Miyazaki International College in Miyazaki, Japan and a former Summer Research Fellow at Stanford University's Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers Project.

file under: life stranger than fiction
Afghan vet claims to be reincarnated Jesus, shoots parents

 

---

The Tulsa Peace Fellowship's Counter-Recruitment Update/Digest, for April 2011
lead story

Amputations and genital injuries increase sharply among soldiers in Afghanistan
By David Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 4, 2011

Doctors and nurses treating soldiers injured in Afghanistan have begun speaking of a new "signature wound" - two legs blown off at the knee or higher, accompanied by damage to the genitals and pelvic injuries requiring at least a temporary colostomy.

Twice as many U.S. soldiers wounded in battle last year required limb amputations than in either of the two previous years. Three times as many lost more than one limb, and nearly three times as many suffered severe wounds to their genitals. In most cases, the limbs are severed in the field when a soldier steps on a buried mine.

The increase in both rate and number of such wounds is most likely a result of the troop surge in Afghanistan that began last spring, combined with a counterinsurgency strategy that emphasizes foot patrols in villages and on farm compounds.

The actual number of patients with the injuries increased even more drastically. In 2009, 75 soldiers underwent amputation and 21 lost more than one limb. In 2010, 171 soldiers had amputations and 65 lost more than one limb. GU injuries increased from 52 to 142 over the same period.

The fraction suffering genitourinary (GU) injuries increased from 4.8 percent to 9.1 percent - a 90 percent increase. Of the 142 soldiers with genitourinary wounds who arrived at Landstuhl last year, 40 percent - 58 men in all - suffered injury to the testicles. Of that group, 47 had injury to one testicle, and 21 men lost a testicle. Eleven soldiers had injuries to both testicles, and eight lost both testicles. Body armor, which has greatly reduced fatalities, usually includes a triangular flap that protects the groin from projectiles coming from the front. It does not protect the area between the legs from an upward blast.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/04/AR2...

also see Photo Gallery: Images from the Afghan war: Week of Feb. 26, 2011
Continued photo coverage from the front lines of the U.S., Afghan and NATO military effort in Afghanistan.

---

The Tulsa Peace Fellowship's Counter-Recruitment Update/Digest, for April 2011
page 1

NATO Kills Nine Children in Afghan Air Strike
Provincial Police Say Children Were Collecting Firewood
by Jason Ditz
March 01, 2011

Already facing public outrage over the killing of 65 civilians in an offensive, NATO is once again in the hot seat in the Kunar Province, with provincial police reporting that a NATO air strike killed nine children this afternoon.

NATO reported that its Forward Operating Base in the region came under rocket fire, and that it launched the air strikes at what they believed was the “point of origin” of the attack, a nearby mountainside.

The mountainside, however, did not contain insurgents, but rather contained ten Afghan children who were collecting firewood on the wooded area. Nine of them were slain in the strike, while another was badly wounded.

NATO has promised a further investigation into the kilings.

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/03/01/nato-kills-nine-children-in-afgh...

more coverage:
Nine children cut down by U.S. helicopter gunships
by Kathy Kelly
Voices for Creative Nonviolence

In Afghanistan, children are bombed by U.S. and NATO helicopters.  Their bodies are casually dismembered and strewn by machines already lost in the horizon as the limbs settle.  They lie in pools of blood until family members realize, one by one, that their children are not late in returning home but in fact never will.

U.S. people, if they do read or hear of it, may be shocked at the apparent unconcern of the crews of two U.S. helicopter gunships, which attacked and killed nine children on a mountainside in Afghanistan’s Kumar province, shooting them "one after another" this past Tuesday March 1st.  ("The helicopters hovered over us, scanned us and we saw a green flash from the helicopters. Then they flew back high up, and in a second round they hovered over us and started shooting.").

Four of the boys were seven years old; three were eight, one was nine and the oldest was twelve.  "The children were gathering wood under a tree in the mountains near a village in the district," said Noorullah Noori, a member of the local development council in Manogai district. "I myself was involved in the burial," Noori said. "Yesterday we buried them."  General Petraeus has acknowledged, and apologized for, the tragedy.

Last August 26th, in the Manogai district, Afghan authorities accused international forces of killing six children during an air assault on Taliban positions. Provincial police chief Khalilullah Ziayee said a group of children were collecting scrap metal on the mountain when NATO aircraft dropped bombs to disperse Taliban fighters attacking a nearby base. "In the bombardment six children, aged six to 12, were killed," the police commander said. "Another child was injured."

http://original.antiwar.com/kelly/2011/03/04/incalculable/

yet more coverage:
War Crimes by U.S. Helicopter Gunships lead to anti-American demonstrations, in Afghanistan
The New York Times
By Alissa J. Rubin and Sangar Rahimi
Published: March 2, 2011

News of the attack enraged Afghans and led to an anti-American demonstration on Wednesday in the village of Nanglam, where the boys were from. The only survivor, Hemad, 11, said his mother had told him to go out with other boys to collect firewood because “the weather is very cold now.”

“We were almost done collecting the wood when suddenly we saw the helicopters come,” said Hemad, who, like many Afghans, has only one name. “There were two of them. The helicopters hovered over us, scanned us and we saw a green flash from the helicopters. Then they flew back high up, and in a second round they hovered over us and started shooting. They fired a rocket which landed on a tree. The tree branches fell over me and shrapnel hit my right hand and my side.”

The tree, Hemad said, saved his life by covering him so that he could not be seen by the helicopters, which, he said, “shot the boys one after another.”

General Petraeus pledged to investigate the attack and to take disciplinary action if appropriate.

It was the third instance in two weeks in which the Afghan government has accused NATO of killing civilians. NATO strongly disputes one of those reports, but another — the killing of an Afghan Army soldier and his family in Nangarhar Province on Feb. 20 — was also described as an accident.

The attack on the boys occurred high in the mountains outside Nanglam in the Pech Valley of Kunar Province. American troops are preparing to close their bases in the valley in the next several weeks, in part because their presence has vexed the villagers, who would prefer to be left alone.

More than 200 people gathered in Nanglam on Wednesday to protest the boys’ deaths, witnesses said. Waving white flags, they shouted “Death, death to America!” and “Death to Obama and his colleagues and associates!”

An Afghan employee of The New York Times contributed reporting from Jalalabad, Afghanistan.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/03/world/asia/03afghan.html?_r=1

more coverage:
Afghans protest over child deaths in NATO raid
--hundreds took to the streets of Kabul, burning an effigy of President Obama and condemning the air strikes.
March 6, 2011

KABUL (AFP) – About 500 people poured onto the streets of Afghanistan's capital to protest over the deaths of nine children killed in a NATO air raid on a remote rebel stronghold.

The protesters chanted "Death to America -- death to the invaders" while marching through central Kabul.

The protest follows similar demonstrations in the northeast province of Kunar following the deaths on Tuesday of the nine children who were killed while collecting firewood in the province's Dar-e-Pech district.

President Hamid Karzai angrily condemned the killings. Karzai says the deaths of civilians in military operations turn people against his pro-US administration. Civilian casualties have been a key source of tension between Kabul and its Western backers, the US and NATO.

"We don't want the invading forces," chanted one demonstrator carrying posters of the dead children.

"When I saw it (the demonstration) and realised it is against the Americans I joined," Azizullah, one of the protesters, told AFP. He uses only one name.

The protesters carried banners with anti-US slogans. One banner carried by a veiled woman read: "Occupation = killing + destruction."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110306/wl_asia_afp/afghanistanunrestn...


follow up: 
Petraeus Suspends Commander and Troops Involved in Killing of Afghan Children
--file under: trigger-happy G.I.'s

March 20, 2011
Noel Brinkerhoff

America’s top military commander in Afghanistan has taken action against those accused of killing two local youths who were tending their farms in the eastern province of Kunar.
 
General David Petraeus suspended a ground forces commander and the helicopter air weapons team that opened fire on two boys, age 10 and 15, who were watering their field, and not planting a roadside bomb, as initially suspected.
 
“We know we cannot succeed if we harm the people we are striving to protect,” Petraeus said in a prepared statement after announcing the suspensions of the military personnel involved in the attack. Disciplinary action may be taken against the soldiers once a formal investigation is completed.
 
Twice this month Petraeus has had to issue public apologies for U.S. attacks on children. On March 1, nine boys in Kunar were killed while gathering firewood on a mountainside, after being mistaken for insurgents.

http://www.allgov.com/US_and_the_World/ViewNews/Petraeus_Suspends_C...



UN: Record Civilian Deaths in 2010 Afghanistan
Gen. David Petraeus blamed for high toll across the Central Asian Nation
by Jason Ditz, for antiwar.com
March 09, 2011

The latest UN report puts the death toll for Afghan civilians across the nation in 2010 to 2,777, the largest since the war began in 2001 and a 15% increase over the toll from 2009. The vast majority of those killed were random victims of the fighting between NATO and the Taliban.

Gen. David Petraeus, has put a renewed emphasis on air strikes, even in heavily populated areas. This has resulted in a growing number of high profile civilian killings by NATO, particularly in air strikes, and growing public anger. If the trend continues as it has through the past two months, it seems assured that the 2011 NATO toll will dwarf its 2010 toll

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/03/09/un-record-civilian-deaths-in-201...

more coverage still:
NATO’s Growing Civilian Toll Sparks Anger in Afghanistan
High Profile Killings, Higher Profile Denials Enrage Locals
by Jason Ditz, for antiwar.com
March 04, 2011

Kunar Province MP Maulana Shahzada has announced that he is filing a complaint against NATO in the International Court of Justice over the massive number of civilians killed by the international occupation force in the past weeks, 74 in his province alone.

The rising death toll from NATO attacks killing civilians is sparking growing complaints from officials in the Karzai government.

Civilian killings are nothing new in Afghanistan, but have become a major problem since the ouster of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, whose policies aimed at curbing airstrikes around civilian regions were finally starting to lower the tolls, and his replacement with Gen. David Petraeus, who has escalated the strikes dramatically.

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/03/04/natos-growing-civilian-toll-spar...


featured op/ed

Dear Congress: Study War Some More
by Steve Breyman, February 28, 2011

Contrary to the refrain of the iconic African-American spiritual, "Study War No More," it makes sense for legislators responsible for it to study war. Studies of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and of America’s military omnipresence around the world, constitute an invaluable and growing library. The studies, from a wide swath of think-tanks and academic researchers across the political spectrum, show, virtually without exception, that it’d be much smarter and cheaper for Congress to end the wars and the omnipresence. Peace and a reduced global American military footprint would be diplomatically, politically, economically, and culturally better for the country. Ending the wars would save American lives and those of other peoples. Closing bases overseas and returning deployed forces to the U.S. will have the same local and regional economic benefits in those places that we’ve seen from conversion at home.

Neither of the current wars is or was necessary. There were and are alternatives. Nearing retirement, this is now the view of Defense Secretary Robert Gates too. Neither of the wars can be presently shown to do anything but harm to U.S. national security.

The Obama administration admits that al-Qaeda’s presence in Afghanistan is negligible. It also admits that war in Afghanistan inflames the border provinces—if not the whole—of Pakistan. It’s past time to declare victory in Afghanistan and bring all fighting forces home. If the war was about ending safe havens for terrorists in Afghanistan, then it has succeeded. If it was about removing the Taliban regime, then it has succeeded. If it was about showing American resolve and fortitude, then it has worked. If it was about vengeance for 9/11, then it has worked. If it was about helping deform Pakistani politics, then it has worked. If it was about making Afghanistan safe for Chinese and Indian enterprises, then it has worked. If it was about stimulating the opium trade, then it has worked. Etc. Remind me: why are we still there? Rather than being afraid of “losing Afghanistan,” President Obama appears to be afraid of winning.

As American troops come home from Iraq, a large chunk of al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia’s reason for being evaporates. We’ll see the same trend in Afghanistan.

Remaining American forces in Iraq should be withdrawn on schedule, regardless of pressure from the Pentagon. No serious threat to the United States or its allies emanates today from Iraq. Rather than extend the U.S. combat presence in Afghanistan to 2014 or beyond, as the current plan appears to (likely unbeknownst to you), Congress should help the president and vice president deliver on their promise to begin withdrawal of U.S. troops this summer. Any additional funds for the war beyond this fiscal year should be limited to ensuring the safe and orderly redeployment home of all American combat forces.

Will it require uncommon valor to snap the war purse shut? Yes. Will you be vilified by that very small number of us who benefit from the wars? Yes. Will you demonstrate rare independence from a president on questions of war and peace? Yes. Will you, most importantly, be forever esteemed by veterans, parents and families of deployed service personnel, a growing majority of your constituents, and other taxpayers? Yes.

byline: Steve Breyman will teach "War in Afghanistan" at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute fall semester. Breyman is a veteran of the U.S. Army.

http://original.antiwar.com/breyman/2011/02/27/dear-congress/

featured song/video of the month:

"Ain't Gonna STUDY WAR NO MORE"

---

from “American Negro Songs”
by John W. Work, 1940

I’m going to lay down my sword and shield
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Going to lay down my sword and shield
Down by the riverside
Ain’t going to study war no more

 Ain’t going to study war no more
Ain’t going to study war no more
Ain’t going to study war no more
Ain’t going to study war no more
Ain’t going to study war no more
Ain’t going to study war no more

I’m going to lay down my hand book
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside

Down by the riverside
I’m going to put on my long white robe
Down by the riverside
Ain’t going to study war no more
I’m going to talk with the Prince of Peace…

http://www.negrospirituals.com/news-song/study_war_no_more.htm

featured op/ed
Army Mafia
by Ray McGovern,
March 05, 2011

Is the U.S. Army stooping to Mafia-style tactics? If the Mafia comparison strikes you as a tad over the top, perhaps a seven-year trip down memory lane may prove instructive. Remember what happened after the U.S. Army learned of the obscene and brutal treatment of Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in early 2004?

Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba led the first (and only honest) investigation of the scandal. In May 2004, he completed a report that sharply criticized the Army and the higher-ups in the Bush administration for creating the conditions that permitted the mistreatment to occur.

When the report leaked to the press, Taguba found himself treated like a disloyal capo who had talked out of school about the Family business.

Rather than thank Taguba for upholding the honor of the U.S. Army, the Bush administration singled out this hard-working, low-key general for retribution and forced retirement.

In an interview with New Yorker reporter Seymour Hersh, Taguba described a chilling conversation he had with Gen. John Abizaid, head of Central Command, a few weeks after Taguba’s report became public.

As the two men sat in the back of Abizaid’s Mercedes sedan in Kuwait, Abizaid quietly told Taguba, "You and your report will be investigated."

"I’d been in the Army 32 years by then," Taguba told Hersh, "and it was the first time that I thought I was in the Mafia."

It was also an early indication that Taguba’s military career was nearing its end because the general had given the American people a glimpse into the dark world of the Bush administration’s policies of torture and murder.

No Medal for Honesty:  The general who had violated the omerta code of silence was banished from the Bush administration’s Mafia.

Of course, Taguba was not alone. There were other brave souls – albeit not enough – who challenged Bush’s unconstitutional and illegal policies. All of them met similar fates of banishment, punishment, and ridicule, the likes of Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill, Army Gen. Eric Shinseki, counterterrorism adviser Richard Clarke, former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson and Deputy Attorney General James Comey.

There is a much longer list of disgraceful examples of war crimes (many still continuing): Reprisal attacks on Iraqi cities like Fallujah, using white phosphorous and depleted uranium weapons; torture, deemed "enhanced interrogation" by the wordsmiths in Washington; orders to look the other way as detainees continue to be tortured by Iraqi security forces; and drone and other air attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan that kill unarmed civilians, euphemistically dismissed as "collateral damage."

One of my greatest regrets is that the Army in which I felt honored to serve has become quite a different animal. It is hard to avoid concluding that the biggest difference between Mafia dons and today’s Army brass is that the dons are less ham-handed about what they do.

http://original.antiwar.com/mcgovern/2011/03/04/armys-mafia-abuse-o...



Marines Boot Social Media Pioneers From Afghanistan After Facebook Freakout

By Spencer Ackerman
March 2, 2011

It started off as an experimental effort to cover the war in the era of social media. But launching a forum where anyone could weigh in about a combat unit’s fight proved to be more than the Marines were willing to handle. The media pioneers have been sent home — largely over some comments left on a Facebook wall.

Journalists working for a new nonprofit media group, arrived in the Musa Qala district of Afghanistan’s Helmand Province in October with an unconventional mission. They’d exhaustively document the war of the 1st Battalion, 8th Marines in videos, audio interviews, articles and mapping tools. And, through Facebook, they’d make their work a portal for those invested most in the Marines, like their relatives.

It was the commenting community, especially Marine family members, on Facebook that drove the brass nuts. Last month, the Marines abruptly ended the experiment and terminated media group's embeds.  Self-identified family members of the battalion kept chiming in — sometimes touching on subjects that Marines wanted left alone. In one instance, Jackie Giambrone, mother of a Marine in the unit, whose son Anthony is a lance corporal in the 1-8, posted something about a Marine wounded in an insurgent bomb attack.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/03/marines-boot-social-media/

featured new documentary:
Louder Than a Bomb
--protest voices from America's youth

LOUDER THAN A BOMB is one of 18 films chosen for the 2011 American Documentary Showcase, a program created by the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs "to cultivate greater understanding among people around the world."

"One of the most inspiring and exhilarating documentaries in months, or maybe years....Vibrant and moving."
~Steve Pond, The Wrap
"An affecting and superbly paced celebration of American youth at their creative best..."
~Robert Koehler, Variety
"Fascinating...Inspiring..."
~Susan King, LA Times
"An ode to Chicago's diverse voices....Genuinely stirring...Irresistible."
`Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune

Every year, more than six hundred teenagers from over sixty Chicago area schools gather for the world’s largest youth poetry slam, a competition known as "Louder Than a Bomb". Founded in 2001, Louder Than a Bomb is the only event of its kind in the country—a youth poetry slam built from the beginning around teams. Rather than emphasize individual poets and performances, the structure of Louder Than a Bomb demands that kids work collaboratively with their peers, presenting, critiquing, and rewriting their pieces. To succeed, teams have to create an environment of mutual trust and support. For many kids, being a part of such an environment—in an academic context—is life-changing.

LOUDER THAN A BOMB chronicles the stereotype-confounding stories of four teams as they prepare for and compete in the 2008 event. By turns hopeful and heartbreaking, the film captures the tempestuous lives of these unforgettable kids, exploring the ways writing shapes their world, and vice versa. This is not "high school poetry" as we often think of it. This is language as a joyful release, irrepressibly talented teenagers obsessed with making words dance. How and why they do it—and the community they create along the way—is the story at the heart of this inspiring film.

view film trailer here:
http://www.louderthanabombfilm.com/index.php?ref=siskeljacobs.com

Bomb Specialist killed by Undetected Roadside Bomb, en route to disable an another IED
Written by Jess Rollins
Springfield, Missouri News-Leader

A 22-year-old Monett man died Monday from injuries suffered in a blast from a roadside bomb in Afghanistan.

The Department of Defense reported that Christopher Stark, 22, and another soldier were killed when their vehicle was struck by an improvised explosive device in Wardak Province.

The family said Wednesday that Stark, deployed as a U.S. Army bomb technician, was en route to disable an IED when another bomb detonated.

Christopher Stark, shown wearing protective gear, was active in JROTC in high school.

http://www.news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2011103030385

Female GIs struggle with higher rate of divorce
By KIMBERLY HEFLING Associated Press
Updated: 03/08/2011

Last year, 7.8 percent of women in the military got a divorce, compared with 3 percent of military men, according to Pentagon statistics. Among the military's enlisted corps, meaning they aren't commissioned officers, nearly 9 percent of women saw their marriages end, compared with a little more than 3 percent of the men.

Research indicates that military women also get divorced at higher rates than their peers outside the military.

The percent of military women getting a divorce has been consistently higher for at least a decade.

Like all divorces, the results can be a sense of loss and a financial blow. But for military women, a divorce can be a breaking point—even putting them at greater risk for homelessness down the road.

It has an effect, too, on military kids. The military has more single moms than dads, and an estimated 30,000 of them have deployed in support of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Female service members married to civilians face their own challenges. The rate of divorce among military women is higher for those married to civilians, said Benjamin Karney, a psychology professor at UCLA who studied the issue for the Rand Corp.

http://www.twincities.com/national/ci_17562689?nclick_check=1


Weight Of War: Soldiers' Heavy Gear Packs On Pain

by Patricia Murphy, for National Public Radio (NPR)
March 12, 2011
from KUOW Radio

Soldiers and Marines in Iraq and Afghanistan routinely carry between 60 and 100 pounds of gear including body armor, weapons and batteries.

The heavy loads shouldered over months of duty contribute to the chronic pain suffered by soldiers like Spc. Joseph Chroniger, who deployed to Iraq in 2007.

Twenty-five years old, he has debilitating pain from a form of degenerative arthritis and bone spurs. "I mean my neck hurts every day. Every day," he says. "You can't concentrate on anything but that because it hurts that bad."

Like many soldiers and Marines, Chroniger shouldered 70 to 80 pounds of gear daily.

A 2001 Army Science Board study recommended that no soldier carry more than 50 pounds for any length of time.

"We were doing three, four, five missions a night sometimes," Chroniger says. "You're jumping out. You're running. I mean it hurts — it hurts."

According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan who retired with musculoskeletal conditions grew tenfold between 2003 and 2009.

http://www.npr.org/2011/03/12/134421473/weight-of-war-soldiers-heav...

op/ed

The DREAM Act as Military Draft

By VAMOS Unidos Youth

The following statement will no doubt be a large part of the discussion around what an ideal DREAM Act looks like—one that does not violate young people’s principles or sacrifice their dreams of justice, accountability, and peace.

We write this statement to raise our voices as Latino youth working and living in the Bronx in opposition to the DREAM Act as it stands. We demand a return to the original DREAM Act that had a community service option instead of a military one. The military has been losing its numbers due to the multiple wars the United States has begun. The DREAM Act would hand us over on a platter to fight these unjust wars. The DREAM Act has been warped over the years to draft Latino youth into the military, as they need more and more soldiers to fight their wars.

We have been living under harsh conditions. Our communities have been historically underprivileged, with militarized streets, schools that seem more like jails than educational institutions, and poverty that pushes people to desperation and sadness. We have grown up with the trauma of having our family members and friends detained, jailed, and deported. But we are strong and determined, so we keep on. We have stood next to our parents as they worked as street vendors, as they were ticketed, arrested, and sometimes assaulted by police for trying to make a living. We, as youth, have also been ticketed and arrested alongside our parents. We have come to understand what it is to be humiliated and then stand and fight for what is right, what is principled, what is just. Our parents’ unrelenting strength to fight for us and their rights has taught us to always stand up for what is right and never sell out.

We have asked ourselves, “Is the DREAM Act an advantage or disadvantage for us as immigrant youth?” Many of us were excited about the possibility of getting documents and finally being recognized as human beings, able to get a job and an education and help our families. Along with our teachers and mentors, we delved into community organizing and becoming politically conscious. We began learning about our history and our people’s resistance. We then expanded to other cultures and histories and began to appreciate them. We marched side by side with youth from all over the world including South Asia and the Middle East. We saw that within our hearts there was no difference and enjoyed each other’s company and diversity. Our spirits were momentarily paralyzed when we began learning about the effects of war and how these young people’s families and communities had been destroyed. We began to ask ourselves, “How can we stop these wars? How can we help?” Our political education allowed us to see through the military propaganda and the army recruiters in our blocks and schools. Speaking to our peers we saw how the military was using them to fight wars that didn’t concern us and killed our friends. This forced us to look at the DREAM Act much more closely.

The DREAM Act Revealed

What happened to the community service option that the original DREAM Act contained? Why did our supposed advocates allow for the removal of the community service option? Was it because in this form the DREAM Act became winnable? At what expense?

Undocumented youth in states like North Carolina, Virginia, Illinois, Ohio, and New Mexico would be forced to take the military option in large numbers as they would not be able to pay the high price of education.

Two Years of Military Requirement

We, the VAMOS Unidos youth, do not support the DREAM Act due to the military component. The fact that it has been introduced as a defense appropriation bill adds insult to injury. The DREAM Act is a de facto military draft, forcing undocumented youth to fight in unjust wars in exchange for recognition as human beings.

The same way many supposed “advocates” of immigrant rights sold out the community with Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR), they now sell us out with the DREAM Act. We stand against any militarization, whether of the border, our communities, or our status. We will not kill innocent people in exchange for Green Cards.

We will not be used for the wars of the corporations and the rich in any part of the world in exchange for blood-stained immigration papers.

VAMOS Unidos—Vendedoras Ambulantes Movilizando y Organizando en Solidaridad (Street Vendors Mobilizing and Organizing in Solidarity)—is a Bronx community-based social justice organization founded by low-income Latina/o immigrant street vendors. VAMOS Unidos organizes Latina/o immigrants, currently predominantly street vendors, for economic and racial justice, immigrant rights, and police accountability.

http://www.warresisters.org/node/1133

 

epitaph, for this edition of "Truth in Recruiting."

"I'm not anti-military. Just anti-crazy."
~Dr. Seuss, commenting on his last book, The Butter Battle Book (1984), ostensibly about the cold war, being a story about an arms race between the Yooks and the Zooks

 

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The Tulsa Peace Fellowship's Counter-Recruitment Update/Digest, for April 2011
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Tulsa Peace Fellowship

who we are:

The Tulsa Peace Fellowship is the activist wing of the peace movement in Eastern Oklahoma.  TPF offers citizens and community groups tools and resources to participate personally in our democracy, to help shape federal budget and policy priorities, and to promote peace, social and economic justice, and human rights.   TPF is a registered non-profit organization and a non-partisan civic-sector organization, loosely affiliated with the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Restoration, north side of Tulsa.

"Waging Peace One Person at a Time".

Through its counter-recruitment task force, TPF is a member of the National Network in Opposition to the Militarization of Youth (NNOMY) representing some 188 counter-recruitment groups in cities and towns across the country. On the web: http://www.nnomy.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=v... 

If you enjoyed this news digest and/or found this update useful, please consider making a donation of time, money, or effort to the Tulsa Peace Fellowship.  

TPF needs your support.

You can donate online via PINC (pull down menu for US$ donations)
http://www.pincgiving.com/donate/organization/1202854

Or, please mail a check or money order made out to the"Tulsa Peace Fellowship" to :

The Tulsa Peace Fellowship
c/o UU Church of the Restoration,
1314 N. Greenwood Ave, Tulsa Oklahoma. 74106-4854
Find on a map: Google Maps link

Contributions to TPF are not tax deductible at the present time. Details on tax status available

 

The next regularly scheduled business meeting of the Fellowship will be held
 on Thursday, April 7th 2011, 6:15 PM – 7:30 PM @ the UU Church of the Restoration, in Tulsa, just north of downtown

Come join us!   Especially parents, guardians, and students in the Tulsa Public Schools system who are interested in countering the presence of military recruiters on school grounds.

The information provided in this digest/update herein is for non-profit use only, according to "fair use" doctrine.  Copyright and all commercial exploitation rights remain with the various authors/publishers cited above. The Tulsa Peace Fellowship does not necessarily endorse the views expressed in the articles appearing herein.