Marines trade 'culturally sensitive' training for bullets

Austin American-Statesman(Original article)

Alternate(no registration required)

Marines trade 'culturally sensitive' training for bullets

By LOURDES NAVARRO
Associated Press Writer

FALLUJAH, Iraq — On a rooftop overlooking Fallujah's industrial wasteland, Lance Cpl. Tom Browne pokes his machine gun muzzle out of a hole in a barrier wall, singing to himself to pass the time.

In the street below, the corpse of an insurgent suspect lies baking in the sun. Browne, from Boston, says he has killed several rebels, probably Iraqis, so far.

"I don't even think about those people as people," he says.

It wasn't supposed to be this way.

The band of Marines in this insurgent stronghold received two big orders this year. They were told to return to Iraq to stabilize the Sunni areas west of Baghdad, Iraq's toughest patch of territory. The normally clean-shaven Marines were also told to grow mustaches in an attempt to win over Iraqis who see facial hair as a sign of maturity.

<snip>

The Marines say it's easier to cope with the daily work of killing inside Fallujah, where a seemingly unending supply of rebels continues to fight, if they don't think about the suspected Iraqi rebels they are targeting as people who, under different circumstances, they might have been trying to help.

"If someone came and did this to our neighborhood I'd be pissed too," said Capt. Don Maraska, of Moscow, Idaho, a 37-year-old who guides airstrikes on enemy targets in the town. "I've never had people look at me the ways these people look at me. I don't know what came before, but at this point, what else can we possibly do but fight?"

<more>

That is what is so sick about the situation. Neither side sees any option because there isn't a plan to end it.

"But Cpl. David Silvers, based in a front-line building nicknamed ``the tower,'' says his experience with Iraqis has been limited to dodging bullets from a persistent and shadowy gunman he dubbed ``Bob the sniper.''

``He's the guy who wakes us up every morning and fires at us all day. He hasn't got anyone yet but he's come close a few times,'' Silvers said.

Even though the Marines have given Bob his name, they say they still want to kill him.

``This is the closest relationship I have with an Iraqi right now,'' Silvers said."

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Once this poor bastards are sent into hell, all they can do is survive killing before they get killed. I feel horror and sympathy combined.

that same sentiment was reflected in my post.

You are right....poor bastards trapped in a hell they didn't want....

If Bob were an adult with a hunting rifle, he would have drawn blood by now.

Viet Nam redux.

Any person w/ average eyesight can become moderately proficient. Look for more of this.

They are learning, they have a few experts out there---- beware.

Just gun down anyone?

These people are coming back to the US

Every time you think this can't get worse, some little veil is lifted and clearer sight shows horrors unthought of. Will we ever get out from under what that little bastard has done to us?

they get home...or will the PTSD provoke the same impulse to kill. Disgusting...simply disgusting.

Unfortunately many of them will be denied benefits by NeoCons who have the their Antenna tuned to recognize Welfare Fakers.

is a fractin of what we will have from this fiasco.

Basically the scum running the system.

When and if they do get home...and their minds slow down, THEN it will be a living nightmare for them and those around them :cry:

How sad to burden another being with even having to deal with the murders of other beings.

The agony, pain, and torture is speeding at these soldiers like a runaway freight train :/

A Canadian who'd enlisted in the US Army and fought in Iraq was back in the States and only a few weeks away from discharge when he panicked and fled back home across the border. He'd killed an enemy soldier in a firefight and the post-traumatic stress only hit him when he was out of the combat zone.

Where the hell do they find these assholes?