A Level Gaze

A Level Gaze

"What effect must it have on a nation if it learns no foreign languages? Probably much the same as that which a total withdrawal from society has upon an individual."
--G.C. Lichtenberg

Thursday, November 04, 2004

Now They Fucking Tell Us

The soldiers, who belong to two different units, described how Iraqis plundered explosives from unsecured bunkers before driving off in Toyota trucks.

The U.S. troops said there was little they could do to prevent looting of the ammunition site, 30 miles south of Baghdad.

"We were running from one side of the compound to the other side, trying to kick people out," said one senior noncommissioned officer who was at the site in late April 2003.

"On our last day there, there were at least 100 vehicles waiting at the site for us to leave" so looters could come in and take munitions.

"It was complete chaos. It was looting like L.A. during the Rodney King riots," another officer said.

He and other soldiers who spoke to The Times asked not to be named, saying they feared retaliation from the Pentagon.

These guys were there, they witnessed and lived with this clusterfuck. Day in and day out, they faced the very real prospect of being blown to hell by the bombs, missiles, and explosives they had watched being driven off into the countryside. They cleared their throats and went back to work, and didn't care enough to speak up about it until until 18 months later. No wonder other countries don't want to mess with us. We're crazy.

There was a presidential election a little while back where one of the candidates, the guy who started the war and endorsed its strategy, was claiming the other candidate would make America less safe. It was his biggest issue. His incompetent underlings created a situation where we couldn't, or wouldn't, secure a known arms depot containing thousands upon thousands of tons of weapons. In. a. fucking. war. zone. Wait, make that two humongous arms depots. I don't know what to call a military command that fails even to plan to secure known munition dumps during battle except dangerously incompetent and unfit to lead.

That LA riots image would have torn right through the heart of Bush's strong leader persona and given Kerry the presidency. It came two days too late. I can't stand it.

posted by David at 11/04/2004 08:00:00 PM ::

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