Too Many Medals? (Court-martial considered for 507th POWs?)

MSNBC ^ | 02-13-04 | Michael Moran

[Prodigal Son]

Never said they didn't.

[ibtheman]

Also the fact they were Army motor transport, and supply clerks. They had an officer that was a dentist, he could not read a map, or even new how to orientate the map! And there weapens on the vehicle had not been properly maintained either! Come folks Army from the rear got wasted! Even the marine road patrols told them not to go down abush alley! Give me a brake. I had trained with army at an army base camp on the big island in Hawaii! Those guys had no military bearing, I was in the marine corp training with live air support c.a.s. missions! The army were like just spectators!It really disguisted me, when I had seen some of there lay backed training missions. No military discipline! That is the way I see it!

[mark502inf]

Notice that you hear NOTHING about the company commander of the 507th. The root cause of the whole debacle was the 507th taking a wrong turn and heading away from the secured convoy route on which hundreds of vehicles travelled without incident.

Shortly after, the 507th commander, who had a GPS and map, said he was following the route he was given. In fact, the wrong turn he made was on the original route. The 507th was a corps level unit temporarily attached to a support battalion of the 3d Infantry Division for the movement forward. Apparently the 507th commander was not present at all the battalion's planning and operations order briefings and did not take part in their mission rehearsal. Somewhere in that process the info on the new route was briefed. The 507th commander was separately briefed and given the movement info in the form of a computer diskette. Not a recipe for success.

Maybe he was never given the updated info or maybe he just failed to see it or post it on his map. Wouldn't have mattered if they'd just stayed tight with the convoy main body. However, the 507th had some breakdowns and also assisted in recovering broken vehicles from other units. They fell behind the rest of the convoy and the company commander had to navigate on his own. Meanwhile, at the critical intersection where the route had changed, the soldiers posted there for traffic control had departed to join their unit in the apparent belief that the entire convoy was through. So when the 507th came to that intersection, they went the wrong way and we all know the rest of the story.

[milbuf]

1. Since the late 1960's the social security number has also been the service number. I went from enlisted USXXXXXXX to officer O52xxxxxx to my ssn. That is the standard today.

The Washington Post and other press pushed the "Hero" status of Lynch and the other PO W's from her unit. It was not the military. If you check back the Military downplayed the whole thing but the Wash Post was the main hero advocate because it sold papers.