[patriciaruth]

She is an American soldier. She suffered severe injuries during an ambush and possibly afterwards in captivity.

There is no need to spin this pro or con women in the military. She deserves, as all our soldiers deserve, our gratitude for serving, and she does not deserve to be used by anyone (pro or con) with an axe to grind or copy space to fill.

[SteveH]

See here for some early suspicions about the stories.

If the report that several male soldiers died trying to protect her and the other women in the group, then the women may have "survivor's syndrome".

At what point does chivalry interfere with the mission? Some military think tanks would have done a lot of studies on this, yes? Or would such studies have been ruled out as sexist from the get-go and never performed? If studies were performed, one wonders, did they extend to dealing with new variations of post trauma stress that gender-integrated armed forces might incur?

[thedugal]

This woman is echoing what I said in the first days of the incident..

Simply by surviving, Jessica done good. She deserves recognition for that fact. BUT, we now know she was not shot or stabbed. I can't imagine that anyone would report she had been both shot and stabbed unless that person had an agenda. This leads one to strongly question the claims that she kept killing Iraqis until she ran out of ammo.

Another point, even when the report came out that she had fought to the last bullet, I was quite disturbed. There are 3 possibilities why she was the lone survivor. 1, a combo of skill and luck (probably more luck since she was a supply clerk) 2, the Iraqis saw blonde hair and decided they were taking her alive for the obvious reasons 3, the men with her died protecting her, forgeting their training when their biological instincts kicked in to protect the young woman.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/885012/posts?page=77#77

[postal_andy]

So the WorldNetDaily and the Center for Military Readiness aren't spinning the story either?
I agree it was irresponsible of the Pentagon sources to feed the WP an unsubtantiated story of heroics, which if it turned out to be untrue would inevitably cause people to disrespect Pfc Lynch through no fault of her own.
Just a point about the doctors stories; where the Toronto Star refers to "intelligence agents" it's clear from the article that they are referring to the central command in Baghdad, not the local Fedayeen.
I think this brave young woman should be allowed to recover in peace without being used as an example to support any political position.

[KeyWest]

The author is accusing others of what they are doing, printing what happened without knowing what happened and drawing conclusions to fit their agenda. Much of what is supposedly attributed to her was from others, yet she is being pilloried as a liar. That is shameful.

I do not want women in combat, but the article is offensive.

[honeygrl]

It may be a while before anyone knows the real story because Foxnews announced yesterday that she has Amnesia

[Husker24]

Lynch suffered a head wound, spinal injury and fractures to her right arm, both legs and her right foot and ankle.

From falling from a vehicle?, was she standing on one of those giant mining dump trucks or what.

[SuziQ]

Gizzy and other doctors said most of the Saddam's Fedayeen fighters, and the entire Baath Party leadership had come to the hospital earlier in the day, changed into civilian clothes and fled

Did this guy just say criticize the Americans for "blasting through the doors like a Hollywood movie" because the Iraqis had laft the hospital TWO DAYS earlier? I guess he's making a distinction between Iraqi soldiers and Baath party leadership and Fedayeen Sadaam. I personally see no difference. If they were there earlier in the day, then American intelligence WAS right, and the rescue was necessary.

I didn't believe all the overblown stuff in the original article anyway. From whom would they have gotten that information? I suspect, as Elaine Donnelly said, it was put out by someone trying to solidify womens' place in combat roles. As the truth comes out, I believe that fervor will be gone. Thank God that Bush is President right now. If it had been a Democrat, they'd have already pushed through the changes making it policy, because Lynch supposedly fought 'as fierce as any man'.

Don't get me wrong, I am NOT criticizing Pvt. Lynch. She has become a pawn in this fight. She and her family, as far as I can tell, have acted with complete honor in this. It is the feminists behind the scenes with whom I have MY beef!

[oyez]

BFL

[CholeraJoe]

Maybe the author of this piece should ask this woman if there's an "armored ceiling" in the military. (Yes those are 3 stars on her epaulets)

Lt General Leslie F. Kenne,
AF Deputy Chief of Staff for Warfighting Integration.

[Jhensy]

I tend to believe that the reality of her captivity was ugly and brutal, involving rapes and beatings and who knows what, and it's best that the People magazines and Today Shows and Fox News just BACK OFF.

[joesnuffy]

When the press and the military spun the photographs of the flag raising on Iwo Jima
the propaganda value ended up destroying the lives of those used for the propaganda

The others of Pvt Lynch's party reported jammed weapons...almost immediately....

Given the past history of Iraqi's treatment of U.S. female personnel...most specifically the rape-torture of even their own women..

The truth of how she was treated may not be for publication ..ever...

To treat her now as a great female warrior ..other than just a soldier like (many others) who did her duty to the best of her ability under the conditions would be doing her a grave injustice.

And ultimately harm her....leave her alone...let her recover in her own time..with her childhood friends and family...

The worse this story gets spun...the worse it will be for her in the long run imo

Yes its nice for us to have heros...but only if the absolute truth comes out...and not some fiction spun on the keyboard of a pentangon-dacowitz nebish

[Robert A Cook PE]

"VIP treatment" is a pure lie.

She was NOT fed, given only two drinks (in some four days) and never allowed to clean herself, nor relieve herself out of the bed .... (A bit tricky to take care of yourself with a broken back, internal injuries (from sodomy with a "blunt object ?), a busted pelvis, broken legs, and several puncture/bullet wounds....)

This is a pure lie, pushed by a lying international press "corpse" that hates Bush.

"Falls" from a truck don't break legs and arms and give internal injuries above the pelvis ... AFTER the fighting/shooting has stopped.

Torture does. Rape does. Sodomy does.

[Tailgunner Joe]

bttt