Jessica: Army used me

NY Daily News ^ | November 7, 2003 | CORKY SIEMASZKO

[presidio9]

Jessica Lynch has angrily accused the Pentagon of using her for propaganda. The 20-year-old private, portrayed as a female Rambo after she was captured by Iraqis during a blazing gun battle, then freed by American troops, told ABC there was no reason for her rescue from an Iraqi hospital to be filmed.

"They used me as a way to symbolize all this stuff," Lynch said in an interview with Diane Sawyer that airs Tuesday, Veterans Day.

"Yeah, it's wrong," Lynch said. "I don't know why they filmed it, or why they say the things" they said.

That footage of U.S. commandos wheeling a grimacing Lynch to a waiting chopper was among the most dramatic of the war - and helped cement her image as a female warrior.

But Lynch said the true heroes were the soldiers who saved her.

"They're the ones that came in to rescue me," she said. "I'm so thankful that they did what they did; they risked their lives. ... They are my heroes."

She also disputed the Pentagon's early version of her capture by Iraqis, which suggested she had heroically defended herself - going down only after firing all her ammo.

Lynch says her M-16 jammed and she never got off a shot.

"My weapon did jam and I did not shoot, not a round, nothing," she said simply.

There was no immediate response from the Pentagon, which awarded Lynch a Purple Heart for her injuries.

ABC released excerpts of Lynch's first television interview yesterday after the Daily News obtained a copy of Lynch's authorized biography and revealed its most shocking secret - that she was raped by her Iraqi captors.

She has no memory of the rape. The book says there was a three-hour gap after her capture, a blank in her mind, during which she was assaulted.

"Even just the thinking about that, that's too painful," she told Sawyer.

Lynch said she was awakened from her stupor by searing pain.

"I seriously thought I was going to be paralyzed for the rest of my life," she told ABC.

The young soldier said at first she did not trust her Iraqi doctors - and tried to stifle her screams.

Trapped in her bed, Lynch said, she tried to tame her terror by thinking about her family, her fiancé, Sgt. Ruben Contreras, and her G.I. buddy Lori Piestewa.

After she was rescued, she learned Piestewa was dead.

In her book, "I Am a Soldier, Too," author Rick Bragg says the scars on Lynch's body and medical records indicate she was anally raped, and tells the reader to "fill in the blanks of what Jessi lived through on the morning of March 23, 2003."

Lynch says her unit was sent into battle armed only with M-16s - no grenades or anti-tank weapons - and in lumbering trucks that could not keep up with the convoy barreling toward Baghdad.

When the trucks in her unit tried to catch up, radio contact with the main convoy was lost - and so were they.

She was filled with foreboding.

"Jessi's fear of being left behind was beginning to come true," Bragg wrote.

[Hillary's Folly]

Geez, from dissing the Iraqi who supposedly helped her to this, this Jessica Lynch thing is starting to get nasty. Too bad.

[OXENinFLA]

the Pentagon ?

how about the "news" media?

[Coop]

"They used me as a way to symbolize all this stuff," Lynch said in an interview with Diane Sawyer that airs Tuesday, Veterans Day. "Yeah, it's wrong," Lynch said. "I don't know why they filmed it, or why they say the things" they said.

So, dearest Jessica, you and your family have not benefitted financially from any of this?? Is that right?

With all due respect and gratitude for your service, PFC Lynch, shut the h*$% up!

[SouthernFreebird]

More like the real story is starting to come out.

[presidio9]

In fairness, this was posted in the NY Daily News, which I think we can both agree is decidedly not a bastion of fair and balanced news.

[SuziQ]

She also disputed the Pentagon's early version of her capture by Iraqis, which suggested she had heroically defended herself - going down only after firing all her ammo.

Someone has told her wrong. I don't believe the Pentagon EVER put out that information. That stuff was contained in the Washington Post story that came out just after the firefight, but before she was rescued.

[End Times Sentinel]

Jessica: Army used me

 

That's interesting.  I'd always thought the Washington Post made that story up to advance the cause of putting women in harm's way on the battlefield.  Guess I imagined that.

 

author Rick Bragg says the scars on Lynch's body and medical records indicate she was anally raped

 

Hmmm... see, I probably would have made that the headline, but they went the anti-Army route.  In fact, they didn't mention the rape until paragraph 11.  But that's just me.

Owl_Eagle

" WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
DIVERSITY IS STRENGTH"

[Hillary's Folly]

Yeah, could be. I don't know yet. There certainly are some hard feeling lurking under there.

[#3Fan]

The liberal media is in full attack mode against Lynch. They're trying to put off on the military what the Washington Post did.

[AxelPaulsenJr]

Her rifle jammed up? Wonder if she ever cleaned it?

[mbynack]

The weapon didn't jam if she never fired it.

If she thinks this type of publicity is bad, what would she think of the films of dead American soldiers being dragged through the mud during Vietnam? I would rather be filmed getting rescued than get filmed in a bodybag.

[Zack Nguyen]

Jessica Lynch is a very brave soldier, but why would anyone want to potentially subject a woman to those sorts of torments by putting them in a dangerous situation in a battle zone? Call me chauvinist if you will, but I do not feel the need to purposefully subject women to the same risks as men in a war.

It seems incongruous at best. Feminists demand the right of women to be sexually assaulted and killed.

[Knightsofswing]

I wonder if she has any cheese & crackers for the WHINE!

While she was enlisted she was goverment property, to be used as needed by the DOD.

She has no complaints, just media spin!!

[bmwcyle]

She is no hero.

[AMNZ]

The media is going to make her rich. The Iraqi and the U.S. only got her out.

[petitfour]

Are there transcripts of Pentagon/Centcom briefings where we have on-the-record accounts of Army/Pentagon officials saying that Jessica Lynch went down fighting?

[PISANO]

Isn't it amazing that ONE GOOD STORY that emenates from the IRAQ WAR, i.e. the rescue of one of our POW's is somehow massaged by the mainstream media as being the Pentagon's trumped up Bullsh.t story. All with the help of the POW herself stating that she "FEELS" used. Very depressing!

I will never UNDERSTAND the need of most Americans to appear on TV and answer inane questions about how they FEEL about one subject or the other.

[lelio]

The weapon didn't jam if she never fired it.

Perhaps "didn't work" is a better term. So you're saying that she's a liar?

[BibChr]

I'm with you.

Look at the direct quotations. I'd have to see her very words, and watch for edit/snips.

If that is what she's saying, she's pretty low-rent. But I'd wait for the full disclosure.

Dan