[JustPiper]

A Stunning Disclosure on Illegals in the Military

"I am stunned, completely dumbfounded. I do not know what is worse: the fact that we have so many 'unknowns' serving, or that they are serving despite the fact that we apparently have reasonably accurate statistics about them."...

By Matthew Dodd

Every now and then, I read or hear something that just stops me dead in my tracks. Sometimes I break out in laughter, sometimes I scream out in anguish, and sometimes I break down and feel like crying.

On rare occasions, I find myself with all those reactions. On very rare occasions, those reactions are almost lost in a cacophony of a multitude of rapid-fire involuntary reactions that include pride, relief, anger, frustration, motivation, inspiration and blatant disbelief. An article in The Denver Post on Feb. 24 that the U.S. military does not know the citizenship status of 16,031 active-duty military personnel provided me with my latest "very rare occasion."

In a recent article ("The Illegal Immigration Threat," DefenseWatch, Jan. 14, 2004), I talked about a 19-year old illegal alien who used a bogus green card to enlist in the Army, and how the Army was going to help facilitate getting him citizen status. (The Army's efforts did result in that soldier being sworn in as a U.S. citizen.) Little did I know at the time that that soldier was literally just the latest tip on a monolithic iceberg.

Let me share with you excerpts from the Denver Post article and my varied reactions to them:

http://www.military.com/NewContent/0,13190,Defensewatch_030104_Illegals,00.html?ESRC=dod.nl

[JustPiper]

The Denver Post article reported:

"[T]he citizenship of 16,031 members of the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines is listed as 'unknown.' That's about one in 100 active-duty military members who might be U.S. citizens, legal immigrants - or just about anybody else."

{{Appalling and Astounding!}}

[MamaDearest]

"The Army has the highest number of unknowns - 9,055. The Navy has 6,531, the Air Force 444, the Marines one. Overall, 1,366,032 U.S. citizens and 35,662 legal immigrants serve in the U.S. military."

This is shameful information. Too bad we can't put some unemployed people back to work checking these people out and either approving their backgrounds or getting them removed from our military because they may represent a direct threat to the lives of our servicemen and servicewomen. Like everything else these days it appears that recruiters want to keep up their numbers and enlisting non-citizens of undetermined origin would seem to pose loyalty issues. Does the government that requires I-9 forms for each employee not use them for their own employees (i.e, the military)? Someone needs to put a stop to this right now.

[TexKat]

http://www.military.com/NewContent/0,13190,Defensewatch_030104_Illegals,00.html?ESRC=dod.nl

I guess this is another instance where they are needed because Americans refuse to take the jobs.

JP this article may need a thread of its own. Get others opinion. Although I have seen on cable news some of our military illegals come back to the U.S. from Iraq with one or more limbs missing I am also concerned after reading the total #s of the unknowns.

I know from talking to a few young military guys is that the reason they enlisted was because of the bonus money. This could be the reason for some of the illegals. I know for a fact that some young American military had no earthly idea that they would be fighting a war today in Iraq or anywhere else although they would/could not admit it in a public forum.