Our soldiers in Iraq aren't heroes (But Andy Rooney is! (not))

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[Peter J. Huss]

Our soldiers in Iraq aren't heroes



4/12/2004

By ANDY ROONEY

Most of the reporting from Iraq is about death and destruction. We don't learn much about what our soldiers in Iraq are thinking or doing. There's no Ernie Pyle to tell us, and, if there were, the military would make it difficult or impossible for him to let us know. It would be interesting to have a reporter ask a group of our soldiers in Iraq to answer five questions and see the results:

1. Do you think your country did the right thing sending you into Iraq?

2. Are you doing what America set out to do to make Iraq a democracy, or have we failed so badly that we should pack up and get out before more of you are killed?

3. Do the orders you get handed down from one headquarters to another, all far removed from the fighting, seem sensible, or do you think our highest command is out of touch with the reality of your situation?

4. If you could have a medal or a trip home, which would you take?

5. Are you encouraged by all the talk back home about how brave you are and how everyone supports you?

Treating soldiers fighting their war as brave heroes is an old civilian trick designed to keep the soldiers at it. But you can be sure our soldiers in Iraq are not all brave heroes gladly risking their lives for us sitting comfortably back here at home.

Our soldiers in Iraq are people, young men and women, and they behave like people - sometimes good and sometimes bad, sometimes brave, sometimes fearful. It's disingenuous of the rest of us to encourage them to fight this war by idolizing them.

We pin medals on their chests to keep them going. We speak of them as if they volunteered to risk their lives to save ours, but there isn't much voluntary about what most of them have done. A relatively small number are professional soldiers. During the last few years, when millions of jobs disappeared, many young people, desperate for some income, enlisted in the Army. About 40 percent of our soldiers in Iraq enlisted in the National Guard or the Army Reserve to pick up some extra money and never thought they'd be called on to fight. They want to come home.

One indication that not all soldiers in Iraq are happy warriors is the report recently released by the Army showing that 23 of them committed suicide there last year. This is a dismaying figure. If 22 young men and one woman killed themselves because they couldn't take it, think how many more are desperately unhappy but unwilling to die.

We must support our soldiers in Iraq because it's our fault they're risking their lives there. However, we should not bestow the mantle of heroism on all of them for simply being where we sent them. Most are victims, not heroes.

America's intentions are honorable. I believe that, and we must find a way of making the rest of the world believe it. We want to do the right thing. We care about the rest of the world. President Bush's intentions were honorable when he took us into Iraq. They were not well thought out but honorable.

Bush's determination to make the evidence fit the action he took, which it does not, has made things look worse. We pay lip service to the virtues of openness and honesty, but for some reason, we too often act as though there was a better way of handling a bad situation than by being absolutely open and honest.

[M1Tanker]

My complaint to CBS/Viacom/Rooney. Will they read it, probably not. If they do, will they use it as some kind of punch-line to a bad joke, probably.

To Mr Andy Rooney and his supervisors,

I choose not to watch CBS for various reasons of which I have written in several complaints about its vile programming. However, I have read the collumn Mr. Rooney wrote about the American Soldier saying we are not heros.

Mr. Rooney, what is a hero? Is it someone, like those on the National Socialist Left, that alllies with terrorists through organizations like ANSWER and Move-On in order to appease the terrorists? These are not heros, and their actions will only lead to the destruction of freedom. Or is it those who stand against the past blindness of the world and seek to free people brutalized by dictators and ignored by the UN? These are heros. They stand for what is right and accept that they may perish defending the world from itself.

The truth is, Mr. Rooney and CBS/Viacom executives that you know what heroism is, but to you it is a punch line. You laugh at and patronize those of us who gladly die to give you the right to be idiots. I have been in the army for over ten years. I saw the world turn its back in Africa and the Middle East in the 90s. I saw politicians with no courage or conviction ignore the comming storm of war and terrorism. I saw the appeasers of the world give in to terrorists and dictators for the nonexistant chance of "peace in our time".

What I now see is a President with courage, conviction, and honesty doing what is right. I see soldiers VOLUNTEERING to go to Iraq. And I see those on the Left sabotaging them at every opprotunity. If you were interested in the truth you would report these things. If you actually were interested in the truth...

Mr Rooney, In answer to your questions:
1. The USA did the right thing sending troops to Iraq.

2. We are doing what America set out to do to make Iraq a demcratic-republic. We are doing it faster and with less cost in our own lives than we did in Germany and Japan after WWII. Our own country took 12 years to make a functional Constitution, in Iraq we took less than 1 year.

3. The "headquarters" you speak of are just as involved in the fighting as the M1 Tank or the Grunt on the ground. They do the best they can, which is much better than any arm-chair general, or biased, leftist newscaster can.

4. Medal and another chance to take the fight to the terrorists. We are not cowards like those in Hollywood or the ANSWER/Move-On members.

5. I am encouraged that people in America see throught the lies of the Left (be it CBS/ABC/NBC/CNN or the arabic 'news' networks). I am encouraged the American people know enough not to trust you and look to other sources for honest. accurate news reports.

In closing, please re-think your politically motivated, hatefull lies and be honest with the people of the world as we soldiers fight to keep the monsters of terrorism and the resurgance of dictatorial socialism at bay.

[txradioguy]

I think I'll go with choice #16
16. All Of The Above

[stanz]

Done. I hate that bastard.

[Bigg Red]

This is part of the Leftist-Socialist-Democrat Party's plan to undermine the morale of our brave servicemen & women in Iraq - in order to affect the outcome of the war.

**

Exactly! Kerry supporters are out in full force.

[Bigg Red]

Demand that every newspaper that publishes this rubbish give equal time to the stories of local servicemen and women.

&&&

Not holding my breath for the success of anyone who tries any of your ideas -- noble but with no chance for success.

[Bigg Red]

Someone needs to send this to Hannity!

[blackie]

Complaint Filed!

We are winning ~ the bad guys are losing ~ trolls, terrorists, democrats and the mainstream media are sad ~ very sad!

~~ Bush/Cheney 2004 ~~

[Squantos]

Media to include that poor excuse for a reporter Rooney are some seditious POS Presstitutes ain't they............

http://media.militaryphotos.net/photos/usmc_eod_in_iraq/aaa

We got some good old boys on the ground that'll get it done regardless of efforts of the RATS 'n RINOS !

Stay safe Coop !

[Coop]

I hope this Rooney sonuvagun is having a miserable day because of this pathetic attack article.

[ohioman]

Unfortunately, I bet this asshole will live to be a 100.

[Coop]

We got some good old boys on the ground that'll get it done regardless of efforts of the RATS 'n RINOS !

You're right about that. But I just want them and their family members to know we're not going to sit back and take this garbage from Rooney and his antiAmerican cohorts.

[Palladin]

I have filed my complaint with See-BS. Not that it will do any good.

[Squantos]

I can honestly say that I have not watched CBSNBCABCCNNMSNBC since the event of 9-11 as I would have watched even telemundo to get nooooze on that day and a few after.

I get my information here at FR, off the net, and SW radio and spread some of the info even received here on my garden as fertilizer. But if validity is lacking FReepers will cut, chop and cultivate till the turd turns to a turnip at the very least.

I thought Andy Loony was dead ? He looks dead ! He sounds dead and only the dead pay attention to his tripe.

Loony Roony needs to go sailing with Walter Cronkite and call it a day.

Stay safe Coop and agree about keeping these SOB's off our GI's backs. It's our duty to try !

[kellynla]

As soon as the Market closes I plan on burning the phone line up making some calls to CBS and some newspapers that carried the piece.
I hope you do the same.
I emailed the piece to Laura Ingraham and Bill O'Reilly.
I called the editor in chief at the Buffalo News(they published the article) and gave him hell yesterday.

[Lily4Jesus]

unbelievable ... I am growing a real hatred for this guy, Lord help me.

[bondjamesbond]

I am always amazed about how when people see a story in the newspaper that they have personal knowledge of, the first thing out of their mouths is usually "Oh, they got it all wrong!"

Then those same people will pick up the newspaper the next day and believe every word.

Outside of sports scores, I have never read any story in any newspaper about which I have personal, first hand knowledge and been satisfied that they got the story even half right.

And that goes double for TV news.

[bondjamesbond]

Hmmm, toughie.

I'm going to have to go with the gorillas, Sloth.

[bkwells]

What an a hole!

I sent the following to CBS news and also faxed it to the Corporate HQ at Tribune Media Services at 312.222.2581 :

As an Active Duty Member of our Armed Forces and previously deployed in support of OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM, I read with utter dismay this so-called editorial by Andy Rooney. I offer the following letter:

While you are correct in your first statement that “Most of the reporting from Iraq is about death and destruction.” you are 100% wrong about the rest of your writing. Why is it that we don’t hear about all the good things that our HEROES (Yes, Rooney, contrary to your opinion they are Heroes) are doing every day in Iraq? What about all the schools that our Brave (Yes, they are Brave!) Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines have rebuilt (BTW, they have rehab-ed over 1500 schools thus far!). What about the fact that all 240 hospitals and more than 1200 clinics are now open throughout Iraq. What about the 22 MILLION vaccinations that have been administered to Iraqi children by coalition forces? The list goes on and on. I have emails from some of my buddies over there listing much, much more with tons of POSITIVE accomplishments thanks to the dedication and efforts of the U.S. and coalition military.

There are plenty of “Ernie Pyle’s” over there to tell us about all the positive and wonderful things our servicemen and women are doing over there, but the American-hating liberal-biased ass holes like yourself refuse to report on this.

As for your 5 “questions” to the military, you are not worthy of even being in the same room with a service member or even shining their boots, let alone ask him or her a question. You make me sick!

Do you really think that we do this for medals and glory? I don’t need a medal to keep me going and I DID volunteer to serve my country “AGAINST ALL ENEMIES FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC”. Have you not heard an awesome song by a REAL AMERICAN stating that we don’t do it for the money, we don’t do it for the glory, we just do it anyway? (That would be Toby Keith BTW.) I have never gone about my duty completing my mission with any expectation of a medal. (Unlike Kerry who put himself in for and wrote his own medal citations AND got to go home immediately afterwards.)

As for your mention of the Army’s suicide rate, have you thought about the fact that the stories and editorials such as yours may contribute to the “unhappiness” over there? So, Mr. Rooney, maybe you and your so-called journalists have contributed to a suicide or two. How dare you. You don’t know anything about the circumstances that may have contributed to a soldier committing suicide. Having been on numerous deployments, I can say first hand that home life and the support from home (or lack of) can greatly affect one’s mental stability and outlook on life.

In closing, I suggest that until you’ve ‘been there, done that” you stick to editorializing subjects you can relate to and have experience with. And if that’s absolutely nothing at all, that’s fine with me.

Brian Wells

[68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub]

Thanks Chief!

[SAMWolf]

Great response, Brian. Thanks for your service and you are heroes to a lot of us no matter what the Press and the Socialists try to have us believe.