Posted on 03/15/2005 6:53:19 PM PST by neverdem
Ironically, it wasn't TV, cell phones or E-mail that caused problems for my unit. When we suffered our first casualty, it was a numbnuts officer on the general staff back home who was officially in the loop that told a few wives about it at a reception - before the official notification process was complete. Shortly thereafter the rumor mill and panic had set in. Loose lips damn near sank our ship in that particular instance...
Sarge's Daily Report PING!
I'd like a little opinion spot, here. My kids will meet this wall eventually, and they need to be prepped for the silence. One chick keeps calling one of my guys a dozen times each day.
My baby girl - 7 - gets upwards of 10 calls a night from a classmate.
I am very familiar with Internet firewall technology, part of the job.
Thinking about the concept of a home phone firewall.....
LVM
That's Mrs. Murray to you bubs!
Just figured you would be interested in this.
LVM
Well, all I can say is that all the technology has made it much easier in my mind to have my kids all over the place. It's a whole lot easier with email than waiting six week for snail mail. And, yes, one was in Iraq and will be going back shortly. I treasure the emails and phone calls. I enjoyed that phone call from Colombia last night too!
"Just as television coverage during Vietnam brought shocking images of war into living rooms, so today's communications technology has the potential to immerse already anxious families in the raw experience of combat, while miring soldiers in domestic problems that distract from the mission."
Neither my mother, or father or brother (older)
ever knew I went to Viet Nam
UNTIL after I came back.
The post office on my ship used to place a stamp on each outgoing piece of mail to them so they were not
tipped off by the free postage.
They were in my hometown of Chicago
and subject to the growing anti war crowds.
My thought why should they worry about me.
Thank you.
GMTA...
Good point, Tonk...sometimes the communications are not what we want our families to hear.
But, the supportive messages are necessary IMO.
Somebody already made my main point...a Colonel's wife is reduced to Ms. ... as though she's unmarried or still a little girl. How demeaning can you be? Oh, that's right. She's part of the military. Can't be bothered with those people's feelings, right?
I can attest to a lot of what was said as being true. When KJ was in Iraq and if I knew he was travelling a dangerous route I would be on pins and needles til I got an email. And when he got there fine but just didn't get a chance to let us know, we spent a few anxious days. It's a catch-22 from the homebound. You want to know, but then maybe you don't want to know everything.
Geez Tonk. You're about to make me cry.
His wife ought to get off her backside and push the lawnmower around herself, as I do, and did just after each of my children was born.
This is one of the things that makes a deployment harder for men: whining women back home. I have heard this from so many men, and I listen to the whining and helplessness in an area full of military wives. Grow UP, ladies! It's 2005! You can do things, make decisions, and manage your life without crying to your husband! Consider it your patriotic duty to be cheerful, supportive, and upbeat when he calls, without hassling him and making him worry about problems at home. Surely he has enough to worry about in Iraq.
Needless to say, I hate helpless girly women.
Things were different then.
The anti war crowd in Chicago was ruthless.
Fueled by the likes of the Chicago 7.
We left in Aug '68, right after the Democratic convention.
There was no "Welcoming the Troops Home" back then.
We all just came back and tried to forget.
And here it is 2005 and Hanoi Jane will be on the airwaves, again, starting on 60 Minutes on Apr 3
And the "Move On" FReepers will do just that.
Ain't life grand.
I know things were different back then. THANK GOD the guys going now will benefit from what you went through and will never have to face the kind of BS you did - and still do...which you know I believe is a crock. It's because of Vietnam vets like YOU that my brother got a welcome home last April. THANK GOD the press will never be able to pull crap like that again without an outcry from people everywhere. THANK GOD Algore invented the internet! I'll bet he wishes he'd never thought of it! He he he!! *HUGS!*
Hooah!! THANK YOU for being a strong woman behind one of my military HEROES - you are a hero too!! *HUGS!*
Well, I appreciate that, but actually I'm not behind any military hero. My teenage daughter's boyfriend is in Iraq and another dear young friend of mine just came home (a Naval officer who was so determined to fight directly in this war that he transferred to ground duty in Iraq, and ruined his fine career in doing so). But I don't have a husband over there. I am just surrounded by local officers' wives in my neighborhood who spend half their lives bitching about how tough it is to have Himself gone for six months or so, and as a divorced mother who has not had a man to make decisions for me in the past ten years I get furious that they call their husbands and whine about how hard it is making the maid do a good job on the bathrooms. Sheesh. These gals need to get a clue. It's the twenty-first century and today women actually are able to make decisions for themselves. I just know that if I had a husband over there I'd never bother his head about a thing, just send him lots of news stories from FR about how the American people love what our boys are doing over there and fill his head with promises about what I was going to do to him when he gets back.
BTTT!!!!!!!
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