At least 1,000 UK soldiers desert

BBC ^ | May 28,2006 | BBC

[canadianally]

More than 1,000 members of the British military have deserted the armed forces since the start of the 2003 Iraq war, the BBC has discovered.

It comes as Parliament debates a law that will forbid military personnel from refusing to participate in the occupation of a foreign country.

Some 900 have evaded capture since the Iraq war started, official figures say.

[FairOpinion]

As I said, it has to be considered in the context of what it was beofre.


Tuesday, March 7, 2006 12:02 a.m. EST

U.S. Military Desertion Rate Drops


http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/3/7/120646.shtml


At least 8,000 members of the U.S. military have deserted since the Iraq war began in 2003 – but the overall desertion rate has dropped sharply following the 9/11 attacks, Pentagon records show.

The Army, Navy and Air Force reported 7,978 desertions in 2001, the year of the Sept. 11 attacks, but only 3,456 in 2005. The Marine Corps also showed a drop in desertion numbers last year compared to 2001.

Desertions in 2005 represented less than a quarter (.24) of one percent of the 1.4 million American forces. During the Vietnam era, 3.4 percent of Army personnel deserted.

[DoughtyOne]

I may even be a decline. This is pure grade A propaganda.

[Romanov]

I asked a British friend of mine with whom I served in Berlin in the 80s (he's still serving). He said the figures are being misreported (like they do over here). Some of that number are guys like we have in the IRR (Individual Ready Reserve) who get a letter to report for duty but never show up OR never got the letter. Of course the drive-by press likes to spin everything negatively.

[familyop]

"Just wow."

Yes, it's a shocking surprise...for some, eh.

Once again, Mr Blair puts America first [Anti-American editorial alert.]
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1639606/posts

[GW and Twins Pawpaw]

4. If they desert in Iraq, where would they go (short term problem), how would they get to friendly territory (long term problem), or even home?

[familyop]

"Maybe some French in their bloodlines?"

Absolutely and factually! They received their first surnames from the French in 1066, and the French proceded to seed England thoroughly after the Invasion. The landlords were then French. Then, over the centuries since, much more of the same...with a dab of Arabic, Indian and this and that here and there.

[familyop]

The deserters should know the territory well enough. There's some very interesting history on that.

British Mandate
http://palestinefacts.org/pf_mandate.php

[bray]

This is the BBC, don't believe anything from them until it is verified from Mad Magazine.

Pray for W and Our Freedom Fighters

[a_Turk]

The pregnancy rate was something much higher.. Anybody remember?

[Brian Allen]

<< Our POTUS apologized only to help our Prime Minister Blair and his weak-kneed countrymen.

How I wish that GWB had looked into the camera and spit.

The Muslims would most certainly understand such a gesture. >>

The muslims did understand. And know, given that by his kowtowing, first to whiny-clipped-vowel Blair's Euro-peons' gutless, poofterish and American Service Man intensive conduct of the war on islamafascism and then to Blair's unpopularity with his anti-American electorate, Mr Bush has both put the final nail in the coffin of his own Doctrine and has ensured the islamafascists' win.

Blair to the marrow of his bones is an absolutely representative of his electorate, cravenly gutless, Euro-peon bullygirlyboy. Witness his and Clinton's Neo-Axis/NATO, picked up where Hitler and the the original fasciSSocialist Axis Powers left off, attacks upon and destruction of Christian Serbia.

An act of infamy that made islamafascism's takeover of Eurabia a lay down misère and effectively a fait accompli [Little frog lingo for youse there] and best revealed and demonstrated the abject evil at the core of the Blair character.

The character, that is, that makes him the most closely representative of his epidemically and endemically-alcoholic, foppish-wimpish, terrorist-appeasing, electorate since Neville Chamberlain absolutely best-ever represented it.

[weegie]

But werent those "French" actually Norman and therefore Viking, and if not then isnt a large part of American blood from the Brits and therefore (according to you) French?

Are you saying that George Washington was French????

[hershey]

The BBC wouldn't understand truth or common sense if it bit them in the behind.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

I had some "extra training" in my brief military career and deserved more. After 12 years of Catholic school, the military actually seemed pretty lax, compared to "real life".

[ishabibble]

I certainly did not mean the British Army's Gurkhas, the legendary fighting force from Nepal. Nor do I mean the Sihks who have long been regarded as some of the finest fighters in the history of warfare. I think you would agree that these distinctions are necessary when discussing the news article.

Of course the stats provided are misleading as on any given day there are desertions from any army. As a matter of fact, there were mass desertions from my brother's secret tree fort army at lunchtime or when the ice cream man's bell would ring out on our street! (1962-64)!


Within the last month I have also read an article re the new Iraqi Army and it's rate of desertion. Buried near the end of that article was the information that most of the "deserters" were in fact, simply following the customs of their culture, which included leaving their posts and returning to their homes to look after their families. A common practice in the old Iraqi Army. The headline made it seem that the Iraqi soldiers were running away en masse. It was just as misleading as this article, and it wears on my nerves. I also read another here at FR that reported an attack on a Sihk family in NJ, where some rowdies simply saw the very distinct headress of a Sihk and, not recognizing it, started some trouble. I have no doubt whatsoever that the Sihk men finished it.

[ishabibble]

President Bush said something to the effect that telling the terrorists to, "Bring it on" was a mistake. He also did some breastbeating re Abu Gahrib prison. Personally, I like that quote, and don't care a whit about what a few morons did in Abu Gahrib (Farsi for NYT Front Page Every Day).

After fighting these SOB's for nearly five yrs., President Bush and Tony Blair should both know that backing up even one bit gives those craven cowards an opportunity to bolster their jihad in the Arab world. The only thing those people understand it brute force. FReeper Brian Allen's posting certainly covers that aspect far better than I could, and I humbly suggest that you read it.

My own opinion of President Bush is that he is the finest of men, and the most tested of American Presidents. No man has ever faced what he has, no leader has ever borne such awful decisions, no one human being has ever faced what he faces on a daily basis. The world is engulfed in madness, and President Bush, with precious little help, is tasked with holding it together.


The very last time that President Bush knew a moment's peace was the morning he walked into a schoolroom and listened to the little children read a story. That day was 9/11/2001.
For those that are angry about one issue or another, I would like to remind them to look at the larger picture and ask themselves where we would be if it had been President Al Gore at the helm on that day.

[ishabibble]

I was reminded of the common practice of Irish IRA's joining up to learn military technique. It may not be the norm any longer, but I have several cousins who live in Ireland and told me about this happening in the simmering times that took place during the troubles in the North in the 60-70-80's.

[Condor51]

***Maybe some French in their bloodlines?***

Well considering the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and the ensuing Norman conquest by William, Duke by Normandy that's likely.

Then again Normans were descendants of the Danes (Norse men, Normans) who invaded Gaul back in the 800's, so were they really 'french'...

oh never mind.

:-)

[northmoor]

What was Christian about using murder and rape as a political policy in creating a Greater Serbia? Get your head out of your arse and forget this pro-nationalist Serbia rot. The dream of a greater ethnically pure Serbia died in 1999. The Iraqi people have a right to be free from terror, Muslims throughout the world have a right to be free of tyrants and autocrats. The Afghans had a right to be free of Soviet rule, and the rule of the Taliban. So too did the Muslims in Bosnia deserve to be free of terror and murderous government. The Serbian government and its allies committed mass murder in the Balkans, and an appeasement line like the one you are setting out, for most of the 1990s, led to them having a clear run, free from immunity.

It wasn't until Blair came into power in 1997 that some steel was put into European foreign policy on the matter. Blair turned around the Chamberlain line towards Serbia. Blair is a brave man to do what he has done in foreign affairs since coming to office in 1997, not least since 2001. And since most of the rest of the world is pretty neutral or anti-US foreign policy, before and since 9/11, I would suggest you should be careful about swelling negative myths about your few friends.

Try not to judge an entire country by what you read on the BBC or in the Guardian. It makes you like a damn idiot.

Is the US media representative of US public opinion, or opinion in the US armed forces? Let's think straight.

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks for that bit of insight. I appreciate it.

[familyop]

"But werent those "French" actually Norman and therefore Viking, and if not then isnt a large part of American blood from the Brits and therefore (according to you) French?

Are you saying that George Washington was French????"

Those "French" (Norman) were both: French intermarried with Vikings. After the Invasion, France planted landlords all over England. Many of them stayed after England was made somewhat independent again. And on "American blood" regarding people of English-French descent, yes. Read the history of the Norman Invasion and 400-500 years of following rule in France-England. It's an interesting history and will better answer your questions.

Empires cause lots of people to intermarry. That's one notable thing that they do.

In America, we've become even more mixed. Consider one case of those "French" surnames mentioned in documents of the Norman Invasion, although it wasn't very French in racial terms (name came through Spain from elsewhere). Almost all of the men in American generations that followed (for 337 years) have married women with names that we now consider to be "English."

If we go even further back, little brown people (probably from around where India is now) populated the area of southern Germany (where it is now), traveled up into Scotland and undoubtedly intermarried with many. We're all "mixed." The English are some of the most mixed of races (goes back at least to a possible Phoenician landing).

Besides, didn't you hear what people said about Frenchmen during the '60s? In racial terms, everyone is French to some extent, and most of the French aren't really so French. They'll be even less so in a few years, given the slow Algerian immigration invasion.