Posted on 03/24/2007 4:48:47 AM PDT by RoadTest
WASHINGTON (Map, News) - The top American general in Afghanistan has expelled a U.S. Marine special operations company for the way the men responded to an ambush March 4, Marine sources said.
Maj. Cliff Gilmore, a spokesman for Marine Special Operations Command, confirmed to The Examiner that the company of 120 Marines is redeploying.
He said the decision followed an ambush on the company's convoy by a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device. A second Marine source said the Marines retaliated and some civilians were killed.
(Excerpt) Read more at examiner.com ...
Our Generals have become nut-less politicians and ceased to be warriors. The days of "Blood and Guts" Patton are long gone
How can alll of these IED's get placed without the local civilian's assent or participation. I think this company has the right idea....screw Elkenberry!
Eikenberry was the manager of his HS football team. He went to West Point, served as an infantry officer and various attache billets in the orient (his wife is Chinese)including a staff billet in Afghanistan.
If there is any doubt as to why we are STILL facing an active war in Iraq, and in this case - Afghanistan - we need to look no farther than how we are intentionally crippling our own troops.
Again - when you try to fight a "PC" war, you are going to loose. Our formerly beloved POTUS, GWBush, who looked like a hero when the WOT began, now looks like another sniveling whimp.
I have had it - either FIGHT THE DANGED WAR, or bring ALL of our troops worldwide back home. We obviously are not REALLY going to fight anybody. Bring them home, put 100K troops on the southern border, and just ignore the rest of the world's problems.
Somw interesting background on ElkenBerry and Chinese weapons (Clinton).
http://www2.xlibris.com/bookstore/book_excerpt.asp?bookid=1598
Karzai needs to face the fact that Marines like these are the only reason his weak-kneed a$$ is holding on to any semblance of power.
I am much of your opinion. You cannot fight a war and go around arresting the troops for doing what they were trained to do.
A group of troops comes under attack,and they come out shooting, If you get in the way thats tough,but its war. there isnt time to look around and say that one is just observing ,and that one is eating his lunch, that one is trying to kill me. These are young men,away from home nervous and yes, frightened. Not the kind of fright that makes you run, the kind of fright that makes you fight.
Thats what training does, It takes away the urge to run when scared and turns that fear into retribution. Then we relieve them for doing their jobs,or worse yet we arrest and punish them for it.
Either its a war or it isnt, if its war then fight it,if it isnt then come home. We dont need these men being sacrificed to Political correctness.
Well, they had been on double secret probation according to General Wormer.
The next step is for these Marines to be sued by CAIR. A D.C. jury will gladly award the Taliban with damages.
Can I join you in the "Amen" corner?
A few nukes in the South Wazirhistan area in Pakistan might get the mountain folks to give up Osama, Zawahiri, and the one eyed wonder, Mullah Omar.
Eikenberry needs a time-out.
How true.
If 9/11 was not enough of a wake up call what is?
IIRC .. the stats for active participants in our own fight for independence was approximately 30% for and the remainder either against or non-commital.
I wish I had been able to attend the GOE ... there are people I'd like to meet and would hope they'd like to meet me.
So maybe we should change the ROE to "if you're attacked you may wipe out the entire village"? That'll sure teach them a lesson, huh?
Seems to me you fail to realize that is what the insurgents want. They realize they cannot defeat us in a conventional war so they'll get the locals to hate our presence. Along with the American press reporting it to the American people.
"It was the intelligent thing to do."
Could you explain that stand?
Thank you for that link. And Clinton's friends, the Democrats, blow every little sneeze in Bush's administration into a tornado. What hypocrites! Phonies! Liars! Traitors!
That Army general is a pussy.
Let's quote Shakespeare insted. "First, we kill all the JAGS..."
The action was based on a sound counter-insurgency principle, i.e. relationships with civil populations are one of the most important factors in an insurgency's success or failure.
Everyone: I am here in Afghanistan right now and have been for 6 months. I spent most of this up in the mountains with the Afghan army as an advisor. The problem with this situation isn't that the Marines fought back but "HOW" they did it. They ran and gunned lighting up everything for 6 miles!! No excuse for that. I am sorry to say it. I have a lot of gunfights under my belt in this deployment, just like I did in Iraq. They played into the bad guys hands by going over board. The war here is much different than the war in Iraq, very different. These people have been fighting like this for a long time. The Soviet Jihad, the Taliban, tribal wars. I personally don't like the Afghan people (didn't like the Iraqis either), but I respect their warfighting and use of the press. I have never hesitated to drop the hammer, never will. But you still have to stay aware because of the PC environment, which I loath. To many Fobbits and pogues and not enough warfighters. Sorry this had to happen to these warriors but it's the nature of the beast nowadays.
I'd much prefer this approach -- our guys went overboard, we admit it, so we're gonna pull them out and let them cool off -- rather than pointing fingers and hanging our guys out to dry like they did with Haditha.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.