Posted on 02/10/2012 4:37:35 AM PST by KantianBurke
SAN DIEGO The Marine Corps on Thursday once again did damage control after a photograph surfaced of a sniper team in Afghanistan posing in front of a flag with a logo resembling that of the notorious Nazi SS -- a special unit that murdered millions of Jews, gypsies and others. The Corps said in a statement that using the symbol was not acceptable, but the Marines in the photograph taken in September 2010 will not be disciplined because investigators determined it was a naive mistake. The Marines believed the SS symbol was meant to represent sniper scouts and never intended to be associated with a racist organization, said Maj. Gabrielle Chapin, a spokeswoman at Camp Pendleton, where the Marines were based.
Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, headquartered in Los Angeles, said he does not buy the explanation that posing with the flag was an innocent mistake and insisted the American public has a right to know what happened.
"If you look at any book on the Nazi period, this is the dreaded symbol of the SS, and to have a Marine Corps unit adopt it and put it beside the American flag when 200,000 Americans died to free the world of that dreaded symbol is just beyond the pale," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
“People need to get their panties out of a wad about symbols”
Considering such a symbol was responsible for the murders of millions of innocent people and the combat deaths of thousands of American GI’s, its use was and is unacceptable.
Given the lack of knowledge about history by today’s youth, I think these guys were indeed clueless.......
I was going to say, it does indeed look like the Siegrune to me.
After just seeing that flag, I guess I'm clueless too because I've never seen it before...........
KISS logo: Frehley created the now-iconic logo, making the "SS" look like lightning bolts, when he went to write the new band name over Wicked Lester on a poster outside the club where they were going to play.[20] The runic letters happened to look similar to the insignia of the Nazi SS, a symbol that is now illegal to display in Germany. Therefore, to avoid controversy, since 1979 most of the band's album covers and merchandise in Germany have used a modified version of the logo instead, with the SS represented by two backwards Zs.
Image of the Schutzstaffel (SS):
If only it did!
That KISS font is easy to find - and that would have made a good explanation. But the KISS “S” is much thinner in the horizontal element.
The Swastika is NOT an evil symbol. It's been used for centuries on the Indian subcontinent as a sign of good fortune and wealth. Hilter canted the swastika 45 degrees which is a big difference from the usage across southern Asia.
Sorry..these guys messed up. SS Runes have no place in the US military.
But if they had a Hammer and Sickle they would have been made part of Obamas Army.
Stupid fail.
Double Sig runes will always be looked at as “SS”. Or for at least another generation or so. They knew what it was, and that it would be viewed as “bad a$$”.
Send them to bed without ice cream and put a Sioux warrior on the flag instead.
Theres a whole bunch or Rudyard Kipling books that have the swastika on the cover - published before the Nazis ruined the poor swastikas reputation.
Is there ANYTHING AT ALL over which some dweeb SOMEWHERE won’t take offense these days?
People these days have their noses so far up everyone ELSE’S butts nowadays that it’s amazing anyone at all can see what the heck they’re doing with their OWN lives.
I am willing to believe that this was an ignorant mistake...Looks like the Corps has handled it correctly...Why use a lame Nazi looking symbol when the Marine Corps has the Eagle,Globe,and Anchor?
Just for fun, Google “45th infantry patch”
History (among other things)is not being taught in our schools....
Men that age might associate those 2 letters with Kiss (as mentioned above) than anything else. Not a smart move by any stretch of the imagination. I would tend to take them at their word (SS = Sniper Scouts). I do not think it was meant to glorify the ideals of Nazi Germany. IOW, a crime of stupidity. I strongly agree the symbol has no place in our military.
...time to broaden the scope of “loose lips sink ships”!
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