Posted on 07/10/2020 4:00:56 PM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
Edited on 07/10/2020 4:01:44 PM PDT by Sidebar Moderator. [history]
The enemy could never break him, but what this decorated Green Beret eventually found was that his enemy was within. Friends who served with him in the military say he was the real “Captain America.”
Master Sgt. Andrew Christian Marckesano served six full tours in Afghanistan with the 82nd Airborne and the Ranger regiment and a half dozen more combat tours overseas. He rose to become a decorated Green Beret and a Silver Star recipient. He had just moved to Washington, D.C., to start a coveted job at the Pentagon. Two days after the Fourth of July on Monday night, after having dinner with his former battalion leader, Marckesano returned home from dinner in Old Town, Alexandria, and died by suicide in front of his wife. He had three small children and was still on active duty.
His death sent shock waves through the military. His friends, family and military leaders were at a loss. Many told Fox News that Marckesano never got over his tour in Afghanistan's Arghandab Valley in 2009 with the 2-508, a battalion that had one of the highest casualty rates of any unit during the war. “That deployment was like being in the ring with Mike Tyson for a year,” according to the battalion’s former Command Sgt Major Bert Puckett.
He sent a passionate appeal this week to the rest of the battalion: “Text me, I told you before my door is open... my phone is at hand. We did things that people make movies about and in some cases, writers and producers wouldn’t even try to write our story... the rucksack is heavy... and when it gets heavy we [&$#*] help each other, but you have to reach out... Don’t let the Valley win.”
“Lynn Cheney seem bent on keeping us there.”
Before you start coming down on Cheney, you should realize she’s not alone in her concern for diplomatic solutions in Afghanistan. Cheney and Mac Thornberry are the two that have vocally been quoted mainly because of the name with Chaney and that Thornberry is GOP. But the decision to slow Trump came from the Crow (Jason, Dem, Colorado) and Cheney from force reduction prohibiting the expenditure of monies to reduce the number of U.S. troops deployed in Afghanistan below 8,000 without a series of conditions first being met.
For these troop reductions from Afghanistan to be allowed, the Defense Department must be able to certify, among other things, that leaving Afghanistan “will not increase the risk for the expansion of existing or formation of new terrorist safe havens inside Afghanistan” and “will not compromise or otherwise negatively affect the ongoing United States counter terrorism mission against the Islamic State, al Qaeda, and associated forces.” Another requirement is an assessment of whether any “state actors have provided any incentives to the Taliban, their affiliates, or other foreign terrorist organizations for attacks against United States, coalition, or Afghan security forces or civilians in Afghanistan in the last two years, including the details of any attacks believed to have been connected with such incentives.
The vote on that from the house armed service committee was a pass at 45 - 11. So there are a lot of representatives in disagreement with how it is being done. More than just Cheney.
rwood
If you were joking, I do not understand your joke.
If you are serious, you stand in serious need of rebuke.
We ask our soldiers at the tip of the spear to repeatedly kill on our behalf. So you can sleep safely, day-after-day engage with the enemy at close range and have to witness and feel each of their kills, as well as the fear of their own death and the deaths of their friends. Many of these soldiers who kill on your behalf spend the rest of their lives haunted by the faces of those they killed and could not save. Then, they come home and have assholes attack them and call them racist murders, depriving them of the support they need to digest the psychological cost of what they did for us.
I am sure that your comment is not an indication of your true character, but it gives the impression that you are quite the heartless bastard.
If you are Christian, reflect on the mercy that Christ shows you, and show a bit for this brave soul who was overcome by the horror that he lived for you. If you are not, realize that he endured his living hell, in-part, so you could enjoy your freedom. Be grateful that there are men like him that enable you to enjoy your peaceful life.
Dude! That’s harsh!
I’m not gonna call names or insults, but just offer a perspective. As the father of someone who took her own life I can tall you that it haunts the survivors forever. But I don’t blame my daughter for the act of desperation because I know that it was the demons that overcame her and she lost hope that she could find an escape from her own personal hell.
I pray that the family of Master Sgt. Marckesano can find peace.
“By the time that George W. Bush left office the U.S. military campaign in Afghanistan was already longer than our involvement in World Wars I and II combined ... and that retarded baboon left the White House almost TWELVE YEARS AGO.”
‘Why should we worry anymore about his problems? He has left them to his wife and three small children.’
keep digging, bud, keep that shovel going...
Shut your pie hole.
Thank you for your comments. I could tell more about a specific freeper who committed suicide a few years back. And the effects that it had on his family and FR friends. But out of respect to his wife who still freeps, I will l Not comment further.
Except to say those who are blasting me have no idea what they are talking about. They have no idea of the hurt and anger suicide leaves behind.
Could have been nagged into it.
I agree suicide is a tremendously selfish act.
I don’t know whether the decision he made was made in the right frame of mind.
I don’t know what demons he was fighting when he still returned home after many tours of service .
I do believe that our country has not been doing right by our military with regards to spiritual and moral care. There is nothing in atheist culture or psychological sciences that can help people fight against demonic oppression. I don’t know what advantage the demons had against this man because of the many times he was in active duty.
Also, his family is suffering a lot. Tons of unanswered questions abound after suicide.
The posters cursing you don’t understand what the soldiers wife will suffer for the rest of her life. It’s just a horrific story.
MY deepest sympathies for the man’s family and circle of friends. I never thought those repeated deployments into battlefields was a good idea, if at all avoidable.
I used to wonder, does this mean we don’t have enough qualified personnel? Should we be going back to the draft?
If someone is not ready to accept help, they often know how to act, so that concerned people will stop asking “Do you need help?”.
Agreed. He deprived them of a husband and father. The Army has extensive services for counseling, adjustment when back from deployment, etc.
His family will be scarred for life from what he did.
“As I said up thread. Why should we worry anymore about his problems? He has left them to his wife and three small children.”
As ***I*** said upthread, if this is the way you feel, then you should have kept your thoughts to yourself. That you keep doubling down on them does not speak well of you (as in, you seem to have a humility deficiency). One or two people telling you off, etc. is not a big deal - but when nearly everyone does, maybe you need to examine yourself, your words and your values a bit more than you seem to have done. I don’t think anyone here, not just including you, likes what this guy did to his wife and kids, but there are clearly better ways of expressing one’s self - particularly when dealing with a man who was a hero for most of his adult life and was dealing with some demons so strong that they drove him to this action.
Sounds like domestic issues instead of combat fatigue.
Good for you.
Yes, a real act of aggression to do it in front of his wife. Of course the ‘vets are special and entitled’ folks are going to flame both of us.
Makes me wonder what his wife said to him when he got home.
I don’t understand why it was necessary for him to serve six full tours
I cannot say about all but many feel a strong obligation to their men.
Our USMC Infantry son did an additional tour in Anbar Provence because he felt they did not have enough experienced leaders.
He was not the only one in the unit to extend.
I do not believe there was any top-down pressure for this action.
They are brothers.
Karma is still still looking for you.
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