Posted on 08/26/2003 1:56:45 PM PDT by JDoutrider
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Using Jessica Lynch
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: August 26, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2003 David H. Hackworth
Jessica Lynch recently was awarded a Bronze Star Medal, a Purple Heart and the POW Medal. The BSM citation reads: "For exemplary courage under fire during combat operations to liberate Iraq, in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Private First Class Lynch's bravery and heart persevered while surviving in the ambush and captivity in An Nasiriya."
A BSM for "bravery" and "surviving in the ambush and captivity"!
The Army's official After-Action Report said she was in a vehicle that crashed while hauling butt trying to escape an enemy ambush. She was knocked unconscious and woke up at a nearby Iraqi hospital receiving special attention from some super-caring Iraqi doctors and nurses.
This was probably the first incident in U.S. military history in which an American soldier was awarded our country's fourth-highest ground-fighting award for being conked out and off the air throughout a fight.
BSMs citing bravery typically read: "Moving his machine gun to a forward vantage point, he covered the advance of the infantry with a heavy volume of effective fire. Repeatedly exposing himself to a devastating small-arms automatic weapons and mortar barrage ..." Or: "He voluntarily acted as point man and ... when the platoon was fired upon ... charged the enemy position ... Through his courage, determination and devotion to duty, he saved his patrol from suffering casualties and captured a prisoner who later provided important information."
It's no big surprise that I've been bombarded by thousands of angry e-mails from vets protesting this assault on our country's sacred award system.
"She wasn't wounded in action, nor did she do anything to deserve a Bronze Star," writes Arch McNeill. "We have hundreds of valiant soldiers here in the 3rd Division who far more deserve more than she received but in many cases didn't receive anything."
"I'm going to send all my awards back to the president and tell him where he can shove them," says a genuine war hero, Jack Speed, a former Army Raider.
Trust me, the troops – past and present – are unhappy.
So I rang the Pentagon and asked Col. Jeff Keane, "Why the bravery bit?" Finally, when the standard Army propaganda drill wasn't going down, Keane told me, " It was for her bravery in the hospital."
But all this flimflam wasn't Jessica's doing. She was used right from the first – a frail prop in the Pentagon's public-relations campaign to sell the war to the American people and to encourage their daughters to join up and be heroes.
To keep the truth under wraps, the Army concocted another whopper: "She suffers from amnesia."
A senior officer from V Corps (the unit that eventually awarded her the BSM), who has asked to remain anonymous, comments that there was "tremendous pressure right from the get-go to award Pvt. Lynch a Silver Star. But the high brass here concluded, 'There was no evidence of heroism on her part,' and told the pushers to back off."
But when the propagandists conned the highly respected Washington Post into reporting on how Lynch was shot and stabbed but continued to kill Iraqis until her last round was spent, heroic stuff that would make Audie Murphy look like a slacker – which the Post then took several months to correct – other media were fast to pick up the fairy tale, and the Army was besieged by proud Americans demanding that Jessica be awarded the Medal of Honor.
Of course, many of us now know that a high-priced flack in Tommy Frank's headquarters came up with this tall tale and then duped the Post.
According to retired Marine Lt. Col. Roger Charles: "There's nothing they won't stoop to spin. The Army needed a female hero to boost female recruiting and PR efforts, so they went and invented one."
And that's the root of the problem. The elevation of Jessica to Joan of Arc status is to recruit more women, even though thousands of female soldiers couldn't deploy with their units to Iraq because of pregnancy, no sitters for single moms' multiple kids and other problems.
And poor Jessica Lynch has become the unwitting poster girl for an Army of One that's fast becoming an Army of Two – since apparently more than half of the women deployed to Iraq are now pregnant.
Could be that FR was not around then and this is "in your face."
Free Republic has been here since '98 (5 years) and medal awardship was never much of an issue even though there have been plenty of military excursions.
You're wrong about that. I don't see half of the people on FR whining about Jessica getting attention for her rescue.
...this person has been trying to sustain a flame war with me for months (some odd obsession, it seems),...
If there were people trashing Iwo Jima vets every week, I think you would engage them about it every time. So again, you're being hypocritical.
and it's not even remotely interesting to me. My advice? Get out while you still can. LOL
Good advice. There will be consequences to trashing POWs.
LOL, Why I am waiting until now to become vocal about this? Your assuming I haven't been prior? How do you figure? Or is it that you know all and see all? Are you assuming that Free Republic is the center of the Universe as far as debate is concerned? I live in a military community and have for quite a few years, and this debate IS NOTHING new to any of us. Welcome to the party, but throwing a tizzy because we don't agree with you doesn't make anyone less supportive, or hecklers.
If you whined about Jessica receiving her medal, then you are one of the hecklers
I guess calling you out for the second time to specifically quote me on where I whined or attacked Jessica would be pointless, since it is amazingly obvious that you cannot. Now it's turned into everyone that doesn't agree with you has "motives" but they (we?) are now trying to rip medals of veterans jackets? Where do you get this crap? Your amazing to say the least, no wonder someone told you to take these personal attacks back to the old threads. Because it seems to be what your best at.
When you feel like actually debating the issue of medals, intelligently, and without personal attacks I'll resume happily.
don't post assumptions about me
I wouldn't think of it.. your doing such a good job of it on this thread, ...assuming everything for yourself and for everyone in disagreement with you.
BTW, When my hero, my husband (who also fights for this country etc, etc.) returns from Iraq, and in returning if he were to receive a medal he didn't deserve, not only would I be proud of his courage to admit that criteria wasn't met, but my opinion (which we share) on the subject would not change. With your thinking I am now heckling my husband and attacking him personally? LOL, O.K. ;-) And he'll also get a laugh about how he is also an "attacking heckler with an agenda" and not "supporting our soldiers", according to your thinking because he doesn't hold your opinions as facts on this subject. Either way, right or wrong this isn't worth the fuss your putting into it. lol... I no longer have time for this.
But in the above Hack text, the Pentagon responded, Keane told me, " It was for her bravery in the hospital."
Now, the injuries that were disputed were gun shot wounds and stabbings. NO ONE disputed her broken arm(s) and back.
Now in these disclassified Iraqi reports from Gulf War 1, all the POW women that had broken backs and arms were from rape issues.
Now, if Jessica was only knocked on conscious in the initial capture, what happened to her at the hospital? And might that qualify for what is said in Post 32:
The Bronze Star Medal is awarded to any person who, while serving in any capacity in or with the military of the United States after 6 December 1941, distinguished himself or herself by heroic or meritorious achievement or service, not involving participation in aerial flight, while engaged in an action against an enemy of the United States; while engaged in military operations involving conflict with an opposing foreign force; or while serving with friendly foreign forces engaged in an armed conflict against an opposing armed force in which the United States is not a belligerent party.
I would change my tag line to;
>>Warning<< If you start with personal attacks or name calling you are conceeding that you have no more intelligent replies to add to a good debate, and hense forfit by using previously mentioned attacks. -and plus you tend to brighten my day by making me laugh a little.
But alas.. it's just to long :(
Yes, you are hecklers. How disrespectful to someone who sacrificed so much for her country. So you're contending that this issue is very important to you and has been for a long time but you just never got around to posting about it until Jessica got a medal? Yeah right.
I guess calling you out for the second time to specifically quote me on where I whined or attacked Jessica would be pointless, since it is amazingly obvious that you cannot.
Oh great, you're one of those people who post something and then won't admit to posting it just a few posts later. Here's what you said in post #53 (I can't believe we have to go through this, denial is not just a river in Egypt)
And yes your right, there are worse examples, but that doesn't mean it's ok because it's "not as bad" as other examples.
You implied her medal isn't OK.
. Now it's turned into everyone that doesn't agree with you has "motives" but they (we?) are now trying to rip medals of veterans jackets? Where do you get this crap? Your amazing to say the least, no wonder someone told you to take these personal attacks back to the old threads. Because it seems to be what your best at.
It's obvious you have other motives. There is 40 years worth of medals being given out cavalierly and yet you heckle a soldier that was a prisoner of war and has lifelong injuries. If you really wanted to prove your case about medals and really cared about medals you would pick a much better example than Jessica. The fact that you won't means you indeed have other issues and are using a soldier who has sacrificed so much for your political purposes.
When you feel like actually debating the issue of medals, intelligently, and without personal attacks I'll resume happily.
I don't want to debate medals, I don't see the importance of it. Every soldier knows what he/she did and God and his/her fellow soldiers knows what he/she did. It's none of my business who gets a medal and who doesn't. My issue on these threads is the heckling. It's wrong to heckle someone who has made sacrifices for all of us when there are much better examples to use for this.
I wouldn't think of it.. your doing such a good job of it on this thread, ...assuming everything for yourself and for everyone in disagreement with you.
You post out of context. I said (paraphrasing) "don't post assumptions about me if you don't want a response from me". Why can't you be honest and post what I say in context?
BTW, When my hero, my husband (who also fights for this country etc, etc.) returns from Iraq, and in returning if he were to receive a medal he didn't deserve, not only would I be proud of his courage to admit that criteria wasn't met, but my opinion (which we share) on the subject would not change. With your thinking I am now heckling my husband and attacking him personally? LOL, O.K. ;-) And he'll also get a laugh about how he is also an "attacking heckler with an agenda" and not "supporting our soldiers", according to your thinking because he doesn't hold your opinions as facts on this subject. Either way, right or wrong this isn't worth the fuss your putting into it. lol... I no longer have time for this.
Your posts are as long as mine so you're fussing as much as I am. I think it's wrong for an awardee to not accept awards for a job well done and to speak against those that wish to give an award. People don't do things exactly the way we wish but we should appreciate their recognition of good deeds.
Oh, me too. LOL And I agree! That tagline field needs to be much longer! I want mine to be "My ancestors killed Abraham Lincoln. It haunts me still. Do you know where I can get a bucket of chicken?", 'cause a stranger actually said that to me once. It just won't fit!
Because Jessica was a lone rescuee in a rescue that was the first of it's kind since WW2. Simple as that. Why can't you accept that?
It haunts me still. Do you know where I can get a bucket of chicken?
LOL, Now that is a odd remark to say...
As far as hero's coming home, and not liking the attention or feeling they deserve it, I can "sort of" understand it up to a point, Even though I fully believe they all deserve it. My grandfather was a "homecoming hero" in the small little town he grew up in when he came back from the coal mines after 3 1/2 years of being a POW from going thru the Bataan Death March. My mother says the one thing she will never forget as a child, is him telling her mom after the big celebration that all he wanted to do was leave before they found out what he was really like. He was a great man, but not one for frill and fanfare. I am convinced he deserved all of the attention, he just didn't see it that way. I can't really blame him though, he was a simple down to earth man.
They have an annual Bataan Memorial Walk (or run?) in the White Sands area in New Mexico, I believe...I have relatives down there and I've thought of trying to train for it, but the climate is so much different than where I live - I don't know if I could possibly prepare for it. (I have been to the Bataan Memorial Museum in Santa Fe, and I would recommend it if you get the opportunity.)
I believe they all deserve to be welcomed home too - each and every one of them. I guess my problem is that when a plane lands in the United States carrying multiple POWs and the FNC caption says, "Pfc. Jessica Lynch Returns Home" or some such thing, I have to wonder why that sort of thing exists to the exclusion of all the others.
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