- "Wow, 130,000 troops on the ground, nearly 500 deaths
and over a billion dollars a day, but they caught a guy living in a hole.
Am I supposed to be dazzled?" - Anonymous Army Specialist
-
- "It's nothing like what the people back home have
been hearing. They're saying the war's over. The war's not over. Now, it's
more of a guerrilla war. The waste and frustration, everything that goes
on over there, it's just a nightmare." - Army Sgt. Michael Badgley
Jr.
-
- "Everyone hears that morale is high and that is
a bald-faced lie. The only people they ever talk to are these commanders.
The reserve soldiers never get to speak their mind. We are the pawns of
this war. We watch the active duty retire, and move to new assignments.
We watch their tours end as we are still trapped because of poor post-war
planning." - Reservist from Indiana
-
- "At the beginning, it was very clear: get that maniac
out of power, get him and his regime gone, and everything else would take
care of itself. We reached that goal, and continued past that goal, and
we've lost track of what we're doing. You can't leave, but you can't win.
... All they're doing now is getting people killed. ... There's not going
to be any end in sight. It only takes a handful of people to hit a place,
move on, and hit another place. It was effective in Vietnam, and it's effective
here." - Sgt 1st Class John Bogle, 101st Airborne
-
- "The equipment they tried to hand us was items that
were bound for the trash pile. Vietnam-era flack vests held together by
dental floss and a prayer won't keep us safe ... It was like pulling teeth
trying to get the things we needed. As 'dirty reservists,' we didn't deserve
the same respect, even though we're supposed to watch the active-duty's
backs." - Nicholas Ramsey, reservist from Indiana, public affairs
unit, Iraq
-
- "You'd be surprised at how many of the guys I talked
to in my company and others believed that the President's scare about Saddam's
WMD was a bunch of bullshit and that the real motivation for this war was
only about money. There was also a lot of crap that many companies, not
just Marine companies, had to go through with not getting enough equipment
to fulfill their missions when they crossed the border. ... It amazes me
with all the money our government spends on the military, all the foul-ups
and screwed up things we've had to put up with during this campaign. We
were promised to go home on June 8th, and found out that it was a lie and
we got stuck doing missions for an extra three months. Even some of the
most radical conservatives in our company including our company gunnery
sergeant got a real bad taste in their mouth about the Marine Corps, and
maybe even President Bush." - Lance Corporal George Batton, Marine
Corps Reserves
-
- "Man, they can't pay me enough to stay here. There's
not enough money in the world to make me stay a month longer." - Anonymous
Specialist, 4th Infantry Division commenting on the $10,000 three year
re-up bonus announced by the Pentagon.
-
- "If someone invaded Texas, we'd do the same thing."
- Lieutenant Colonel Kim Keslung, 21st Combat Support hospital, Balad,
Iraq.
-
- http://www.traveling-soldier.org/1.04.words.php
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