I haven't highlighted individual soldiers' deaths. Who knows why they enlisted, what they believed?

[bigtree]

. . . but this man was lied to. Whatever mission he was told he was on was long ago been shown to be nothing but a load of Bush's self-serving bull. Now, with nothing of the original 'mission' remaining -- and the rhetoric about terrorist threats from Iraq coming out of the White House like a criminal repeat of the original lies about mushroom clouds and aluminum tubes -- this soldier, like the thousands before him in Iraq, (and the inevitable sad losses to follow) died in vain.


El Paso sailor killed after just 7 days in Iraq

EL PASO, Texas -- Navy corpsman Gilbert Minjares Jr. told his brother that if he died in Iraq, he wanted his two children to know he served so they could grow up free and without fear.

Minjares, 31, and six others died Wednesday _ just seven days after he reached Iraq _ in a helicopter crash in Al Anbar Province, the Department of Defense said Friday. The cause of the crash is under investigation.

"He gave me all his clothes and stuff, like he knew what was going to happen," said Jose Minjares, Gilbert's brother. "He told me, 'If anything happens, I want you to let my kids know I did it for them.'"

Minjares is survived by his wife, a 2-year-old son, and a 4-week-old baby living in North Carolina, said Eddie Pedregon, the seaman's cousin. Gilbert Minjares also worked as a recruiter in El Paso, Jose Minjares said.

"He always wanted to give to others before he gave to himself," Pedregon said. "His dream was to save Marines."

A corpsman is the Marines' equivalent of an Army medic.

The seaman was happy-go-lucky, loved his family and his home and had no doubts about his service or heading to Iraq, his brother said.

"He said he'd rather go fight over there than have to fight (terrorism) over here," the brother said.

http://www.kristv.com/Global/story.asp?S=6065227


"He was a brave, brave man."

[patrice]

1. Sad. His kids are almost certainly going to grow up way less

Free and way more in Fear.

Death and Destruction embolden those (all over the World) who intend to become religious martyrs or tribal heroes. And there's simply no way around that unless we achieve perfect Genocide of all Muslims. Not only will the effort make war slaves out of all Amerikans forever, but it also makes U.S. no better than our putative "enemy".

[Bobbieo]

2. Weren't many of them "weekend warriors" - National Guard -

who got moved into active duty. That happened to my husband during the Korean War.

[bigtree]

3. absolutely

historic deployments

[patrice]

5. I was in the Air National Gaurd in a unit that had a 24/7 refueling

mission. I was in for over 10 years and at that time you could quit after 10 if you wanted to, don't think that's true anymore. Also when I enlisted in the Gaurd it was more exclusively under the governor's control, but something about that changed around Desert Storm. My unit was activated, but I never went to the MidEast and then I quit shortly after Desert Storm was over. I heard after that that the command structure of GAurd and Reserve became even more centralized, and less under the governors' control. I think it's pretty interesting too that even if the Federal government doesn't take your Gaurd troops, it can still take quite a bit of Gaurd equipment. Governor Sebelius was complaining about this in the press a few months ago.

I joined, like so many others, for training (you could get a gauranteed job in those days, something else I don't think is true anymore despite what the commercials say) and educational benefits. Being a child of the '60s I had to settle with myself about getting into wars in foreign countries. I decided the Gaurd was different; it was more for defense of the home soil and that was something I didn't have a problem with. If some country invaded us, I would want to fight them. Desert Storm came along and put the lie to that. I knew it was because of a treaty we were in with Kuwait, but I couldn't understand what we were doing fighting for such a degenerate country. Our status as mercenaries for Oil Royalty is clearer to me now.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

4. Expendable cannon-fodder used by politicians to further their ambitions.

Millions lie in graves dug by the powerful "leaders" who sent them to kill and die.