Pentagon Holds Thousands of Americans "Prisoners of War"By Penny Coleman, AlterNet. Posted March 26, 2008.
There are at least 60,000 of them, but they're not on the DoD's list of soldiers missing in action. Sgt. Kristofer Shawn Goldsmith was one of the many soldiers and Marines, veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, who gave testimony at last weekend's Winter Soldier investigation. They spoke from personal experience about what the American military is doing in those countries. They gave examples of what they had done, what they had been ordered to do, what they had witnessed, how their experiences had wounded them, both physically and psychically, and what kind of care and support they have, or most often have not gotten since coming home. The panel Goldsmith was on was called "The Breakdown of the U.S. Military," so he surprised the audience when he said that he was going to talk about prisoners of war.
He was not, however, going to talk about the three soldiers listed as missing in action on the Department of Defense website. He was referring to those who have been the
victims of stop-loss, the device by which the president can, "in the event of war," choose to extend an enlistee's contract "until six months after the war ends." The "War on Terror" is this president's excuse for invoking that clause. Because that war will, by definition, continue as long as we insist that there is a difference between the terror inflicted on our innocents and the terror inflicted on theirs,
American soldiers are effectively signing away their freedom indefinitely when they join the military. They are prisoners of an ill-defined and undeclared war on a tactic -- terrorism -- that dates back to Biblical times and will be with us indefinitely.
According to U.S. News and World Report, there are at least 60,000 of them............
Pentagon studies have shown that each deployment leaves a soldier 60 percent more likely to suffer serious mental health problems. In support of that, as this president sends soldiers back into combat as many as five times in as many years, the U.S. Army Medical Command Suicide Prevention Action Plan acknowledges that suicides among active-duty soldiers in 2007 were up 20 percent from 2006, their highest level since the Army began keeping such records in 1980. And the number of suicide attempts has increased sixfold since the Iraq war began. There were several in the I-30 Infantry Battalion, and Goldsmith holds his sergeant major responsible. Like Goldsmith, these young soldiers are being told not only that they are prisoners, but that they are disposable.
They are our children, and their deaths are on the hands of those who hold their freedom hostage.
Congress could put an end to this.more at:
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/80461/?page=2
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
