Winter Soldier Europe
Apparently, there was a short notice Winter Soldier hearing in Freiburg, Germany today. The press release was issued on March 12 for a hearing on the 14th. I guess that’ll be their excuse for piss-poor attendance. The press release reads;
Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) invites you to hear the hard truth about what is really on happening on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan, day in and day out, from American, British and German veterans.
Sounds pretty impressive. Until you look at who the speakers are expected to be;
U.S. AWOL soldier and Iraq veteran André Shepherd who seeks asylum in Germany.
Christian Neumann, soldier of the German army and veteran of the war in Afghanistan.
US Navy journalist Zack Baddorf.
US-veteran Chris Capps who deserted before deployment to Afghanistan.
André Shepherd (who I’ve written about before) was a depot helicopter mechanic who never left the hangar. He admits in other interviews that he didn’t know what was going on in Iraq until he returned from his first tour and saw the news broadcasts.
A German soldier? Really?
Zack Baddorf – a Navy journalist who spent a month in Iraq on a ship in the Persian Gulf (It was a six month cruise on the USS Peleliu that left San Diego in February and returned to port in August). What is he going to testify to? Other people’s war stories?
Christopher Capps, the IVAW Chapter president in Germany, who deserted before he was deployed. Is his testimony going to focus on the evils of packing his gear? Well, he did do a tour in Iraq in the 440th Sig Battalion at Camp Victory. But he insists on addressing the Afghanistan campaign;
Afghanistan has been recording record level opium harvests, action on removing land mines from Afghanistan is all talk with very little action, most Afghans surveyed want coalition forces out of Afghanistan, and the Taliban is experiencing a resurgence along the Afghanistan/Pakistan border. The idea that continuing to act as a soldier is bringing peace or stability to Afghanistan anymore is a farce, especially when there is rampant corruption inside the fledgling government you are fighting to support. For every insurgent you kill it creates a martyr which means more recruits for the insurgents.
He hasn’t been there – he deserted before he went, but he knows all of this stuff and he doesn’t need to provide proof. That’s Winter Soldier – so he fits right in. His tale of atrocities in Iraq consists of hooking up a fiber optic cable labeled Abu Ghraib;
I ended up working as a cable dog running communications wire within the camp. At first I was pretty apathetic about the war, but I started to understand my complicity in it. I stared to realize what the infrastructure I was building and maintaining was being used for. One day I was working for the combat engineers. They were telling me how important my work was to the mission. But I didn’t believe in the mission anymore. Later I was asked to reconnect a fiber optic cable that was labeled Abu Ghraib. The reality of it all would slap me in the face repeatedly over the course of the deployment.
It’s easy to understand why he was so upset at the Big Army machine;
I arrived at Camp Victory in Baghdad on Thanksgiving Day 2005.
They were having a giant turkey that day in the DFAC (cafeteria). Some other things they had in the DFAC were made to order. There were Philly cheese steaks, a good salad bar, a juice bar, Baskin Robbins Ice Cream, and food better then anything I had ever seen before. There was a Pizza Hut, a giant PX store, a Subway, an Arby’s, a Greens Beans, and a Popeye’s Chicken too.
When you’re expecting a combat zone and you walk into something like this you have to wonder “What the hell is going on here?” It was surreal sitting there eating a Subway sandwich, listening to elevator music, and hearing explosions so loud they could knock your drink right off the table, and gunfire in the distance.
Yeah, that’s some real horrifying stuff, Chris.
You know Darnell Stephen Summers will be there, too;
That’s Shepherd on the left and Capps on the right.
Category: Antiwar crowd, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Phony soldiers
[There were Philly cheese steaks, a good salad bar, a juice bar, Baskin Robbins Ice Cream, and food better then anything I had ever seen before. There was a Pizza Hut, a giant PX store, a Subway, an Arby’s, a Greens Beans, and a Popeye’s Chicken too.]
The horror…the horror…
I wish they were open when I was on duty. Best I could get after a long patrol were a couple of sandwiches from the back door of the DFAC. I had to sign for them. Kisses to my spoons for hooking a brother up.
What a bunch of unadulterated Sissies! With credentials like this it is understandable how they made it into a great outfit like the IVAW. And when they got there, they were probably dismayed to find that fellow Hero Jesse McFake had already been thrown under the Code Pink Bus. Sissies!
nuf sed
I would have loved to crash that party.
I’d of crashed it with ya, spork. woohaw!
Likewise, too bad they do not give time off during deployments for that sort of thing.
All that food, and he’s complaining? Boo-friggin’ hoo!
I wonder what he would have thought about the Gitmo prisoners? Getting ‘tailor’ made religious diets, Korans and prayer rugs…let’s not forget to add humiliation in there, too!
I’m so sorry he thinks it should have been much worse. Wah!!
Matt,
You get to Philly, let me know. I’ll buy you a Greenman’s Monster hoagie.
I’d defend, but I was under written orders not to attend and so have no idea about what happened. However, I do know that other people were scheduled to attend than the ones you have listed.
How does one defend the indefensible? If you were under orders not to go, sounds like your career in the active Army is, shall we say, not going the way you want it, or IVAW envisions it should be? Must be tough to get your marching orders when you can’t go study at the feet of Darnell?
Well since you’re here the biggest beef that I have is with Shepherd. He did not go outside the FOB and as far as his statements by him he never actually saw any wrongdoings. His biggest argument was that Apaches would use their weapons when need. I have been on coms overhearing a conversation between the landowner and a Apache unit about permission to use force because they saw some people that looked like they were planting IEDs. The request was denied because in the description of what was happening was not enough to approve a fire mission. Also when I was on a route that our platoon got hit several times by IEDs and one time which we revised some pop shots, just their presence on the field prevented further problems in the immediate days that followed. Also f you never been off of the FOB how can you tell how things are going outside. If I was saying that things in Iraq are going great and never been out at all, would view me as a creditable source as how Iraq is doing? If not then why do you expect me to view in as a creditable source.
Also with him requesting asylum he is taking away a much needed slot for those who are trying to escape real persecution. Because you know as well as I do that the odds of him getting a death sentence is non-existent. But it seems that is getting brought up because Europe is against the use of the death penalty. Also considering that Germany still considers many that where tried and executed as traitors are still listed as traitors even though the Nazi government has been gone for more then 60 years.
Corrected copy:
“Christian Neumann, soldier of the German army, which has orders not to fire, unless fired upon while in Afghanistan, and veteran of drinking beer up in Konduz,Afghanistan.”
In every war there are those who go this route, the war I served in some bitch sat on an anti aircraft gun and called us names. We still refer to her as the bitch and that’s all she will ever be nothing more than a Bitch! Many ran off to Canada, some even went to jail. Today some thirty odd years later my body is rotting with Agent Orange, but at least I can sleep at night. Shit we drank beer too, even got laid once in a while Christ we were only 18 years old what the hell did you think we were supposed to do or be? Heroes not hardly just a bunch of humps doing our job, hell we even got paid to do it shit heads like that idiot Senator from Massachusetts said we were mercenaries everyone likes to call names God help us all because all I wanted was to get freakin home but I waited my turn and did the dam job and now I pray for you guys that you all make it home, frankly I wouldn’t even piss on those shitheads a freaking waste of good beer piss!
There was a time in our society, when duty, honor and country meant something to Americans. Since there is very little honor and defending America has been criticized, anybody can say anything without impunity. Without morality and honor we are doomed.
Screw all those Blue Falcons. I hope CBP/CIS doesn’t let their traitorous asses bask in the country.