What the Hell do you know about Afghanistan?
I caught wind of a little presentation that the Chicago chapter of IVAW was giving in the Windy City next month entitled “What the hell do you know about Afghanistan?“. Apparently, it’s designed to inform us woefully ignorant Americans about Afghanistan. But here’s their press release about the event;
Iraq Veterans Against the War present a series of shorts, improvised skits, talks, stories, and performances that dive into how little and how much we know about Afghanistan. Hear from the first hand experience of veterans that have walked the streets and driven the roads of a country that too many of us know too little about. And tell us what the “hell” you know about a country we have now occupied
for over nine years.
So I went over to the Chicago Chapter’s roster just to see who the Hell is going to tell me what the Hell they know about Afghanistan.
Chicago | Chapter 12
President – Pete Sullivan
Treasurer – Mike Applegate
Secretary – Jim Redden
So what is their background? According to their profiles, none of them have been Afghanistan – or Iraq for that matter;
So, I checked the profiles of the other members of the Chicago Sect and couldn’t find any who had been in Afghanistan. Two had been to Iraq, one had been to Guantanamo.
So I wonder what the Hell they know about Afghanistan that I don’t already know.
Category: Antiwar crowd, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Phony soldiers
So, more bloggers at TAH have been to Afghanistan than IVAW Members leading the effort to tell us about that country.
Nice.
Isnt it always that way with these Frauds?
Oh skits! I love little skits. Is this where they all fall down and play dead, while they are watched over by wanna-be’s holding their fingers like cap guns? I almost destroyed my monitor and keyboard watching that one!
Jerry; was that the one with Kokesh looking all tough?
The next group of Saturday Night Live, I take it.
When the hell is this organization going to fold?
Like their predecessors Vietnam Verans Against the War, these participants were liars telling prevarications at the Winter Soldier Investigation.
Ohhh GOD, I think we are going to see the world’s first interpretive dance of an IED, water boarding, rendition, and conscientious objectors. I do however think I would like to see IVaw’s “skit” about some good old fashioned Man-Boy-Goat loving A-stan style!
Although I might have to wait until the show hits the road and performs in San Francisco to see that.
“A evening of performances by Chicago artists, intellectuals, and veterans”
…I wonder how many of these “artists & intellectuals” have real jobs… As for their “veteran status”… Weelll, they are IVAW members & that’s an iffy question…
Not all members have public profiles on the website. The Chicago chapter is pretty damn big.
A vast majority of IVAW has deployed. I’ve done the stats and seen the numbers. More Iraq than Afghanistan, but I’m sure that will change over time.
Chicago IVAW in particular are pretty damn awesome.
Selena, care to post these numbers?
Probabaly the only accurate skit they will do is “Man Love Thursday.”
If that was the case AS then there should be NO excuse for the higher leadership not to have have been in Iraq or Afghastan. Also if you are having a event that talks about first hand knowledge there then the should be no tolarance for those who have not been thier being allowed to speak.
To Army Sgt.
What makes the Chicago IVAW so damn awesome?
AS – after reading many of your posts, I have come to the inescapable conclusion that Denial is not just a river in Egypt with you. I am told by others that you served honorably, but were never deployed to a combat zone – thus I question why you are considered an “Iraq Veteran” instead of an “Iraq/Afghanistan Era Vetran” which is a big difference, but I digress. You need to wake up and smell the coffee, these guys are attention whores, nothing more though occasionally a whole lot less. You demean yourself and your service by associating with these pretenders.
As to this event – “intellectual” should refer to a person of above average intelligence who thinks for themselves and reaches logical, defensible conclusions; not a self-serving reactionary. I get the feeling this event will be full of the latter with none of the former to be found.
You know I have to admit that I have no clue about where you have been posted too. I take it you had some oversea deployments?
I heard that there were hot chicks in bikinis behind every pine tree in A’stan…that’s about all I know. Oh and they love Bob Ross’ painting show from PBS even though he was once an Army sergeant, was rocking the coolest fro’ any white boy ever did see and is now dead…but that being dead thing had nothing to do with him being white, having a ‘fro or being a painter who was in the Army once. True story, bro.
Actually, Wiki says Ross was AF. I never heard of the dude, but that is some STYLIN’ hair.
I also would like to see those #’s AS, because when I ran them based on profiles, it was under 50%.
Just my two cents… In my observation in my previous work with VFP, some of the most credible vets who have taken a position in opposition to the war, often remain largely silent and invisible behind the scenes, barely making themselves known even to their fellow VFP members. Yet maintain membership and perhaps nominal communication.
TSO and Casey: the vast, vast majority of our members do not have profiles and are not as public. They do a lot of work behind the scenes.
As for what I did and when I did it…I honestly can’t tell you. It sounds like BS, which is why I don’t tend to talk a lot about what precisely I did in my time. I will say that it wasn’t exciting, it wasn’t James Bond like, I wasn’t a hero, but my work did help to save combat troops’ lives and I am very proud of that. I once offered to meet CJ inside a SCIF and have a serious chat with him, but that never wound up happening. Despite what the Army did to me because of my (legal) activities, I haven’t betrayed my oath to them and won’t. I would rather you all think I was useless and had nothing to do with Iraq at all. Intel soldiers don’t need public acclaim to have pride in themselves.
Mike: Chicago IVAW as far as I know works together, makes shit happen, and is always responsive. I’m not saying other chapters aren’t awesome too. But Chicago is one of the “big chapters” that helps other chapters and committees out, and I have to give them their due especially when folks go after them. Could have gone more in depth but I’m typing shit out on my Blackberry.
Blah, blah, fucking blah. Give me the names of the Afghanistan vets in Chicago who will be educating us about Afghanistan. Last I heard, from TJ Buonomo, only 2/3 of IVAW have even had their service verified. Stop telling us about how many don’t have profiles and that you were a secret squirrel and can’t talk about what you’ve done. It’s fairly exasperating trying to get actual proof from IVAW. Whenever you’ve asked me for proof about something, I’ve presented it. So quit flapping your gums and prove some of your endless blather.
Oh, and don’t tell me it’s not your job or responsibility to prove anything for IVAW. It became your job and responsibility when you opened your trap.
Fuck!
AS: When you stepped up to defend them you became their spokesperson here. If they claim to speak from a position of authority about A-Stan, then they must verify their authority. Shadowy figures who move chairs after the meeting, don’t count when they aren’t the ones doing the talking.
As per your service, unlike John,I don’t care. You’re not telling the world how your gonna set us all straight about A-Stan, your compatriots are. They get to bear the scrutiny. Now if you step up and start shouting about your authority to speak ‘truth to power’ then yeah, that secret squirrel shit ain’t gonna fly.
Old Trooper: Bingo! That’s the one. I love street theater-of-the-absurd.
AS- Agreed unless you know of any real vet speaking then what makes you say that there will be there? If they are hiding what makes you think that they will show up? This is just another example of why IVAW is losing any respect for what they claim they are.
Finrod; I don’t care about her service – I’m just tired of hearing about how she can’t talk about it. Anyone who hasn’t heard the story, raise your hand. See?
I’m amazed at the amount of “Vets”that can’t talk about what they did because it’s all hush-hush. I, on the other hand, can talk freely about by black ops but then I’d have to kill everyone. 🙂
I am going to break the rules of my service and tell you what I really did. Yes, I was a Tank Mechanic, but it was much more than that. I was an Airborne Ranger Marine Recon Navy Seal Halo Jumper Ninja Tank Mechanic. I designed the new top secret way to air drop tanks into the combat zone, for which I still get kudos for from everyone except Tankers. It seems to hurt them a bit when it lands, not matter how many parachutes we put on it.
BWAHAHAHAHA.
Now that there is some funny shit.
I wish the sht I do was secret- I have to re-explain the mundacity (if that isn’t a word, it should be) of it every day at 5pm.
Oh, now I get the whole secret squirrel “Don’t ask Don’t tell” thingy.
I wanna be an Intel Analyst!
I wanna live a life of boredom!
(can’t find a rhyme of analyst)
I wanna see pictures of Iraq!
I wanna **** dudes on my back!
Come on guys! Get in step!
Is that what you’re singing these days during PT formation, dutch? Man, you live a GOOD life, dude.
I also designed a combat mechanic jump suit that you could wear into combat with all your rounds and weapon, but carriers everywhere for all the tool you need. However, I learned the hard way not to sheath ratchets on the inside of your thighs. As soon as you hit the ground they drive right into your nuts. I just curled up in a ball and cried in the drop zone when that happened.
No, Sparks. Here in “Space Command Land” they tend to do individual runs. Not sure if that is because of some sort of Air Force rule or what. (Peterson AFB) I never see any formation runs here.
“I wanna be an Intel weenie,
Not because my **** is teeie!
I wanna be a cyber-warrior!
’bout as weak as a Army lawyer!”
John: Didn’t mean it like that brother. Being on a training base I get this secret squirrel crap all the time and ignore it. I don’t know all the history on the site but have a clearer picture now and understand where your firing from as regards this particular secret squirrell shit. I had to raise my hand earlier LOL.
Casey, LOL! That explains the “real” reason a tanker friend is known as “One Ball.” As for the ratchets, be glad it was them and not the secret squirrel stilettos…
MOS’s are not, I say again, not Secret. I was a 98GRU and an 11B. I also spent three years in a 97E slot. I would gladly list all of my unit assignments too because all of those are based on orders and those orders aren’t even Confidential let alone Secret, TS, or higher. My last assignment before I went NG was Special Activities.
I’ve slapped mine on the table AS… your turn.
Wow, IVAW still has an organization. I thought they and Code Pink had disbanded since their not in the news anymore. Or did they stop protesting outside until they have more Sunshine just like the patriots they are.
for which I still get kudos for from everyone except Tankers
No shit, my ass still hurts from testing those super secret air drops you engineered……now when I see you go out of a plane in an M88 I’ll be impressed……or do a jump with a cheater pipe strapped to your inner thigh. Better yet, assist me in pulling a pack in mid-jump, or fix all the busted torsion bars after impact…. 🙂
I can pull a pack in mid-air, under fire, with my eyes closed. Duhhh! It’s one of the first thing I did. A Tankers ass might hurt after a jump, but there heads never do. hahaha Besides, snapped torsion bars are a great reason to remove them giving the M1A2 SEP a cool lowrider feel.
snapped torsion bars are a great reason to remove them giving the M1A2 SEP a cool lowrider feel.
So long as I get some of them fuzzy dingle balls to hang from the view ports……and BTW, those torsion bars better not cost me a drivers “T” badge……
AS…..I kinda expected that generic answer to what makes the Chicago IVAW “so damn special”…..Yawn
Since the IVAW has pretty much run its course and they and you seem to be trying to change their image from basically a “60’s anti-war, kick George Bush in the head daily” group to a group trying to support and help out veterans, why not change the name to IVHV (Iraq Veterans Helping Veterans) and stop all the ” we’re trying to be as famous as the VVAW, John Kerry, Hanoi Jane” bullshit.
If you haven’t noticed, the media never did really latch on to your “cause”….they were too busy with Cindy Shithead and even Media Benjamental to give you all much attention.
Your 15 minutes of fame is over….time to move on to something worthwhile….helping vets is a noble cause….drop the anti-war crap….it’s old news.
One more thing… a lot of guys have here have had no problem divulging their mos…..mine was 31Mike years ago….we let you look down our pants, now let us look down yours..
Sniper: 98J, 98Y, 35S, because the Army hearts changing MOSes so damn bad. Like lots of others, I haven’t always worked in my MOS. I’ve never refused to say that stuff. I’m just saying that I won’t talk about my actual work. Primarily because honestly at this point, I can’t /remember/ what aspects were classified. And I never really bothered learning that-because my attitude was always ‘just don’t talk about anything that has to do with SCIFs, location of same, and what you do inside them, and you’ll be fine and have to keep a lot less shit straight’. And the only reason it comes up periodically is because people keep bringing it up. Again. I’m not claiming it was exciting, I’m not claiming I saved children with my bare hands while wearing a sarong and seducing secrets out of mysterious men who can bend steel with their hands. The work was not sexy, but I did my job, did it well, and it directly helped combat troops. It’s just funny and frustrating as shit: I take shit from the right AND the left for not talking about my intel work. The right assumes I’m making it all up and was a file clerk, the crazy wing of the anti-war movement assumes that my ‘supposed’ intelligence career was just a cover for being CID. And the funny thing is that two years ago when everyone found out I was in intel, I took shit and some asshole even reported me to CID because he was sure I was going to flap my mouth about what I did. You just can’t fucking win. But dudes, I know you’re infantry and all, but can we stop the genital metaphors? sporkmaster: I don’t know who’s speaking and neither does Jonn, but he’s convinced that it must be those three and that they have no Afghan vets…I think that’s a bad assumption. Jonn: You gave me proof because you were coming to our event, in a special slot that we held tickets for designated for military veterans and we wanted to make sure no… Read more »
Army Sergeant: Yes, this is the response to which I’m accustomed. You address every issue except the one which is the main issue. Let me use all caps, so MAYBE you’ll answer it;
WHO IN THE CHICAGO CHAPTER OF IVAW IS AN AFGHANISTAN VETERAN?
Rather than just making empty disclaimers about the lack of profiles, just answer the question.
AS, I so totally sympathize.
AS
This was not be in doubt if not for how the other Winter Soldier type events. How many people that have been to Iraq that was not a Fobbit and saw the day to day events in the country are still in IVAW? Why should we believe that the IVAW will do this any differently? More so since the people that seem to be advertised as their key speakers can’t seem to be able to show any records of being in Afghanistan. Based on that on this what is there to assume that there will be even one Afghanistan Veteran there?
Secondly with your case about what you can and cannot tell. We are not asking to give pain staking detail over what happened with every second of every day. The readers of this site know very well the importance of keeping sensitive information safe, but saying you cannot tell anything about what your overall job was and how you helped. There are too many people out there that use the “Top Secret” phrase to hide the fact that they lie about their military service if they served at all. Too many people, too many times. We get if you cannot tell everything but going into not telling anything is misleading and dishonest. I thought you had been in the country of Iraq when you talked about having PTSD I thought some of it was from the deployment, I figured since it was a sensitive topic that I would not press. But now I don’t even know if you where ever in the middle east area or even overseas. Yet you keep defending the IVAW and I have no idea why.
Because the question that I want to know is what you had intended to tell the American people about our actions in Iraq when you cannot/will not tell us anything at all? If we were a random person person off of the street that wanted to know what is going on in Iraq at a IVAW event what would you say and why. Not a rhetorical question.
Sporkmaster: I understand the frustration. However, I’m going to say that most people who invent ridiculous top secret stuff at least make it cool. What I did was from a place of relative safety and it was not exciting at all. It was one of those things where if you made a movie about it, they would make a montage and throw in some cheesy music just to make it less boring. I don’t use my service to say “the top secret stuff I saw makes me oppose Iraq”. Whenever I talk about the things that made me oppose the Iraq war, I /do/ talk about the unclassified stuff. I talk about the great captains and NCOs I saw leaving because the 5-year conflict was breaking our military. I talk about the impact that I saw this unnecessary war have on our national defense and military readiness. I talk about unwarranted promotions and soldiers that it was impossible to get out that needed to be. I talk about the lack of reasons to invade in the first place and the lack of a followup plan. I talk about my love for my country and my pain seeing it do what I believe to be the wrong thing. My PTSD is a sensitive subject. Jonn and TSO are very well aware of where it’s from, as are some other bloggers, like CJ. Sometimes I feel like talking about it, sometimes I don’t. It generally depends on who I am talking to, how I trust them, how I’m feeling that day. Today’s not the day. Maybe tomorrow will be, but I doubt it. I am not asking for anything from you because of it and I don’t think I even talk much about it on this blog though I have on my own. Jonn, to be honest, I don’t remember off the top of my head but I remember that they do have them, because I remember their Afghanistan veterans were coordinating with LA’s Afghanistan veterans to do some non-IVAW Afghanistan-related project at one time. I don’t have the time, energy, or… Read more »
“Hear from the first hand experience of veterans that have walked the streets and driven the roads of a country that too many of us know too little about.”
Honestly, this makes me think that the publicity people, at least, have never been there. The streets and roads of Afghanistan are memorable, but mostly for their scarcity. They should talk about the rocks. There’s a lot of rocks.
AS
Ok, but from the repeated and implied events that these were people that had seen first had accounts about events where we recklessly or deliberately killed the people of Iraq. Yet more and more it is not the case. Because what is the difference in your experiences against a service member that has never left the US? I do not doubt that there are many issues that should be looked at, but I do not believe that Iraq suddenly manifested all these issues.
Yes Iraq should not have happened the way it did, yes we should have had a better plan, but we are here now. That is why I joined up to make sure that we make sure that we do not have to come back again like we did with what we did not finish in the Gulf War.
I understand that if you do not want to talk about it but for a long time I thought it was due to something related to a event(s) in Iraq. It would be safe to assume that I would not be the only one who thought that. For me that is why I thought you stayed on with IVAW. I just do not know why you stay with the IVAW considering that a rapist is on the board of directors.
I have learned a lot about Afghanistan since I returned from there a few years ago. A LOT. Makes me want to go back in time and do the extra reading ahead of deployment!
Anyway, my 2 cents are that we ought to give room for a public debate on how to improve a campaign even if or especially if it’s currently under way. However:
A) The motivation should be to improve. Else, you pull the rug from underneath those who serve or have served in the past. This motivation filters and funnels the exchange.
B) Contributors to the debate should be knowledgeable about something relevant to the subject. Else, how much value can a contribution have. Now, in my mind you don’t have to be a vet to be able to contribute. The things I learned after the deployment was over were chiefly not from sources with military experience.
“Jonn, to be honest, I don’t remember off the top of my head but I remember that they do have them, because I remember their Afghanistan veterans were coordinating with LA’s Afghanistan veterans to do some non-IVAW Afghanistan-related project at one time. I don’t have the time, energy, or inclination at the moment to track this down.”
However, you took the time to post unsubstantiated facts on my blog to cool the debate. I, at least, took the time to look at all of the members I could. If you’re going to make claims, the least you could do is have the courtesy to name names. I can’t count the times you’ve done the same thing – even promised to provide the facts later, with no results. Either put up or shut up.