The Discerning Texan
All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
-- Edmund Burke
-- Edmund Burke
Friday, December 03, 2004
A Texas Marine's story
I found this on the political discussion board of Hornfans.com, which is a community of University of Texas Longhorn supporters. The marine "AO" posts multiple times in this thread. The first post is reprinted here, but I would recommend reading the discussion afterwards just to get a feel for where the level of political discourse is in this country.
We are incredibly fortunate to have men and women who are willing to volunteer to put their lives on the line for us in this war. As has been the case throughout history, without a robust military and multiple Presidents Washington, Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Wilson, FDR, Reagan, and George W. Bush who have taken an unpopular stand where others feared to tread, this country as we know it would not exist. And I am proud as a Texan and Longhorn that men like this are out there:
Boots on the Deck in Fallujah
Ok. I just got back from the fight of my life. It was absolutely the craziest experience of my life. Urban combat is probably the scariest environment for any offensive unit to attack but we did so with honor and valor.
YOUR Marine Corps is as strong as it has ever been and we proved it out here. My unit was assigned to be the main effort for the attack and we were given the Jolan District of the city. We actually split it with another Marine Infantry unit (3/5) and the Army 2/7 Cavalry. 2/7 is heavy mechanized (tanks and Bradleys) and they were the initial unit in and took the foothold by destroying any obvious targets or obstacles. They also controlled the main streets in the city.
3/1’s job was to move in right behind them and clear every house (over 3000) in our sector from North to South and kill any insurgents who challenged us. There is nothing more heart pounding than entering a building and knowing there is a good chance as soon as you turn a corner or enter a room a bullet is coming at you. That is why they invented the hand grenade. We used a lot of them. It is my weapon of choice in an urban environment (that and the D-9 Bulldozer). To be honest 2/7 Cav did not see too much of a resistance. For the insurgents, there is no honor in being martyred by an Abrams Tank or a Bradley. They wanted the face-to-face fight and we gave it to them.
The estimates are out there and they are accurate I guess. I did not keep a tally of all the dead guys I saw. We did thoroughly check each one we killed and gained whatever info we could. No doubt there were hundreds of foreign fighters. This was “the show” for terrorists. Believe what you want, but we are killing terrorists over here by the truckload. For those who say there are no terrorists here, I can give you the proof that states otherwise. We found passports, Ids, money, documents, instructions or orders, we found contracts (if you kill 5 Americans we will give you $$$$), computers, CDs, photos of them in the act of committing terrorists acts!!!!, and so on. There were Chechnyians, Moroccans, Syrians, Saudis, etc… The Chechnyains we killed were professionals. I have a few photos of them. They had really expensive weapons, utility type uniforms, magazine vests, and they knew tactics. They were very well trained compared to most.
We found torture chambers, propaganda videos of suicide bombers (really sick), a lot of kidnapped victims personal affects, thousands and thousands of pounds of weapons and ammunition (mostly stockpiled or staged in various patterns), vehicle IEDs, and many other items I can’t think of right now.
For the most part their tactics were like this: Booby trapped doors, car bombs, trip wires, dropping grenades through spider holes in the rooftops, pre-positioned machine guns, RPGs, snipers from the rooftops and minarets (mosque steeples), mortars, and landmines. They would hide in the most complex areas of the houses. The spots that gave them the best geometry to fire on us without us seeing them. These guys were smart, well trained and worst of all, willing to fight to the death. These were not the nickel and dimers we have been facing on the outskirts during the months leading up to this. They knew how to fight us in an urban environment. They would move house to house and fall back as we approached. They had weapons/ammo staged in every house.
We cleared the Jolan and south of it 3 different times. The insurgents would move around to stay alive. After the third time through most of them were dead or had given up. I am sure 1-2 are still running around. They will die eventually. There is no place for them to go. We haven’t let the mass population back in yet. They will run out of food and water if nothing else.
The civilians that came to us for refuge were all treated fairly. They all get tested for gun powder residue and interrogated with different questions. My Battalion gave these guys the fight of their lives without a doubt. We knew it would be dangerous and it was. 22 young Devil Dogs in my Battalion gave their lives for their country on that battlefield but not before they all gave the terrorists a piece of hell. We all owe those guys every ounce of gratitude we can muster. One of them was from Austin. They are real heroes and true warriors. They are also good friends, brothers, sons and grandsons. God bless them all and their families. Almost 200 in my Battalion will receive a Purple Heart from this fight due to their injuries. Our Navy Corpsman kept us in the fight and did a wonderful job keeping us on our feet.
My Battalion had NBC News’ Kevin Sites along for the ride. It was a Marine in my Company who allegedly murdered and insurgent. It is under investigation and I will leave it at that. I am confident the military will make the correct findings.
The day before we step off on the attack, my Battalion had the 1st Annual Ben Hur Thundering Third Chariot Race. You might have seen a few pictures on the news. It was the tension breaker we all needed. We had confiscated some horses and carts a while back. We dressed up a number of Marines to look like chariot drivers (Spartans, Romans) and race the horses. These horses were in terrible shape. One was named "Ribs" for obvious reasons if you had seen the horse up close. Eventually only one horse would race so we had time trials to determine the winner. It was hilarious. I will never forget it. Ok.
That is about it. It is hard to write about every little engagement or every area of the battlefield. I will try to answer your questions if I can.
Read the rest. You'll find that most of the people responding to this Marine's post were grateful and heartfelt. And you will also find that on the left there is a lot of misdirected hate and hostility, still. You can clearly see why the left is losing power in this country: they seemingly still have nothing but negativity to offer us.
We are incredibly fortunate to have men and women who are willing to volunteer to put their lives on the line for us in this war. As has been the case throughout history, without a robust military and multiple Presidents Washington, Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Wilson, FDR, Reagan, and George W. Bush who have taken an unpopular stand where others feared to tread, this country as we know it would not exist. And I am proud as a Texan and Longhorn that men like this are out there:
Boots on the Deck in Fallujah
Ok. I just got back from the fight of my life. It was absolutely the craziest experience of my life. Urban combat is probably the scariest environment for any offensive unit to attack but we did so with honor and valor.
YOUR Marine Corps is as strong as it has ever been and we proved it out here. My unit was assigned to be the main effort for the attack and we were given the Jolan District of the city. We actually split it with another Marine Infantry unit (3/5) and the Army 2/7 Cavalry. 2/7 is heavy mechanized (tanks and Bradleys) and they were the initial unit in and took the foothold by destroying any obvious targets or obstacles. They also controlled the main streets in the city.
3/1’s job was to move in right behind them and clear every house (over 3000) in our sector from North to South and kill any insurgents who challenged us. There is nothing more heart pounding than entering a building and knowing there is a good chance as soon as you turn a corner or enter a room a bullet is coming at you. That is why they invented the hand grenade. We used a lot of them. It is my weapon of choice in an urban environment (that and the D-9 Bulldozer). To be honest 2/7 Cav did not see too much of a resistance. For the insurgents, there is no honor in being martyred by an Abrams Tank or a Bradley. They wanted the face-to-face fight and we gave it to them.
The estimates are out there and they are accurate I guess. I did not keep a tally of all the dead guys I saw. We did thoroughly check each one we killed and gained whatever info we could. No doubt there were hundreds of foreign fighters. This was “the show” for terrorists. Believe what you want, but we are killing terrorists over here by the truckload. For those who say there are no terrorists here, I can give you the proof that states otherwise. We found passports, Ids, money, documents, instructions or orders, we found contracts (if you kill 5 Americans we will give you $$$$), computers, CDs, photos of them in the act of committing terrorists acts!!!!, and so on. There were Chechnyians, Moroccans, Syrians, Saudis, etc… The Chechnyains we killed were professionals. I have a few photos of them. They had really expensive weapons, utility type uniforms, magazine vests, and they knew tactics. They were very well trained compared to most.
We found torture chambers, propaganda videos of suicide bombers (really sick), a lot of kidnapped victims personal affects, thousands and thousands of pounds of weapons and ammunition (mostly stockpiled or staged in various patterns), vehicle IEDs, and many other items I can’t think of right now.
For the most part their tactics were like this: Booby trapped doors, car bombs, trip wires, dropping grenades through spider holes in the rooftops, pre-positioned machine guns, RPGs, snipers from the rooftops and minarets (mosque steeples), mortars, and landmines. They would hide in the most complex areas of the houses. The spots that gave them the best geometry to fire on us without us seeing them. These guys were smart, well trained and worst of all, willing to fight to the death. These were not the nickel and dimers we have been facing on the outskirts during the months leading up to this. They knew how to fight us in an urban environment. They would move house to house and fall back as we approached. They had weapons/ammo staged in every house.
We cleared the Jolan and south of it 3 different times. The insurgents would move around to stay alive. After the third time through most of them were dead or had given up. I am sure 1-2 are still running around. They will die eventually. There is no place for them to go. We haven’t let the mass population back in yet. They will run out of food and water if nothing else.
The civilians that came to us for refuge were all treated fairly. They all get tested for gun powder residue and interrogated with different questions. My Battalion gave these guys the fight of their lives without a doubt. We knew it would be dangerous and it was. 22 young Devil Dogs in my Battalion gave their lives for their country on that battlefield but not before they all gave the terrorists a piece of hell. We all owe those guys every ounce of gratitude we can muster. One of them was from Austin. They are real heroes and true warriors. They are also good friends, brothers, sons and grandsons. God bless them all and their families. Almost 200 in my Battalion will receive a Purple Heart from this fight due to their injuries. Our Navy Corpsman kept us in the fight and did a wonderful job keeping us on our feet.
My Battalion had NBC News’ Kevin Sites along for the ride. It was a Marine in my Company who allegedly murdered and insurgent. It is under investigation and I will leave it at that. I am confident the military will make the correct findings.
The day before we step off on the attack, my Battalion had the 1st Annual Ben Hur Thundering Third Chariot Race. You might have seen a few pictures on the news. It was the tension breaker we all needed. We had confiscated some horses and carts a while back. We dressed up a number of Marines to look like chariot drivers (Spartans, Romans) and race the horses. These horses were in terrible shape. One was named "Ribs" for obvious reasons if you had seen the horse up close. Eventually only one horse would race so we had time trials to determine the winner. It was hilarious. I will never forget it. Ok.
That is about it. It is hard to write about every little engagement or every area of the battlefield. I will try to answer your questions if I can.
Read the rest. You'll find that most of the people responding to this Marine's post were grateful and heartfelt. And you will also find that on the left there is a lot of misdirected hate and hostility, still. You can clearly see why the left is losing power in this country: they seemingly still have nothing but negativity to offer us.
