evidenced by my own extended family...the educated ones are on top doing well the undereducated animals at the bottom where they will always remain...
Oh PLEASE. "Killology" has been around for 75+ years now. Inspired by a firing rate of just 20% in WWI, the science was defined by WWII, where the Nazis took it to a new level. One of the most potent methods is to dehumanize the enemy: separate by race, religion, whatever, and drive and reinforce those difference so that a soldier considers killing them is virtuous. But the entire training program is designed to make soldiers kill people, against the soldiers natural inhibitions. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/08/13/INGKFKDJHC1.DTL
I recall reading all about killology by a lecturer at Sandhurst Military Academy...during the civil war after battles in collecting the muzzle loaders of the dead they were finding many soldiers had repeated loaded their guns but not fire, some had as many as ten balls in the barrel...ww2 ,most of the US dead came on Omaha beach from machine gun fire, most germans would fire over the heads of americans, but those in machine gun crews felt obligated to shoot as there would be witnesses if they deliberately missed(same for allied soldiers)...this was common to all armies the average conscript was very reluctant to kill...he mentioned an american general who understood the problem and changed training procedures so that by Vietnam the american kill rate went way up
Not here in the U.S. since maybe early Vietnam. This would be the second uninformed argument for this thread. All that those who serve, have served, or will serve, ask of you "non-servers" when the crap hits the fan again, is that you get out of the way. You can debate all you want in some hole in the rear while the "dummies" up front protect your miserable a$$.
it was preVietnam, I tried to find it in my books but haven't found it as yet...if I recall correctly 20% of the soldiers in ww2 and a lot of that was machine guns, artillary, methods that aren't personal... by Vietnam it was up to 75-80%...
Same here. The military gave me an education, self-discipline, confidence and leadership training which our schools sorely lacked. It made me a better person and a better American citizen. Not sure how it works in Canada.
I'm afraid not as evidenced by previous posts under the Canadian section of PF. You embrace many patriotic myths of Canadian nationalism I'm afraid.
Hypocrisy on the PF? Please say it isn't so. Ha Ha. He strikes me as some one who is very young and so unsure of himself he has to badmouth another class of people in order to make him feel better. Is this how he appears to you? The Canadian military, in fact most Canadians, strike me as very good people.
What do you not understand about money? This is why Dan Rather lied and why the VA exaggerates. Dan Rather dreamed up his statement in his special " The Wall Within " . This was an hour long special about veterans and painted a horrible picture of them. The bottom line was to increase ratings. The VA like any government organization has to justify the tax dollars they spend . And also like any government organization they fear cuts in their budget and take extreme steps to avoid cuts and obtain increases to their budgets. Consider that the VA has a very real problem which is fewer veterans every year. The largest group of veterans are the WWII era vets and they are old timers dying off rapidly. Those generations which follow have fewer veterans. In WWII over 12 million war veterans were created in less than 4 years. In vietnam it was 1.4 veterans spread out over ten years and less than 13 % of them saw any combat or violence. Those are official military numbers from the DOD. Later generations have fewer combat veterans still. The result of all this was the VA standing on an infrastructure built for the WWII generation and no one to put in it. They literally had to scramble to get veterans in because they had empty hospital wards in many facilities and surgeons who collected pay but did not set foot in in operating room for years. Sooner or later the taxpayers will get fed up with this and a politician will promise to make it right. Since it is harder and harder to find wounded men from the war who need help you go after anyone else you can. Focus your resources on PTSD or any rumored illness which someone claims might be linked to the war ( gulf war syndrome , agent orange) . Even go so far as to create back door loopholes to let non veterans into the system. The VA did this in the seventies allowing an unknown but significant number of people with no military record to gain access to the system through Veteran outreach centers. Fortunately this program was shut down although as far as anyone can tell those people are still in the VA system. No one least of all me is trying to claim veterans do not deserve support especially combat veterans. The VA is not veterans however it is a government agency and like all it is motivated by the self interest of its employees more than their stated purpose.
And how do they identify the veterans in these shelters as opposed to some homeless guy in an old army shirt who says " yeah I was in the war ". And BTW what war was Canada in before Afghanistan?
This is long since proven to be nonsense in the USA. Sure a number of military members might fit this description but most enlistees come from the middle class segment. In fact historically and even today the military reflects the American society. The reflection may not be perfect but it is surprisingly accurate. What this means is that if you say ten % of the population comes from a wealthy background then the military will have roughly the same percentages. Since most Americans are what is described as middle class the military reflects this. And just because a poor kid from a low income background enlists does not mean he or she is enlisting due to lack of jobs. Many of them are in fact signing up for reasons of patriotism or adventure or to seek a good life or career. Either way a poor guy volunteering is as much as hero as a rich guy who does the same.
Never has been the accurate reality and is not as much as Micheal Moore may have told you this it is not true.
No by summary I mean. When they joined what training or schools they attended , what decorations they received if any , where and when they were stationed , where and when they were discharged and under what circumstances. Even some information about disciplinary problems. True this may not be the COMPLETE service record and in fact pay roll and medical records are exempt and fall under the privacy act. This information on W has long since been accessed and is easily found on the web. It has been aroudn and people arguing about it for a long time. Try google.
What do you mean by veterans? This is yet another area where people fudge. Technically anyone who served AT ANY TIME in the military is a veteran. Most veterans served in peace time and never heard or fired a shot except on a training range. Then you have war time ERA veterans: those who served during a war but not IN the war. These are not a small group but in fact make up a very large % of veterans. Such as Ronald Reagan who served during WWII but never left the States. Or the many troops stationed at Ft. Benjamin Harrison in WWII which is where the Army's Finance corps was centered. These people spent the war making sure the millions of soldiers got paid , but of course the only battles they fought were against paper cuts. The of course actual war veterans who served in the war but in a non combat role. These make up most war veterans. They may have been in the theater but did not take part in the fighting. How many sailors do you think kept the USS Enterprise sea worthy during Vietnam? I have no idea but it takes many highly trained experts to make sure the nuclear reactor works right and these people did not pull triggers in the jungle. Then of course the helicopter mechanics and supply experts etc etc etc. Finally you have combat veterans and even these have different groups , some people experience sporadic and isolated combat. Such as many support personnel who had to pick up weapons and fight during the Tet Offensive in 1967, and they did so admirably. The rest of the time however they only saw the war on TV like the people back home or heard it in the distance. It is really a relatively small number of people who deliberately go out into harms way looking to bring the fight to the enemy the rest of the military supports them. Obviously this includes the infantry but also pilots and special operations personnel and some others. So your bet on 100K veterans in prison depends on who you man by veterans. IF you mean anyone who served somewhere at one time or another then you may be right. if you mean combat veterans it is a stupid bet for you.
under educated and unemployed...28% of americans have university degrees the rest mostly your cherished middleclass are filling the lower ranks of the military, these people generally are not deep thinkers(that's not saying they're dumb)...the educated end up as officers...just as my family military members reflects, those with Uni education ended up in officer training, those with high school went to grunt training... only 10% of University graduates come from the lower half of american society... the uneducated http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/22/national/class/MILITARY-FINAL.html
You are merely proving my point while trying to subtly backpedal away from your original claim. What you claimed originally was that the poor join the military due to lack of jobs now you wish to shift the focus to college educated vs no college. While it is true that college opens more opportunities it does not mean one is hopeless without college. Lack of college education does not mean lack of employment opportunities , many without college background have good jobs and careers. The N.Y. Times article you post the link to merely states what i did originally which is that most members of the military are from the middle class. The link also describes a guard unit not the overall military and one unit does not reflect the military.
Having checked the DOD information I have to correct one of my statements. Vietnam veterans number about 3.3 million not 1.4 million.
The military does not teach one to dehumanize the enemy that is an old myth. And just because someone is in prison does not mean that they are a murderer. Many may be arsonists , rapists , thieves , drug users etc.
" killology " is a non word dreamed up by ignorant people who know nothing about the military. Whatever the nazis did does not equate to what other armies do.
not back pedaling away from anything, you think the middleclass is some sacred group of pure morality...it's not, undereducated, low pay, subsistence jobs, either your well off or your not, this middleclass crapola is just there to make you feel good about not being well off....there is nothing wise and sacred about this group, education reflects outlook on life right and wrong...there is an undeniable connection between higher education and liberalism...
when a highly respected former military man and lecturer at a prestigious military academy says soldiers are trained to be desensitized to killing I tend to think he knows what he's talking about... http://www.gwynnedyer.com/
"All human remains, POW's, and refugees, are to be treated with dignity and respect." Essentially, You kill combatants and leave everyone else to be sorted through by the red cross and peacekeeping troops in PR rolls. We are all taught very strict rules concerning who you can kill and how you can kill them. As far as desensitization goes: "PULL THE TRIGGER, people, possibly in large numbers, are counting on you." Before you deploy, you go to deployment training centers. Classes are taught by some x-navy seal bad ass about concealment and cover, and gun fighting tactics. Then you go outside and work on bayonetting and knife fighting. To some extent you are desensitized, your sitting around talking about shooting people, then you go outside and practice stabbing people. Its nothing heinous though, we dont bathe in blood and fight dogs to the death with our bare hands. The Russian Spetznaz, now those are some mad dog killers. They do bathe in blood and beat each other with batons. The UK is fairly abusive as well. Education. I hung sheet rock before I joined, scored high on the asvab. Couldn't go into officer training because a lack of college. Its easy to get into officer training though. If you do a semester at a community college and score in the 75th percentile on the asvab you can enter officer training. It's fairly safe to say most of us joined for education. Its a good lifestyle, good clean living, well funded education, excersize, and they pay you to do it. Most of us are tired of being inconsequential and directionless. Commander of the air force wasn't in officer training, He is selected from enlisted men. So to insinuate you can't excell in the military without the officer training program is inaccurate.
I actually agree with you...the desensitizing is real, it's more subtle then you realize and not as sinister and obvious as Spetznaz...it has proven effective in training normally reluctant passisve soldiers into killers, the stats are ther to back it up...the details are somewhere in my library, finding it is the problem,too many books... I think I posted earlier that a lack of education does not mean a person is stupid, but a lack of higher education does effect your outlook on life... and yes you can rise through the ranks to high levels but that isn't all that common...the highest ranking person in my family did so to the rank of Commander but he also aquired a degree in engineering along the way, I asked if he could become an Admiral, he said it's unlikely as he would've needed to enter through officer training... his son took his Uni education and went striaght into officer training as did a cousin both became Commanders...another cousin went in with only high school and never advanced very far, he was discharged for petty criminal offenses...
