by James Glaser
August 13, 2003

Washington keeps telling us to support the troops and they say this while they are screwing those same troops. Neither George Bush nor Donald Rumsfeld have any idea of what it is like to be in a War. That is also true for almost all of the Bush administration.

Most of our leaders are all for starting wars as long as they don't have to go or their children for that matter. The war hawks in Washington have never heard their countries call, so they have no idea of what our country asks of its military, when we send them off to fight in some foreign land.

Today the troops got word of how Washington and their military commanders are screwing them. These troops believed their leaders when they said "the faster you get to Baghdad, the faster you get home." These same troops and their families believed those in charge when told they would be going home in June and then in July. The last they heard was that they would be heading home in September.

The new General in charge of our forces in Iraq is Lt. General Ricardo Sanchez and today he told our troops that they will all be staying in Iraq for one year. To quote the General, he said, "It's a one year rotation."

Here is where the screwing comes in to play. General Sanchez then went on to say, "Every soldier has been told that they'll be deployed for a year, and at the end of the year we'll be working to send them home."

General Sanchez didn't say the troops would be coming home in a year, no, he said they would be "working to send them home." Niko Price of the Associated Press went out to talk to the troops and reports, "some of the 148,000 soldiers in Iraq said nobody had told them how long they would be in the country." Private First Class Deacon Finkle, 20, of Dallas, "screwed up his face-red from the heat-when asked how long he would be in Iraq. Don't know. No Idea. He said."

Many families are at wits end waiting for loved ones to come home. Many have been told time after time a date to expect their loved one home, only to have that date changed. Believing Washington this time is hard.

Those in Washington that time after time get the hopes of the troops and their families up by giving false rotation dates are out and out screwing with these peoples minds. They have no idea of the stress level for those at home and the troops in the field. I can only imagine what our troops are saying today after they hear this new date for going home.

I am sure that no one believes anything Central Command says any more. Troops that are living in limbo have very poor morale and job performance suffers causing more accidents and deaths.

These troops know that when a year is up, it will be impossible to rotate all of them at one time and many will be serving for months longer than the year General Sanchez was talking about. I am sure many want to know when that year starts, Maybe it starts with the opening of combat, maybe the day they were sent overseas, or maybe it starts today. They don't know, their families don't know, and the American people don't know. I doubt if the Pentagon knows.

Washington has screwed up this war from the start. Each and every Soldier and Marine is thinking about the one or two Americans getting killed every day and they are wondering if they will make it home. Many have seen friends lose a limb, their sight, or maybe get a horrible shrapnel wound. These troops think about if their day has come or will they make it home in one piece.

POST SCRIPT DEATHS IN IRAQ

One American was killed and two wounded when their convoy was hit with command detonated bombs west of Baghdad.

No this isn't the same report as yesterday, in that report one American was killed and five were wounded.