ArmyBlood

Parents given closure after four years

The VFW Magazine did a well put-together article on one of the four remaining POWs this month – now Staff Sergeant Matt Maupin, captured in April 2004.  His parents and family kept up the fire, took care of other Soldiers and hung on to every shred of hope. 

It all seems to have ended, with this short article in their hometown paper:  M

Maupin’s remains found

BATAVIA, Ohio – The father of a soldier missing in Iraq since since 2004 says the military has informed him that remains found in Iraq have been identified as his son, Sgt. Matt Maupin.

Rest well SSG Maupin, you are well-remembered.  Would that you have no more company.

Big doin’s on Fort Hood today.  The Killeen Daily Herald puts the best spin they can on this event:

It was about 80 days ago that soldiers of the 37th Infantry Brigade Combat Team mobilized and began training at North Fort Hood, preparing for the largest single-unit deployment of Army National Guard soldiers since World War II.
The nearly three months of training for the unit’s deployment to Kuwait was led by the 1st Army’s 120th Infantry Brigade.
Some of the National Guard soldiers had a pass to go home during Easter, but for others like Sgt. Ronald Todd, Christmas was the last time they got to see their loved ones.

On with the mission

Soldiers from the 37th Infantry Brigade Combat Team pass for review in front of family members and the adjutant generals for Ohio and Michigan during a farewell ceremony on Thursday on Fort Hood’s Sadowski Field.

What’s not mentioned in the hooh-ah moment is that these brigades will be away from home for about nineteen or so months by the time they are done (3 to train and deploy + 15 in Iraq + another to return and DEMOB [dee - moab])  These families’ sacrifice will be longer than all of World War I.  Nice day to parade too, as the Mahdi Army marches and fights US and ISF in Iraq. 

It seems almost an afterthought to remember that they were supposed to have four months on the ground to train, not less than three.  Would it be quibbling to ask how many of these troops are stop-lossed or backfilled from other units?  Good Luck gentlemen – do well, stay safe – scan, focus, and act.

Maybe the Magna Carta should rank here someplace but this rings awfully true:

The first flaw of western discourse is its inability to practise what it preaches in this respect: to speak truth to power. This is revealed in the reluctance of western governments to discuss the most catastrophic reversal in the field of human rights: the decision by the US government to defend the use of torture. In the evolution of human rights there have been two quantum leaps: the first was the universal abolition of slavery; the second, the move towards abolishing torture.

Kishore Mahbubani: The sermons of cowards | Comment is free | The Guardian

Government Executive reports on still more contractor issues raised by a new GAO report:

The Defense Department relies excessively on a growing band of private contract specialists to assist with its acquisitions, blurring the line between federal employees and contractors and opening the door for serious conflicts of interest, according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office.

…

These contractor employees, who assist in preparing statements of work, managing acquisition plans and drawing up contracting documents, are paid 27 percent more than their similarly graded federal counterparts, even when including benefits.

Read the whole thing at Pentagon blurred line between contractors, feds: GAO (3/27/08) — www.GovernmentExecutive.com

The comments are especially illuminating since they are from and about contractors (thanks for the title). 

So now we’ve SecArmy Pete Geren admitting that the Army can’t go to war without major help from the contractors and the GAO reporting that mostly contractors are watching other contractors.  And what sort of dent will the Army’s 5800 person contracting command make in this?  I’m guessing – not much for now.

  Glad I’m not a pig!

VCU-created blood clotting product nears Army OK

By the Associated Press March 23 2008 RICHMOND, Va. — By April, a blood-clotting product created by Virginia Commonwealth University scientists could win the Army’s approval for battlefield use. The complete article can be viewed at:

 http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/virginia/dp-va–bloodclotproduct0323mar23,0,5060388.story

Here’s a hopeful note courtesy of FCW News (http://www.fcw.com) note about the National Response Framework. Making progress -but still have a way to go. I see that the ARC commented favorably, but the plan leaves out much realistic discussion of blood supplies and is, in some parts, contradictory about how and who to move it around.

Disaster action plan inspires hope March 24, 2008 By Ben Bain Framework outlines roles for authorities in responding to large-scale incidents. The entire article may be viewed at http://www.fcw.com/online/news/152008-1.html

…and a darn good excuse to use a picture of SMG:

   Gellar also claims she knew she had made it as an actress when she saw a porn spin-off of her hit show ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’.

“I think there was a ‘Muffy the Vampire Layer’. We had a cast viewing in one of the trailers. You know you’ve made it when they make a porn version of you!”

Sarah Michelle Gellar Lousy In The Sack

Lest anyone tell you that the reasons for invading Iraq have changed, make sure you let the President do so:

And the reason why it’s successful — important to be successful in Iraq, because, one, we want to help establish a democracy in the heart of the Middle East — the most volatile region in the world. Two, we want to send a clear message to Iran that they’re not going to be able to have their way with nations in the Middle East. Three, that we want to make it clear that we can defeat al Qaeda. Al Qaeda made a stand in Iraq. They’re the ones who said, this is the place where the war will take place. And a defeat of al Qaeda will be a major victory in this war against extremists and radicals. Four, we want to show what’s possible to people. There are reformers all over the Middle East who want to know whether or not the United States and friends will stand with these young democracies.

Here’s the entire statement:  President Bush Participates in Joint Press Availability with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd of Australia

A little more from the CinC on the use of the military:

I’m worried about an opponent who uses nation building and the military in the same sentence.

Nov. 6, 2000  George W. Bush

Let me tell you what else I’m worried about: I’m worried about an opponent who uses nation building and the military in the same sentence. See, our view of the military is for our military to be properly prepared to fight and win war and, therefore, prevent war from happening in the first place. (more)

I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation building.

Oct. 11, 2000  George W. Bush

Somalia. It started off as a humanitarian mission then changed into a nation-building mission and that’s where the mission went wrong. The mission was changed. And as a result, our nation paid a price, and so I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation building. I think our troops ought to be used to fight and win war. I think our troops ought to be used to help overthrow a dictator when it’s in our best interests. But in this case, it was a nation-building exercise. And same with Haiti. I wouldn’t have supported either. (more)

A nation-building corps from America. Absolutely not.

Oct. 11, 2000  George W. Bush

I think what we need to do is convince people who live in the lands they live in to build the nations. Maybe I’m missing something here. I mean we’re going to have kind of a nation-building corps from America. Absolutely not. Our military is meant to fight and win war. That’s what it’s meant to do and when it gets overextended, morale drops.

Hmmmm, maybe he’s onto something there.

Say it:  Dumb Asses!

KABUL–Taliban attacks on telecom towers have prompted cellphone companies to shut down service across southern Afghanistan, angering a quarter million customers who have no other telephones.

Even some Taliban fighters now regret the disruptions and are demanding that service be restored by the companies.

TheStar.com | World | Now Taliban regrets cellphone disruptions

As reported in “Army Families Online”, the Army stood up the Contracting Command last week.  Not bad – only five years after the greatest expansion of contracting on the battlefield ever, with up to a 1:1 ratio of contractors on the battlefield, and with the SecArmy saying we can’t fight a war without contractors – now is a good time to take a look at them.

Griffin said the stand-up was a historic event, not because it was a new command but because the Army was demonstrating to OSD leadership, Congress, and the American taxpayer that Army leadership was serious in taking steps to regain confidence in Army contracting and ensuring that it becomes one of the Army’s core competencies.
Parsons told the audience that his new command would be world-class providers of contracting support to warfighters whenever, wherever to meet their needs.  News: Army stands up contracting command

Maybe they’ll find some of the EIGHTpointEIGHT BILLION dollars that disappeared in a single day in Iraq.  Or maybe they’ll get forward enough on the battlefield to actually provide contract money to the COs in the remotest bases and not just the big complexes, then followup on local contracts and standards.

And here’s a near perfect illustration of one of my main points about these so-called American companies:

And now Congressional investigators report dodgy bookkeeping by which Blackwater insists its 850 operatives in Iraq are separate contractors, not employees. That little device has allowed the company to avoid paying an estimated $50 million in American payroll taxes. (The Private Sector’s Tramping in Iraq – New York Times)

Now Blackwater’s contracts with the State department won’t be under this kind of scrutiny but it brings home another point -the straight outflow of dollars from the treasury to these companies and then nothing comes back. They don’t pay taxes on lots of it, claiming to be offshore companies or they play paperwork games.  KBR and Haliburton, both Houston companies, only book a small percentage of their revenues as being paid here.  Most of the monies they make are claimed to be paid overseas to companies in the Cayman Islands.  Besides losing transparency, there are few tax dollars that come back into the country this way, piling up in dividends and salary instead.

Some will see the Contracting Command as more affirmation of the administration’s intent to permanently remain in Iraq.  Of course – there is one other thing that the Army and the larger Pentagon could do to insure more success and more accountability:  have an honest dialogue with the American citizenry about the costs of war and occupation, get their support, and then have the Armed Forces fight the damn thing!