| Words from the front-lines "On the subject of weapons of mass destruction, we once did a raid on a place where we heard they may have been storing 'mustard gas,' [and] being the patriots that we are and always out to prove our Commander in Chief's allegations, we geared up in our chemical suits and stormed the place. It turnout out to be a restaurant. but they did have mustard, and some guy there had gas." - Reservist, 124th Infantry Regiment, Florida National Guard "Did I honestly think doing this and coming over here was going to stop terrorism? No. That's the dumbest thing I ever heard. There are no weapons of mass destruction that we've seen. These people didn't even have an air force. ... I didn't even see an army." - Lt. Michael Isbell, 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry, 4th Infantry Division "We were pointing our weapons at those families and they don't know what will set us off. I'd be pretty angry if someone came to my town and started pointing a gun in my face." - First Lt. Katie Noll, 1-24 Signals Battalion, 4th Infantry Division "I was in Germany when [Chancellor Gerhard] Schroeder made his speech against the war saying he would put his country first. Don't quote me because in the military it doesn't pay to be too critical, but I thought hey, that's a good point. We've got jobless and homeless too back home and we can't go round being a Band-aid for everybody." - "Reserve members can't possibly keep this pace up. With deployments to Bosnia and for homeland defense, our families are continuing to suffer. Does anyone care? This is totally unacceptable. Bring us home or suffer mass exits soon." - Master Sgt. C.J. Nouse, reservist who has spent 4 months with his family since September 11th. "Even the $1,000 a month is not going to keep me here. I will retired when I get back. I am not going to put my family through this - or myself." - Warrant officer Jim Akers, 319th Signals Battalion, National Guard. "Once we got there, we accomplished what we did... what we set out to accomplish, and we were just guarding ourselves. Well, if all we're doing over there is guarding ourselves, why don't we just leave? I believe we should just leave. We went there under false pretenses, which I didn't know at the time. ... We were told there were some weapons of mass destruction over there. Well, we didn't find any; still haven't found any. So we went over there to try to get rid of those. But when we got over there, we didn't find any. Okay, well, we got rid of Saddam. ... I think we did our job, more than our job as soldiers, and now it's time for us to leave. I mean, we're not the world's police force. I'm not a conscientious objector, I'm a patriot, and I will die to defend this country. But I'm not going over to another country and die to produce more oil for someone to make profits off of." - Anonymous soldier in a T.V. interview Sources: Newsweek February 9, 2004 Matthew B. Stannard, San Francisco Chronicle, February 1, 2004 sfgate.com/article.cgi?=/chronicle/archive/2004/02/MNGOC4MLJC1.DTL Agence France Presse/Jordan Times, February 26, 2004 http://www.occupationwatch.org/print_article.php?&id=3350 Kerry Taylor, "Soldiers, families oppose Bush; casualties grow post Saddam," War Times, Feb.-March 2004 http://www.war-times.org/pdf/War%20Times%2015%20ENG.pdf The Guardian, March 1, 2004 http://www.occupationwatch.org/print_article.php?&id=3365 The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, March 10, 2004. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/military/jan-june04/military_3-10.html# |