As soon as the Marine victory tinkle story "broke," I went public immediately with my support here and here on news broadcasts: "So what?" The name-calling and attacks commenced, trying to squelch the beginnings of any support for our fighting men. The enemedia cannot get enough of the trashing of our men and women in uniform. Pure evil.
Who leaked the marine video? That is the real story. The timing of its release is deliberate and points to the ugliest of motives.
Our boys and girls are coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan after ten years of battling an enemy so evil and bloodthirsty that most Americans would weep if they had any idea what these savages do, how they "live" and die. The people haven't a real clue, because an enemedia obfuscates and either under-reports or doesn't report at all the actual news -- and when they do, they speak affectionately of an enemy so brutal and bloodthirsty that it defies the Western mind. Jihadis did far worse to American corpses in Fallujah and Somalia, and it was excused, downplayed, denied, forgotten. But this? The coverage is nonstop.
Our troops are coming home, and this story breaks? Now? Why? So that our troops have a Vietnam welcome? So that the American people will rebuke our returning soldiers? The victory tinkle took place in Spring or Summer of 2011. Why now?
The media is all over the victory tinkle like maggots on dead flesh. The nonstop reportage focuses on the "outrage." Whose? Theirs, that of the enemedia and our enemies. Americans by and large think it's no BFD. And they're right.
Today, the NY times is setting up the next media fiction to save the destroyer in the White House. Get this: the NY Times is advancing the idea that the Marines are responsible for the failure of Obama's "peace" negotiations with these soulless savages. As if.
Think about the timing of the tinkle news drop. You. are. being. so. played, America.
Yesterday, when I was at CNN studios being interviewed for SUN TV, I heard some loud, self-important pundit calling for the prosecution of General Petraeus and other military brass over the Marines' victory tinkle. This hot pile of steaming dung is being heaped upon the American people in an endless loop.
There is talk of jail time for the Marines who risked life and limb to protect you, your children, your town, your country. A reprimand, yes, OK. Jail time? Let them try it. We will descend on Capitol Hill with pitchforks and torches in hand and we will storm the Bastille.
Self-Inflicted Wound NY Times Editorial
Even after seven years, the photos of Army soldiers abusing detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison are an ugly black mark on the American presence in Iraq. Now there is a new scar on the country’s reputation. Four Marines were filmed urinating on what appear to be the corpses of three dead Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.
The scandal is inflaming anti-American sentiment in Afghanistan, where many people already think Americans disrespect Islam, and couldn’t have come at a worse time. President Obama has just begun to make tentative progress in starting negotiations with the Taliban ahead of his pledged withdrawal of most American troops by the end of 2014. He needs help from President Hamid Karzai, and the new crisis will not help that troubled relationship.
On Thursday, a Taliban spokesman said the video would not derail the talks. If true, that’s good news. But it will certainly complicate them. The video went viral on the Internet this week. It was made last year between March and September, when the Third Battalion, Second Marines was in Helmand Province, a Taliban heartland.
There is no question that the Taliban are brutal, including against their own people. The 1,000-man battalion lost seven men during its seven months in Helmand. But the stress of combat cannot excuse desecrating corpses — not to mention filming it. Such behavior is morally repugnant and suggests a breakdown in discipline.
It may be a war crime. The 1949 Geneva Conventions, which regulates armed conflict, prohibits degrading treatment of anyone who falls into enemy hands.
American officials and military commanders moved quickly to condemn the behavior and contain the damage. On Thursday, the Pentagon said Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called Mr. Karzai and told him “the conduct depicted in the footage is utterly deplorable.” Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said: “Actions like those are not only illegal but are contrary to the values of a professional military.”
They promised a full investigation by the Navy Criminal Investigative Service. By Friday, the service had identified all four Marines involved and had interviewed two but had not released any names. The investigation must be quick, thorough and transparent. And it must hold any Marines who committed crimes to account.
Administration officials and military commanders also must take a close look at what the troops are being taught about the laws of war.
