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H&I Fires* 28 Jul 07

Open post for those with something to share, updated through the day. New, complete posts come in below this one. Note: If trackbacking, please acknowledge this post in your post. That's only polite.

You're advertising here, we should get an ad at your place...

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Over at Stop The ACLU, a silly liberal joke...

Hugh Hewitt on the war, more specifically, Congress and Al-Qaeda.

This will be a busy weekend at the New Castle - so's all y'all may have to entertain yourselves... which is what this post is for, after all! -the Armorer

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American Idol finalist and former Marine Adam Gracin shows his true colors in "making a fan's year."

Apparently the Washington Post is not learning from TNR's mistakes.

A former SFC has been corresponding with Scott Thomas Beauchamp's 1SG. I don't know whether it's proper or not, but what the 1SG says interesting both in and between the lines.

Finally, a couple stories that may have gotten loss in the Scott Thomas brouhaha:

Captain's Quarters on the subject of Congress and executive privilege. Short version? Congress is gonna regret it.

The utter impossibility of actually putting the fairness doctrine to work.

Finally, Powerline catches CBS Evening News in the act of journalistic malpractice: "The obvious inference is that CBS has deliberately chosen to mislead and misinform its viewers on the most vital issue of our time. I would much rather not believe that. But what other explanation can there be?" - FbL

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Sigh! yet another Myth busted. - BOQ

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In the spirit of Pvt B, but in no way implying any such action be taken, a little humor on "wall to wall counseling" (now the civilians among us may have a clearer idea what the milbloggers are talking about)

In contrast, New Zealand Soldier awarded the Victoria Cross for carrying his wounded comrade away from the battle field under very tough conditions.

Just in case you're confused, like some people are, about rather Al Qaeda in Iraq is really Al Qaeda (the newest old line of attack on why we shouldn't be in Iraq: the bad guys aren't there): Iraq is the Central Front

Suing the VA - This is an extremely touchy subject involving the death of a young man who seems obvious was having major psychological issues. Yet, while this presents the VA without any defense for it's actions, basically implying that they turned this young man out without any resources leading to his death, there are parts of this story (huge parts) that are missing about the entire process and services offered. We'll have to wait for more of the judicial process.
-Kat

*A term of art from the artillery. Harassment and Interdiction Fires.

Back in the day, when you could just kill people and break things without a note from a lawyer, they were pre-planned, but to the enemy, random, fires at known gathering points, road junctions, Main Supply Routes, assembly areas, etc - to keep the bad guy nervous that the world around him might start exploding at any minute.

*Not really relevant to today's operating environment, right? But, it *is*

The UAVs (oops, can't call 'em UAVs anymore - they're now Unmanned Aerial Systems... some Colonel got his Legion of Merit for that change...), er, um UAS's we fly over Afghanistan and Pakistan looking for targets of opportunity are a form of H&I fires, if you really want to parse it finely. We just have better sensors and fire control now.

I call the post that because it's random things posted by me and people I've given posting privileges to. It's also an open trackback, so if someone has a post they're proud of, but it really isn't either Castle kind of stuff, or topical to a particular post, I've basically given blanket permission to use that post for that purpose. Another term of art that might be appropriate is "Free Fire Zone"

6 Comments

YOu know, we ran a story from that Thomas guy not too long ago. It was the 'Ghost Dogs of Baghdad' story in TNR. I sent it to Armorer and he posted the link. So, is it that he said something distasteful this time? (Hey, I'm in SoCal largely away from a 'puter and haven't followed the whole thing.)
 
Ry, I hardly know where to begin... He was writing under a pseudonym and put out stories of misbehavior that seemed technically questionable and culturally implausible (and that's putting it nicely). He has since been unmasked and it turns out he has a blog of unreadable, pretentious, whiny writing that included publishing the details of when/how his unit would deploy. He's a Deaniac who by his own statements joined simply to burnish his creds for the writing career he delusionally thinks he's going to have. He's a PV2 who has been brought up on article 15 charges at least twice (most recently for going AWOL in Iraq). To top it all off, he's married/engaged to someone at TNR, which may explains why they fell for it. There's more. Start here (read top to bottom), then check out Blackfive (there's a list of posts on the subject embedded there). There's also a prescient psychological profile written before he was outed.
 
While re-reading the Wall to wall counseling manual, I found a statement that I have to disagree with in principle. "Knee in the nuts Needless to say, this doesn't work very well with female soldiers!" Actually, this has been proven to work by female MPs during fights with other females.
   
Guess so. I just saw it. I was wondering if you had already posted it, but really couldn't remember. Oh well, a good kiwi with the victoria cross deserves to be posted twice.
 
They didn't notice it at all in the Australian media. Too busy trying to tell their sheeple that we're being all pasive and terrorist hugging or something.