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Private whine

23 comments on Private whine

Private whine
: I may get crap for this, but I’m bothered by the stories about U.S. soldiers in Iraq whining because they aren’t coming home yet.

On the one hand, I want to say that I understand the work is hard and the environment awful and the separation from family unbearable, but this is their job; this is what they volunteered for (and they all volunteered). And in Vietnam, soldiers went for a year at a time; in WWII, they went until they won.

On the next hand, I doubt that the whining is as widespread as we are being led to believe by stories such as the ones linked above. I wonder whether this is an attempt by some reporters to sculpt a story about a quagmire. They’re Vietnaming Iraq again. The truth is that we all knew bloody well that this was not going to be over in weeks; we knew that we were going to have to stay there until we get things in order; we knew what we were in for; the soldiers especially new.

The fact that this is hard duty should only make us more grateful for the good work and hard sacrifice they are giving us. I still think they’re good soldiers, not a bunch of whiners.

23 responses to “Private whine”

  1. AST Avatar
    AST

    I sympathize with these guys. Most of them are my sons’ age group and many are reservists, but it’s part of honor that you follow through on your promises. It still sucks to be told you’re going home repeatedly and then have it revoked.
    I blame the French. They’re always a good bet.
    I’m sure also that you nailed it with the Vietnaming Iraq line. The people who write this stuff are probably the same ones who covered the war from hotels and gave away their journalistic ethics to Saddam’s minders.
    When are we going to start turning out some reporters like Michael Kelly, who wouldn’t cover a war that way for love or money, and who enjoyed life and his job. Maybe we need some term limits on journalism, or at least some enforced sabbaticals working on a farm or in a grocery store, or anywhere away from D.C. and the Coasts, so they can get in touch with normality every so often.

  2. Jeff Jarvis Avatar
    Jeff Jarvis

    I didn’t coin “Vietnaming Iraq.” I can’t remember exactly who did; it spread quickly once minted. Anybody remember where it started?

  3. Kaushik Avatar
    Kaushik

    I am probably going to get flamed for saying this here and this is not even my battle …
    But I always felt that people who have not soldiered should not trivialize the complaints of those in the battlefield. If you keep in mind:
    – These people were not originally told that they were in for a year. They were originally led to believe that they are coming back in May and then in June then in Aug…etc. you would probably appreciate the psychological impact of each change
    -they are in the middle of a summer, you can not imagine in the desert, wearing armors, in a shooting gallery without access to all the modern amenities that is surrounding you
    you would probably rethink the ‘whining’ bit.
    I am not a fan of Bush. But I know that these soldiers will fight and labor on and will do what they are told. Troops almost always crib about how things are run by the higher ups after a while, after things start going awry. Their loyalty is to their mates and to the regiment rather than to smooth talking politicians. It is officers who dont do that in public….What they never had access to earlier was mass media which the modern world now gives them.
    You might also revisit your thinking about the army knowing that they are gonna be there for a long time. They did not. Unlike us cynical folks, they probably believed the pitch.
    I am not terribly shocked that the US govt is using its army terribly. I am just shocked that this is so gigantically mismanaged. I suspect that if it turns bad, this administration would simply dump the mess to some local thugs and walk away before the 2004 election which will lead to the Beirutization of Iraq. It would do to 21st century Iraq what USA and erstwhile USSR did to Afghanistan.
    Just my two cents …

  4. button Avatar
    button

    I don’t know where it started, but I’ved noticed it, too. I don’t like much of the coverage of the Iraq situation. And it does seem to be heavily influenced by the intent to convince us that it’s another Vietnam. That’s also the Baath party line and their agenda.

  5. Robert Speirs Avatar
    Robert Speirs

    Kaushik:
    “Mismanaged” – compared to what? We conquered the most fearsome Arab army – shows you what that means – in three weeks. We’re taking another six months or so to constitute a democracy that has never existed in eight thousand years of Mesopotamian history. This is easy? Soldiers always gripe. Hell with it. They’re getting paid.

  6. Brian Smith Avatar
    Brian Smith

    I agree about the whining. Im an ex-marine. We whined ALL the time. All we did was whine. But we would NEVER whine to anyone outside the “family”. I would give them something to whine about. Seriously.

  7. Kalroy Avatar
    Kalroy

    I’ll bitch about it. Air Force for nine years, brother in the Marines for four, another brother still in the Air Force, father ex-Army.
    They’ve only been there for ten months and some (I’m sure the press is showing an accurate cross-section of the comments) are already bitching. If they were on a remote short tour they’d have two more month and if they were on a remote long tour they’d have another eight months to look forward to.
    Kal

  8. Moira Avatar
    Moira

    The whining bothers me, too, but many soldiers say that while the situation is difficult, they acknowledge that this is what war will be like in the fight against terrorism and that they have a job to do and will do it. That’s the spirit I expect from our troops.
    Consider that the Russians have lost 25,000 soldiers in Chechnya since 1994 (with a three year break in hostilities) and are currently losing a dozen soldiers a day in ambushes and remote-controlled mine explosions, and they don’t seem to be making much progress in pacifying the the region–that’s a Vietman-style quagmire.
    I read recently that during the Allied occupation of Germany that Nazis, their sympathizers, and Germans who just hated foreign occupiers were sniping at soldiers, sabotaging Allied equipment, running razorwire across roadways to flip jeeps for quite some time until they were captured or just gave up, so it isn’t as if the US hasn’t been in this situation before.
    I also read recently that the US armed forces have never before had as many married fathers in active service as they do today, which is probably contributing to the overall unhappiness. That curious statistic also makes me wonder if service in the armed forces is regarded as a comparatively “safe” occupation given the reluctance, until now, of deploying troops on the ground for long periods other than peacekeeping, after the major combat has been fought from the air. We usually fight and go home for the most part, leaving troops behind as part of a multinational peacekeeping force. We haven’t done anything like this for fifty years, and maybe many troops never thought it would be a possibility. We pulled out of Lebanon and Somalia once our troops were attacked by locals rather than fight them, and it’s true that we have a risk-aversion mentality when it comes to warfare. Only this time, we created the chaos, so we have to stay until the country is stable and the new government has the army and police force in place to protect itself.

  9. lshannon Avatar
    lshannon

    I understand their heartache but it should stay within the “Family”. My spouse was in Korea from Aug 89 to Aug 90 was home ONE WEEK and was off to Gulf War I for another year! How do you explain that to your 2 and 5 year old?
    I think these young soldiers need further lessons in duty, honor and country. I am not saying the are doing a bad job, I think they are ding a awesome job. IMHO, they are dishonoring their follow soldier.

  10. Kalroy Avatar
    Kalroy

    Moira, I don’t think they enlist as fathers. I’d bet that the kind of men who enlist tend to be the kind to marry a woman they knock up (ya know, the ‘honorable’ thing). I think, that once they’ve started a family many re-enlist because change is scary, and to go from a seemingly secure life to the uncertain life of being a civillian can be difficult.
    Kal

  11. Laura Avatar
    Laura

    I just figured they were whining because their leaders told them they were going home, then decided not to let them go home after all. Even the best soldier is going to get a wee bit cranky after his commanding officers have lied to him about when he’s going home for the third or fourth time. When I read those, I’m just seeing “I’m fed up with being lied to” not “I wanna go home cuz I’m a wuss”.
    And the media knows how to get good sound bites. They’ll hunt and hunt for the one or two soldiers who aren’t smart enough to “keep it in the family”. Don’t underestimate the power of the media to spin the story.

  12. Rezwan Avatar
    Rezwan

    In every place you will find escapists who whine. It is the soldiers’ & the medias’ responibilty not to expose these kinds of remarks: ” If Donald Rumsfeld was here, I’d ask him for his resignation.” This sends a wrong message to others.
    But I believe the US soldiers serving in Iraq ahould also be treated like another human being apart from their duties. They have also their thoughts and conscience and worries about their families.
    For instance an anonymous US soldier is ranting from Iraq in http://turningtables.blogspot.com sharing his thoughts. Some excerpts from his blog:
    “i want to discuss…and learn…and hear…there are other opinions in this world besides mine…besides ours…i want to understand…why we feel these things…where is it all coming from…where will it all go…
    they blame me personally for the deaths of countless children…they accuse me and each american for the horrendous atrocities inflicted upon their people…they hate us and wish us harm…i don’t know about you…but i have never killed a baby or destroyed a home…but does that make me innocent…
    i sit here all night trying to change the world from my lap top…and it’s beginning to weigh on me…there is a story here that deserves to be told…there are other sides to this multi faceted goliath…” Rest read from his blog.

  13. balbulican Avatar
    balbulican

    Soldiers are human beings who fear, sweat, and bleed. They don’t enjoy eating bad food, getting shot at, discomfort, uncertainty, or extreme temperatures, and they would prefer not to experience them. Yup, it goes with the turf in wartime…doesn’t mean they enjoy it. ‘Twas ever thus… read your Kipling. Or your Herodotus, for that matter.
    It’s amusing that lefties who opposed the invasion and criticized Bush’s was were accused of “failing to support our soldiers” by the same homebound, armchair heroes who are now calling those soldiers “whiners”.

  14. Bill Avatar
    Bill

    It has been the right of soldiers to whine and bitch about their situation since the first soldier… they’ve earned the right to bitch!
    Hell, it’s every American’s right to bitch about their job, their dumbass boss, and every other thing that pisses ’em off!
    They just happen to have a media with an agenda looking to exploit their comments!

  15. MommaBear Avatar
    MommaBear

    All those ‘citizen-soldiers’ have forgotten one very simple yet serious part of the UCMJ: it is forbidden to make comments to the public which are uncomplimentary or worse about the armed services or the leadership. They are breaking the rules, big-time when they whine on-camera. Their superiors need to give them refresher courses in what they may or may not say in public.
    The media have made it a mission to find armed forces members who will speak against the situation, with a token speaker with a positive message sandwiched in the middle where it gets lost. In the armed services it is perfectly acceptable to whine and bitch and moan within the group; it is totally against the rules to do it outside the group.

  16. balbulican Avatar
    balbulican

    That’s right. God forbid we should know how they really felt.

  17. Ben Avatar
    Ben

    I think balbulican missed the point. The UCMJ’s article that silences public dissent is there for a reason. A military has to do its job, and to do that, they need to maintain at least the semblence of unity. The American military needs to be be obedient to the civilian commander, you really don’t want it otherwise.
    Yes, God forbid you know how they really feel. The only way you are going to know is to put on a uniform and do the job they are doing, under the conditions they are doing it. Listening to an isolated soldier’s comments, devoid of context, tells you really nothing except that soldier wants to come home. Well that is hardly news.
    You don’t know how that or other soldiers stack that desire to come up with the desire to finish the job they are doing. How important they see there jobs, or really anything else. And because you don’t have the time, nor patience, nor resources to do anything in the way of an in depth interview with a sufficient number of troops to determine their mood, you still don’t know.
    Soldiers, and sailors will complain. They earned the right to. And as long as that does not undermine civilian control of the military, as long as it is kept in family, there is no problem. It is when people used individual comments like this to undermine the civilian leadership politically, that you should be worried.

  18. Catherine Avatar
    Catherine

    I am sure others have said similar, but here goes…
    If I went to the newspapers and complained about being an employee of my company, I would be fired. Unless you have consent of your employer, I can not represent my company as an employee and speak about it. And no, it’s not a free speech issue.
    Second, IT’S A VOLUNTEER ARMY! They VOLUNTEERED to do this! You sign your life over for the time you have committed to when you join. Period. Where did that Sargeant earn his stripes, STATESIDE? I was equally annoyed at a story in the WaPo where reservists were annoyed about being gone for 4 months. THIS IS THE PRICE YOU PAY FOR YOUR BENEFITS. It may be one weekend a month of training, but you MAY be called up. My ex didn’t go into the reserves because he didn’t want to have to make that possibly inconvenient commitment if it came up because sometimes it does.
    Last, I have seen WW2 documentaries based on home movies and letters and some soldiers bitched. About conditions (freezing cold, no showers for weeks), about people at home going on with their lives like nothing is going on. They were drafted. People forget that they weren’t always all gun-ho. Some times they were in the mood of F-it. My father spent 2 years in the pacific and never once went home. Other guys were in for 5 years and maybe went home twice if they made it home.
    I believe these guys are hanging out in cozy Kuwait too, right?

  19. SSG B Avatar
    SSG B

    Kalroy and Brian Smith nailed the attitude of soldiers. I know, I am one. I’m not in Iraq and I probably won’t go. But I’ve spent my time in the field. I’ve been hot, I’ve been cold, I’ve been soaking to the gills from sweat and rain. I’ve had to use a hose to wash the sand and dirt out of my various creases and crevasses. The whole time I and my fellow soldiers would complain about how good the officers must have had it. How much we wanted to be home. How incredibly whatever we were doing sucked, and how much more sucky it was than the sucky thing we were doing before.
    It’s the nature of the business. You’re out there doing something no sane and rational person would do. To make it worse you VOLUNTEERED to do. Half of the time you’re ticked at yourself for getting into it.
    But you know what else, when it was all over, back in the tent or wherever, you relished it. You’d chat with your buddies about what had happened that day. Laugh at the guy who tripped when the ground rose up and bit him. Talk with amazement that everyone managed to make it through what had to be the longest march in the history of the armed forces.
    What these reporters are doing is quoting a soldier at his most miserable. Of course they’re disappointed that they will be staying in Iraq longer. But no one, and I mean NO ONE, in the Army believes it when we’re told we’ll be home at a set time. Espicially when they’re telling us that time six months in advance.
    And a final bit of advice for any current or future soldiers who happen to read this: Your time in the military will go a lot faster and you’ll remember it more fondly if you learn to Embrace the Suck.

  20. Sgt. Mom Avatar
    Sgt. Mom

    Amen to SSG B: “Embrace the Suck!” (But keep it in the family!)

  21. PhotoDude Avatar
    PhotoDude

    I’ll only speak to one part of the “whining,” that which has come from the 3rd Infantry Division (much of the complaints I’ve seen are from within this unit). They were the first division deployed to Kuwait in preparation for the war (the Marines who fought alongside them have long since left), they bore the brunt of the fighting (and the majority of the casualities suffered), and they have been told (and the media has reported), more than one time, “you’re going home by X-date.” A week and a half ago, they were told they’d all be home by September. Days later, their return home was “postponed indefinitely.”
    Quit jerking them around, publicly, and maybe they’ll quit complaining, publicly.
    While it may be correct that they should keep their bitching “in-house,” it also might be good to spend some time wondering why these guys in this one division can’t be rotated out. You’ll likely find the answer is that when we reduced from 15 divisions to 10 after the Cold War, we maybe went two divisions too far.

  22. Gary Utter Avatar
    Gary Utter

    I spent a year and a half in Viet Nam, I’m thinkin’ that gives me full comment rights.
    These whiners are assholes.
    We ALL bitch. It is one of the time honored rights of soldiers, damned near an obligation. But you KEEP IT IN THE FAMILY.
    Bitching to the press is STUPID. First of all, it’s a total violation of the unwritten (but very real) rules. Secondly, it publicly displays severely flawed judgement. I saw someone complaining on TAPPED that these people who complained on network television have been advised that thier careers are over. This is as it should be. If you are STUPID enough to do something like that with your face showing, you clearly do not have good enough judgement to be trusted in combat.
    I wasn’t real happy about my time in the Army, but under no circumstances (short of pillow talk :) would I have said that to a reporter, or ANY civlian.
    Look, you’ve got a job to do. A job you volunteered for (yes, I was a volunteer too). Part of doing that job includes projecting a confident attitude for public (and enemy) consumption. This supports the morale of our civilian masters, and erodes the morale of our enemies. It is part of the job.
    The whiners are not doing thier job, they have bad attitudes, and if I had the power, i would send them home NOW, with a 2 week severance check.

  23. Donnah Avatar
    Donnah

    Everybody gets soldierization class and knows you’ll be held accountable if you talk to the press. I was never approached by a reporter during my service, and so was never put to the test.
    If it was so bad, you were always free to write your Congressman.