White US Soldier Sentenced for Cowardly Murder of 16 Civilians

When I came back over 80% of my unit was diagnosed PTSD. At least half of them were scamming it just so they could get benefits. (and no, before you ask, I did not come back PTSD, I have too much integrity for that and nothing I saw over there bothered me enough to run crying to a shrink).

That said, though, it is a real phenomenon, and this guy probably had it. Doesn't excuse what he did, and he must pay for his crimes. I don't care how many buddies of yours their families have killed, that's not how it works. You simply can't murder innocent civilians and be allowed to get away with it.

I want this guy to get life, so that he can work through what he did and his family can still be in touch with him. I think he snapped. I want Hassan to get life so that he can be denied martyrdom, even though he'd become a PR tool for the jihadis. Hassan didn't snap, he clearly planned it. He wants death, and he should be denied it for as long as possible.

When I read the story about the Marines pissing on corpses, I understood why they did it. It wasn't right and it shouldn't have happened, but I get it. This one.. He snapped. And he has to pay.

 

white people

 

Sorry I used whacked out. I guess screwed up is ok while whacked out is politically incorrect to you.

Also many, many , many men do this every day and have for eons. And I too know many who have served in active duty and continue to serve in active duty. I also know that there are 'screwed' up people who join the army that were already 'screwed' up before they went in. This most likely triggered something that preexisted and the end result was the death of many innocent lives. For US relations to exist in an occupying foreign countries, I think the US has to enforce the toughest penalties on crimes committed. If you're crazy and you sign up for active duty, you should know that crimes will be punished to the fullest extreme.

 

First the native Americans. Then the African Americans. Now the afghanis... When will it stop?!?

 

I feel the sentence is too harsh given the extreme stress he was put in by Bush-Cheney lying us into an illegal war. They should serve time,too

He should do some pretty serious time, but life parole is I think is in part scapegoating this guy for now what all but a declining minority of diehards know was disastrous for America and Iraq but helpful for Iran and terrorists.

 

Also have a look here, more complete stats:

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

Bad, but miniscule compared to Saddams yearly average. The numbers don't fit the propaganda.

 

Invading Iraq was a cluster####, and it would have never happened if the American public had not been deceived. Human right's violations by Saddam is just an excuse, the real reasons were oil and Israel.

And the same warmongering fascist who tricked us into war with Iraq now want us in Syria. Since we aren't going to toss these war profiteers into prison, the least we can do is ignore them and their shills.

 

Crock of sh^t. The intelligence was incorrect on WMD, there was no deception involved. The entire damned world's intelligence agencies believed that Saddam still had stockpiles of WMD - and everyone was wrong. The whole "blood for oil" thing is possibly the dumbest argument ever put forward, as it has a big, gaping hole in its logic: if we invaded for the oil, then we screwed up, because we forgot to actually take the oil. As for the Israel thing, I'll just chalk that up to the usual anti-semitism we see coming from the Left.

Which warmongering fascist is that? Or does that label just fit anyone you disagree with?

As for Syria, we need to stay FAR away from that one. When your enemies are fighting each other, the only mistake you can make is trying to stop them from doing so.

 

Ugh... You know what? I'm not going to watch another thread get derailed over Iraq. It's all been done to death a thousand times before and nothing new or good will come of it. It's not worth it.

So, back to crazy soldier snapping and murdering innocent civilians, please.

 

So, is it your view that anyone with "integrity" will avoid any sort of PTSD? That's pretty damned harsh.

I'm glad you don't have it, but some people legitimately do. I'm sure you saw some bad **** over there, but you didn't see and experience exactly what every other soldier did. You're closer to being in their boots than I am, but you still weren't in their boots.

 

War profiteering? Heck, I wish that was the actual reason, since maybe then we would have given the soldiers all the equipment that they needed. Instead, it was the exact opposite. Bush and Rumsfield didn't get together to plan some war for defense contractors, they did the exact opposite, and tried to use shock and awe and technology to wage a war on the cheap.

 

NO, I don't think you are getting what I meant to say. As I said, PTSD is a real phenomenon, and there is a portion of the serving population that does have it. But it is ridiculously overdiagnosed (it's one of those diagnoses that is very general and very easy to fake) and there are ALOT of servicemembers that are claiming it so that they can either get drugs or benefits. Like I said, over 80% of my unit was diagnosed with it. I knew those guys, I knew that most of them were just scamming the system. They talked about it openly.

The military was handing out drugs like candy to anyone who got that diagnosis when I was in. Also, once you get that you get the much-coveted disabled veteran status, which helps immensely in job searches (especially with government jobs) and promotions. There are a few ways you could get that disability without the doctors having any real evidence, just your say so. Tinnitus was one - automatic 10% disability, you just say you always hear ringing and the docs can't disprove it. Back problems from wearing armor - automatic 20% disability, and you don't necessarily need to have an xray showing damage or anything. I know alot of guys in my unit that claimed those two so that they could get a 30% disability, which is a magic number for job seekers with the government.

So yeah, some guys really do have PTSD, but that actual, real occurrence of it is WAY below what the statistics show. A very large chunk of those claiming it, likely a majority, are simply scamming the system. This guy likely genuinely had PTSD, and it looks like there were warning signs that his superiors should have seen. He probably should have been taken off the line. Just as Hassan should have been booted before he killed a bunch of people. But of course hindsight is 20/20.

 

Idiotic title. Like Bobmarley needs a twin to reach around with.


The truth lies somewhere in between and usually follows who benefitted the most.

What was criminally negligent by the Bush Admin was to use 9/11 as a pretext to the American people to sell the Iraq invasion.

Without that, the initial support for it would've been muted. And maybe, just maybe we would've avoided a multi-trillion dollar cluster**** with significant loss of blood and welfare which to this day we and the ME are still feeling and for generations to come.

It's easy to enshrine soldiers as noble warriors who face extreme pressures on the battlefield, but knowing that process is dehumanifying should give more insight on the price we pay for these wars and whether it's worth it to send the young or poor over there to experience it.

 

I get it now, thanks. That squares with what my dad (Korean vet) sees when he volunteers at the VA in east texas. But he also complains about older vets trying to scam the system as well. Sad all around.

 

Makes one question why they got into the military in the first place (no other options perhaps) and what scams they pulled while on tour. If these soldiers are so truly so mentally weak and/ or deceptive it's a strong indicator that our 'hero' soldiers are simply the dregs of American society with no other options and no future after discharge.

 

Alot of young ones get in to get money for school. And then are surprised when they get deployed. Many of the guys I knew who were faking the PTSD did it just so that they could get ambien and similar stuff to help them sleep. We didn't get much sleep...

The military is a mix of the best society has to offer and the worst, the smartest, sharpest people that you will ever meet and the dumbest, most slack-jawed morons you'll ever meet. The NCO corps is the glue that holds it all together and keeps the latter in check.

 

Agreed. It is sad. It's far more common than most people know, unfortunately. You'd think that is a sacred ground that everyone would keep integrity upon, but... nope.

Throw potential free money or benefits at people and they will find a way to catch it. Vets or otherwise.