True Heroes...

That's not representative, some people are just sick.

 

im not comparing this war to Vietnam, shut up

 

He's a Marine...what do you expect?

 

With the proliferation of photoshopped images, it's hard to know what's real anymore.

The Marine Corp has apparently investigated this and will release its findings in the not-too-distant future (from the stories, it appears that the original sign is the true one, though no one is yet claiming the message itself is actually true).

 

I doubt that the message is true. I don't think that's the point. The point is that the people we are supposedly there to liberate are being 'humiliated' by our soldiers. That is ashame. Is the biggest concern in a place where death is a real and daily danger? Of course not. I'm troubled by this, but not so much by little individual incidents of juvenile behavior, and stupid humor, that makes fun of people who can't read English. If it's representative of how U.S. GI's are interacting with the population and that is the level of respect on a broad basis, then things need to change very quickly.

 

Deleted because of accidental repeat posting.

 

Sorry for the repeat posting. Deleted

 

The really funny thing is that these kids will probably grow up w/ more knowledge and awareness of the world than this clueless robot pawn soldier of fortune trying to clown them in their innocent youth.

 

Unfortunately war does this to people. I've heard that videos of those Americans being mutilated in Fallujah is selling like wild throughout the Middle-East.

I once heard from a veteran who served in the Pacific in WWII that they would save the skulls and other bones of dead Japanese soldiers as souvenirs and would even send them back to their girlfriends. He told me he wasn't proud of it at all but that in war you lose a part of your humanity.

 

http://www.snopes.com/photos/military/boudreaux.asp

Origins: That anti-American rumors have been consistently prevalent in Iraq since the U.S. invasion of that country in March 2003 is hardly a surprise — spreading denigrating rumors is a technique people have always used as a way of reclaiming some measure of control and striking back at a controlling force of outsiders. Anything that appears to corroborate what people say or believe to be true about a reviled group is bound to receive wide distribution, as has been the case with the photograph displayed above.

This picture, if taken at face value, seemingly confirms the worst of what is rumored about U.S. servicemen in Iraq — not only has the Marine pictured killed a man (presumably a civilian), but he has also impregnated the dead man's daughter, then proudly and grinningly advertised his deeds, humiliating the Iraqi family even more by enlisting two of their young sons as unwitting accomplices. But should the photograph be taken at face value, or was it the product of some kind of a staged set-up? Is the photograph genuine or the product of digital manipulation? If real, was it on the level, was it a joke pulled off by the Marine pictured, or was the Marine — like the two Iraqi boys in the picture — the victim of a callous prank?

All we know for sure so far is that the picture does depict Lance Cpl. Ted J. Boudreaux Jr., a reservist with Headquarters and Service Company, 3rd Battalion, 23rd Marines, a New Orleans-based infantry unit deployed in Iraq from May to September of 2003 (Boudreaux himself is no longer on active duty), and that the circumstances of the photograph have been investigated by the Marines. (They have not yet announced the results of their investigation.)

Several different versions of this picture have been circulated on the Internet, each with the sign altered to reflect some other humorous message (e.g., "My country got invaded and all I got was this lousy sign"). Additionally, another version suggests that the picture is a manipulated version of a photograph that originally bore a more positive message ("Lcpl Boudreaux saved my dad th(en) rescued my sister!"):

Some news accounts have implied that, although the message written on the pictured sign does not reflect anything Lance Cpl. Boudreaux actually did, the photograph is indeed real and was a poor attempt at humor on Boudreaux's part:

During his deployment in Iraq last year, Boudreaux was stationed in Al Kut, the capital of Wassit Province, which runs southeast of Baghdad to the border with Iran. His duties there with a headquarters unit kept him largely confined to the big concrete hangars at an air base on the outskirts of the city, and he had little contact with locals. The photo, which shows the trio in front of a ramshackle hut, could have been taken at one of tens of thousands of locations in Iraq, including a shed outside the back entrance of the airfield where the Marines would buy soda, tobacco and trinkets such as prayer beads and head scarves from locals.

Boudreaux could not be reached for comment. His commander during the 3/23rd's Iraq mission, Lt. Col. David Couvillon, called the photo a sophomoric attempt at humor.

"Look, he didn't actually do what that sign says," Couvillon said. "This is stupid, lance corporal stuff that he thought was cute. But it's not, and I was informed the commandant of the Marine Corps had it and the Marine Corps will deal with this."

 

It's pretty hard to get young men to kill other human beings without dehumanizing them. And when "guerillas disguised as civilians are killing your friends all around you it probably gets difficult, or even dangerous to differentiate.

 

Having not served in the military I can't completely judge what your experience or his experience was like. I will say though that WWII was a much different time than now and that the length, intensity and brutality of combat in WWII was far greater than probably anything you experienced in Afghanistan while the standards of what qualified as acceptable behavior among troops was different.

 

That sounds like the picture is real....



What a sick f***.

 

I bet those kids don't know what's written on the sign.