Hock's Blog Feb. 2009
   
 
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February,2009

 

SFC HEADQUARTERS DOCTRINE

 

"Read by Thousands Round' the World!"

 

 

 

 

26 February 2009: Machine Gun / M16 Family Simulated-Ammo Combatives Seminar

"If you come to this? You will have an absolute blast!" April 18, 19, 2009 Sacramento area,CA

"The M16 (more formally “Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16”) is the U.S. military designation for a family of rifles derived from the ArmaLite AR-15 and further developed by Colt starting in the mid-20th century.The M16 rifle family including the M16/A1/A2/A3/A4 has been the primary infantry rifle of the United States military since the 1960s. With its variants, it has been in use by 15 NATO countries."

You are not learning how to gunfight unless someone is shooting back at you! I have been teaching combat scenarios involving pistols as well as the classic machine gun, sub-gun or otherwise since the 1990s. Since, well...before it was “cool and socially acceptable.” But, I did this in an effort to teach some basic combat, firearm skills enhanced by interactive fire, using common surroundings and vehicles, yet not require the extensive body armor and almost, impossible-to-find, indestructible environments that Sims ammo will dent, shatter and otherwise destroy. With airsoft, you can bring aspects of the interactive shoot-out into the common back parking lot and inside a common classroom and learn some important things. You can learn a lot!
As time progressed, I, and a small handful of others in this field, have taught these airsoft-based programs all over the world and since - ohhh, about the year 2004 or so - the idea has been slowly recognized, respected and practiced by various SWAT teams, police, military and citizens we have taught. It is not as expensive, painful and educational as the real Sims ammo, (which I completely endorse) but experiencing the great variety of subject matter and combat scenarios with airsoft is an eye-opening, challenging, educational training experience. Easy to staff. Easy to stage.

This April weekend we will cover:
* M-16 Family Basic Training (familiarization/acclimation, review basic military training)
* Fire and maneuver combat scenarios
* Convoy shoot-outs scenarios
* Bodyguard/VIP scenarios
* Breakheart Pass Drill
* Parking Lot Shoot-outs
* Hostage Rescue scenarios
* Pistol and Long Gun Disarming
* Long gun and pistol transition drills

You will need:
* An electric airsoft machine gun or M-16 family weapon of realistic length (possibly 2 - in case one goes down)
* Hint! Collapsible or folding stock an advantage!
* M-16 Sling
* An electric airsoft pistol (possibly two) and holster and belt. NO SPRING GUNS! Electric!
* Airsoft ammo
* Flashlight
* Eye protection, elbow and knee pads
* Training replica pistol and knife, and replica long gun if possible. Got it? Bring it!
* Hat and Raincoat (if it rains? We still train. Get ready to get wet and dirty)

Sample Weapons
Here are samples of a M16 / acceptable machine gun models: (Sample) (another sample)

Here is a sample of an electric pistol: (sample)

Sacramento area airsoft store! (store near seminar)

Location and tuition: Sacramento Close Quarters Combat, 3612 Madison Ave. Suite 30. North Highlands, CA 95660 916-514-0100 (Keith's school)
10am to 7pm Saturday. 9:30 am to 4pm Sunday. Two days $150. Any one day $100. SPACE LIMITED! We require pre-registration by 8 April, so Keith can prepare all the logistics. We anticipate a large attendance, which prompted us to do this in the first place. We reserve the right to deny access to any questionable people. Any questions email Hock at Hock@HocksCQC.com

Sign up here" (More seminar info)

Note: please don’t show up for this with sweat pants and a smile. Try to get outfitted! Host Keith Miller will be offering some of this for sale. But, get on the internet, look at local airsoft stores and buy this gear.

 

Adios amigos

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22 February 2009: Unintended Consequences

2,974 people died in the new York City 911 attacks. This created a temporary fear of flying. An inadvertent result of this fear of flying was a major increase in driving cars for alternate transportation. Then in the next few months, this fear waned and driving leveled off to normal rates.

Dr Gerd Gigerenzer, a psychologist in the Max Planck Institute of Berlin, Germany published a paper studying the increase of 911 influenced driving accidents by studying five years before and 5 years after the terrorist attack. Dr Gigerenzer reports that he can identify 1,595 additional traffic accident deaths as a result of this post 911 fear of flying. So, add 1,595 to the tally.

 

Adios amigos

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19 February 2009: Seven Men Down | The Conclusion

I got a better angle and a better look into the car full of bad guys. Still bad. But better.

With my pistol aimed into the back car window. I cuffed the right hand of the kneeling driver, swing his arm down, kneeled and cuffed the left hand. And pushed him down on his chest. He was not patted or searched, even around where his hands were cuffed where he might have a “small of the back (SOB) weapon! Well, this whole thing was wheels-off anyway. I backed up a bit.

“Here's the deal,” I shouted. “This ain't no traffic stop for speeding. We know you sons-a-bitches have been robbing people all over the post, all day long. You are all under arrest for armed robbery. I am going to bring you out of the car and spread you out on the street one at a time. I will instantly shoot and kill anyone of you who fucks this up.”

Not exactly the 7-Step violator protocol speech. My voice was angry and frankly I was pissed at all of them and myself for being put in this awkward position. But you know what? Barney-Fife-Timid and Jack-Webb-Calm doesn't exactly elicit control over a pack of felons. Crazy and angry does and I was a little bit of both. They call it “command presence” in the badge business.

I brought out the drivers side, back seat man, ordering the door shut behind him and the inside man's arms stuck out the window. I ordered him to his knees. Then chest down. Arm spread. Palms up. Legs spread, toes out (if their ankles are hooked? This allows them to roll over faster.) I ordered him to look away from me and their car.

Then the next guy, the next. Then the next. I ordered the passenger side guys out one at a time. They passed in front of Willie. Willie was still doing a good job as a statue holding up a gun. People seemed packed in this car, like the old college, telephone booth crammed with people. How many eventually? Seven!

“I will shoot off the first fucking thing that moves!” I told them. “Finger? Foot? Knee cap? Twitch? Don't matter. I will shoot it off.”

I heard sirens! Help was closing in on us. Over the street I had seven men down and they took up a lot of space. I cuffed the closest on to me.

Our patrol sergeant screeched up in his car and bailed out with a shotgun as I cuffed the third. I used up all three of my handcuffs. The Sarge threw me his pair. That's four cuffed. Three still not cuffed with their arms spread wide. But the MP Sgt with a shotgun walking their perimeter enforced their stillness and surrender. I was damn glad to have him.

Then next squad car came. Two men. I asked them to cuff the rest and they had enough cuffs. Then another MP car rolled up. We started searching the suspects. No weapons on any of them!

A CID car showed up. Two agents. Apparently they were working all day interviewing victims and witnesses and doing a little searching for them too. They started flash-lighting the interior of the car.

Willie Morman spoke up to the agents. “They threw something out over there.” Willie's flashlight beam guided them to the spot. The agents found one switchblade knife and a plastic bag of drugs in the roadside grass. “Good eye, Willie!”

The agents ordered a tow truck to seize this Galaxy. (I recall the agents later searched the vehicle and found more knives and drugs.) The patrol sergeant arranged for all of the prisoners to be transported to the station. We only had a small holding cell at the station, but there was a minimum-security prison on base where bulk arrests such as these were detained. These details were above my pay grade.

And that was the single, largest group I corralled for arrest. Yes, Willie Morman was there, but I felt very much alone, until the others showed up. The next day I drove to a downtown Army Surplus store and bought 8 more pairs of handcuffs and tossed them in my cheap, work suitcase. 10 pair of cuffs sounds like a whole lot. They only issued us one pair! Then you got through something like this hairy night. The old school rule is, “one is none. Two is one.” I guess, “ten is SNAFU.”

Within a few years, the word spread that common telephone company, plastic wire “gatherers” made great field, handcuffs. We could even wrap several strands inside our hat brims. You just needed scissors in the jail to cut them off. Soon, police supply companies made more expensive ones for sale. Then, some were made in “staged” positions, ready to apply and pull tight on the wrists. A small industry developed.

The common traffic stop and the 7-Step Violator program can go straight to hell and fast. It helps to know from the get-go, such as with this case, that your vehicle has bad guys in it. My next biggest “catch?” Years later, a Texas Highway Patrolman and I arrested 6 armed robbers. I chased them north from the scene and the state trooper stood in the middle of the interstate highway - and I mean on the white lines between the lanes - with his shotgun up, ready to shoot the windshield and kill all of the bad guys. It was the 1970s, the trooper would indeed shoot, and the bad guys knew they would die. They stopped stone-still right there on the highway, just a few feet in front of him. I thought they would run him down! But they didn't! Whew-boy! But, that's another story for another time.

Oh, and a word to the wise. Do something like this? Don't expect any “good jobs” and “atta-boys.” Just don't. Just do the job for the job's sake. In the 1970s and thereafter, authority figures, “the establishment,” the “Man,” were oppressive, disliked and often despised. We never expected anything but grief. Since the 9-11 attack, the police and the military have been much appreciated. Which is great, but I wouldn't count on it to last. Hope it does. Either way, in the end, do the job for the job's sake. It's really a Zen thing. If you want to be appreciated and loved? Become a fireman.

After that MP evening shift, I never saw Willie again. Everybody working from CID, MPI and patrol eventually showed up on the scene that night. Everyone, but 2nd Lt. Creel, who was probably real busy back at his office making up tomorrow's ball-buster, trivial pursuit, Army questions for the next, guard mount. After all, tomorrow is another day! And, another blast of plastic spray on the ol' boots of life.

 

Adios amigos

 

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15 February 2009: Seven Men Down | Part Three

We stopped at several of the artillery unit mess halls, giant operations they were, for coffee. As long as we brought our own cups with us through the back doors, the mess sergeants didn't care if we MPs passed through and raided their back kitchen urns that fueled the “potato peelers.” I became a black coffee drinker in those days, or rather I should say, those cold winter nights, forgoing the civilized luxuries of sugar and milk/cream just to get something hot to drink and stay awake. (Only to learn in later years that hot liquids really won't warm you up. But sugar, acting as a fuel, will.) Willie Morman didn't have a cup so we got a paper one at a coffee vending machine - the kind with the poker hands printed on them, so he could keep re-using it through the shift.

We had a few forgettable calls, but my mind was pre-occupied on the Ford Galaxy of robbers. Night fell. A chill blew in. I circled the southwest parking lots on my high percentage bet that these units were the only places such a group might come from, in my district anyway.

About 9:30 pm, I turned down the far west road of the area bordering the parking lots. These roads were quite wide as they sometimes handled even tank traffic. (Did I tell you one of the “parking” lots had about 50 tanks on them? Hell, it's the military! You have to park those babies somewhere). In the distance, I saw some headlights of a single car approach. I u-turned so that it would pass us and be in the same direction of travel.

The car approached in my rear view mirror. Big. Wide. Dark. Closer. A Galaxy! It was crammed full of silhouettes. It passed us slowly. The license plate matched the partial plate we had. I got behind them.

“That's them!” I told Willie.

I picked up the radio and reported in, telling the dispatcher I was following the suspect vehicle. She ordered several units my way, but they were afar. I mentioned that Ft Sill was 93,000 acres? Most of that turf was wide-open country, ranges and reserves with unmanned, opened gates. We were driving south on a road that would soon lead to this wildness on the west side. I could envision a chase and even an escape out one of these gates? Or, a game of hide and seek down dirt roads and hills that has happened to us before? No way!

“Where gonna' stop em' here,” I warned Willie. No time to explain why. I threw the switch for the red lights. “Put a bullet in the chamber.” (You see, we could not carry our .45s with bullets in the chamber. Doing so was a hanging offense.) Willie took out his pistol and gingerly racked the slide.

“This is a guns-out deal all the way,” I told him, not sure he knew.

The car stopped. I stopped. There we sat, stopped.

I opened my car door, pulled and racked my pistol. Willie opened his side. I put a foot on the street. I told the dispatcher where we were. Passing the pistol to my left hand, I aimed the gun at the car and with my free right hand turned on the car loudspeaker system and grabbed for that mike.

“Driver!” I ordered over speaker. “Turn off your car!”

Nothing. “Turn it off!” Then, the big rumbling engine stopped. Silence. The smoke left the exhaust with the Oklahoma night wind.

“Roll down your windows. Everyone in the car! Roll down your windows!” Nothing. But, it was hard to see this. I stepped out stretching that coiled mike cord into a straight cable line. Willie got out too. Two windows rolled down on my side. The car was FULL of people.

“Stick your hands out the windows. I want to see hands AND arms!” Nothing. And only the four, door people could stick their hands out anyway.

“Stick em' out now. Or this is gonna' get REAL ugly!” If you've ever done this kind of thing? Or, are even just reading this now; you know this kind of showdown talk is much like a giant bluff. But the bluff often works. Eight hands and forearms thrust out the four windows!

“Driver, throw out your car keys. Throw them out!” The keys hit the street! I took a deep breath. The back-up cars were still far way. We couldn't just sit there. I imaged four men with guns suddenly kicking open their doors and charging us while firing. Worst case secnario! Or, they all bolt off in different directions. Also unacceptable.

“Any of you all have guns or knives, throw them out now! Throw them out now because I will kill you later if you don't.” Nothing. Oh well. Nice try.

“Driver step out of the car! Get out and put your hands behind your head.” He did! He was a tall, thin black male. Young. In his twenties.

“Face the other way and walk backwards to me.” He did.

“Get down on your knees. Keep your hands on your head. If you fuck this up I will kill you. Anyone else gets out of the car, I will shoot them down.

I left the squad car's side. Willie did too. Ordinarily one partner would cuff as the other did the “voice-over,” and the back-up, pistol-aiming routine, but one look at Willie and I thought better of this scheme. Willie was standing, his pistol in a two-handed grip all right, but his pistol was actually shaking and his face looked like he'd seen two Godzillas having rough sex.

I knew I was a lone ranger on this. If Willie would just stand there with his gun up, he might help scare them into our handcuffs. Handcuffs! Oh, yeah! Oh, fuck? Handcuffs! I suddenly needed a lot of handcuffs.

“Willie, toss me your cuffs,” I whispered.

Willie pulled his cuffs from his Sam Brown and flipped them over the roof.

“Any more?” I asked as I caught them and draped them over my belt. He shook his head no.

I backed up, opened the back door, opened my suitcase on the back seat and got my other set of cuffs. Just great! I got about a hundred guys in that car up there and three sets of cuffs. Great! I still envisioned everyone bailing out the car at once for who knows what? Mass escape? Mass attack?

“Cover me,” I told Willie, and approached the car…

 

Part four coming soon…

Adios amigos

 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

11 February, 2009: Seven Men Down | Part Two

They called it “Guard Mount.” And no, it's not the latest Brazilian Jujitsu move. It's an age-old military term “ to go on duty as a guard or sentinel.” Our new, rule-happy, 2nd Luey', liked to push his power around and he instituted the optional mount. He made us amass in a line-up - the "mount" if you will - in an inspection formation every day before we attended our patrol briefing. The guard mount. For us it wasn't just a head count, it was an inspection. We had a stand-up, guard mount of inspection and readiness, and a sit-down, guard mount, which was our shift briefing.

Today these inspection/guard mounts still exist, in the military obviously, but also in some police agencies. Police work has always been declared as “quasi-military” and some, not all, city, state, county and federal agencies have them daily or with some regularity. Certainly, more state police agencies are very strack and often do very militant roll calls.

I've never been one for rules, or rulers for that matter, especially pain-in-the-ass ones, but in an effort to dodge problems I had to clean up pretty - buttons all brassed, shiny belt buckle, and shoes-a-shining each day. Before I rolled out of my POV (privately own vehicle) on the parking lot to attend guard mount, I'd spray my boots with a false, temporary “plastic” shine that eventually would crack in white lines like a drunken spider web. But, it would get me through inspection.

We'd stand in a line long and 2nd Lt. Crell would stop in front of each of us, give us the evil eye and often ask a question about some kind of Army thing he thought we were supposed to know by heart and verse. He had a little crony at his heel, to keep track of our “demerits.” A little list of screw-ups I guess he would someday use against you when you'd ask for a vacation or justify your bad evaluations. (Actually, I liked Crell. He was good guy, and you have to understand some of these officers often have absolutely nothing else to do but bust-balls.)

Crell would look at my boots and say, “Hochheim, I know what you are doing with your boots and that cheap spray. It looks good for five minutes and they you pay the price to clean it all off later. You are not fooling anyone but yourself.”

“Yes sir," I would reply. Keep it simple, or the banter will continue.

This Saturday afternoon there was a bit more prima-donna showboat, ball-busting in play because amongst us in the line, were several US Army Military Police Reverses. They were fulfilling their weekend, warrior duty. Lt. Crell played Patton on them a little extra, freeing us regulars up from his normal scrutiny. But, we all always knew that no matter how hard it got, Crell couldn't jack around too long because we had to beat feet over to the squad room and get the briefing started, so we could relieve the other shift and deploy on time. So, the dentist always had a short drill.

After railing on the poor Reverses, Crell dismissed us and we got inside and downstairs for our meeting. The patrol sergeant was already there and waiting. We started right up with his news:

“Since 1100 hours this morning, there has been a series of armed robberies. The victims have all been married couples up on the parks, lakes and rec centers of the north side. The couples were all officers and their spouses. They were all roughed up or beaten. Two of the suspects brandished knives. The suspects are five or more black males, short hair, in civvies, but probably military.”

The suspect vehicle was a 1960s, four-door Ford Galaxy. They even had a partial plate but no state was known. (This was a prehistoric age in policing. Researching partial license plates was done by a hand search of handwritten, paper files. Ft. Sill had way more people and cars than a large American city and this was major undertaking. Our one National Crime Information Center (NCIC) so-called “computer” machine back then was a huge, metallic device about the size of a giant church organ, primitive and unable to play modern search games for people and license plates.)

The Sarge reported other daily business from the NCIC and then issued our patrol district assignments. He also had to assign the weekend Reverses.

“Private Willie Morman? You ride with Hock.” Willie looked the room over and I flashed a pointy finger up to let him find me.

We all disbursed…dismounted…whatever…and stood on the police station parking lot as the day shift officers drove in and we took over their squad cars.

Morman and I climbed into our car and he immediately started calling me “Specialist,” which I immediately nixed. “hey, just Hock.” Within the first 20 minutes I got the full intel dump on the life and times of Willie Morman. He was a shoe salesman from Ft Worth, Texas. Married with two kids, he joined the Army Reserves for all the good intentions and college benefits. He had graduated the Ft. McClellan, military police school, which frankly had become a joke compared the older, hard-core. Fort Gordon MP school I attended. Of course, every vet cops this “older-was-better” attitude, but Ft. Gordon was really an extension of Army Basic Training with just a few added freedoms. Ft. McClellan, on the other hand, was an experimental school “campus” with a lot of new ideas like dorms, and videotape instruction. (The McClellan approach was eventually dropped. Today, the MPs attend Ft Leonard Wood, MO, a beautiful and professional facility. A showcase of modern police training.)

Morman warned me that he had seen very little action in his short, weekend reserves stints, which often consisted of classroom training, coffee, doughnuts and volley ball for PT. He was nervous with a nervous giggle. I confessed that I too was new at all his, and had seen little action also. I reminded him that all 94,000 acres of Ft Sill was no national crime capital, which seemed to calm his nerves. But, I couldn't help but think about catching that Ford Galaxy crime wave full of armed robbers. The southwest corner of our patrol district had thousands of soldiers housed in it and I drove to its massive parking lots, trying to spot the car and partial plates.

While Morman talked and giggled, I looked at parked car, after car, after car. But that late afternoon, the Galaxy crime wave was actually still busy up north, roughing up and robbing one more couple. However, they would soon drive south and west where our worlds would collide. But don't tell Morman yet...he doesn't have an underwear change!

Part three coming soon...

Adios amigos

 

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5 February 2009: Seven Men Down | Part One

Police survival stats say that about 40% of the time, officers deal with two or much suspects. Three suspects about 30% of the time. Then four? Five? How about the unlucky number seven? A rarity. The most people I have ever arrested “alone” (alone to clarified later) in one incident were seven and it happened in my very first year of police work. It was felony traffic stop of a car with 7 robbers in a 4-door sedan. It's an oddity for many reasons, but car-wise, one must recall the “big-boat” era of cars from the 60s and 70s.

Traffic stops are risky and responsible for many officer injuries and deaths. Back in the old days, a seven-step, traffic violator, contact program was very popular around the USA. It was a system I was taught in the Military Police academy and again later in the Texas police academy.

"Officers will follow the seven-step violator interview unless circumstances exist that

make the use extraneous or non applicable. The steps will be used in the following order :

 

1 . Greeting and identification of the agency

2. Statement of violation committed

3. Identification of driver and

check of conditions of violator and vehicle

4 . Statement of action to be taken

5 . Take action stated

6 . Explain what violator must do

7 . Leave"

 

We had an old police chief named Wayne Autry, an ex-Texas Highway Patrolman who, when faced with one of our officers screwing up or getting hurt in a traffic stop, he would lecture with his baritone voice,

“If these guys would only follow the 7-step violator contact steps, none of these problems would happen.”

His voice was easily imitated by several mimics in our agency and if you had such a problem with a traffic stop, you would likely hear several, comic versions of this advice and eventually hear the serious riff from the man himself in his brick office the next day!

 

So, the 7-step pointers were top on our list for the common traffic stop, and most times this was so true, unless the vehicle or occupants were very suspicious and/or involved in crimes. In such cases other strategic training was required. Nowadays and with the plethora of hundreds of self-appointed, police defensive-tactics instructors, and many self-published paperback books, I marvel at the numbering systems out there today. Some of these new programs even have sub-section, numbering systems. But they also include important safety and tactical issues.

The typical problem was and is, is that officers would start the Seven Step protocol with dangerous people, not knowing they were dangerous! And, after about Step 3, the Seven steps would turn into an infinite number of bad possibilites. Thats polite-society talk for "go to hell."

 

One such training session every cadet had to experience hands-on is the multiple-opponent, felony, traffic stop. In the Texas police academy, they even used blank guns in the training, which was my first exposure to such training. In the 70s!

We were taught to stop the vehicle and tactically remove all the occupants and stretch them out on the street and so forth. But, in those sessions there only two, or maybe three bad guys in the cars, not seven! Still, this hands-on training was instrumental for me to stay alive many a night and stay alive this aforementioned night on an isolated street in Ft Sill, Oklahoma when I, Mister Hotshot Rookie, corralled the unlucky 7.

 

Part Two coming soon.

Adios amigos

 

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1 February 2009: President Bush Remains Thus Far Unsung...

This is from a US solider I know of who wishes to remain anonymous:

 

"There has been a lot of bad press over the years about our current Commander-in-Chief, President George W. Bush. As a serving member of the armed forces, I have a responsibility to be circumspect and neutral in anything that I might say in a public forum such as this. So with that caveat out of the way, let's get to the photo and the story behind it....

I had expected to see a lot of strange things here in this little slice of paradise that is Kirkuk, Iraq. I have not been disappointed. In the middle of the city is a huge Citadel dating from the Ottoman Era, with remains of shrines and temples on the same ground dating back over 5000 years, including the reputed tombs of the prophets Daniel and Isaiah. Not too far away, bright orange flames erupt from the ground at a place called Baba Gurgur, or "Eternal Flame", where some think that Dainiel's "Fiery Furnace" was located. We can see the glow of the flames in the distance at night...it's pretty surreal. There's a lot more that I could describe, but training prepares you for most of it to some extent, so it's no big deal.

Kirkuk is a mainly Kurdish area. As most of you know, the Kurds were heavily persecuted during the Saddam Era, and the Sarin gas attacks that he conducted against his own people in the late '80s targeted Kurdish villages. Also, there have been longstanding conflicts with the Turks. Without a nation of their own and occupying strategic routes in the mountains, they have a long history of simply being in the way of marauding armies on their way to fight someone else. There is a saying among them: A Kurd has only one friend...the mountains. They have long claimed Kirkuk as their ancestral capital. With the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Kurdish Pesmerga forces quickly moved in and established control over the city, and its rich oil resources. Today, there is an uneasy peace between the Kurds, who make up a majority in the area, and the Turkomen, Christians and Arabs who make up most of the rest.

On one of my first missions in the city, I noticed a statue in a nearby square...didn't look Kurdish.... A while later while gunning on a convoy, I had a better vantage point. As I approached the statue, I saw a figure with a suit, tie, big, blocky head, and big ears. As we rounded the circle I recognized the distinctive profile of President Bush. I was flabbergasted! Nothing had prepared me for this.

We all know the perception of President Bush in the popular media. I will leave it to others to judge the accuracy of this perception (at least until I am off of active duty orders!) But I have never seen or heard about these statues erected by the Kurdish people in appreciation for George Bush, who they see as their liberator. If CNN or whoever wants to run hours of video of some joker hurling shoes and insults at my Commander-in-Chief, fine...the American people have a right to know. But you had damned well better flesh things out with the whole story, and there are many aspects of it that simply are being ignored. No sense crying about it...I guess, as usual, it's left up to just another "stupid" Joe like me to try to set things straight....

An Anonymous Soldier in Iraq

 

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