So, they tortured our own solders too, practicing.

[ThomCat]

:cry:

This article, and this letter, makes me physically ill.


http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/5/16/732174/-Mother-of-U.S.-Marine-Who-Was-Waterboarded-Rips-Cheney,-Others

My 19 year old son was water boarded, among other despicable things, and I had encouraged him to succeed at SERE. They did more to him that he has yet to explain to me, one thing that went on long enough for him to start hallucinating and to think he was dying....

Now we all have found that the two men who came up with this program were using my son and everyone else who went through SERE as guinea pigs for their sick, sadistic torture program. Then they sold their torture program to the sadists in the Bush Administration and became overpaid military contractors who spread this poison throughout our military.

My son did NOT volunteer to be tortured. He was NOT told what would be done to him at SERE. He was told he would be taught to survive. Instead he was tortured, humiliated, degraded, shamed, and told to keep quiet about it. How in God's name would that prepare any of our troops to survive capture? It won't. It will only make them break quicker in the hopes of not having to go through more torture.

Who will speak up for my son and the others like him who joined the military to serve and who were subjected to sadistic torture, not by the enemy, but by the war criminals ostensibly on our side? These people, Cheney and his talking heads, everyone of them chicken hawks who avoided serving, should NOT be allowed to use torturing our troops as rationalization for their crimes.

[lbrtbell]

1. Oh...my...GOD!!

What the hell is happening to this country?? I'm a t a total loss for words.

[ThomCat]

2. I wish there was a hell, now more than ever.

I wish Cheney and these military contractors would burn in hell for this. :grr:

They were so in love with the idea of torturing people that they tortured anyone they could get, starting with our own soldiers. OUR OWN SOLDIERS. :cry:

I wonder if those soldiers were able to get any physical and psychological care they need to recover from what was done with them. If they were told to shut up then it's doubtful, which would be a second horrible crime. :cry:

The republicans have had the Gall to accuse us of not supporting the troops while Bush Administration was allowing THIS?

:wtf:

[Occam Bandage]

11. This didn't start with Cheney. It's been going on since the Korean War.

Including waterboarding, including degrading treatment, including mockery and verbal abuse, including intense physical and mental strain. People who go through SERE are people who intend to place themselves at risk of capture. If they can't handle a carefully controlled simulation of survival, evasion, resistance, and escape, they can't handle the real thing. Better to know that before they're shot down over hostile territory.

[KittyWampus]

20. Stop talking sense. The Reactionary Screamers will be along to give this thread 100 Recommendations

too.

[readmoreoften]

25. Actually, people who support torture and uphold military tribunals for the love of their state

are by definition reactionary.

[Occam Bandage]

32. Good thing nobody here supports torture,

and nobody here is in favor of military tribunals as a result of "love of their state."

[Raksha]

40. I can understand the Survival, Evasion and Escape part of the training,

but not the so-called "Resistance" (torture) part. What is the point of THAT? If all it teaches you is that "everyone breaks under torture, including you" how does knowing that help a captured soldier survive? None of the apologists on the other thread has come up with a sensible explanation for that so far.

[Occam Bandage]

42. Simple. It doesn't teach them to break. It teaches them not to break.

A person who is consciously aware and who completely and totally believes that their life is not threatened can be waterboarded near indefinitely (by that I mean as regards an ongoing campaign, and not a single session, of course.) They may "break," as in request/plead for a stop, but without fear there is no reason to divulge information once the unpleasantness stops--that is, to truly break.

[ThomCat]

3. Please respond, say something,

Kick this so that it doesn't sink and disappear. People need to see this tomorrow. :(

How many people knew, or even guessed, that our military was letting the contractors learn to torture by practicing our own soldiers before they took it on the road and started torturing people we captured?

This needs to end up in front of congressional hearings. :grr:

Please keep this going for the day crowd tomorrow.

[EFerrari]

4. I'm speechless but will help you kick.

Is it torture NOW?

:puke:

[Senator]

5. I don't think "practicing" is a fair or accurate description.

And I would caution against following this mother's conflation of the SERE program with the paranoid misapplication of it by bushcheney.

--

[EFerrari]

6. That's very possible but she is right in the sense that her son's experience

was sold to the Pentagon by Mitchell and Jessem.

And as far as SERE goes, a lot of those kids go into the service at a time when they are most vulnerable to come down with psychotic disorders like schizophrenia if they are predisposed. An experience like that could easily trigger the onset. :(

[ThomCat]

7. If this letter is even partially accurate

that they tortured our troops, without telling them in advance what was going to be done to them, and without any actual purpose of training them to resist torture...

And if those people who did this then went on to sell their services as contractors to torture detainees...

Then what other word would You use if not Practice?

And if the same people were involved in both the torturing of our people in the SERE program and then torturing of detainees, and with Cheney claiming that the SERE program proves that torture isn't really torture, how can we not discuss this? Burying this, or burying our heads in the sand and ignoring this does no good for anyone.

Caution all you want but I want this investigated. I want to see where this leads.

[Occam Bandage]

10. Two members of my immediate family have gone through SERE.

One in the past few years, one in the early 1980s. Both were waterboarded. Both strongly believe that their experience completely demystified waterboarding, and as a result of their training they would be able to resist if captured. The torture aspect of waterboarding is the fear of death. SERE is designed to strip away that fear in a safe, controlled setting. The reason SERE isn't a huge scandal despite having existed in more or less its current state since the 1950s is that it works and works well, despite what the mother of a troop who had some problems says.

Military training is strenuous. It's designed to be strenuous. Some people can't handle the strain, whether mental or physical. A person who cannot survive training is a person who should not be placed in a position where they are at risk of capture.

[Common Sense Party]

12. Don't confuse people with FACTS. They can't handle facts.

It's much easier to hyperventilate and emote.

Honestly, what do people think the military is? Summer camp?

[MADem]

16. Succinct, accurate and well put. NT

[Nickster]

18. Exactly. The program was designed around the experiences of Allied POWs so they could train the rest

of the troops on how to resist torture techniques. The Dubya cabal lost the learnings from this program, especially the learnings that told them these torture techniques lead to false information during interrogation.

[Occam Bandage]

23. I've always kind of wondered about one aspect of that:

The military believes, with cause, that if you teach someone waterboarding is not nearly as dangerous as it feels, it ceases to be nearly as effective. Given that waterboarding has been one of the most common forms of torture as part of interrogations for centuries, wouldn't it stand to reason that al-Qaeda and the Taliban would put its members who held important information through a SERE analogue? They had intensive physical training camps, they needed to teach their recruits how to survive in prolonged guerrilla warfare, and they were aware of the fact that they were all at risk of capture.

[Nickster]

41. Makes sense to me. We know so little about them, it's entirely possible that they already are doing

such things.

[Ani Yun Wiya]

30. What is the difference between...

A cup of water.
A bucket of water.
A fire hose.

[Occam Bandage]

31. One is about 250mL, one is about 20L, and one is part of a high-pressure water delivery system. nt

[Ani Yun Wiya]

36. Accurate assessment.

And the difference between

A face sized cloth.
A plastic bag.
A canvas hood.

(And let me clarify that the fire hose is delivering the water.)

It will also be at least six hours before I may reply to continue a train of thought about SERE.

[Occam Bandage]

47. Size, texture, color, shape, and permeability. nt

[Ani Yun Wiya]

55. I have recollections regarding each of these...

being used as a face covering (or head covering) during what is referred to as waterboarding.

Have you seen anything like this personally ?

[Occam Bandage]

60. I haven't personally experienced or personally observed waterboarding. nt

[Ani Yun Wiya]

43. In addition to the 2nd question...

What is the difference between:

A regular "average" troop.
A troop who"stands out".
A troop who stands out AND has "an attitude".

And trust me this is going somewhere in regards to SERE and shall we say, similar training.

[Occam Bandage]

48. Performance and mentality. nt

[Ani Yun Wiya]

56. OK, that is one kind of answer.

However it is also true that those three profiles (for lack of a better word) will elicit varying intensities of various aspects of this particular kind of training.

Would you be surprised if things like snakes and electric shocks were an aspect of this "training" ?

[Occam Bandage]

59. I wouldn't be surprised if either were used,

though I would be surprised if there were venomous snakes or electric shocks capable of causing significant harm.

[stanwyck]

52. Thanks, Occam. Everyone needs to read your post

My son, an active duty Marine, was waterboarded at SERE "school". He hated it. It was horrifying. He believes waterboarding is torture. However, he doesn't believe he was tortured. He would agree with your assessment. The psychology of being a SERE participant and being a captive of another government is not the same. The SERE participant knows his experience, carefully monitored, has a beginning and an end. The SERE participants are not alone. They have the support of each other and the leadership of the instructors. Of course, as a mother, I have a difficult time imagining what my son has been through, both in training and in Iraq. However, it's just possible that someday SERE could save my son's life.

[MADem]

15. The Senate Report is the source for accurate information on this subject, not a LTTE.

I agree with you. I invite everyone's attention to the Senate Report that no one here wants to read, apparently.

While everyone's flitting around complaining about pictures, and letters to the editor that don't get to the root of the issues, they're missing a report that discusses this SERE business and a zillion other tangential topics that all relate directly to the abuse and torture of detainees--and it is a doozy.

I think everyone named in it should be called to testify in open Congressional hearings. Starting with Donald Rumsfeld.

I keep providing this link, and very few people seem interested in reading it--they'd rather call me an asshole because I think fretting over pictures is a waste of time, while holding hearings with everyone named in this report called to testify seems like a FINE idea to me:

http://armed-services.senate.gov/Publications/Detainee%...

That's the FULL LINK--not the Executive Summary, which is only nineteen pages. If you're lazy or impatient, just read that bit--it will give you a good idea of what's shaking.

[VenusRising]

8. There is more discussion in another thread about this.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5667074

It's worth repeating loudly and often, though. This needs to be shouted from the rooftops. It's too horrible to think that they used our honorable men and women to sharpen their services for sale. There needs to be investigations and people held accountable.

I'm so sick of having to wonder when accountability disappeared in this country. :grr:

[ThomCat]

13. Thank you very much.

:)

I didn't find that thread, or I wouldn't have posted this again. It's good that now there is a link here to it.

[VenusRising]

14. You're welcome.

Thread titles can make it difficult to search sometimes. Like I said though, this should be shouted loud and often until the people that are responsible are held accountable. So, thanks for posting it.

:hi::hug:

[Deja Q]

17. I couldn't agree with you on that more...

[Occam Bandage]

9. And to think that's only been public knowledge for decades.

Seriously, if he volunteered for SERE without knowing what SERE was, it's his own damn fault.

[KittyWampus]

19. This letter is either bogus or from a mother who is grossly misinformed. STOP FALLING FOR THIS

SERE existed for at least FORTY years and yet suddenly a letter pops up from some anonymous mother?

:WTF:

DU'ers apparently can't handle the truth.

[readmoreoften]

24. Why is she "grossly misinformed"? You should read the post below yours. /nt

[walldude]

28. WTF are you talking about? SERE has existed and is a classified

program, people aren't allowed to speak out. Jesse Ventura was on Larry King and admitted he was waterboarded during his quest to become a Navy Seal. This letter could be bullshit but the claims in it are not.

[Occam Bandage]

34. SERE is not a classified program.

Parts of SERE training are classified (parts of almost everything in the military are classified), but the existence of SERE is public knowledge, as is the fact that SERE does involve subjecting those who volunteer for SERE training to interrogation techniques like waterboarding.

[madokie]

21. I'm a SERE survivor

I went through the school before being stationed there before I went to VN. Its been 40 years since but parts of it I remember like it was only yesterday, others it takes some shaking to break the memories loose. I wasn't waterboarded but I was tortured, or what could be said as torture as part of the training. By the time I was brought in for interrogation I was totally convinced that I had been captured and this was all for real. At the time I realized this started as a training class but I just knew something had gone horribly wrong along the way, starting about the time I and the rest of us were captured and put in the concentration camp. I haven't talked about my experience there as some of the things we were doing was highly classified. I had to have a top secret clearance just to be on the premises let along going through the class and being stationed there helping in the training of the students who came after me. I was debriefed upon leaving and it was highly stressed that I talk to no one about any of it. 40 years later and I still don't know what I can legally disclose so I'll pretty much stop where I am now. I can say this much that I do know I can say and that is upon my graduation I became one of the bad guys or what I had seen as the bad guys as I was in training myself.

I joined the Navy to keep out of Vietnam, went to boot camp, then went back to boot camp as a company commanders aid then went to SERE school then stayed on there as a trainers aid. By the time I had completed that duty I had determined I needed to do my part so I volunteered for 'Nam duty. Upon arriving in 'Nam I was made a postal clerk, so I finished my Navy duty as a postal clerk, which was excellent duty at the time, 'cause even the captain likes to get his mail so we were treated like, well let me say real nice like.

Shortly after my getting settled in there at the training camp we had a couple very important visitors, H.R. Haldeman & John Erlichman, a couple of President Nixon's goons. At the time I was thinking why would the President send his men here and what was the purpose. Pretty much I now know the answers to that question.

[Joanne98]

26. You should talk about it.

[ManiacJoe]

38. If he wants to stay out of jail,

he may need written permission from the DOD.

[AngryAmish]

22. I know a few guys who went through it

All air force aviators.

NOt fun. They all broke. Virtually everyone breaks under torture.

[merh]

27. Jesse Ventura said he was tortured duringe SERE navy seal training

prior to being sent into the combat zone (Viet Nam).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9yfMdNC6cQ

He said he disagrees with Obama on this, Ventura said he would prosecute the torturers, those who ordered it, those who carried it out, authorized it, let it happen because it is against the law.

[Audma]

29. It's hard, but he volunteeered.

What did he expect? A rose garden? He volunteered to become Government property. During any kind of military training you aren't supposed to be nice or caring, you're supposed to train these men and women to be the meanest, toughest son's of bitches out there. There's a reason why they're the best, they strip them of their civilian life and work them to the bone, especially in Marine Boot Camp. You cannot kowtow to the media or anyone else, it's very dangerous when you're trying to change the one thing that we know for a fact the US is BEST at, think about it...


Please, please, please try to remember that this is VOLUNTARY. Want to know what Army Ranger school training is like?

"Ranger students conduct about 20 hours of training per day, while consuming two or fewer meals daily totaling about 2,200 Calories (9,200 kJ), with an average of 3.5 hours of sleep a day. Students sleep more before a parachute jump for safety considerations. Ranger students typically wear and carry some 65–90 pounds (29–41 kg) of weapons, equipment, and training ammunition while patrolling more than 200 miles (320 km) throughout the course.<2>" "Only around 20% of soldiers make it through all three phases without having to repeat a phase."

and don't get me started on BUD/S.

[Occam Bandage]

35. I agree. Nobody is drafted into SERE training.

If someone signs up for a position requiring SERE training without even performing a google/Wiki search, and then is surprised to find SERE is very unpleasant, I do not have much sympathy.

[Ani Yun Wiya]

45. During the Vietnam era they certainly were.

Shall I give out with a summary of the training "activities" ?

[Occam Bandage]

46. The thread is about SERE while Dick Cheney was Vice President.

Bringing up Vietnam weakens the OP's claim that something new and shocking is going on.

[Ani Yun Wiya]

50. To the distraught mother I am certain it WAS shocking.

What is your response to my post #43 ?

[Occam Bandage]

51. It's unfortunate she didn't bother Googling it beforehand.

Ignorance isn't cause for sympathy when the information is readily at hand.

My response to that post was posted half an hour before you posted this post.

[Ani Yun Wiya]

53. Pardon me I missed your response.

Why would a soldier's mother "google" a military program ?
It's not as if she has to supply a note permitting her son's involvements vis a vis training.

[Occam Bandage]

54. Not a problem.

If she has an interest in her son's training, I would think she would look up what that training was. If she has no interest in her son's training, that is fine as well, but she should not take on an air of outrage, shock, and surprise when she finds out about it. The information was readily available.

[Ani Yun Wiya]

61. "outrage, shock, and surprise "

AS I recall it, that is precisely the sentiment that was expressed by an entire company of soldiers within the first minute of the start of this "training" on the day I was involved with it.


Or maybe they just did not expect the days training to begin with a rather brusque and rather early wake up.

Then again, perhaps they should have boned up on the course before it was offered.

[stanwyck]

58. Maybe because the mother wants to be able to

talk with her son openly about his military experiences and provide the understanding and comfort a son expects from a parent. I'm often questioned by other liberals as to why I "let" my son join the Marines. He was in college, quit, and enlisted. He discussed his decision with us beforehand. We asked him to wait six months before enlisting, just to make sure it wasn't a rash decision. He waited the six months. He was 19 at the time. We raised him to be independent. He is. He made his own decision. Yet, we are always here for him. And that includes knowing what his training involves and what experiences he's had. Certain military jobs require SERE school. In the mother you reference, her son is part of a flight crew. Pilots and flight crews attend SERE school, as do special services, and some Marines. Military parents have responsibilities. I understand this mother's pain, her son is hurting. But she seems incredibly naive about her son's job and the purpose of SERE. Her son was receiving training to help him survive in the case of capture.

[Ani Yun Wiya]

65. OK

I can understand that perspective.
It could simply be that the specifics of the training were not clearly explained and discussed in advance between them.

[DU GrovelBot]

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[stanwyck]

37. OK. Flame away. But here's another mother's perspective

My son, a Marine, went to SERE training. The intent is to teach methods to avoid capture, survive capture, and escape capture. As I've explained in another thread, the methods, from my understanding of my son's experiences and those of other family members who have also attended SERE training, have been used for decades to train pilots, special forces, and other military members who are more susceptible to capture due to the nature of their jobs. They undergo scenarios they might face as captives. The intent is to prepare them to save themselves.
I agree that we have every right as American citizens to debate the validity of this training as we confront the treatment of the detainees. I believe we should adhere to the Geneva Convention. Our strength as a nation depends on our adhering to our values. Torture is anti-American.
What happens at SERE is undeniably unpleasant. But it could save my son's life.

[BlooInBloo]

39. A perfectly reasonable opinion.

[Wednesdays]

44. K&R

:kick:

[riverdeep]

49. Man, I hope this DOESN'T go viral.

It's gonna make us look quite stupid.

There's several things going on in that letter, if taken on face value.

1) The accusation that the information that resulted from putting our troops through training was sold by Dick Cheney to contractors in Iraq so they could torture. I know we all hate Cheney, but this has been around for years, long before Cheney came on the scene. Now, I'm sure they do collect data, for all kinds of reasons, but the CIA and the School of the Americas was teaching torture in the 70's to Central Americans. The CIA knows torture already, this program would hardly be the main conduit for it.

2) A mother's grief and a broken son: There are some possibilities.

a) This is a very rough program, and it's possible they misjudged their pre-selection process and allowed in someone who was very unsuited and in no way prepared for this, or at a vulnerable time in his life. Unlike others, I don't believe he was 'weak', but rather, not suited. There are many tough guys who can't handle a 9-5 and go off the deep end. There are plenty of straight arrow types who could never handle the stress and inner disorientation that comes from creating a great work of art. And of course, a mother will feel for her son, and understandably lash out at those who she believed did this. But that doesn't speak to the general accuracy of the letter.

b) It's possible these particular instructors DID go too far and left some permanent damage. Not everyone is good at their job or good at their job all the time, and this could have been the tragic result. Torture, when done for real, DOES leave permanent damage in the brain that is hard to impossible to undo. This may have been TOO real. But the armed forces would have discontinued it if that happened all the time.

3) That this program in unnecessary. Look, ANYONE can be broken, it will happen. No one, no matter how tough they think they are, can put up with stuff forever. Just ask Pol Pot. But it can help soldiers deal with lower level and milder resistance, and that can help create some confidence going into combat if the training is done in a controlled fashion. Now, the stuff that Pol Pot did, well you're not going to be able to train for that, unless you build a synthetic body.

BTW, to those of you thinking it's preposterous that we would ever conduct horrifying and unnecessary tests on our own troops are woefully naive. We have done it and done it plenty of times.

("Veterans Sue CIA Over Past Chemical Tests on Soldiers")
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aQLKz5TZ0PpY&refer=us

I just don't think that's what's going on here.

[ProSense]

57. Malcolm Nance: Waterboarding is Torture… Period

As a former Master Instructor and Chief of Training at the US Navy Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape School (SERE) in San Diego, California I know the waterboard personally and intimately.

[annm4peace]

62. the Veterans for Peace have been speaking out

" Who will speak up for my son and the others like him who joined the military to serve and who were subjected to sadistic torture, not by the enemy, but by the war criminals ostensibly on our side? These people, Cheney and his talking heads, everyone of them chicken hawks who avoided serving, should NOT be allowed to use torturing our troops as rationalization for their crimes."


the Veterans for Peace and the Iraq Veterans Against the War have been speaking up and out about this torture.

I am not a Vet but have supported them actively since 2001. These Veterans have been speaking out and especially on recent torture since 2002. There where 72 of us in orange jumpsuits and blackhoods walking thru downtown. Most of us where Veterans.


for Veterans who need a place to talk, and if able, speak out please reach out to Veterans for Peace and Iraq Veterans Against the War (it is also for Afganistan Veterans).

http://www.veteransforpeace.org/

Find a chapter near you:
http://veteransforpeace.net/chapter_contacts.htm

[annm4peace]

63. a Veteran for Peace's Letter to other Vets

Suffering Post-Traumatic Stress for Having Killed Them In Their Own Home Country

By Jay Janson


Hi brother and sister veterans and friends!

There is a new free treatment for veterans suffering Post Traumatic Stress, who have children.

If the Veterans Hospitals could cure the mental problems of their post-combat soldiers, returned from having engaged in immoral actions in defenseless populations, their children would certainly benefit.

This veteran has often thought to report having Post-Traumatic Stress, having lived almost an entire adult life with emotional upset, even depression, over the genocide by United States military forces done 'in my name' and 'in the name of family and friends', all the more intense for having personally participated in the trigger pulling.

The category Post-Traumatic Stress has been until recently reserved for something like an older category, 'Shell Shock' emotional stress caused by 'others attacking us' - like on 9/11 - and not for emotional pain caused by guilt and shame for OUR having gone into other peoples' countries to bomb and attack the inhabitants, often in their very own homes, killing and maiming in order to conquer, occupy and rule by whatever arrangements necessary for U.S. corporate interests.

Maybe we could force them to broaden the category to include mental distress for having taken part in something immoral.

For this elderly veteran, it is a case of one musician suffering years of mental anguish that interrupted and ended full dedication to a socially useful calling, replaced by solum duty to be the perennial conscience-stricken protester.

Are not most fellow Veterans For Peace, who steadfastly come to meetings, participate in leafleting, marches, demonstrations and other activities driven by similar brutal memories of doing wrong to mankind while deceived by their elders, by their own nation's prominent leaders and lied to by media and even clergy?

Do we not all feel compelled to try to make up for wrongdoing by working, albeit impotently, for the world peace we mistakenly, immorally, and naively followed orders to destroy in the time of our youth?

In spite of years in penance in activist dedication to history and humanism journalism to expose the false justifications of wars of imperialist capitalist society, one still suffers stress from being aware of the continuing killing overseas, killing deviously proclaimed in the military beholden conglomerate mass-media as protecting our freedoms and American interests - the taking of lives in all of our names, supposedly for everyone's good.

Each of us is living life in the singular, regardless whether one cooperates or
does not cooperate with others. Except when citizens cooperate in some agreed upon purpose, collective life is only an abstract term.

One veteran cannot personally experience another veteran's stress. Apart from Veterans For Peace meetings and activities, when each individual stress is temporarily melted down and poured into a warm brotherly collective dissatisfaction instilled with intentions to act responsibly, each of us is alone, dealing with one's own personally experienced stress.

Moreover, except when engaged in group anti-war activities, one is alone with one's thoughts, not being able to answer for anyone other than for oneself. Each of us, anguishes as if the murdering might as well have been carried out, and continues to be carried out, solely in one's own particular name, for example, in Jay Janson's name. The anguish and frustration is suffered individually.

The continual merciless slaughter of others is observed from one single
accountable conscience's point of reference and painful experience. So John, Tom, Mary, Bill, Sue, Jay, etc. are each only able to experience trauma from one's own particular perception, as the news constantly reminds us of our acquiescent complicity in our nation's bringing mass violent death to our Third World brothers and sisters.

We ache, each of us alone, for our inability to save one's fellow human beings
from slaughter. It can be diagnosed as arising within a sensitivity to caring and
helping others taught to us by our parents in early childhood.

There is no cure for this vicarious ache for the pain and misery of bereaved members of the various families whose loved ones have passed from this world in sudden horror for having gotten 'in harms way' of American weapons? No cure. One can only anesthetize the ache with distractions and thats why the majority of Americans tightly confine our interests to our personal lives, desperately seeking intense fun with sports and movies.

Perhaps it is truly said that "ignorance is bliss". For any citizen, once cursed with the knowledge of one's portion of collective guilt, the only balm for this conscience inflicted wound is action to awaken as many as possible to the task of halting one's nation's murderously callous and cruel behavior.

But, 'If the burden is too great, just put it down!' says the adage. So does the media intructed majority, giggling with fun and recreation. Why-me-worry, 'patriotic' flag waving civilians send the kids off to overseas wars. On TV they are brave and hansome looking in increasingly heavy gear dressed to kill with star-wars-like high tech hand held weapons often equipped electronically with phones to call-in coordinates for planes and drones strike in back up. This media obedient majority, believing in the wars, will ready to cheer them if they make it back.

Adjust!, says the military psychiatrist. Look at all the other combatants and
trainees. They are mostly well-adjusted to following orders, and trusting
their commanders and the commander-in-chief. How could life in the military be otherwise. Just take care of number one, stay tight with your buddies and protect them and yourself. Leave the thinking to your officers. Just follow orders.

You followed orders. It's over, you made it back. Forget it! And now, supress that searing human compassion for the families of our Afghani, Iraqi, and Pakistani brothers and sisters killed or maimed in these weeks of U.S. drone bombings and other weapons fire. Forget them just as before them, you tried to forget the dead and maimed Koreans, Vietnamese, Laotians, Cambodians, Dominicans, Panamanians - no, no, no, to worry about them is called being a 'bleeding heart.' Big Brother media warns us that that is what the communists and the terrorists and America's 'enemies' want you to do. Break down, so they, the bad guys, can win.

Multiply these thoughts of your veteran-writer by hundreds of thousands, or
millions, if you add in ordinary civilians no longer comfortable about being an American now, or already uncomfortable before, during our war in Vietnam, or whenever horrific covert CIA life-taking activities are declassified (and you manage to read of them on the Internet's alternative independent media.)

A multitude of us applying for treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress syndrome might be an angle for Veterans For Peace and even non-Veteran peace activists to pursue as a public consciousness raising technique for exposing a bitter reality that is never discussed publicly?

[Bravo Zulu]

64. I went through SERE training,

before I went to Viet Nam, they did not water board us! I escaped from them and when they caught me they gave me an orange to eat for a reward, actually, It was kind of fun!