NOT AT: NOT POLITICS: Wanted - More Green Beret Recruits

[Guest guest]

Hi y'all,

 

Dr. Chuck Woodfield passed this to me .. we share a comraderie only a

few can understand. I wanna share it with you. This discussion is

NOT about politics .. it is about TAKING CARE OF OUR OWN!!!

 

Some of you may recall on another list lately a lady began to discuss

some hot shot politico opposition to military pay raises ... and the

list mom cut her off ... said it was political. Perhaps it was as it

did focus on particular anti-military elected officials - this doesn't!

 

Though its not AT related, we are not robots and this is not a formal

classroom setting. I think such discussion has far more value than what

EO to use to keep meeses out of the kitchen or skeeters from biting our

butt. Why? Because it is your fathers, mothers, sons, daughters,

grandkids and cousins we're talking about here and anybody who thinks

paying a young person $1,500 a month basic salary is reward enough to

get them to lay their butt on the line .. they're in Never Never Land.

 

The $110 a month they pay for paratroopers is, I'll admit, a lot of $$.

In fact, its twice what we were paid when I gradualte from jump school

back in December 1963 .. maybe a $55 raise for jumping out of perfectly

good airplanes over hostile territory in 39 years is too much - huh?

 

And the $110 combat zone pay is 367% more than the $30 a month we got

during my first tour in the 'Nam .. back when I was too damn young to

vote or buy a beer but not too old to go to the jungle and mountains and

eat monkey brains with Montagnards.

 

Granted .. Uncle Sugar does give the single soldiers three slops and a

flop .. but you wouldn't wanna live like that long. And there is a

small allowance paid to married soldiers .. but its not paid for being

married .. its paid cause you aren't taking Uncle Sugar's three slops

and flop anymore .. you provide your own for yourself and your family.

Thankfully, long gone is the mentality of " If Uncle Sugar wanted you to

have a wife he would issue you one. "

 

We understand that its not the money so much that brings young troops

into the military .. and that is what these left-wing, anti-military

congressional a.holes who oppose military pay raises hang on to when

they try to put it down. Is this not exploitation? If someone were to

focus on a particular racial or ethic group and exploit them for any

reason we would be up in arms. But some folks can tolerate elected

officials exploiting an entire generation of patriotic young Americans.

 

They see no need to spend money improving living standards for folks who

are probably gonna join anyway .. besides, such folks normally vote

conservative so its better to direct funds to the professional loafers.

Give them more welfare so they can buy more crack. The loosers aren't

gonna vote conservative and helping them to raise their children to be

professional crack-using, baby-making welfare recipients, keeps a good

stash of liberal voters and appeases those who leaning that way now -

those who wanna stick a flower in every gun barrel and a stash of cash

in the hands of every crack-head.

 

I say again .. regardless of your particular stand on politics, we are

talking about your children, your brothers and sisters, your grandkids,

your cousins and your friends. Screwing with the individual soldiers is

not the proper way to voice dissent against the military.

 

Again .. its NOT about politics .. but about TAKING CARE OF OUR OWN!!

 

Thank God for Patriots .. Butch

----------------

 

From the February 21, 2002 edition -

http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0221/p03s01-usmi.html

 

Wanted (badly): More Green Beret Recruits

 

By Patrik Jonsson | Special to The Christian Science Monitor

 

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. - Wanted: Someone who can move undetected through

jungle brush. Prefer a person who can strike with the force of a

" lightning bolt. " Must be able to swim long distances in boots

and heavy clothing. Ability to order food in Arabic optional.

 

This is the gist of a recruiting pitch the Pentagon is putting out as it

looks for the next generation of its elite soldiers, the Green Berets,

to fight the terrorist wars of tomorrow.

 

In a bold attempt to capitalize on a surge of patriotism and buttress

its aging corps, the Pentagon is offering application forms to the

man-on-the-street for the first time since 1988. And, like NBA scouts at

the start of highschool basketball season, recruiters are fanning out

across the country in search of 400 men with the right stuff to wear the

green beret.

 

The elite fighting division had, for years, filled its ranks by

headhunting the best and brightest volunteers from the Army. But the

depth of talent just isn't there anymore.

 

" They're going to be looking for the captain of the football team and

the guy everyone looked up to in high school, " says " John, " a

broad-chested Green Beret from Miami, filling out his gear bag at Ranger

Joe's surplus shop on Bragg Boulevard here. " Believe me, there are

undiscovered naturals all over this country. "

 

Tactical linchpins

 

The Green Berets are even looking for volunteers willing to transfer

from Navy, Marines, and Air force divisions. Perhaps at no other time,

analysts say, has the military's focus shifted so dramatically from

tanks and cannons to the kind of all-round American troops largely

credited for the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

 

" There's been some reconsideration, if you will, a tailoring of the

future concept of our tactics in war, " says Dan Smith, chief of research

at the Center for Defense Information in Washington. " This training and

recruitment for special forces is along those lines. "

 

In a speech at National Defense University in Washington last month,

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld admitted that more of what the Army

often calls " military occupational specialists " are needed.

 

" The department has known for some time that it does not have enough ...

[of] certain types of Special Operations Forces, " Mr. Rumsfeld said.

 

Green Beret forces today number about 6,000, spread out from Bosnia to

the Philippines. They are an intelligent, strong, and lethal band of

brothers, all young men, whom the administration has pegged as

the most likely choice of spear tip for what appears to be a protracted

stab at terrorists outside the US.

 

Their jobs include rallying and training local militias, gathering

" intel, " and tromping through jungles and deserts. These troops are

seen by many as the epitome of American ingenuity and self-reliance.

 

Are you tough enough?

 

Which is why only half of the recruits actually make the grade. After

basic training at Ft. Benning, Ga., the new civilian recruits come here

to Ft. Bragg, America's largest Army base, to undergo three weeks of

rucksack marches and intense psychological tests.

 

" They'll do stuff like put you on guard duty for three days straight, to

see what you're made of, " says John, the Special Ops soldier from Miami.

 

Once accepted, a special forces trooper isn't built overnight. In fact,

it takes 80 weeks to build a civilian duffer into a lean, mean fighting

machine, as able to engage enemies on the ground as make jokes in

Tagalog.

 

" What you need is a combination of stamina, physical endurance, and

mental toughness, " says Capt. David Connolly, a spokesman for the US

Army Recruitment Command at Ft. Knox, Ky.

 

While some soldiers showed surprise at the Army's new tack, others saw

it coming.

 

" The Army has only been shrinking, and that means that the pool of

capable soldiers has also been shrinking, " says David, a retired special

forces sergeant who, in the 1960s, taught the mountain-dwelling

Montagnards to fight the Vietcong.

 

The move also comes at a time when the Army is vying to revamp its

soldier schools to appeal to today's tech-savvy teens. At the JFK

Special Warfare Center and School here at Ft. Bragg, for instance, top

brass are now jazzing up their linguistics curriculum to incorporate

state-of-the-art language software.

 

" A lot of our guys are getting older and retiring, and we're trying to

find ways to appeal to the next generation of soldiers, " says Tim Loney,

the commander of Charlie Company, which runs the school.

 

Pay incentives have also been mooted. The base salary for a battle-ready

soldier is about $1,500 per month. (Food and lodging are free.)

 

Soldiers get $110 if they're " jumpers, " and another $110 for serving in

a combat zone. There are also marriage allotments that can run as much

$400 a month.

 

But a pay raise may accompany the US Department of Defense's proposed 21

percent increase in the fiscal year 2003 budget for the US Special

Operations Command - which oversees the Green Berets.

 

Underwhelming response

 

But will Americans, emboldened, perhaps, by patriotic fervor, enlist?

 

To some, the new gambit is the first real chance for Americans to join

the war effort. Up to this point, however, there has not been a crush of

civilian volunteers at recruitment offices. Some critics wonder if

the Army will have trouble filling its ranks.

 

" What has not happened since 9/11 has been an increase in actual

recruits, " says Mr. Smith of the CDI.

 

" I have watched the Army's reports about an upsurge in calls, but they

tend to be mostly old fogeys wanting to reenlist or people calling to

express their support. "

 

Top brass stress that Americans now have a chance to support their

country.

 

" The president has said that now is the time to step forward and do your

time, " says Army Lt. Col Ryan Yantis. " A lot of people who come to the

Army come for the adventure, but, today, what's overriding that is the

sense of service to country. "