Saturday, June 14, 2008

i need to see this...soon (please come my way)

From Sgt. Brent Sammann, an active-duty soldier in the US Army:

Sgt. Brent Sammann, US Army
(Click for full-size image --
check out the two flags)
2008-06-13-IMG_0338_180.jpg
I'm a first-hand witness to the exploitation by KBR and other companies lending their services to the war effort -- services us soldiers are fully capable of doing ourselves.... The military is being overcharged by these companies on a regular basis. Also, the poor service and treatment we get from some of their employees who make three times as much as those of us serving our country that are not in it for the money but are trying to make the world a better place for everyone.

From SPC (P) Johnny Rhodes in 3/2 SCR Infantry based in Diyala, Iraq:

After being awake for 3 days I may be a little bit out of it, so excuse any rambling or incoherence on my part. Off the top of my head, I can easily say that KBR in particular is of no help here in my area of Iraq. They do, jobs soldiers could do, get paid way better for it, but the work is almost always substandard.... at any given time there are hordes of these guys tying up the phones and internet, cramming the chow hall, etc. Which makes the soldiers have to wait. And wait. And wait. They also paid way more than me, for a job, I could do with my eyes closed.

From Brenda Clampitt, of Baton Rouge, LA, the wife of a soldier stationed at Camp Adder in Tallil, Iraq:

[My husband] drives the trucks and Humvees and escorts the KBR around where they need to go. He doesn't understand why they get paid way more then he does when [he and his fellow soldiers] are the ones doing the protecting, and are the ones getting shot at and blown up. He has seen soldiers die in front of him; he has seen lives destroyed and the country torn apart. My husband would serve his country whether he got paid or not, that is just how he is. He loves his country and wants to protect it but he sees first hand what is going on over there and he doesn't like it.... I myself am sick and tired of this war. It is dragging on and on and it is all about the money. I am not anti war. But I am FOR everything your movie is about.


Today's lead editorial in the New York Times, titled "Interrogation for Profit," decries "one of the Bush administration's most blatant evasions of accountability in Iraq -- the outsourcing of war detainees' interrogation to mercenary private contractors" and calls on Congress to approve "measures to make war-zone contractors liable for criminal behavior." The editorial concludes: "The way out of the Iraq fiasco must include an end to the outsourced shadow armies."

This indictment has the same urgency of War Inc. Especially with John McCain reminding us that it's "not that important" to him when our troops come home. (from Arianna Huffington, "War, Inc: Cusack's Savage Satire Strikes a Chord with Soldiers and Their Families," June 12, 2008)

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