A word about our troops.

This is a diversion from my normal happy-go-lucky post.

I am tired of seeing slanted reports in the news about how terrible our troops are: “Civilians killed by US troops”, “Collateral damage caused by US troops”, “Karzai wants restraint on US troops”, “MacCrystal apologizes for US troop’s mishaps and promises greater restraint on troops-in-contact”. What a crock of sh*t. What you don’t read is the behind the scene story. The collateral damage caused by US troops is because the Taliban use women and children as shields. They hide in mosques, clinics, and civilian homes. They fire on coalition troops from these locations. They hijack fuel tankers and leave them in villages in the hopes that US troops will attack their position – but the Taliban are long gone and the villagers are stealing the fuel when we arrive. (Remember that incident?).

You never hear about the Afghan National Army (ANA) or Afghan National Police (ANP) getting whacked out on dope and shooting American troops. It has happened. Karzai never apologizes to US families for that crap. You don’t hear about the ANP breaking down your door (if you live in town) and taking your computer, all your electronics, body armor and weapons. And then the local police don’t know anything about it.

You don’t hear about the Taliban taking the family of an ANA member hostage , an ANA member that is stationed with US troops. The ANA family members are killed if the ANA member does not shoot Americans… it has happened. Did you hear about that?

You don’t hear about the ANA running like scared children when they get into a gun battle with the Taliban. You don’t hear about the ANA and ANP taking bribes, kick-backs, and hush money.

You don’t hear about the corruption fee everyone has to pay if they want to get around in this country. Try getting something through the border and then through customs without paying every Muhammed, Achmed, and Halil along the way.

And we have not even touched on the amount of greed and theft that occurs here. You can go down- town Kabul and find hundreds of US products that were hijacked at the border. You don’t hear about that in the news either.

But, you will always hear about how it is the American’s fault that we are not doing enough to help these poor people. You will hear how it is our fault that the Taliban are such bad people – if we could just sit down and talk to them… to understand them… to open a dialog… another crock of sh*t.

And you never hear the US soldiers complain about their treatment from the locals. You don’t hear about the kids that are paid by the local cleric to throw rocks at our troops. You didn’t hear about the Air Force woman whose jaw was broken by one of these little angels.

It is a shame (and and a sham) that so many Americans don’t really know what goes on here. You only get the slant of the biased media.

Read “Lone Survivor” by Marcus Luttrell if you want to have some idea of what it is like in Afghanistan.

Start doing your own research on what really happens here. Stop listening to the talking heads on the morning and evening news… that isn’t news.

Yep! I’m fired up about the poor treatment of our troops.

Someone get me a soapbox – I have something to say!!!!!