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2008-05-29 Afghanistan

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Posted by 3dc 2008-05-29 09:30|| || Front Page|| [11136 views ] Top

#1 Oh, goody, Jerry Springer in the Wire(tm)! Only on Pay for View

They get to learn all over again how do destroy unit cohesion when people screw other peoples significant other and everyone else starts taking sides in the unit. Talk about a morale builder. Yeah, I'll watch your back when the bullets fly. That's the ticket.

Posted by Procopius2k 2008-05-29 10:37|| 2008-05-29 10:37|| Front Page Top

#2 I dunno, the Gauls fought the Romans and their wives or whatever joined in. The Romans were more afraid of the Gaul women.

I know that some IDF units have couples in them. I also know that the IDF had some units fighting in the Golan Heights during the big dust up in 1972 and they fought very hard.

The idea that promiscuous women would lead to jealousy is a bit over blown. A cheating spouse would be a big problem.......witness Uriah the Hittite.

Posted by Sock Puppet of Texas 2008-05-29 11:32|| 2008-05-29 11:32|| Front Page Top

#3 How about some new recruitment posters? "Join the army for the greatest unsafe sex in the world's hot spots." It sure would have gotten my juices flowing when I was young.

Posted by Thusoper Tojo5736 2008-05-29 11:40|| 2008-05-29 11:40|| Front Page Top

#4 "Folks are dumb where I come from,
They ain't got no learning.
Still they're happy as can be
Doin' what comes natur'lly"

Posted by GK 2008-05-29 11:49|| 2008-05-29 11:49|| Front Page Top

#5 RANT ON:

Negative. The problem is force division. Females getting preggers and having to be sent home because we can't have preggos in a combat zone is the bigger underlying prob. Hence, someone needs to fill their line number and do their job or the job falls on the rest of their section, fire team, etc.

Then they go home, have the child and are non-deployable for another 9 months or so. Can and does this happen stateside? - sure, all the time. Doesn't make it right. My last tour I commanded my first ever co-ed unit after only being w/the grunts or running recruit training companies at P.I. - of my last company command I had (a log/supply outfit) 17% of my command was NONDEPLOYABLE as they were either preggo or post-partum non-deployable - that in all honesty made me combat ineffective as a unit - so before we went to Iraq the first time we had to fill those line numbers up with you guessed it - guys and gals who had just come back from a tour in the sandbox or reservists called to active duty...complete bullshit.

The problem is not them having sex in and of itself - I'm no puritan, I think supervised alcohol would be fine to. The prob is the pregnancies and stds that cut into to your workforce that cause manpower issues. The morale busters of couples, desert love triangles, high school cafeteria style breakups and adulteries are just some extra bennies that used to waste my time in the war zone. When we as professional fighting unit needed to focus on fighting the enemy and taking care of the war fighter in the fighting hole or the grunt on patrol we're wasting time on NJPing one Marine for punching out another over some mattress pad or vice versa - two female Marines cat fighting over some numb-nut.

I am sick of the Corps nannying these kids. Gen Boomer had it right about 15 yrs ago when he said all first term Marines should be single of have to ask their C.O. for permission to marry. If they want to f*ck fine by me, but they're needs to be consequences for negative actions as a part of the responsibility ring. Give'm all a mandatory depro shot as part of their enlistment/deployment contract or make some poor NCO supervise them wearing condoms prior to the act - hahaha, I'd love to see that in a standing order.

RANT OFF

Posted by Broadhead6 2008-05-29 12:27|| 2008-05-29 12:27|| Front Page Top

#6 "Standing order" indeead, Broadhead6.

100% agree with you: pregnancy in theatre or before likely deployment is simply not acceptable, the more so because we have easy, legal and more or less safe means to prevent it.

Posted by lotp 2008-05-29 12:33|| 2008-05-29 12:33|| Front Page Top

#7 The big problem is not the forming of relationships (although the favoratism that results can wreck morale). The real problem occurs when a relationship breaks up.

I've worked on a project where 2 team leads ended their affair. Not only did they forbid team members from helping the other side, but they actively sabotaged each other's work (deleting code etc.) While this is painful in an IT project, it can be downright deadly in combat.

Al

Posted by Frozen Al 2008-05-29 12:53|| 2008-05-29 12:53|| Front Page Top

#8 lotp,

My last deployment to the sandbox we ended up sending three females home that got empregnated while in iraq. Other then relieving a punitive and administrative burden for HHQ I see little good in this from a warfighting perspective -Unfortunately decriminalizing it will not stop what it does to the greater force protection issues.

I don't know of any interunit sabotage but I guess I could see that happening on some of our convoys moving stuff around anbar w/blue force tracker, rfid tags etc. If I caught any Marine sabotaging some other Marine's work as a payback I'd be close to going into Ike Turner pistol whipping mode.

Posted by Broadhead6 2008-05-29 13:09|| 2008-05-29 13:09|| Front Page Top

#9 So, they weren't doing it before it became legal?

Posted by g(r)omgoru 2008-05-29 13:44|| 2008-05-29 13:44|| Front Page Top

#10 Gotta say, my wife and I both met while in uniform (and soon got out of uniform over in Germany).

I had one stripe on her, and was in a different unit though, so chain of command issues did not come into play. And it was also cold war Germany, not a hot war zone.

Posted by OldSpook 2008-05-29 14:31|| 2008-05-29 14:31|| Front Page Top

#11 try to find a quiet spot on a carrier....
more than once on my last cruise on the JFK came across some he-in' and she-in in dark corners.
this is bad news if it becomes another 'don't ask, don't tell' sort of thing.
but i guess if the gays (gawd i hate using that PC word for faggots; it used to mean an emotion, not a lifestyle) can get away with it, then why not the straights?????

Posted by USN,Ret. 2008-05-29 14:31|| 2008-05-29 14:31|| Front Page Top

#12 USN - one med work up on the Khearsarge (aka queerbarge) - one of our Sgt's got caught getting oral from a female ensign - hahaha - in the CAPT'S dinghy! I can only imagine what CAPT's mast wrt that incident was like.

Posted by Broadhead6 2008-05-29 15:24|| 2008-05-29 15:24|| Front Page Top

#13 We used call them love nests or desert luv in iraq...then they gave us two & three man 20'x20' "cans" to live in - guys and girls would play look out for each other while their roomies would get it on. This wasn't like an epidemic problem but it did happen on occasion. We also used to shakedown the odd convoy coming back from Camp Fallujah because the lads could score whiskey from the locals there. Some of it was home brewed - the last thing I wanted to have to do was explain to some parent why their kid lost their vision due to bad grain alcohol.

Posted by Broadhead6 2008-05-29 15:28|| 2008-05-29 15:28|| Front Page Top

#14 #4: "Folks are dumb where I come from,
They ain't got no learning.
Still they're happy as can be
Doin' what comes natur'lly"

My uncle out in Texas,
Can't even write his name,
He signs his checks with "X"es,
But they cash them just the same

Grandpa Bill was never ill,
a single day of "Livin,
and he died at ninety three,
Doin' a what comes natur'lly"

Posted by Redneck Jim">Redneck Jim 2008-05-29 16:04|| 2008-05-29 16:04|| Front Page Top

#15 Disgusting! Yea, I know it goes on, and the field hospitals hand out condoms like dinner mints, but no good will come from any of this. A young man's mind should be on the mission and his survival and the survival of his buddies, NOT on pu**y back at the FOB and in the back of a truck. Like women in combat, "don't ask - don't tell," this is yet another step BACKWARD!

Posted by Besoeker 2008-05-29 16:55|| 2008-05-29 16:55|| Front Page Top

#16 BH6; finally found something an Ensign is good at. Usually 'sucking up' for JG is just an expression....

also funny that it was IN the Capt's dinghy, not, on; err nevermind.

Posted by USN,Ret. 2008-05-29 17:09|| 2008-05-29 17:09|| Front Page Top

#17 I agree wholeheartedly with all the negative comments. You've got to remember one thing though that is different now from all other wars: the lads aren't able to "fraternize" with the local ladies. Yep, having soldiers doing each other is a problem, no doubt about it. Lock that pressure relief valve shut though and you'll have other problems, and maybe worse ones, because you're trying to suppress the second most powerful human instinct in people at the ages where that instinct is running strongest. You've got to divert that river because you're not going to flat-out dam it up permanently without flooding something or the dam breaking. Hell, even the Victorian Brits had approved brothels for their troops in India because they KNEW something had to be done; they were losing too many effectives to venereal disease.

Posted by Thaimble Scourge of the Pixies4707 2008-05-29 17:30|| 2008-05-29 17:30|| Front Page Top

#18 Better to organise hookers. they know what they're doing and no emotional problems after either.

Posted by Bright Pebbles 2008-05-29 17:33|| 2008-05-29 17:33|| Front Page Top

#19 #17&18 - you make good points and UKs Gen Montgomery did have such a thing during WWI&II for his troops much to the chagrin of the Church of England. I can only see the prostitution/women's rights/slavery issues that would come about now that a serviceman can get NJP for using a prostitute.

Posted by Snash Oppressor of the Mohammatans aka Broadhead6 2008-05-29 18:29|| 2008-05-29 18:29|| Front Page Top

#20 Thinking more about the whole op, it appears to [excuse the expression] to backdoor in convincing Congress to change to law to allow gays to serve openly. If heteros can engage in open violation of UCMJ articles concerning sexual behavior regardless of the impact upon morale and therefore readiness, then the foundation for exclusion disappears and is solely based upon sexual preference rather than sexual behavior. "Commanders got tired of having to punish..." or did our good buddies in JAG get tired of processing the paper and cases. You know the ones who told our combat people how, what and who they can shoot in a combat zone.

Posted by Procopius2k 2008-05-29 21:02|| 2008-05-29 21:02|| Front Page Top

23:51 3dc
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