Feb. 25, 2007
GIs Petition Congress To End Iraq War
More Than 1,000 Military Personnel Sign Petition Urging Withdrawal
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Play CBS Video Video Some Soldiers Oppose Iraq War A new opposition to the war in Iraq comes from some men and women in uniform. Hundreds of soldiers have publicly asked Congress to stop the war. Lara Logan has this "60 Minutes" report.
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Video Logan's Reporter's Notebook Over 1,000 active-duty and reserve members of the U.S. military are against the war in Iraq and have said so in an unusually public way.
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Video Soldiers Oppose Iraq War In Full: Lara Logan talks to a group of soldiers who are against the war in Iraq. Their dissent has been criticized, but they say that nobody has the right to question their patriotism.
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(AP / CBS)
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Interactive New Plan For Iraq Key elements of the plan, excerpts from the president's speech, reaction and more.
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"I'm not anti-war. I'm not a pacifist. I'm not opposed to protecting our country and defending our principles. But at the same time, as citizens it's our obligation to have a questioning attitude, you know, about policy," Hutto says,
"Just because we volunteered for the military, doesn't mean we volunteered to put our lives in unnecessary harm, and to carry out missions that are illogical and immoral," Madden adds.
They say they’re permitted to express their opinions under a number of military rules, which the group lists. Among them is the 1995 Military Whistleblower Act. Although it prohibits them from speaking against the Commander in Chief or any of their superior officers, it does allow “Members of the Armed Forces…” to speak on their own behalf and “to make a protected communication to… Congress.”
"A senior officer in the Marine Corps said to me when I asked him about the Appeal, what was his opinion – and he served in both Iraq wars – he said, 'I have a hard enough time getting young men to put themselves in harm’s way, without having to have men in uniform tell them it’s not worth it,'" Logan remarks.
"We’re not telling young men and women that it’s not worth it, to serve their country. We’ve served our country. The men and women who have signed the appeal have served their country. So those, we’re not saying it’s not worth it. We’re saying that, if you have reservations about it to communicate it. That’s simply what it is," Hutto says.
"There are gonna be a lot of people who don't like what you’re doing," Logan says.
"By volunteering we've done more than about 99 percent of the population. And anybody who joined after 9/11 when the country was at a state of war, it's my opinion that nobody has the right to question that soldier's patriotism, nobody," Cantu replies.
"There are going to be a lot of people listening to this who say that, 'You're a traitor. You're betraying your uniform. You don't deserve to wear it,'" says Logan.
"I hope there aren't people that think that," says Lt. Commander Mark Dearden.
For him, going public has been one of the hardest decisions of his life. He’s a combat surgeon who served during Operation Iraqi Freedom, returned for a second tour and now treats soldiers at a Naval hospital in California.
"The decision to come here for me personally was not an easy one. And I don't expect it was for anyone. Last night I was with my family in the park in our town and it hit me that 'At this very moment, while I'm standing here, people are fighting and people are dying.' I've seen it with my own eyes. And I can feel it in my chest," Dearden says.
Dearden acknowledges this is very hard for him and he also admits that it isn't so much a protest as a plea.
According to a recent Military Times survey, many in uniform feel the same way. The poll found that for the first time ever more US soldiers oppose the president’s handling of the war in Iraq than support it.
Still, critics claim the group is partisan, just out to boost Democrats who oppose the war.
"I'm certainly not liberal, and I doubt many of the members on this panel are liberal. It's not funded by any partisan organization. It's soldiers. It's service members. It's grass roots. It's us," says Lt. Kent Gneiting.
White House spokesman Tony Snow has dismissed the protesters as an insignificant minority. "It’s not unusual for soldiers in a time of war to have some misgivings. You have several hundred thousand who served in Iraq. You have reenlistment rates that have exceeded goals in all the military," he said.
Logan read to the group: "And then he goes on to say that it's unfortunate that people like you – and the quote is – are 'going to be able to get more press than the hundreds of thousands who have come back and said they are proud of their service.'"
Sgt. Cantu responds, "You got two right here who are gonna do multiple tours in Iraq and, you know, I'm reenlisting. I never said I wasn't proud of my service. I fit some of those statistics right there myself."
Produced By Peter Klein
© MMVII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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See all 914 CommentsCarl Webb
Defend Iraq!
http://carlwebb.net
Playing chess in the dark could be construed as engineered by blind politicians, or by a non-unified political front. Securing neighborhoods and borders, block by block and mile by bloody mile is a difficult and painstaking task. The only dim hope is that the Arabs and Persians form a union to achieve stability, and agree to enforce their borders. I have no doubt we can aid Iraq in its containment, but the region must take care of business, and it looks doubtful they can look beyond their own cloaks.
If your answer to ANY of these if none, you better go enlist and volunteer for duty in Iraq before calling these soldiers "communist *******" and "cowardice son-of*** and ***."
I seriously doubt that 60 minutes or CNN will experience any jeopardy because you decided to stop watching! Your way of "thinking" is bias. Any editorial piece done about our troops in Iraq today must have some kind of built in bias because of the nature of this "war". This isn't WWII where everyone felt pretty much the same.
No one thinks war is pretty. We were duped into this mess... there is no "may have" about it. The bottom line as you put it is "we are in Iraq" the reason why is highly RELAVANT. That is where you and I part ways. If you want to demean the media start with the media that condones and supports the mess we are in they are the true warmongers
here not CNN and not 60 Minutes.
You mentioned that dissident's of the war should step out of their comfort zone? The fact is the more we go along with this fiasco .... the smaller and fragile our comfort zone becomes. Ever think of that? I didn't think so.
CNN publishes the number of dead and wounded every night .... FOX doesn't .... THINK MAN!
semper_fi183 said, "respect ..... i dont have to prove it to u i got my metals to prove that ty."
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Hate to break the news, but some medals are awarded for job performance, and some for simply being there, and not *** up. Medals are not Nobel prizes, though some undeniably represent courage.
What McDazz means is courage is found everywhere people do their best for their country, from whatever station in life they come. All these people deserve respect-- if not also medals.
Posted by alphaa10 at 12:27 AM : Feb 26, 2007
The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living, and the get-rich-quick theory of life. Theodore Roosevelt
Sign this Appeal.
This site is an Appeal For Redress in support of our mission in Iraq.
An Appeal For Redress is an authorized means for active duty military to submit a grievance to Congress. It can be signed by Active Duty, Reserve, or National Guard military personnel.
It is authorized by DoD Directive 1325.6 and DoD Directive 7050.6.
The wording of the Appeal for Redress is:
As an American currently serving my nation in uniform, I respectfully urge my political leaders in Congress to fully support our mission in Iraq and halt any calls for retreat. I also respectfully urge my political leaders to actively oppose media efforts which embolden my enemy while demoralizing American support at home. The War in Iraq is a necessary and just effort to bring freedom to the Middle East and protect America from further attack.
If you are active duty, reservist or national guard, please Sign this Appeal.
Most service members fully support the war in Iraq and feel calls to retreat by Congress and attacks by our media on our conduct and mission act to motivate our enemy while demoralizing our support at home, directly increasing the threat we face and resulting in greater American casualties. This Appeal for Redress provides a way in which individual service members can appeal to Congress to fully support us and actively oppose media attacks on our mission and our morale.
This Appeal will be delivered to members of Congress.
http://www.appealforcourage.org/
I recently retired and spent the majority of my career as a paralegal and I can only begin to imagine how difficult the decision to come forward must have been, and I pray that none of you will suffer fall-out for standing true to your convictions.
I have been opposed to the invasion of Iraq from the get-go...I understand and support Afghanistan, but Iraq does not, to this day, make any sense. I hope one day the "truth" behind this decision, the real reason, Bush invaded comes out.
I also want each and every one you to know I have been doing all I can to bring you home...home, where you belong. And if the people I elected into office does not stop the illegal invasion of Iraq...they be gone too.
I truly can't stand it...lives are being destroyed, and for what? Be safe and come home soon!
I recently retired and spent the majority of my career as a paralegal and I can only begin to imagine how difficult the decision to come forward must have been, and I pray that none of you will suffer fall-out for standing true to your convictions.
I have been opposed to the invasion of Iraq from the get-go...I understand and support Afghanistan, but Iraq does not, to this day, make any sense. I hope one day the "truth" behind this decision, the real reason, Bush invaded comes out.
I also want each and every one you to know I have been doing all I can to bring you home...home, where you belong.
Be safe and come home soon!
I recently retired and spent the majority of my career as a paralegal and I can only begin to imagine how difficult the decision to come forward must have been, and I pray that none of you will suffer fall-out for standing true to your convictions.
I have been opposed to the invasion of Iraq from the get-go...I understand and support Afghanistan, but Iraq does not, to this day, make any sense. I hope one day the "truth" behind this decision, the real reason, Bush invaded comes out.
I also want each and every one you to know I have been doing all I can to bring you home...home, where you belong. And if the people I elected into office does not stop the illegal invasion of Iraq...they be gone too.
I truly can't stand it...lives are being destroyed, and for what?
Be safe and come home soon!
Susanne
Just wanted to let you know that there are 2 Appeals for Redress out there. If you would like to link to the one lars008 spoke of copy and paste the following into your address bar and it will bring you there. http://www.appealforcourage.org
As far as the show in CBS they in my book are right u there with cnn who I no longer watch. If you are going to do a piece on the troops in Iraq do it without bias. I am at this point so disgusted with the media in this country. War is not pretty. I do understand that the reasons we went to Iraq MAY HAVE been false and I will repeat MAY HAVE but the truth is buried so deep in the media and politics that we as everyday American will never know what it is. The bottom line is we ARE in Iraq and why we got there is irrelevant at this point. All you who say we should leave are blind to the fact that if we do the deaths there will increase 100 fold and that blood will be on our hands nad they will want revenge. So step out of you comfort zone for 5 minutes and look at reality we can not walk away from a mess we created.
http://siadapp.dior.whs.mil/personnel/CASUALTY/Death_Rates1.pdf
Laura Logan, the CBS reporter, is a hero in my book for bringing out the gruesome details of this terrible civil war in Iraq. I would now like to see her employer, CBS, begin showing us the names, faces and ages of those killed daily in Iraq during the CBS Evening News in the same way the PBS News Hour does now. Once the viewers begin seeing the faces of the 18, 19 and 20 year old soldiers who die daily in Iraq their opinion of this bloody quagmire will change quickly.
As a vietnam veteran I salute every soldier who has been killed or injured or who has endured countless additional tours of duty in this useless illegal war for oil and Halliburton profiteering.
The moron-in-chief, Chimpy The DECIDER, (Wastey Pants) now plans to start a war with Iran. IT IS TIME FOR THE CONGRESS AND THE SENATE TO PUT AN END TO BUSH%u2019s WAR IN IRAQ AND HIS FUTURE WAR PLANS WITH IRAN!!
Now that CBS has represented this view of the Iraq war, it would only be fair to interview an equal number of soldiers that have not lost their will and continue to support our action. They should not be hard to find as I believe they are in the vast majority of the soldiers.
Will CBS do this? I highly doubt it.
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