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one of my best friends was in transportation for the navy. his job was to put together huge armored convoys to transport stuff from point A to point B. he did the scheduling, assigned roles, etc. rules of the road in Iraq were US convoys get the center and everyone moves to the side. of course, Iraqi teen males with cars would play chicken with the convoys because they're stupid loving teenagers. procedure was to wave them off, then fire two warning shots, then fire into their hood if they didn't move away. last car of the convoy had a huge mounted .40 cal or something and they rotated who was positioned in it because it would be targeted first in an attack. They had one guy in their unit who everyone, commanding officers included, called "Speedy." This guy absolutely should not have been in the military and anyone who said two words to him would realize he was developmentally delayed. They were trying to keep him off of the .40 cal because they knew he couldn't be trusted with a potato gun, let alone something that could hurt people, but some random superior felt that EVERYONE had to share the most dangerous job Oorah whatever so my buddy was ordered to put Speedy on the back so it looked good on a report. he did it for a route that was generally the most quiet where teens didn't gently caress around and just hoped for the best. SURE ENOUGH on that route here came some car full of Iraqi teens trying to get a thrill. My buddy on headset gave explicit instructions on how to handle the car coming up based on their protocols. Guy on the gun immediately opened up with it right into the car full of teenagers, then all the other cars around. Just full send. the way my friend described it was looking in the side view mirrors of his vehicle and seeing multiple cars, basically sliced in half by the gunfire, just bouncing off the highway. He said he could see the insides were just bright red. he kept screaming for the guy to stop shooting but the convoys weren't allowed to stop and split, bright red cars just. kept. bouncing
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Mar 20, 2023 14:16
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Beard Dandruff posted:I've held a lot of dumb beliefs, and opinions over the years but I'm glad that I never wavered in thinking that the invasion was wrong and incredibly stupid. My naive 18 year old self literally thought the build up was just more US saber rattling. The jingoistic blood lust unleashed by 9/11 and the 03 invasion were wee little beard dandruff's first crack pings towards realizing that the US is a irredeemable shithole largely populated by cruel idiots incapable of learning from our past crimes. I was angry and scared from 9/11 and had a lifetime of hearing about how Saddam was a bad dude who had chemical weapons. Gradually realized that I'd been played since 1990 and got angry about it. But I was for it before I wised up, and I have to own that.
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Mar 20, 2023 14:18
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Living in Canada it was easy to see the pretext for the wars were obvious lies, but this is in no way praiseworthy because it was all such transparent bullshit to anyone even slightly impartial. Felt like you had to be the direct intended of the consent manufacturing effort and subject to constant social pressure to believe it all because otherwise it was obviously fabricated.
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Mar 20, 2023 14:20
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https://twitter.com/DavideMastracci/status/1636711713943715842
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Mar 20, 2023 14:21
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my bony fealty posted:Barack Obama made his name on saying he would have opposed the War in Iraq if he had been a Senator at the time lol obamna would have 100% voted for it
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Mar 20, 2023 14:22
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Beard Dandruff posted:I've held a lot of dumb beliefs, and opinions over the years but I'm glad that I never wavered in thinking that the invasion was wrong and incredibly stupid. My naive 18 year old self literally thought the build up was just more US saber rattling. The jingoistic blood lust unleashed by 9/11 and the 03 invasion were wee little beard dandruff's first crack pings towards realizing that the US is a irredeemable shithole largely populated by cruel idiots incapable of learning from our past crimes. the invasion being a dumbass idea that was only going to make the world worse has been like my only accurate political prediction
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Mar 20, 2023 14:23
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Piss vial is real.
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Mar 20, 2023 14:26
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my mom got panda express during that time and i was too worried to eat that i would be drafted
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Mar 20, 2023 14:28
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Zeroisanumber posted:I was angry and scared from 9/11 and had a lifetime of hearing about how Saddam was a bad dude who had chemical weapons. Gradually realized that I'd been played since 1990 and got angry about it. Its not like having the right take at the time mattered. Our leaders were going to do it anyway. I held a sign and latter voted for Kerry, woooo this will surely make a difference.
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Mar 20, 2023 14:35
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 a couple weeks early for this one, but why stand on ceremony it's enough to drive you nuts learning about rumsfeld's early career laying the groundwork for the poo poo that'd really bloom after bush got in, and the realization that when rummy maneuvered kissinger out of favor while ford was in office, that was basically the worse of the two main foreign policy factions winning out. worse than kissinger, gently caress
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Mar 20, 2023 14:37
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https://twitter.com/theserfstv/status/1506706179178725379?s=20 it owns that america did this once and then went "this was good, we should do it again but more" and americans overwhelmingly supported it
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Mar 20, 2023 14:39
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both of the invasions were incredibly wrong and terrible and it sucks theres been no repercussions to the pieces of poo poo that planned the entire thing i remember the giant protests that amounted to nothing
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Mar 20, 2023 14:40
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Paul bremer lmao
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Mar 20, 2023 14:41
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Zodium posted:https://twitter.com/theserfstv/status/1506706179178725379?s=20 if only we had voted for the Democrat in the 90s
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Mar 20, 2023 14:43
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Beard Dandruff posted:Its not like having the right take at the time mattered. Our leaders were going to do it anyway. I held a sign and latter voted for Kerry, woooo this will surely make a difference. I remember being surprised that people thought that we would reverse course once we had 50k+ troops in Kuwait and three aircraft carriers in the Gulf. No one in history has backed down once they made that sort of committment.
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Mar 20, 2023 14:43
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Zodium posted:https://twitter.com/theserfstv/status/1506706179178725379?s=20 I read a journal article that argued measurements of mortality rates afterwards showed the 500,000 figure was probably a huge overestimate that should be revised down, but the thing that gets me is that even if that journal article is correct and 500,000 children didn't really die from US sanctions, Madeline Albright didn't know that and she thought that was the correct number and said it was a good thing
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Mar 20, 2023 14:45
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vyelkin posted:I read a journal article that argued measurements of mortality rates afterwards showed the 500,000 figure was probably a huge overestimate that should be revised down, but the thing that gets me is that even if that journal article is correct and 500,000 children didn't really die from US sanctions, Madeline Albright didn't know that and she thought that was the correct number and said it was a good thing yeah it's an incredible clip lmfao
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Mar 20, 2023 14:48
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Biden voting for the war and somehow winding up current President says a lot about how much Americans learned from their mistakes. Similarly a number of familiar names in the list of Democratic Senators that voted for the war, even 20 years later.
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Mar 20, 2023 14:49
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Nocturtle posted:Biden voting for the war and somehow winding up current President says a lot about how much Americans learned from their mistakes. Similarly a number of familiar names in the list of Democratic Senators that voted for the war, even 20 years later. remember in 2008 Biden's plan for Iraq was to partition Iraq into three more states and give the Kurds their own which honestly in retrospect probably would have been a good thing unless your Turkish or whatever
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Mar 20, 2023 14:52
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Nocturtle posted:Biden voting for the war and somehow winding up current President says a lot about how much Americans learned from their mistakes. Similarly a number of familiar names in the list of Democratic Senators that voted for the war, even 20 years later. people dont actually think the invasion was bad, they think the way we did it was bad
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Mar 20, 2023 14:53
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Nocturtle posted:Biden voting for the war and somehow winding up current President says a lot about how much Americans learned from their mistakes. Similarly a number of familiar names in the list of Democratic Senators that voted for the war, even 20 years later. he didn't just vote for it either, he was the main guy who whipped votes for it among democrats who wanted to play coy like they weren't completely for the invasion right from the start. it's probably going too far to say the war wouldn't have happened without him, but he's even more culpable for all the poo poo that came after than all the legislators that went along with it
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Mar 20, 2023 14:53
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AnimeIsTrash posted:people dont actually think the invasion was bad, they think the way we did it was bad "There is nothing liberals hate more than a poorly executed imperial war of conquest" - Mike Duncan, Revolutions, at the end of his political transformation
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Mar 20, 2023 14:57
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FizFashizzle posted:one of my best friends was in transportation for the navy. his job was to put together huge armored convoys to transport stuff from point A to point B. he did the scheduling, assigned roles, etc. i work with a dude who made $$$ being a contractor in iraq, and he asbolutely doesnt regret anythign we did there
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Mar 20, 2023 14:57
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i used to work with a guy who told me a hilarious story about how one time he was working in a command post, overheard on the radio some guy on overwatch saw two iraqi guys having sex and domed both of them. like he thought it was the funniest thing ever. i really hope its made up but uh. terrible country.
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Mar 20, 2023 15:56
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Mar 20, 2023 16:27
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https://twitter.com/JohnRentoul/status/1637139006734450690
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Mar 20, 2023 16:29
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20 years on and I still want to rock her jaw whenever I see her.
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Mar 20, 2023 16:29
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Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair's chief spin doctor and one of the main architects of faking intel about WMDs, does a podcast with Rory Stewart, a former Conservative MP who was a military governor in Iraq after the occupation https://twitter.com/david_jamieson7/status/1636787426176663557
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Mar 20, 2023 16:32
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3 of the last 4 Democratic POTUS nominees voted for the war as senators lol
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Mar 20, 2023 16:40
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https://twitter.com/NotABigJerk/status/1637785841563992071 i hope this is true, there won't be any justice while they're alive
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Mar 20, 2023 17:21
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mohammad saeed al sahhaf was a more honest and decent man and braver than every american soldier and politician at the time and he was right to call american soldiers mercenary thugs
Al-Saqr has issued a correction as of 17:30 on Mar 20, 2023 |
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Mar 20, 2023 17:27
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Nocturtle posted:Living in Canada it was easy to see the pretext for the wars were obvious lies, but this is in no way praiseworthy because it was all such transparent bullshit to anyone even slightly impartial. Felt like you had to be the direct intended of the consent manufacturing effort and subject to constant social pressure to believe it all because otherwise it was obviously fabricated. Or you're just evil and think America has the sovereign right to do whatever it wants
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Mar 20, 2023 17:40
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it still rings true that the biggest reason to believe saddam didnt have weapons of mass distruction is that we invaded him
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Mar 20, 2023 17:44
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its the war that taught us armored bulldozers are the solution to trench warfare
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Mar 20, 2023 18:11
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Zeroisanumber posted:I was for it because I was a dumb, angry 23-year old kid who bought the bullshit. lmao that I was smarter than you at 13, thank God I got all my politics from Daily Show instead of South Park
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Mar 20, 2023 18:24
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vyelkin posted:I marched in a giant protest against the war and it accomplished absolutely nothing
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Mar 20, 2023 18:25
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Look, America got its bracket busted. Happens to all of us. Nothing having another go at it won't fix.
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Mar 20, 2023 18:34
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War and Pieces posted:lmao that I was smarter than you at 13, thank God I got all my politics from Daily Show instead of South Park Things like that it depends a great deal on the media you consume and the people you're around. I was reading the NY Times and watching CNN and thinking that I was as informed as a person could be. I didn't buy that Saddam was going to work with Osama to drop a nuke in NYC or whatever, but I did think that he probably had WMD's and I figured that since he was a scumbag it'd be a good thing to overthrow him. I figured that Iraq could be like post-WWII Germany or Japan and and get set up as a real democracy. In retrospect it wasn't even stupidity so much as it was being painfully, disgustingly naive. Edit: Thinking back on it my biggest objection was that we were taking our eye off of Afghanistan and we hadn't killed Osama yet. So why were we going to Iraq when the job in Afghanistan wasn't done? Zeroisanumber has issued a correction as of 18:56 on Mar 20, 2023 |
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Mar 20, 2023 18:54
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15-year old me is in there somewhere: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAWKqbv4_SY Gonna relisten to the Dollop on the War and then to Blowback Season 1. My way of marking the occasion.
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Mar 20, 2023 18:54
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when they had live video of that tank pulling down the saddam statue i called in sick to school so i could watch it at home five years later in the financial crash i was living in absolute poverty, stealing groceries and somehow got convinced to sign up for the army by being told i'd have health insurance and therefore access to mental health. i got through basic and then immediately had a meltdown and quit when obama announced the afghanistan surge i still remember a ton of people from basic and most are insane now. one guy went to iraq as a contractor in 2007, made $120k doing nothing, and thought his best career move afterward was to enlist. he was the dumbest motherfucker i've ever met (behind myself)
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