Lt. Col. Sherri Reed of West Point told The Associated Press that cadets are “purposefully exposed to different perspectives and cultures.”

“The National Prayer Breakfast Service will be pluralistic with Christians, Jewish, and Muslim cadets participating,” Reed said. “We are comfortable and confident that what retired Lt. Gen. Boykin will share about prayer, soldier care and selfless service, will be in keeping with the broad range of ideas normally considered by our cadets.”

Boykin backed out of the event on his own volition, according to a report from Fox News.

The retired lieutenant general has been on CAIR’s radar for casting Islam in a poor light, specifically in speeches in which he analogizing the War on Terror to a war against Satan.

CAIR and the group VoteVets.org pushed hard for a retraction of Boykin’s invitation to the event due to his “Islamophobic” views.

Huh? A Veterans organization has teamed up with CAIR to silence a General they deem insensitive to Islam? Apparently I’m behind the curve on this one.  VoteVets.org is an organization whose mission it is to push progressive causes under the false banner of being a Veterans advocacy organization.  I was given a heads up from Matt of Blackfive that the fine gentleman over at This Aint Hell have been onto this faux organization for years.  A few highlights:

• The organization thinks Iraq was a “pointless war.”  That’s not at all in line with the Veterans like me who served in Iraq.
• Apparently are big fans of both the Occupy movement and the IVAW, another faux Veterans group known for having mental patients pretend to be Veterans to push their agenda.
• Has no problem defrauding the IRS for its own political gain. Notice how all their donations go to Democrats.  I wonder how much money intended for Veterans gets funneled into their own political operations.

Like I said, just because an organization has the word “Vets” in it does not mean its a trustworthy group.  When in doubt, send to the organizations who I have had personal experience with during my recovery at Walter Reed.

The following comments can be seen at the Washington Post article.  Rather than take a million screen shots and paste them, I’m just copying the text.  As near as I can tell the person commenting is a Soldier.  His story seems to mesh with mine in that the Soldier was young, couldn’t handle the stress, and just wasn’t a good fit for the military.

peterroach

12/21/2011 9:33 PM CST

O k. But, don’t you think these guys could have handled this a little better ? They could have had him transferred or something. We will see how these facts unfold. If this guy refused his orders, then he should have been set up for Court Martial, not this.

peterroach

12/21/2011 9:35 PM CST

i_go_pogo, these allegations you mention about errors in troop deployment need to be investigated also.

i_go_pogo

12/21/2011 9:36 PM CST

This guy didn’t refuse orders. His officers judged him a liability to the team and left him behind. And getting him transferred out? Like I said, you have no idea. Why did they transfer a guy just out of basic who was incapable of being a soldier into the hottest spot in Afghanistan? It’s just how the military bureaucracy works.

peterroach

12/21/2011 9:38 PM CST

O K. I Understand. I am aware of how ridiculous the military bureaucracy can be. Maybe a good airing of this may help us do better in the future, I hope.

keviquin

7:25 AM CST

All those charged ARE nco’s -with the exception of one lieutenant. Just teaching a slow-learning boy how to be a man.

aristotlegleuteusmaximus

8:37 AM CST

Where does i_go_pogo get his news? From the perps who are being charged?
It seems odd a soldier can just decide to stay in the barracks while the rest go out to get shot at. At any rate this is a wise course of action, if he had a choice why subject one’s self to danger unnecessarily?? Your friend sounds like a thug, so do you.

DoubtingThomas2

8:55 AM CST

When everyone has guns, and the only people you can run to for help to are part of the problem… poor kid.I know about putting on the pressure to get someone to crack, because if your fellow soldiers do it, just think how much more the enemy would. But when they DO start to crack, that’s how you know to ship them back home to some position they can’t get either you or themselves killed at, or if case may be, discharged.

Don’t keep sitting on them to see if…See More they’re actually cracking or not. They’re done- they couldn’t take it. They did their time and at the very least tried to serve. Send them home, or you’re no better than the enemy. Everyone involved with this shameful incident should get an OTH.

My heart and prayers go out to you, Mr. and Mrs. Chen. Thank you for your son’s service.

i_go_pogo

8:58 AM CST

From reading other news reports, it sounds like he stayed behind the wire and took a nice hot shower and forgot to turn off the burner. When the rest of the troop came back from patrol, they found the fuel was gone and they would get cold showers.I have experienced a few incompetent soldiers who were more dangerous to their team than to the enemy. You’d be nuts not to leave a guy like that behind.

“Your friend sounds like a thug, so do you.” Do you hav…See Moree any idea what a reprehensible comment that is? You are sitting fat and happy in your dirty underwear in front of your computer, calling guys who are trying their best to protect your stupid self “thugs”. Thanks a lot, pal.

i_go_pogo

9:01 AM CST

Meanwhile, the Army has made it a priority to recruit more Asian-American soldiers, and the two investigations are being driven by calls from “Asian-American activists”. I’m sure that to some extent, the military is managing the information emerging from this incident for their own political purposes.

DoubtingThomas2

9:02 AM CST

@i_go_pogoLol seriously? That’s one of those things I can laugh at because I’m sitting in front of my computer (my underwear is clean though), but would be less than pleased to find upon my return. One may as well start throwing rocks at a hornet’s nest, safely behind one’s glass fence.

What was done to send him back? That’s what I’m confused by.

i_go_pogo

9:04 AM CST

@DoubtingThomas
Have you ever found yourself in a live fire situation with the man behind you lying on top of his weapon crying, with the weapon pointed at you?

DoubtingThomas2

9:11 AM CST

Thank God no. That’s why I can certainly understand the whole situation from the rest of the rest of the platoon’s eyes… right up until this kid is sent into a country where he indeed might be placed in a live fire situation. Without knowing more details, I can’t say any more, but if he showed any signs of cracking before being shipped out, WHY WASN’T ANYTHING DONE???

i_go_pogo

9:37 AM CST

Read my lips: ten years of constant deployment of an undersized, under-funded, all-volunteer army in fights that people who knew better knew from the start were unwinnable. These guys are stretched beyond the breaking point. As I said above, this 45-man unit replaced 160 Canadians, and the mission didn’t change. Not that the mission ever made any sense: win the hearts and minds of a bunch of folks who don’t want you in their country by shooting at them.

BTW, the unit deployed from Ft Wainwright to Afghanistan in April. This guy finished basic in April, and went to Wainwright to wait around until August, when he was sent over to replace guys who got blown up. It’s pretty clear from other news reports that he didn’t do well in basic, and was completely unprepared to be in a war zone. But they sent him anyway, to replace guys who had been beloved by their teammates. And they wonder why he didn’t get a lot of warm fuzzies from the other guys?

After finding the above, I stumbled across this article from the NYTimes posted a day later that seems to validate the above comments.  It also points out that one of the accused Soldiers has a violent past, and Chen was having trouble being a Soldier.

Family and friends of Danny Chen, who apparently shot himself to death in Afghanistan, say racist taunts and bullying led to the tragedy, and they are demanding more action beyond the arrests of eight of his fellow soldiers.

Eight U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan have been charged in connection with the October 3 death of fellow G.I. Danny Chen, who allegedly shot himself to death in a guard tower. But alleged racist taunts and bullying leading up to the tragedy of the Chinese-American’s apparent suicide, at 19, have left Chen’s family and friends outraged.

Although the exact circumstances of his death are unclear, advocates speaking for his family said Wednesday that regardless of who fired the bullet that killed Chen, the soldiers who allegedly mistreated him are responsible.

“Whether suicide or not, the actions of these people led to his death, and they must be prosecuted for killing him,” said Liz Ou­Yang, a Chinese American activist who pushed for an investigation of Chen’s death.

“There can be no plea-bargaining — they must be tried in the death of Danny Chen.”

First let me say that I feel for this young Soldier and his family.  I really do.  No Soldier should ever think that what he did is a proper solution to any problem. The way he chose to leave this world is terrible. Whatever problems he was facing were nothing compared to what he did. If he was being bullied and if it was based on race, why didn’t he ask for help?  Why not report it?

So according to the aforementioned article, they don’t know what happened, but they’re probably all guilty, and since he was of Chinese descent it must be racism.  Gee, no bias there.  And now that the media is weighing in with their typical slant, the truth will never get out (or if it does it will not be believed or portrayed correctly).

First of all, racism in boot? At Ft. Benning? In 2004 I went through the same Sand Hill at Ft. Benning Chen did. If you have a different accent, a funny name, or any other distinguishing feature you’re going to stand out. I could climb the ropes faster than the other Soldiers so one of my Drill Sergeants (who was from Ghana) called me Spiderman, and continued until we graduated. The smallest member of the platoon was called Mighty Mouse. Everyone had a nickname, and everyone was made fun of.  If your name was too hard to say you were Private Alphabet. Chen? That’s a no-brainer for Jackie Chan. Its not personal, its to break everyone down before they build you back up as a Soldier.  Show me a kid whining in his diary about getting picked on in boot and I’ll show you a whole company doing the same thing in their letters and phone calls home. Its basic training in the military, its not supposed to be easy.  If it were that easy to be in the Infantry everyone would be doing it.  On top that, Ft. Benning is Infantry Training which means men only. You don’t have 9 weeks of hell followed by a gentleman’s course in your respective MOS. You have OSUT, One Station Unit Training, otherwise known as 14-15 weeks of hell.   We lost almost 20% of the Soldiers in our platoon alone before graduation.  As for the racism allegations, boot at Ft. Benning was one of the most diverse places I have ever been in the military. You have every shade of human there. Only half of the Drill Sergeants were white in my company, A Co 2-58 INF.  My experience holds pretty close to the representation of the Army which is 38% minorities.

I went through the names and ranks of the accused. The Platoon LT, and a couple Squad Leaders and/or Platoon SGT will get the standard dereliction of duty charge and maybe a lying under oath charge. The rest of it breaks down as fire team leaders (SGTs) and junior enlisted (SPC) members of the fire teams. Some were charged with “cruelty and maltreatment.” Its a blanket term like disorderly conduct and isn’t the first time we’ve seen this charge in regards to a Soldier suicide.

As far as the accusations break down, without context its hard to understand or point fingers.

“We were told that he was dragged from his bed across the floor, and other soldiers threw rocks at his back,” Elizabeth OuYang, president of the New York chapter of the Organization of Chinese Americans, tells The Daily Beast. And, OuYang says, while forced to do chin-ups with liquid in his mouth, “Danny couldn’t cough up the liquid.”

Dragged from his bed could mean any number of things. Soldiers could have been horsing around. Infantry Soldiers love to practice GFT, or Army Combatives when they get bored.    Or perhaps Chen did not want to get out of bed to do his guard shift or go on patrol. I saw this happen on a few occasions in Iraq. If you dont do your job people will be on you for it.  Everyone gets extremely tired after days of no rest. But you suck it up and do your job. Maybe he had a beef with a battle buddy who had it in for him.  Who knows.

Threw rocks at his back? Again, context needed. Was he wearing body armor? Were they on patrol? Standing in line at the DFAC? We used to throw water balloons and rocks at the guard towers. Partly to break the boredom of 12 guys living in the desert by ourselves, and partly to make sure the guards were staying awake.  A rock to the back of your body armor makes a loud “thwack” sound. You don’t feel a thing through the ceramic plate, but it gets your attention.  Without context allegations of wrong doing are mere speculation.

Look, everyone has a breaking point. When you’re in those kind of conditions for an extended period of time with the same people things wear on you. Soldiers reach that point and break down mentally. We saw it with the young privates, like Chen, in Iraq. Some reached a point and said “No, I’m not doing this anymore.” Nothing we were doing was that hard, but the monotony and threat of what might happen was just draining. Last Sunday during my Alive Day celebration, I got a text message from one of the younger Privates – who broke down – that I served with in Iraq over 5 years ago. He essentially said “sorry I acted like such a shit head in Iraq.”

Remember, the military plays by different rules than civilian courts. When someone dies there is an extensive investigation, especially when its caused by a non-hostile act like this. We lost a guy due to a vehicle accident. One vehicle was towing another and hit a sandy patch of road. They lost control and rolled and one gunner died instantly. The investigation lasted months. The CET (Convoy Escort Team) leader was told there was a possibility he would go to jail for the death simply because he was in charge. After months of sweating it out the investigation concluded that he was innocent. If there was clear and obvious wrong doing in this situation they probably would have been charged immediately, not two months later.

If the Soldiers are guilty of bullying the Private then they should be punished accordingly, especially if it was due to racism.  Racism has no place in our nations fighting force and can shred moral and unit coherency. No Soldier should ever feel that taking your own life is an option.  Look, I feel for this Soldier and his family, I really do.  The loss his family has felt must be indescribable.

I really hope they’re not just looking for justice in the form of trumped up race charges. Unfortunately, based on the stories out in the media its pretty obvious which direction its headed.

As Memorial Day weekend approaches and we make plans to celebrate with family and friends, there are so many who will not be celebrating. They will, instead, be visiting Arlington Cemetery and hundreds of other cemeteries across the country where their loved ones, who paid the ultimate price for our freedom, have been laid to rest.

And then there are the “lucky ones” who made it home.

Go read the whole thing.

Nine Army officers received reprimands for missing the warning flags raised by accused Fort Hood killer Maj. Nidal Hasan as he rose through the ranks of the military.

The nine officers – all ranked lieutenant or above – were sanctioned with either oral reprimands or possible career-ending written letters of censure, said Army Secretary John McHugh.

The secretary said the officers failed to meet the “high standards” expected of Army officers when they supervised Hasan at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.

The harsh sanctions “send a clear message to everyone that the Army will not tolerate such negligence and passivity in reaction to clear signs that a soldier is radicalizing to Islamist extremists,” said Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.)

Photo credit to AP.

Read the whole thing.

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