THOUGHTS?

KABUL, Afghanistan - An Army sergeant complained in a rare opinion article that the U.S. flag flew at half-staff last week at the largest U.S. base in Afghanistan for those killed at Virginia Tech but the same honor is not given to fallen U.S. troops here and in Iraq.

In the article issued Monday by the public affairs office at Bagram military base north of Kabul, Sgt. Jim Wilt lamented that his comrades' deaths have become a mere blip on the TV screen, lacking the "shock factor" to be honored by the Stars and Stripes as the deaths at Virginia Tech were.

"I find it ironic that the flags were flown at half-staff for the young men and women who were killed at VT, yet it is never lowered for the death of a U.S. service member," Wilt wrote.

He noted that Bagram obeyed President Bush's order last week that all U.S. flags at federal locations be flown at half-staff through April 22 to honor 32 people killed at Virginia Tech by a 23-year-old student gunman who then killed himself.

"I think it is sad that we do not raise the bases' flag to half-staff when a member of our own task force dies," Wilt said.

According to the Defense Department, 315 U.S. service members have died in and around Afghanistan since the U.S.-led offensive that toppled the Taliban regime in late 2001, 198 of them in combat.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force said that the flags of all its troop-contributing nations are flown at half-staff for about 72 hours after the service member's death "as a mark of respect when there is an ISAF fatality."

Sgt. 1st Class Dean Welch, who works with Wilt at the U.S.-led coalition public affairs office, said the essay is a "soldier's commentary, not the view of the coalition and not the view of the U.S. forces."

Welch added that such outspoken opinion pieces are rare.

Wilt suggested that flags should fly at half-staff on the base where the fallen service member was working and in the states where they hail from. He said some states do this, but not all of them.

He wrote that the death of a U.S. service member is just as violent as those at the university last week, but it lacks the "shock factor of the Virginia massacre."

"It is a daily occurrence these days to see X number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq or Afghanistan scrolling across the ticker at the bottom of the TV screen. People have come to expect casualty counts in the nightly news; they don't expect to see 32 students killed," he wrote.

"If the flags on our (operating bases) were lowered for just one day after the death of a service member, it would show the people who knew the person that society cared, the American people care."

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Wilt suggested that flags should fly at half-staff on the base where the fallen service member was working and in the states where they hail from. He said some states do this, but not all of them.

Bingo.

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It is a daily occurrence these days to see X number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq or Afghanistan scrolling across the ticker at the bottom of the TV screen.

That's the problem with society. Absolutely ridiculous...

There are three kinds of people; the sheep, the wolf, and the sheep dog.

We are the sheep dogs. We are the guardians of the weak. The situation is different for us. We are expected to fight to defend and if necessary to die to protect them. That is our calling. We share that role with the firefighters, police and other protectors that are expected to do their duty. The sheep on the other hand are our responsibility. We slipped up and a wolf got into the flock. It is a sad situation. When I first heard about it I was kind of upset. Now, after rationalizing it like this, I don’t feel so upset.

I agree with SGT Wilt and his outrage. It is ridiculous that people are over stepping the importance of the victims. Yes, Virginia Tech shootings were terrible. No, I don't care enough to cry. I attended a high school 6 miles from Columbine during the shootings. I am NOT Columbine, nor will I ever be. I didn't know the dead then, and I don't know the VA Tech dead now. Double Duece has a point about the types of people, but I do not believe it puts us in different categories. How many of thoes students may have gone into the military? How many Soldiers have ETSed and gone to college?
There is an article by Rosa Brooks called 'Distinguish between direct victims and the rest of us' in the Stars and Stripes 24 April 07 (mideast edition) originally in the Los Angeles Times. I agree with her. I don't know how to post a link to it online, but she is basically saying that Anericans are taking on and personalizing too much 'grief' that isn't theirs. "There's something fraudulent about this eagerness to latch onto the grief of others and embrace the idea that we, too, have been victimized. This trivializes the pain felt by thoes who have actually lost something and pathologizes normal reactions to tragedy....Our self-indulgent conviction that we have all been traumatized also operates ironically, to shut down empathy for other, less media-genic victims."
I am not cold-hearted, I am not immune to the terrible things that happen here. My medics and I see quite a bit of trauma and too much death. We have even lost one of our medics. This doesn't justify anything, nor does it make us cras and unemotional. It means that we have been touched, but we can still CM and honor our people without making drama about it. We as a nation need to stop dramatizing everything. Its childish.