Well some of us banded together for a donation of some $$ to the legion. We were thanked for our offer, but told it would only keep the Legion afloat for about a month, and thus our offered was refused.
I was hoping that the loss of $$ caused the closure but just a lack of money in was the real culprit.
Please visit your local Legion and buy a pop to support the Legion. As I said before, you may even leave the Legion with a few stories from the Veterans that may be there. Want to ensure a good story, buy them a pop also.
Chris.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Taliban protection payoffs denied by contractor
Kabul-based Watan Risk Management was among the private companies fingered in recent media reports alleging that the firms are paying off insurgents to protect supply routes, essentially funnelling international funds to the very groups troops are fighting against.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2010/04/27/private-security-afghanistan-lang.html#ixzz0mP6klaOf
Read the story and watch the video accompanying it.
Most who have been to Afghanistan will admit that bribery is an everyday event in the lives of Afghanis. I saw it all too often.
It was also common in Bosnia, for folks to get through the various' factions check points.
This is the type of shit facing our troops in Afghanistan. And the US, UK, French and German Troops and others. Here is a convicted drug dealer that can go back to Afghanistan and still have enought family ties to build up a private security business. This guy denies any bribes, but he is after all a drug dealer and a Afhghani, so lying comes natural for him and his ilk...
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2010/04/27/private-security-afghanistan-lang.html#ixzz0mP6klaOf
Read the story and watch the video accompanying it.
Most who have been to Afghanistan will admit that bribery is an everyday event in the lives of Afghanis. I saw it all too often.
It was also common in Bosnia, for folks to get through the various' factions check points.
This is the type of shit facing our troops in Afghanistan. And the US, UK, French and German Troops and others. Here is a convicted drug dealer that can go back to Afghanistan and still have enought family ties to build up a private security business. This guy denies any bribes, but he is after all a drug dealer and a Afhghani, so lying comes natural for him and his ilk...
Monday, April 26, 2010
Afghan mission needs credible partner: former envoy
"Former deputy UN envoy to Afghanistan Peter Galbraith said the recent U.S. surge of 30,000 troops into the country to bolster the counter-insurgency strategy also requires reliable local partners, such as a competent army and police force. Galbraith said the Afghan army is not yet ready to function on its own and he outright dismissed Afghan police as "an utter disaster," while pointing out that President Hamid Karzai's government lacks legitimacy because of fraudulent elections and ongoing corruption allegations."
Yes the police are a bunch of idiots! He says the Afghan Army is not yet ready to function on its own! We have been in this arsehole of a country for 9 years and they are not capable of leading a section attack because half the section is high on hash or whatever...
I really try to like our involvement in this country, but deep down and not so much I could really not miss if this country disolved into the red hot magma.
Yes the police are a bunch of idiots! He says the Afghan Army is not yet ready to function on its own! We have been in this arsehole of a country for 9 years and they are not capable of leading a section attack because half the section is high on hash or whatever...
I really try to like our involvement in this country, but deep down and not so much I could really not miss if this country disolved into the red hot magma.
Bosnia gets Nato membership plan
"Nato foreign ministers have agreed to launch a Membership Action Plan (MAP) for Bosnia-Hercegovina - a penultimate step to joining the military alliance. MAP has been granted to Bosnia today, but with clear conditions," alliance spokesman James Appathurai said at a Nato summit in Tallinn, Estonia."
Do you need anymore proof that NATO won the war for Croatia and Bosnia?
This is the kind of news and plus the facts that I know that will make me forever a Serb follower and Yugoslav Loyalist fan..
I can't help it ...
Do you need anymore proof that NATO won the war for Croatia and Bosnia?
This is the kind of news and plus the facts that I know that will make me forever a Serb follower and Yugoslav Loyalist fan..
I can't help it ...
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Torpedo likely sank S. Korean ship
"Investigators say they have new information regarding last month's sinking of a South Korean naval ship that indicates the force of a passing torpedo may have caused the disaster."
Well this is interesting. And one can only presume that it came from a North Korean vessel. And the South and North are still at war, it was only a truce that stopped the fighting in 1953. Is the next great battle to be initiated from this region of the world?
And I have very little knowledge of why the Korean war started besides watching the movie The Brotherhood of War - Tae Guk Gi; an infinite sad story.
The country was divided before the war into North and South... could this be a result of WW11? North was Communist and supported by the Chinese. How could a common folk fight each other? The movie tells a story of brothers, and not how or why the country was divided.
The wars in Yugoslavia were divided by the various religions in the region, but Korea was one country with one religion I think. The reason can only be political, the treacherous attempts by the few to aquire power. I refer back to my explanation of why small villages in Afghanistan don't know or care about the world outside their mud villages..
Well this is interesting. And one can only presume that it came from a North Korean vessel. And the South and North are still at war, it was only a truce that stopped the fighting in 1953. Is the next great battle to be initiated from this region of the world?
And I have very little knowledge of why the Korean war started besides watching the movie The Brotherhood of War - Tae Guk Gi; an infinite sad story.
The country was divided before the war into North and South... could this be a result of WW11? North was Communist and supported by the Chinese. How could a common folk fight each other? The movie tells a story of brothers, and not how or why the country was divided.
The wars in Yugoslavia were divided by the various religions in the region, but Korea was one country with one religion I think. The reason can only be political, the treacherous attempts by the few to aquire power. I refer back to my explanation of why small villages in Afghanistan don't know or care about the world outside their mud villages..
80 Afghan schoolgirls fall ill; poison feared - From FOXNews
" Dozens of Afghan schoolgirls have fallen ill in recent days after reporting a strange odor in their classrooms in northern Afghanistan, prompting an investigation into whether they were targeted by militants who oppose education for girls or victims of mass hysteria. In the capital of Kabul, President Hamid Karzai's spokesman, Waheed Omar, said any attempt to keep girls out of school is a "terrorist act."
The Taliban said they didn't do it. The whole thing probably has a simple explanation or is else an attempt by the Karzai government to garner the West's support. He has been in the doghouse lately for his suggestion that negotiations with the Taliban may be better than continuing NATO civilian deaths.
And included in this story:
"Elsewhere in Afghanistan on Sunday, hundreds of people blocked a main road in Logar province, west of Kabul, and burned several trucks to protest what they said were civilian deaths in NATO operations. They gathered hours after NATO said coalition troops killed several insurgents and captured a Taliban sub-commander.
"The man they killed was a schoolteacher and a mullah," said businessman Jan Mohammed. "They killed him inside his house and because of that the people came and burned my gas station, my car and my house."
He complained that if NATO thought the mullah was with the Taliban, "they should have arrested him at his school not gone to his house at midnight."
"The people are very angry. They are saying these people killed are innocent civilians," provincial spokesman Din Mohammad Darwesh said.
The villages in Afghanistan are very tribal in nature. You hear this in the news often, but do you know what it means? Even though they may be only 20 or so kms from a big city (ie, Khandahar or Kabul) 99% of them have never been outside their local area. They live in houses made of rocks and mud and manure and have no running water or electricity. Their whole universe is within the village and surrounding pasture area for their sheep and goats and if lucky cows. They have little care for what is going on in Kabul or Khandahar. They raise their children and their sheep and goats and their crops. And they practise a hashish society or even an opium one. So their decision to grow opium poppies instead of wheat or even grapes is very logical to them.
They have no concept of far away lands such as Europe and North America; they mean nothing to them.
They are a friendly people for the most part, but being so poor they always have an alternate goal in mind.
For them a central government means nothing. There is always an armed warlord to deal with, to sell their drugs to. When the government in far away Kabul vowes to cut back drug production it means nothing to the small village economy. This is the best way that they have to support for their family and themselves.
I'm searching my little brain for another example of this,, maybe when the southern states were producing cotton and other crops with slaves may be similiar. Who cares if Washington bans slaves? The farmers are producing a valuable crop at great profit to the farmers because they only have to feed and house the workers. Did they only sell cotton to fellow southerners? Or to notherners (yankees) also? And even to Canada?
When does a Nation's profit overwhelm it's ethics? And is that so simple a question at all? Our ethics can't be compared to those of other countries.
Also in this story Fox reports on a homicide bomber attack that targeted the guards at a bazaar in Sahjoy district of Zabul province. This is the first time I have heard the phrase "homicide bomber" instead of Suicide bomber, although they refer to him as a suicide bomber in the text of the story.
The Taliban said they didn't do it. The whole thing probably has a simple explanation or is else an attempt by the Karzai government to garner the West's support. He has been in the doghouse lately for his suggestion that negotiations with the Taliban may be better than continuing NATO civilian deaths.
And included in this story:
"Elsewhere in Afghanistan on Sunday, hundreds of people blocked a main road in Logar province, west of Kabul, and burned several trucks to protest what they said were civilian deaths in NATO operations. They gathered hours after NATO said coalition troops killed several insurgents and captured a Taliban sub-commander.
"The man they killed was a schoolteacher and a mullah," said businessman Jan Mohammed. "They killed him inside his house and because of that the people came and burned my gas station, my car and my house."
He complained that if NATO thought the mullah was with the Taliban, "they should have arrested him at his school not gone to his house at midnight."
"The people are very angry. They are saying these people killed are innocent civilians," provincial spokesman Din Mohammad Darwesh said.
The villages in Afghanistan are very tribal in nature. You hear this in the news often, but do you know what it means? Even though they may be only 20 or so kms from a big city (ie, Khandahar or Kabul) 99% of them have never been outside their local area. They live in houses made of rocks and mud and manure and have no running water or electricity. Their whole universe is within the village and surrounding pasture area for their sheep and goats and if lucky cows. They have little care for what is going on in Kabul or Khandahar. They raise their children and their sheep and goats and their crops. And they practise a hashish society or even an opium one. So their decision to grow opium poppies instead of wheat or even grapes is very logical to them.
They have no concept of far away lands such as Europe and North America; they mean nothing to them.
They are a friendly people for the most part, but being so poor they always have an alternate goal in mind.
For them a central government means nothing. There is always an armed warlord to deal with, to sell their drugs to. When the government in far away Kabul vowes to cut back drug production it means nothing to the small village economy. This is the best way that they have to support for their family and themselves.
I'm searching my little brain for another example of this,, maybe when the southern states were producing cotton and other crops with slaves may be similiar. Who cares if Washington bans slaves? The farmers are producing a valuable crop at great profit to the farmers because they only have to feed and house the workers. Did they only sell cotton to fellow southerners? Or to notherners (yankees) also? And even to Canada?
When does a Nation's profit overwhelm it's ethics? And is that so simple a question at all? Our ethics can't be compared to those of other countries.
Also in this story Fox reports on a homicide bomber attack that targeted the guards at a bazaar in Sahjoy district of Zabul province. This is the first time I have heard the phrase "homicide bomber" instead of Suicide bomber, although they refer to him as a suicide bomber in the text of the story.
Special medals presented to three Calgary soldiers
The Canadian military created the Sacrifice medal in 2009 to replace the Wound Stripe. It is awarded out to members of the military killed or injured in the line of duty since Oct. 7, 2001.
Linda Loree accepted the award on behalf of her son Cpl. Nathan Hornburg, who was killed by a shell explosion in Afghanistan in 2007. Loree said she doesn't want her son's legacy squandered after the Canadian military's planned withdrawal in 2011. She said she'd like to see the Canadian Forces maintain some presence there.
"The word 'sacrifice' will take on an entirely different meaning to me if I don't feel good (about) what is going to be done post-2011 to validate and use those sacrifices in a way that helped Afghanistan move forward," she said.
My Regiment also awarded this medal to several soldiers in March, and to two of my good friends, members of my Troop in Afghanistan whose luck run out on their third or fourth tour in Afghanistan..
She has a good point. Unfortunately it will cost more Moms to recieve the Sacrifice Medal. Hey, I don't want all our deaths and injuries to be in vain, but to just add to these statistics is akin to WW1 over the top and walk into death strategies. Hopefully the big US surge will make a difference and kill or repulse the Taliban from Afghanistan. But they may just melt away from them and lay low for as much as a decade and strike again.
Linda Loree accepted the award on behalf of her son Cpl. Nathan Hornburg, who was killed by a shell explosion in Afghanistan in 2007. Loree said she doesn't want her son's legacy squandered after the Canadian military's planned withdrawal in 2011. She said she'd like to see the Canadian Forces maintain some presence there.
"The word 'sacrifice' will take on an entirely different meaning to me if I don't feel good (about) what is going to be done post-2011 to validate and use those sacrifices in a way that helped Afghanistan move forward," she said.
My Regiment also awarded this medal to several soldiers in March, and to two of my good friends, members of my Troop in Afghanistan whose luck run out on their third or fourth tour in Afghanistan..
She has a good point. Unfortunately it will cost more Moms to recieve the Sacrifice Medal. Hey, I don't want all our deaths and injuries to be in vain, but to just add to these statistics is akin to WW1 over the top and walk into death strategies. Hopefully the big US surge will make a difference and kill or repulse the Taliban from Afghanistan. But they may just melt away from them and lay low for as much as a decade and strike again.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
