Date: Thu, 30 May 2002 10:37:27 -0400 From: info@libertarians4peace.net (Libertarians4Peace) Subject: [libs4peace] US Soliders told to kill women and children To: libs4peace@yahoogroups.com ( L4P), organize-libs4peace@yahoogroups.com ("L4P-O!" )
Ok, this is what should be what it looks like when I change my settings to Libs4Peace.
> http://www.theithacajournal.com/news/stories/20020525/topstories/380284.html
>
> Saturday, May 25, 2002
>
> Fresh memories of war
> Soldiers prepare for their second mission at the Bagram military base in
> East Afghanistan.
> By KANDEA MOSLEY
> Journal Staff
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> ITHACA -- The stench of decaying flesh hung heavy in the air as soldiers
> passed blown-up bunkers and caves.
> As they moved down an L-shaped corridor, the stiffened limbs of a Taliban
> soldier jutted from beneath piles of rock and dust in the sweltering
> afternoon air.
>
> Ripped-up pages from the Koran, and booklets describing ways to kill
> Americans, littered the tree-lined valley that had been bombarded by U.S.
> air strikes before their arrival.
>
> These recollections, marking the intensity of every hour of every day felt
> in combat, typify the memories that resurface for veterans of World War II,
> Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War and other military combat this Memorial Day
> weekend.
>
> For Army Private Matt Guckenheimer, who recently returned home to Tompkins
> County after two missions in Eastern Afghanitan, processing these memories
> and readjusting to American life has just begun.
>
> Guckenheimer, who helped clear the L-shaped valley near the border of
> Pakistan whose twists and turns are burned into his memory, explained the
> nature of his company's mission. In doing so, he spoke candidly about the
> reality of war.
>
> In an April interview with The Ithaca Journal at his family's Cayuga Heights
> home, Guckenheimer, 22, shared his experiences during Operation Anaconda. He
> was sent on March 6 in a company of more than 100 soldiers to participate in
> the largest U.S.-led ground engagement in Eastern Afghanistan.
>
> "We were told there were no friendly forces," said Guckenheimer, an
> assistant gunner with the 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum. "If there was
> anybody there, they were the enemy. We were told specifically that if there
> were women and children to kill them."
>
> Taliban al-Qaida soldiers had already been given about two weeks to
> surrender when U.S. soldiers were ordered to demolsh their last strongholds
> and finish the operation, he said.
>
> Guckenheimer said he loved learning about tanks and guns and watching battle
> scenes on TV when he was young.
>
> As a teen-ager, he said, his desire to prepare himself to confront the
> challenges of war intensified despite his family's disapproval. After
> attending Ithaca High School his freshman year, he transferred to a boarding
> school in Bath, Maine.
>
> His parents, Meredith Kusch and John Guckenheimer, attended Oberlin College
> in Ohio and the University of California at Berkeley during the Vietnam era.
> They used to joke that they would disown him if he ever joined the military,
> he said.
>
> "They're just about the most passive people you could want," he said with a
> smile. "I just ended up not being that way."
>
> Guckenheimer said he believed his parents had been indoctrinated with a
> skewed view of the Vietnam War that led them to undervalue war's place in
> defending the United States. But he said he has noticed a shift in their
> outlook since Sept. 11.
>
> John Guckenheimer agreed, to an extent, with his son's assessment.
>
> "I think it was necessary for the U.S. to respond militarily to the events
> of Sept. 11, but I don't feel completely comfortable with the way the war in
> Afghanistan is being conducted," he said.
>
> He thinks that the United States is settling into a long and entrenched war
> in the region, and might repeat the mistakes the Russians made there.
>
> As a Cornell math professor, he said, he has worked with members of the
> armed forces and has held them in high regard. Regarding the U.S. military
> as an institution, and his and his wife's opinion of it, he said, "I don't
> know that our attitudes in general have changed since Matt joined."
>
> Matt Guckenheimer said his first combat experience in Afghanistan was
> enough.
>
> "I know that I can get through it, so the challenge is gone," Guckenheimer
> said. "I don't think wanting to put yourself in that position is really
> healthy to begin with."
>
> Because of the effectiveness of earlier U.S. military operations in
> Afghanistan, the number of Taliban soldiers killed during Guckenheimer's
> missions was minimal, he said. He knew of only about 10 enemy fighters who
> were killed, he said.
>
> "Most of it (the difficulty of the missions) wasn't as much the enemy as it
> was the elements," he said.
>
> Adjusting to the high altitude and low oxygen levels of the region was a
> struggle. Layers of Gortex and fleece couldn't shield them from the cold
> nights. They would wake up to find their canteens covered in ice, he said.
>
> When he returned to the United States after spending a month either on
> missions or at the Bagram military base, Guckenheimer said, he remembered
> how alienated Americans are from each other. After living in a Third World
> country, where people he didn't know would smile or say hello to him on the
> streets, it was jarring to return home, where contact among strangers is
> mostly shunned.
>
> "These people who lived through life, they seemed to be more grounded," he
> said. Coming home was like walking back into a "clueless" society where
> over-consumption is commonly regarded as the route to happiness, he said.
>
> He said although he only interacted with Afghan men, those he spoke to
> looked forward to women re-entering public life. On the whole, he said,
> residents of the towns attached to the Bagram base had been able to achieve
> a measure of happiness despite living amid constant war.
>
> Guckenheimer returned to Fort Drum on April 24. He said he looked forward to
> their next assignment and would like to serve in Sinai, Egypt.
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