What in the name of skilfully poised ****?

[Walsingham]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/9073459/US-Marines-posed-with-banner-of-Nazi-SS.html

 

 

 

Where the **** does that begin to be sensible?

 

A huge part of me wants to reject it as a photoshop, but it's altogether too crazy.

[Gorgon]

odd choice. Why not a Finnish flag, they had the most renowned snipers.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Western pro Wehrmacht propaganda is at fault. Nazis, while formally reviled are also treated as some sort of super soldiers that were only defeated because the Soviets had more men than they had bullets.

 

You just need to look at the history channel. There are more documentaries regarding the Nazis than all other topics combined. And those documentaries alternate between Hitler hate and Wehrmacht circle jerk.

 

Its no wonder many members of armed forces have the quiet adoration thing going.

[Drowsy Emperor]

And in other recent news, pissing on corpses is also in vogue with the marines:

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2085378/US-troops-urinating-dead-Afghan-bodies-video-used-Taliban-recruitment-tool.html

[Walsingham]

And in other recent news, pissing on corpses is also in vogue with the marines:

 

http://www.dailymail...tment-tool.html

 

That's old news. Amd quite honestly while I can see it's a publicity own goal, if I'd just shot a bunch of ****ers whose stated intention is to enslave a nation and systematically rape its intellectual and social life then I'd probably vomit on them.

 

But posing with SS flashes?

[Bos_hybrid]

Unfortunately you get idiots in all parts of society,

[Tale]

There's other possibilities. Maybe nobody told them what it meant.

[Janmanden]

Scout Snipers. SS. Blame it on Hitler that scary, cool and menacing rune S's is forever tainted. I think maybe some people have moved on and others are still stuck in history.. I wonder when if ever these symbols can be used again without that historic taint or ambigiouty.

 

What the hell, why is this text so small.. Hm.. Ah switching editing mode.. Sub?! Delete done.

Edited February 10, 2012 by Janmanden

[Gorgon]

I still think part of the equation is that the Germans just had the coolest looking uniforms.

[Walsingham]

Having thought about it more I think perhaps the weirdest thing is why a marine would imitate any other military outfit. I thought the POINT of being a jarhead was refusing to kowtow to anyone. Let alone a bunch of ubermensch wannabes who got soundly thrashed.

[Hurlshort]

There's other possibilities. Maybe nobody told them what it meant.

 

Sadly I think that is the most likely possibility. At least no one explained the full history of the symbols.

 

Maybe someone also likes lightening bolts.

[Walsingham]

Maybe they just like the band Kiss?

 

[Raithe]

There's that mixture of things about the Wehrmacht that tends to be easily confused. At the time, one of the praiseworthy aspects about it as a group was that it promoted by ability, rather then by class and family connections. One of the few armies of the day that really did that. A son of a baker could become an officer if he had the skills and ability.

 

On the other hand, they had a lot of political bias and the unconditional "following orders" that has a rather bad schtick from the historical viewpoint..

 

Either way, with all of the political connotations, it was a rather stupid thing for the Sniper Scouts to do..

[Malcador]

They should probably stop letting soldiers have cameras, I think. I am pretty curious as to what the heck they were thinking by trying to identify themselves with the SS.

[Morgoth]

Long wars without any goals turn soldiers into ****ed up animals. What's the news?

 

If those guys come home and they don't get their AD's 'cause the Pharmamedical Industrial Complex wants more moniez, expect some "Fun" lethal accidents, while President Romney is gonna sing "America f-yeah!" to re-patriotinize his sheeple.

 

Move on, citizen.

[Drowsy Emperor]

The problem is that today's armies are effectively no more than mercenaries, a profession done more for the money than anything else. As such, they by default attract the stupid, poor, psychotic and criminals. And ignorance makes for a poor excuse.

 

@Wals: justifying pissing on corpses puts you just below Papua New Guinea's cannibals on the civilization scale.

 

Any soldier of a twentieth century european nation state, back when people had an idea just what they were fighting for, even if they were going the wrong way about it would consider these men no better than dogs.

If they can't stomach the fight, they shouldn't be in it.

[Morgoth]

Wals is always trying to vindicate anything his American buddies are commiting, don't try to fight it.

Edited February 10, 2012 by Morgoth

[Zoraptor]

Nah, he's right. Disrespecting corpses is something people of all nationalities do, if they're sufficiently angry/ hyped/ scared/ conditioned/ stupid. They should be run out of the military on a rail, but that's mainly because they are clearly just too stupid (hey guys, let's pose as we pee on corpses/ build nude prisoner pyramids/ stand in front of SS flags, it'll be a sweet memento!) to be away from mummy and daddy, let alone put in charge of weaponry. That's not just a US problem, it just tends to be more newsworthy when it is their problem.

 

If you want something to get grumpy about Hadaitha being worthy of a 3 month suspended sentence would be a better target, because that required extended malice rather than being potentially a one off nervous reaction or some hick ignorami posing in front of 'cool' symbols.

[HoonDing]

I still remember the outrage when Belgian paratroopers (the elite of the elite) pissed on Somalis in '90 or '91. That was before the military was pussified, and Belgian UN soldiers just let themselves be macheted by those nice Hutus in '94.

[Morgoth]

@Zoraptor

 

It's not that US soldiers are urinating on corpses, it is how this is received at home by the press, and why there's such a widespread support for such behavior that worries me.

[Meshugger]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_presence_in_the_United_States_military

[Drowsy Emperor]

I still remember the outrage when Belgian paratroopers (the elite of the elite) pissed on Somalis in '90 or '91. That was before the military was pussified, and Belgian UN soldiers just let themselves be macheted by those nice Hutus in '94.

 

The UN had no mandate to use force in Rwanda IIRC. Some of them weren't even armed. That whole crisis was a disaster, but it Belgian involvement that led to it in the first place, with the classic colonial policy of supporting an ethnic minority rule over an ethnic majority. That led to a lot of bad blood and the outcome was predictable.

 

Strictly speaking they aren't even separate ethincities - from what I was taught in my peace studies course they were basically one ethnicity but two separate lifestyles (cattle grazing and agriculture.) . I don't know how correct that is however.

 

Regardless, Morgoth is right. Barbaric acts in war shouldn't be tolerated with a systematic slap on the wrist policy the US has.

Those people will one day come back home and they might be pissing on corpses after a killing spree in an american city next.

Even if they don't its simply unethical.

[Gorgon]

Is it not a universal theme that in war soldiers are reduced to rather base behavior, we try and fight against that impulse but it doesn't always succeed.

[Blarghagh]

I can't believe how much you guys are trying to rationalise this. I've seen outrage in threads about video game reviews but in here these is mild distaste coupled with understanding? Frankly, I'm almost equally disturbed and appalled by the subject of the thread and the contents of the replies in it.

[Walsingham]

According to Shake Hands with the Devil (from memory), the Belgians merely succeeded in breaking discipline by acting like hired goons, and ****ing what llittle credibility the UN had with the various parties. Their CO was furious.