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Handling Of Ft. Hood Shooter Could Bring Disciplinary Action
The LA Times is reporting that several Army officers could face disciplinary action related to the Ft. Hood terror attack.
The Army believes Major Nidal Hassan was promoted up through the ranks when he clearly should not have been.
The review found that Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, repeatedly failed to meet basic officer standards for physical fitness, appearance and work ethic, but that superiors allowed his medical career to advance.
"Had those failings been properly adjudicated, he wouldn’t have progressed," and could have been forced out of the armed services, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the review’s findings had not been made public.
Instead, the investigation found that for much of Hasan’s career, supervisors were blinded by his resume, believing they had found a rare medical officer: someone with a stellar undergraduate record, prior service in the infantry and intimate knowledge of the Islamic faith.
The officers responsible for his promotions could face disciplinary action and hold the ranks of colonel and below.
The Times article goes on to cite a lot of bureaucratic mistakes and the need for more stringent oversight of this or that.
What the article and more importantly the Army fails to address is the culture inside the military that allowed these mistakes to occur at all. There is no place in America where political correctness is more entrenched than in the military.
Officers need to feel comfortable that their careers will not be ruined if they report a fellow soldier believed to hold extremist views. Muslims are part of the “protected class” and no one wanted to be accused of racism or anti-Muslim bigotry for reporting Hasan.
Heartwarming Iraq Picture Moment
Take a look at these heartwarming pictures from Iraq. I think these pictures manage to capture the essence of what it means to be an American.
There are no words to express everything conveyed by this photo. To me, it represents the highest ideals of our country and our guys, and the hopes and aspirations of the Iraqi people.
This is why we fight.
About The Photos:
U.S. Army Task Force Regulators 1st Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment Staff Sgt. Fred Hampton, of Lexington, Ky., kneels on a knee to talk with a young Iraqi boy at the future site of Regular 6 Park in the Thawra 1 section of the Sadr City District of Baghdad on June 20. Photo: Tech Sgt. Cohen Young, Joint Combat Camera Center Iraq.
(hat tip to Soldiers’ Angels Germany)
New Republic’s “Baghdad Diarist” Confirmed a Fraud
Looks like Matt Drudge has delivered the goods once again! It should be fun watching The New Republic try and deny this one. At this point TNR has about as much credibility as Dan Rather which is pretty much none.
This would be an appropriate time for Rush Limbaugh to use that “phony soldier” line again.
-Chris Jones
From the Drudge Report:
The DRUDGE REPORT has obtained internal documents from the investigation of THE NEW REPUBLIC'S "Baghdad Diarist", Scott Thomas Beauchamp, an Army private turned war correspondent who reported tales of military malfeasance from the Iraq War front.
The documents appear to expose that once the veracity of Beauchamp's diaries were called into question, and an Army investigation ensued, THE NEW REPUBLIC has failed to publicly account for publishing slanderous falsehoods about the U.S. military in a time of war.
Document 1: Beauchamp Refuses to Stand by Story (Beauchamp Transcript Part 1)
THE NEW REPUBLIC has been standing behind the stories from their Baghdad Diarist, Scott Thomas Beauchamp, since questions were first raised about their accuracy over the summer. On August 10, the editors at TNR accused the Army of "stonewalling" their investigation into the stories by preventing them from speaking with Beauchamp. The DRUDGE REPORT has since obtained the transcript of a September 7 call between TNR editor Frank Foer, TNR executive editor Peter Scoblic, and Private Beauchamp. During the call, Beauchamp declines to stand by his stories, telling his editors that "I just want it to end. I'm not going to talk to anyone about anything really." The editors respond that "we just can't, in good conscience, continue to defend the piece" without an explanation, but Beauchamp responds only that he "doesn't care what the public thinks." The editors then ask Beauchamp to cancel scheduled interviews with the WASHINGTON POST and NEWSWEEK.
Document 2: Beauchamp Admits to "Gross Exaggerations and Inaccurate Allegations" (Beauchamp Transcript Part 2)
The DRUDGE REPORT has also obtained a signed "Memorandum for Record" in which Beauchamp recants his stories and concedes the facts of the Army's investigation -- that his stories contained "gross exaggerations and inaccurate allegations of misconduct" by his fellow soldiers.
Document 3: Army Investigation: Tales "Completely Fabricated," Beauchamp Wanted to be Hemingway
The third document obtained by the DRUDGE REPORT is the Army's official report on the investigation into the allegations made by Private Beauchamp. The Army concluded that Beauchamp had "completely fabricated" the story of mocking a disfigured woman, that his description of a "Saddam-era dumping ground" was false, and that claims that he and his men had deliberately targeted dogs with their armored vehicles was "completely unfounded." Further the report stated "that Private Beauchamp desired to use his experiences to enhance his writing and provide legitimacy to his work possibly becoming the next Hemingway."
The report concludes that "Private Beauchamp takes small bits of truth and twists and exaggerates them into fictional accounts that he puts forth as the whole truth for public consumption."
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