Death of 19 Year Old Marine in Iraq "Non-combat Injury"

First US military death announced since Isis offensive started in Iraq
The first US service member has died in the third US-Iraq war, although not in combat, the Department of Defense says
The Guardian
October 24, 2014

Nearly three years after Barack Obama withdrew the US military from its bloody, exhausting second conflict in Iraq, the first US service member has died there in the third US-Iraq war.

Marine Lance Corporal Sean P Neal, one of 1,600 troops serving in Iraq to support the Iraqi struggle against Islamic State (Isis), died of a “non-combat” injury, the US announced late on Friday. Neal, of Riverside, California, died in Baghdad, more than 7600 miles from his home, on Thursday.

Neal, 19, was the first American acknowledged to have died in Operation Inherent Resolve, the US military’s new name for the war Obama launched on August 7. Americans have been dying in Iraq since 1991, some four years before Neal was born.

Technically, Neal may not have been the first US fatality of the Iraq-Syria war against the Islamic State. Naval forces assigned to US Central Command, which has operational control of the war, acknowledged on October 3 that a Marine, Corporal Jordan L. Spears, went missing at sea in the North Arabian Gulf after bailing out of his MV-22 Osprey. Spears took off from the amphibious assault ship USS Makin Island, which carried Marines of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, assigned to support the war in Iraq and Syria.
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Inside Section 60 at Arlington National Cemetery

Section 60 of Arlington National Cemetery Offers Tragic Testimony to America's Most Recent Wars
Improvised explosive devices have transformed battle—and disrupted one of the central rituals of grieving, author says.
National Geographic
Simon Worrall
for National Geographic
PUBLISHED OCTOBER 21, 2014

Photo of Mary McHugh lies at the gravesite of her fiancee.
On May 27, 2007—Memorial Day—Mary McHugh mourns her dead fiancé, Sgt. James Regan, in Arlington National Cemetery's Section 60. Regan had been killed by an IED explosion in February in Iraq.
PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN MOORE, GETTY

It's a tiny piece in a much larger jigsaw puzzle. No famous poets or presidents are buried there. No admirals or generals. Instead Section 60 in Arlington National Cemetery, just across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., is the final resting place of the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice in America's most recent wars, especially Iraq and Afghanistan.

The emotions it inspires, intensified every November 11 on Veterans Day, are raw. Its stories, heartbreaking.

Robert M. Poole, a former executive editor of National Geographic, spent several years listening to those stories for his new book, Section 60: Where War Comes Home. Speaking from his home in Vermont, he explains why he wanted to commemorate this patch of hallowed ground, why it takes years of practice to fold a ceremonial flag, and why Section 60 is one of the few places in America where it's considered normal to talk to the dead.
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War Ends For Fallen, Not For Widows

Moving On: Project Helps War Widows Recover
NPR
by GLORIA HILLARD
September 25, 2014

"And I still have that voicemail, and I still listen to it seven and a half years later. I can't erase it," she says. "Just because that war is over, it doesn't mean that ours is over, like our journey is still continuing."

Members of the American Widow Project cheer at the end of an annual event in San Diego. The organization's mission is to help heal and empower participants.

In the kitchen of a beach house in San Diego a group of moms is preparing dinner.

The 13 women from all around the country have one thing in common - they lost their husbands in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

They are part of the American Widow Project, a support group for women whose husbands were killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Defense Department estimates there are more than 3,200 military widows and widowers from those wars.

The women gather once a month in small groups for bonding and adventure.

For 34-year-old Danielle Schafer, much of the day her husband died remains hazy.
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Fiscal 2016 sequestration marks ‘breaking point’ for the Army

It seems as if people have just gone insane in the online world. So many so upset about Obama getting off Air Force 1 with a coffee cup in the same hand he saluted a Marine with. Ok, so he should have switched hands but he didn't. That is what they are upset about but not so much the fact that our troops are under siege by Congress.

Army Chief: Fiscal 2016 sequestration marks ‘breaking point’
Fort Hood Sentinel
By David Vergun, Army News Service
SEPTEMBER 25, 2014
ACROSS DOD

WASHINGTON - Should sequestration resume in fiscal year 2016, “it will be very difficult for us to lead around the world. Fiscal year 2016 is a breaking point,” said Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno, adding, “I’m not seeing peace breaking out around the world in (2016).”

Odierno delivered his remarks Friday, at a Defense Writers Group, at the Fairmont Hotel here, where he was guest speaker.

Everyone wants the U.S. to lead the way in resolving global conflicts and crises, he said, not necessarily supplying the preponderance of forces, but involvement to some extent. The nagging question is, “Do we want to do that or not?”

In fiscal year 2016, Odierno pointed out that the budget will go down $9 billion from what it is now. That would have a “significant degradation” on the force “because I cannot take people out fast enough.”

The general explained that manpower, modernization and training need to be kept in balance even as the budget shrinks and it’s currently out of balance with too many Soldiers and not enough dollars to properly train and equip them.

With a reduction of 20,000 a year, that’s as far as he said he’s willing to push it without seriously degrading operational concerns and personnel considerations.

Sequestration takes “a large percentage of a small portion of the budget” that would have otherwise gone to training and equipping the force, he said. The slashed budget will delay aircraft purchases, platform upgrades, improved command-and-control systems and a host of other needed requirements for years to come.

The active Army is now 510,000, which is down from a high of 570,000. It will be 490,000 by the end of fiscal year 2015, 470,000 by fiscal year 2016, 415,000 by fiscal year 2017 and 420,000 by fiscal year 2019, he pointed out.

Before the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant, and the Russian incursion into Ukraine, Odierno said he testified to lawmakers that a reduction to 450,000 would pose a “significant” security risk and 420,000 would mean the Army would be unable to “execute our current strategy.”
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Guess they just weren't important enough for Congress to stick around long enough to figure out what they would approve and fund before taking off to try to get re-elected.

Military suicides keep going up so that Navy SEAL, Green Berets and other Special Forces bravest of the brave have committed suicide even after Congress spent billions a year on "preventing" them. Ya, and they just keep writing the checks no matter what happened to the troops. Top that off with they really aren't too upset over veterans committing suicide either, since their numbers went up as well.

Sorry but when it comes down to what we really have to complain about, do we really think it is a wise use of indignation to focus on feeble salute?

Oh by the way, Obama was focused on military suicides in 2008 when he was running for office and serving on the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, just in case you forgot that. We expected a lot more of out of him but as of this very day, no one has been held accountable.

Could some of the wounded survive instead of die?

Are U.S. Soldiers Dying From Survivable Wounds?
Despite Advances in Care, the Military Failed to Save Some Troops in Iraq and Afghanistan From 'Potentially Survivable' Wounds
Wall Street Journal
By MICHAEL M. PHILLIPS
Sept. 19, 2014

In an unassuming building in suburban Washington, a team of military medical specialists spent six months poring over autopsies of 4,016 men and women who had died on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan.

They read reports from the morgue at Dover Air Force Base, where bodies arrived in flag-draped coffins. They examined toxicology reports. They winced at gruesome photos of bullet wounds and shredded limbs. In each case, the doctors pieced together the evidence to determine the exact cause of death.

Their conclusion would roil U.S. military medicine: Nearly a quarter of Americans killed in action over 10 years—almost 1,000 men and women—died of wounds they could potentially have survived. In nine out of 10 cases, troops bled to death from wounds that might have been stanched. In 8%, soldiers succumbed to airway damage that better care might have controlled. "Obviously one death or one bad outcome is too many, but there are a lot of them," said one of the researchers, John Holcomb, a former commander of the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research.

The findings appeared in the Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery in 2012 to almost no public attention. But in military medical circles, they have fueled a behind-the-scenes controversy that rages to this day over whether American men and women are dying needlessly—and whether the Pentagon is doing enough to keep them alive.

Indeed, a new internal report concluded that the military still hasn't fully adopted battlefield aid techniques that could have kept many wounded men alive in Afghanistan. Some of those techniques have been used to great effect—often with little extra cost—by elite commando units, such as the Army Rangers, for more than a decade, say active-duty and retired military trauma specialists.
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Kitchen Commandos Debate War Again Ignoring Cost

War Computer Games vs Real Call of Duty
Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
September 20, 2014

The debates about sending troops back into Iraq, keeping them in Afghanistan and spreading them out into other countries leaves most of us sick because they never manage to consider the cost. Hell, they never really do while they show their knowledge, or lack of it, defending their opinions on the options never thinking beyond their limited view. Kitchen Commandos think they understand because more Americans play computer war games than actually go to do it for real.

The New Yorker has an article about "Isis's Call of Duty" computer game "In a recruitment video for the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham, or ISIS (also known as ISIL or I.S.), that has been making the rounds of some uglier parts of the Internet"

The real Call of Duty on Google Plus has this many followers

3,522,318 followers 57,054,760 views

More people are paying attention to computer war games than the real battles being fought as the politicians push for more. The real price paid is what they ignore the most.

ICYMI: WITH A VETERAN COMMITTING SUICIDE EVERY HOUR
U.S. REP. RON BARBER SAYS THEY MUST NOT ‘FACE THE GHOSTS OF WAR ALONE’
Sep 18, 2014

Press Release

Congressman calls for ‘well-funded, well-planned campaign’ to halt epidemic WASHINGTON – U.S. Rep. Ron Barber, noting that a veteran commits suicide every 65 minutes, called for increased attention to the issue, saying that soldiers and veterans “are left to face the ghosts of war alone.”

“The suicide rate among our country’s brave service men and women and veterans is at a frightening level,” Barber said yesterday on the floor of the House. “Some estimates have shown that as many as 22 veterans take their own lives every day.”

Barber, who represents 85,000 veterans in Southern Arizona, called for an increased focus on identifying members of the armed forces and veterans who may be at risk of taking their own lives and increased attention to preventing that from happening.

“We must combat military and veteran suicide with the same conviction that we take on an enemy of war – because it is killing our men and women in and out of uniform,” Barber said. “We must wage a well-funded, well-planned campaign to fight this heartbreaking epidemic.”

Video of Barber’s entire remarks can be seen by clicking on the photo below:
Published on Sep 18, 2014
Rep. Ron Barber spoke on the floor of the House on veterans suicide prevention. "The suicide rate among our country’s brave service members and veterans is at a frightening level. Some estimates have shown that as many as 22 veterans take their own lives every day.

“We must combat military and veteran suicide with the same conviction that we take on an enemy of war. Because it is killing our men and women in and out of uniform. We must wage a well-funded, well planned campaign to fight this heartbreaking epidemic. we must do more for those who have borne the brunt of war. We must come together, Congress, the administration, the health care community, mental health experts and build upon a plan to help the veterans who served this nation proudly, yet may be suffering." September 17, 2014.

I left this comment

Kathie Costos DiCesare
Being appalled is one thing, knowing how long it has been going on is inexcusable. By 1978 there were 500,000 Vietnam veterans with PTSD. Their suicides were 200,000 many years ago and today, today veterans over 50 are 78% of the suicides no one talks about. How many more years does it take to stop being home more deadly than being in combat?

OEF OIF Memorial Honors Fallen

Memorial dedicated to WNY Iraq and Afghanistan Heroes
WIVB News
By Brittni Smallwood, News 4 Reporter
Published: September 13, 2014

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) - Bill Wilson’s son, Staff Sergeant William Wilson the third, was killed while he was fighting for our freedom in Afghanistan.

On Saturday he and his wife attended a memorial in honor of the fallen servicemen and women that died after September 11, 2001.

“We took a look at his picture. My wife touched his name and it’s been pretty emotional today” said Wilson.

The new Western New York Iraq/Afghanistan Memorial bears the names of more than 70 military members that lost their lives.

“It’s not just names that carved into a piece of stone. There are stories. There are people here who served with them. There are people and those among us who have troops that we did not bring home” said Dan Frontera of the WNY IAM Committee. “We’re hoping this becomes a point where we can start our healing and our forgiveness process”.
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ISIS Video Shows Journalist Beheaded in Iraq

BREAKING: US officials confirm video released by ISIS shows gruesome beheading of US journalist James Foley
BY LARA JAKES AND BRADLEY KLAPPER
Aug 20th 2014

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A grisly video released Tuesday shows Islamic State militants beheading American journalist James Foley, U.S. officials said, in what the extremists called retribution for recent U.S. airstrikes in Iraq. The militants threatened to kill another captive they also identified as an American journalist.

Separately, Foley's family confirmed his death in a statement posted on a Facebook page that was created to rally support for his release, saying they "have never been prouder of him."

"He gave his life trying to expose the world to the suffering of the Syrian people," said the statement, which was attributed to Foley's mother, Diane Foley. She implored the militants to spare the lives of other hostages. "Like Jim, they are innocents. They have no control over American government policy in Iraq, Syria or anywhere in the world."

The statement was posted on a Facebook page called "Find James Foley," which his family has used a number of times since his November 2012 disappearance. Earlier Tuesday, a red-eyed but gracious Diane Foley said the family would not have an immediate statement when approached at her home by an Associated Press reporter. A priest arrived at the home several hours later.
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Iraq now has Ex-Prime Minister al Maliki

Iraq's al-Maliki gives up post to rival
The Associated Press
By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA AND SINAN SALAHEDDIN
Published: August 14, 2014

BAGHDAD (AP) -- Nouri al-Maliki, Iraq's prime minister for the past eight years, says he is relinquishing the post to fellow Dawa Party member Haider al-Abadi.

Al-Maliki says his decision is based on his desire to "safeguard the high interests of the country," adding that he will not be the cause of any bloodshed.

"I will stay a combat soldier to defend Iraq and its people," he added in the televised address late Thursday, with al-Abadi standing by his side.

Iraq's President Fouad Massoum named al-Abadi on Monday to form the next government, but al-Maliki had until now refused to step aside.
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Michigan Gold Star Family Honors Son's Last Wish Helping Others

Couple Channel Grief Into Retreat for Veterans
Associated Press
By MIKE HOUSEHOLDER
Aug 1, 2014

OCQUEOC TOWNSHIP, Mich.

Before shipping out for Iraq, Army Sgt. Trevor Blumberg asked his father to do two things if he didn't return: Look after his puppy, Scrappy, and "take care of my guys."

Blumberg, a 22-year-old paratrooper known to his guys in the storied 82nd Airborne as "Blum," was killed days after deploying by a roadside bomb that tore through his Humvee.

In the decade since, Terry and Jan Blumberg have dutifully honored their son's wishes by using Trevor's death benefits and insurance money to build a 3,500-square-foot house on 12 acres in northern Michigan that doubles as their retirement home and a retreat for those who defend the country. For the past two years, veterans who served post-Sept. 11, 2001, have been welcome to stay for free at the three-bedroom Ocqueoc Township home for up to five days.

"We made a promise to Trevor," Terry Blumberg said.

The Blumbergs, church volunteers and veterans' group members toiled for years to build "Blum's Landing," which is tucked back from a dirt road and nestled among trees, with Orchard Lake around back.

Guests eat, rest and play alongside the Blumbergs and Scrappy, who is now a 12-year-old light brown Staffordshire terrier that follows Terry Blumberg around everywhere with tail wagging.

Terry Blumberg, who fought in the Vietnam War, said the loss of their son is "never going to stop hurting," but he and his wife take satisfaction in knowing they are doing what Trevor would have wanted by hosting those who shared his mission.
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Outset of the great war, a dreadful rumor arose

History lesson on Combat PTSD
WWI "Shell Shock"

The Shock of War
World War I troops were the first to be diagnosed with shell shock, an injury – by any name – still wreaking havoc
Smithsonian Magazine
By Caroline Alexander
September 2010

In September 1914, at the very outset of the great war, a dreadful rumor arose. It was said that at the Battle of the Marne, east of Paris, soldiers on the front line had been discovered standing at their posts in all the dutiful military postures—but not alive. “Every normal attitude of life was imitated by these dead men,” according to the patriotic serial The Times History of the War, published in 1916. “The illusion was so complete that often the living would speak to the dead before they realized the true state of affairs.” “Asphyxia,” caused by the powerful new high-explosive shells, was the cause for the phenomenon—or so it was claimed. That such an outlandish story could gain credence was not surprising: notwithstanding the massive cannon fire of previous ages, and even automatic weaponry unveiled in the American Civil War, nothing like this thunderous new artillery firepower had been seen before. A battery of mobile 75mm field guns, the pride of the French Army, could, for example, sweep ten acres of terrain, 435 yards deep, in less than 50 seconds; 432,000 shells had been fired in a five-day period of the September engagement on the Marne. The rumor emanating from there reflected the instinctive dread aroused by such monstrous innovation. Surely—it only made sense—such a machine must cause dark, invisible forces to pass through the air and destroy men’s brains.

Shrapnel from mortars, grenades and, above all, artillery projectile bombs, or shells, would account for an estimated 60 percent of the 9.7 million military fatalities of World War I. And, eerily mirroring the mythic premonition of the Marne, it was soon observed that many soldiers arriving at the casualty clearing stations who had been exposed to exploding shells, although clearly damaged, bore no visible wounds. Rather, they appeared to be suffering from a remarkable state of shock caused by blast force. This new type of injury, a British medical report concluded, appeared to be “the result of the actual explosion itself, and not merely of the missiles set in motion by it.” In other words, it appeared that some dark, invisible force had in fact passed through the air and was inflicting novel and peculiar damage to men’s brains.

By 1917, medical officers were instructed to avoid the term “shell shock,” and to designate probable cases as “Not Yet Diagnosed (Nervous).” Processed to a psychiatric unit, the soldier was assessed by a specialist as either “shell shock (wound)” or “shell shock (sick),” the latter diagnosis being given if the soldier had not been close to an explosion. Transferred to a treatment center in Britain or France, the invalided soldier was placed under the care of neurology specialists and recuperated until discharged or returned to the front. Officers might enjoy a final period of convalescence before being disgorged back into the maw of the war or the working world, gaining strength at some smaller, often privately funded treatment center—some quiet, remote place such as Lennel House, in Coldstream, in the Scottish Borders country. read more of PTSD in WWI Here War Neurosis

The Century: America's Time - 1914-1919: Shell Shock
ABC News

Sounds like they should have figured out what to do to help soldiers heal. The truth is, they didn't.

WWII
After WWI they had thought the issues veterans faced had more to do with the "shells" and the compression taking a toll on their brains. By WWII, they knew they were facing something different.

"During the early years of World War II, psychiatric casualties increased by 300% when compared to WWI."

"At one point in the war, the number of men being discharged from the service for psychiatric reasons exceeded the total number of men being newly drafted."

23% of the evacuations were for psychiatric reasons. Readjustments Problems Among Vietnam Veterans, The Etiology of Combat Related Post Traumatic Stress Disorders (1978)

In the same article the Korean War was also discussed. Things changed for the better. They did something right.

Psychiatric evacuations dropped to only 6%. Why? Because clinicians were there when needed. "Clinicians provided immediate onsite treatment to affected individuals always with the expectations the combatant would return to duty as soon as possible. (Also from the above article)

By Vietnam, the number of soldiers diagnosed while deployed dropped. Why? Because they were in and out in a year. What followed was the number of Vietnam veterans needing help to heal.

Everything went up after that. Arrests, drug and alcohol situations made the news but homelessness, suicides, attempted suicides and everything else we see today happened to them, but no one cared enough to notice other than their own families.

Next time you hear some "expert" saying PTSD didn't exist before Vietnam, give them a history lesson.

Ovideo War Memorial Honors 385 Fallen

Fallen Floridians Memorial Cross Tribute 385 crosses, one for every military member from Florida who died while serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, will arrive on the grounds of the Lawton House in Oviedo. Larger crosses will collectively honor those who gave their lives in previous conflicts. Each cross will hold a wreath created in 2013 by Eagle Scout 17-year-old Conner MacFarlane and refurbished by his 14-year-old sister, Chloe. One of the crosses is in honor of their father who died in Afghanistan in 2012. Chloe and fellow Girl Scouts from the Oviedo area will lay the wreaths. Lawton House, 200 West Broadway, Oviedo, 32765. May 17 - May 27 the public is invited to walk the grounds of the Lawton House from 10AM to 8PM daily to see the crosses and pay tribute to these brave men and women who have made the ultimate sacrifice.

No music, no words, just the power of seeing this many Afghanistan and Iraq fallen heroes remembered from Florida.

Blue Angels Missing Man Formation Remembers 1st Lt. Travis Manion

Veterans turn out to see Blue Angels at Annapolis
The Capital
By Tim Pratt
Annapolis, Md
Published: May 22, 2014

The U.S. Navy's Blue Angels perform a missing man formation at the U.S. Naval Academy as an aerial salute to honor the memory of 1st Lt. Travis Manion, who was killed in action in Iraq on April 29, 2007.
KATHRYN E. MACDONALD/U.S. NAVY

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Standing near the end of the Naval Academy Bridge on Wednesday afternoon, 71-year-old Bill Sykes peered intently at the sky as the Blue Angels roared above Annapolis.

A Navy veteran who worked on planes years ago in Pensacola, Fla., Sykes said he has seen the high-performance flight group 30 or 40 times.

With the Blue Angels’ return to Annapolis, he and his family spent the afternoon watching the jets fly up and down the Severn River, crossing over surrounding neighborhoods and soaring high into the clouds.

“I just like them seeing them fly,” Sykes said, a USS Constellation hat atop his head and dark sunglasses covering his eyes.

Sykes was one of a number of veterans drawn to the area around the Naval Academy Bridge and World War II Memorial on Route 450 for the Blue Angels performance.

Some sat in chairs and relaxed, their children and grandchildren snapping photos and covering their ears. Others talked with family members and made friends with fellow onlookers.

Among the veterans at the war memorial was Francis Horner, who served with the Army in Vietnam from 1968 to 1969. While Horner spent much of the last 40 years living in Glen Burnie, he recently moved to Annapolis and decided to take in the Blue Angels show for the first time.

“I’ve been waiting to see this for years,” Horner said.
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Declaration of Independence, read publicly in Exeter in 1776 and 2014

Veterans shine at moving tribute
Seacoast Online
May 20, 2014

On Saturday evening New Hampshire Senators Kelly Ayotte and Jeanne Shaheen and New Hampshire Gov. Maggie Hassan, led the Pledge of Allegiance at the second annual Veteran's Count Salute Our Soldiers gala at Service Credit Union headquarters in Portsmouth.

But these political luminaries were not the stars of the night.

Through a feat of diplomacy, determination and security that simply boggles the mind, Julie Williams, director of the American Independence Museum in Exeter was able to wheel out, in a Colonial-style display case crafted for the event, the priceless Dunlap Broadside Declaration of Independence, read publicly in Exeter in 1776 by John Taylor Gilman.

The Declaration, along with original drafts of the U.S. Constitution, a Purple Heart awarded by George Washington, a Purple Heart awarded to Bill Schuler and a Congressional Medal of Honor awarded by Franklin Roosevelt to Harl Pease, will be on display at Service Credit Union, and may be viewed by the public free of charge, through May 29, from noon to 5 p.m. each day.

But these shining American treasures, however impressive, were not the stars of the night.

The stars, as keynote speakers Col. Danny McKnight ("Black Hawk Down") and Jim Webb (former U.S. senator and secretary of the Navy) noted very clearly, are America's military veterans who, from the dawn of our nation's history, have answered the highest calling to protect our sacred freedoms.

The cherished ideals contained in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution have been protected by the men and women of the military who have fought and sometimes made the ultimate sacrifice for Americans' life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.

Honored Saturday night were veterans from World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. There were parents whose sons and daughters are deployed to Afghanistan today and who know the mixture of pride and anxiety that comes from having someone you love putting themselves in harms way in service of our glorious country.
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Soccer field of dirt Army paid $1.1 million for?

In Baghdad, a $1.1M US-funded soccer field turns to dirt
The Washington Post
By Loveday Morris
Published: May 17, 2014

BAGHDAD — As the beating heat of the day gives way to night, the soccer fields of Sadr City swarm with young men partaking in what is no doubt Iraq's favorite sport.

The evening bustle in this cramped and impoverished Shiite neighborhood looks far different from the worst days of Iraq's sectarian violence, when some of these pitches were instead killing fields.

For Haider Jameel — janitor by day, soccer coach by evening — one of the patches of land, among a jumble of mechanic shops and scrap yards, has been a back yard for decades.

It went unused only during the grimmest periods of civil war, which peaked in 2006. The Mahdi Army, a Shiite militia loyal to Muqtada al-Sadr, the anti-U.S. cleric for whom the neighborhood is named, would use the area to stage attacks. Those the fighters kidnapped were often executed by a nearby dam.

But when the violence subsided, the Iraqi government and the United States began pumping in millions of dollars to clean up Sadr City. That's when the scrap was cleared to make Jameel's makeshift neighborhood pitch into a full-size soccer field.

The contractor who built the field — who did not want to be identified, out of fear for his safety — said he was paid $1.1 million for the job by the U.S. Army. But it's difficult to see where that money went, despite his assurances that the site was once in a better state of repair.

There are no lights, no bleachers, no showers. The boys who play here use a nearby shop to wash.

When it rains, the field floods and local residents chip in to buy new dirt to resurface it.
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Australia War widow touched by Kate's sympathy

War widow touched by Kate's sympathy
News Australia
24 HOURS AGO APRIL 20, 2014

WAR widow Nicole Pearce says her meeting with the Duchess of Cambridge was a surreal and privileged experience, but she desperately wishes it could have been under different circumstances.

It's been almost seven years since a roadside bomb claimed the life of her husband, Trooper David Pearce, just two weeks into a tour of Afghanistan.

Her daughters Stephanie and Hanna lost their father. She lost the man she loved, and, for too many years, any sense of a normal life.

Nothing can bring her 41-year-old husband back but the widow was touched by the duchess's heartfelt concern for her family.

Kate and Prince William spoke with four families who lost loved ones in Afghanistan and Iraq during their tour of Queensland's Amberley RAAF base on Saturday.

"She asked how long David had been in the military for and how long he'd been overseas when he was killed," Mrs Pearce told the Nine Network.

"She was sincerely quite sad for us to think David was only over there for two weeks when he was killed. She seemed very, very genuine and she was very sweet."

It was a bitter sweet occasion for the family.
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Iraqi boy became a US Marine serving in Japan

How one Iraqi boy dodged extremists and came to serve in the US military
Stars and Stripes
By Matthew M. Burke
Published: April 12, 2014

MARINE CORPS AIR STATION IWAKUNI, Japan — While his fellow Marine recruits cried and urinated in their trousers in the face of Parris Island’s tough-as-nails drill instructors, Pvt. Mansure had never been more thrilled.

A drill instructor barked at him to run.

“My pleasure,” he enthusiastically replied.

He was told to do pushups.

“I will do this all day long,” he recalled thinking. “I’m like, ‘This is awesome. I have a bed to sleep in, food; I get to work out all day.’”

Plus, he had been spared from the Islamic militants hunting him in his native Iraq. Mansure — whose name has been changed by Stars and Stripes due to safety concerns for his family in Iraq — was so happy to accept the physical and mental punishment that he got in trouble for not looking depressed enough, the Marine said last month from his duty station near Hiroshima in southeastern Japan, where he works in administration.

His story is similar to that of thousands of Iraqis who worked for U.S. forces following the 2003 invasion.

After U.S. forces pulled out in December 2011, many were left to dodge extremists looking to kill “traitors” who had worked for the American military while trying to navigate the bureaucratic process to get U.S. visas.

Mansure knows some didn’t make it. But his story has a happy ending. Now a private first class, the hulking 6-foot-3, 24-year-old is having a big impact on fellow Marines in Iwakuni, where he has been stationed for about three months.
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Memorial for fallen soldier vandalized, jerk won't be charged?

Man who painted 'war criminal' on veteran's memorial will not be charged
AJC.com
By Kevin McCarty
KIRO-TV - Seattle
April 10, 2014

RAINIER, Wash. — For people in this small Washington town, seeing a mural honoring a local man killed in Iraq vandalized for a second time is angering.

“I think it’s disgusting," said espresso drive through owner Glenda Guerra. “It’s angered a lot of people. It’s a shame and it’s almost a personal offense to us.”

The mural was painted on a concrete railroad trestle support honoring Army Sgt. Justin Norton, who died while deployed to Iraq in 2006. Someone spray painted the words "war criminal" across the mural in green florescent paint. The person or persons also painted over the word "hero" under Norton’s name.

Norton’s father Jeff, a Thurston County sheriff’s deputy, said the graffiti hurts his family. “Kind of a gut punch”, said Norton in a telephone interview. “We as a family are very proud of him, of Justin. And the community is really proud of him too.”
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U.S. casualties from OEF and OIF will be honored at Vietnam Wall

U.S. casualties from Afghanistan, Iraq will be honored at Vietnam Wall
The Washington Post
Michael E. Ruane
April 6, 2014

WASHINGTON — The first name that will be read at the ceremony on Memorial Day weekend is that of Evander Earl Andrews.

A small-town boy, he left his parents’ home in central Maine, joined the Air Force, and on Oct. 10, 2001, became the first military member reported killed in the post 9/11 wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

His mother, Mary, 71, said on Friday that she never thought his death would be followed by 6,700 more.

On May 24, Andrews’ name and the names of the others killed in the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will be read aloud chronologically for the first time in a tribute at the Vietnam Wall, according to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund.

The ceremony will open at 9 a.m. on the east knoll of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, and the reading will run from about 10 a.m. to about 5:40 p.m., the fund said.

Those interested can register to read names starting at 8 a.m. on April 14 at Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund. People will be asked to read 15 names at a time.

Did reporter use "race card" on Marine Rafael Peralta's story?

Fallen Marine Rafael Peralta’s family accuses reporter of playing ‘race card’
Supporters still press for Medal of Honor
Washington Times
Stephen Dinan
February 27, 2014

Ten years after a 2004 firefight in Iraq, Sgt. Rafael Peralta’s death continues to ignite controversy, with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel last week refusing to reopen his nomination for the Medal of Honor and the Marine’s family accusing a newspaper of race-baiting in its reporting on the standoff.

Peralta’s mother, Rosa, said in a letter this week that a reporter for The Washington Post seemed intent on trying to get her to say her son was denied the Medal of Honor because he was Hispanic.

Some Marines who were on duty with Peralta on Nov. 15, 2004, the day he and his squad were clearing houses in Fallujah, were stunned that their comrades were now saying the story that Peralta scooped a grenade to himself, saving a number of Marines’ lives, was a concocted lie.

“If you’re trying to smear the legacy of a Marine who’s a hero, who saved my life, then you’re barking up the wrong … tree,” said Nicholas Jones, one of the Marines in the room when insurgents tossed the grenade toward the troops.

Peralta received the Navy Cross for his actions, but his supporters — including Rep. Duncan Hunter, a California Republican who also served as a Marine officer in Fallujah during the Iraq War — say he deserves the Medal of Honor.
read more here

If you believe the DOD then ask yourself one question on this. Why would they have given him the Navy Cross for "falling" on a grenade or having it land near him?
Iraq veteran battles for fallen Marine to be honored

Comrades say Marine heroism tale of Iraq veteran was untrue

Sgt. Rafael Peralta will not receive Medal of Honor for saving lives

Did Sgt. Rafael Peralta's actions deserve MOH or not?

Video of Sgt. Rafael Peralta pulling grenade under his body being reviewed for Medal of Honor