The Voice Which Gives Them Their Orders
Military Resistance 12A4
WHEN IT COMES TO MARCHING MANY DO NOT
KNOW
That their enemy is marching at their head.
The voice which gives them their orders
Is their enemy’s voice and
The man who speaks of the enemy
Is the enemy himself.
[Bertolt Brecht]
From: A German War Primer
By Bertolt Brecht
THOSE WHO TAKE THE MEAT FROM THE TABLE
Teach contentment.
Those for whom the contribution is destined
Demand sacrifice.
Those who eat their fill speak to the hungry
Of wonderful times to come.
Those who lead the country into the abyss
Call ruling too difficult
For ordinary men.
WHEN THE LEADERS SPEAK OF PEACE
The common folk know
That war is coming.
When the leaders curse war
The mobilization order is already written out.
THOSE AT THE TOP SAY: PEACE
AND WAR
Are of different substance.
But their peace and their war
Are like wind and storm.
War grows from their peace
Like son from his mother
He bears
Her frightful features.
Their war kills
Whatever their peace
Has left over.
ON THE WALL WAS CHALKED:
They want war.
The man who wrote it
Has already fallen.
THOSE AT THE TOP SAY:
This way to glory.
Those down below say:
This way to the grave.
THE WAR WHICH IS COMING
Is not the first one. There were
Other wars before it.
When the last one came to an end
There were conquerors and conquered.
Among the conquered the common people
Starved. Among the conquerors
The common people starved too.
THOSE AT THE TOP SAY COMRADESHIP
Reigns in the army.
The truth of this is seen
In the cookhouse.
In their hearts should be
The selfsame courage. But
On their plates
Are two kinds of rations.
WHEN IT COMES TO MARCHING MANY DO NOT
KNOW
That their enemy is marching at their head.
The voice which gives them their orders
Is their enemy’s voice and
The man who speaks of the enemy
Is the enemy himself.
IT IS NIGHT
The married couples
Lie in their beds. The young women
Will bear orphans.
GENERAL, YOUR TANK IS A POWERFUL VEHICLE
It smashes down forests and crushes a hundred men.
But it has one defect:
It needs a driver.
General, your bomber is powerful.
It flies faster than a storm and carries more than an elephant.
But it has one defect:
It needs a mechanic.
General, man is very useful.
He can fly and he can kill.
But he has one defect:
He can think.
DO YOU HAVE A FRIEND OR RELATIVE IN THE MILITARY?
Forward Military Resistance along, or send us the email address if you wish and we’ll send it regularly with your best wishes. Whether in Afghanistan or at a base in the USA, this is extra important for your service friend, too often cut off from access to encouraging news of growing resistance to injustices, inside the armed services and at home. Send email requests to address up top or write to: Military Resistance, Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657.
AFGHANISTAN WAR REPORTS
Foreign Soldier Killed By Attack OnShinwar Base:
Nationality Not Announced
1.4.14 AFP
Six Taliban attackers launched an assault on a joint Afghan-U.S. base in the east of Afghanistan on Saturday, killing one soldier during a prolonged firefight, officials said.
One attacker in an explosives-packed vehicle blew himself up at the entrance of the base in Nangarhar province, and five other insurgents were shot as they tried to storm the facility.
Afghan and Western officials said the attack took place in Shinwar district, a volatile area on the main highway from Kabul to neighbouring Pakistan, where many Taliban insurgents seek shelter.
In an emailed statement to the media, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for the attack.
Soldier With St. Louis Ties Among Six Killed In Helicopter Crash In Afghanistan
Joshua B. Silverman (Photo courtesy of the St. Louis Jewish Light)
December 20, 2013Stltoday
ST. LOUIS • A soldier with ties to St. Louis was among six men killed Tuesday in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan, officials say.
Joshua B. Silverman, 35, an Army chief warrant officer who had attended Parkway Central High School, died from his injuries. The Black Hawk UH-60 helicopter went down during a mission in the country’s Zabul Province. The crash is still being investigated.
Silverman was based at Fort Riley, Kan., but lived in Scottsdale, Ariz. He was a 1990 graduate of the former Solomon Schechter Day School, friends said at a prayer service Friday morning.
Scott Lefton, 36, went to junior high and high school with Silverman. When Silverman’s parents moved to Scottsdale, Silverman wanted to stay in St. Louis and finish out the year at Parkway Central. So he moved in with Lefton’s family.
“It was like I had a brother,” Lefton said. “We were best friends.”
Lefton said Silverman had been well-liked and unique.
“He had a thousand hobbies, he was always on the move,” Lefton said. “He was a magician, he ate fire. He played the guitar and loved music. He was in the Civil Air Patrol.”
“How many 16-year-old kids say, ‘Sign me up for the civil air patrol?’ Josh loved aviation.”
Silverman’s parents are Barry and Susie Silverman, who now live in Aurora, Colo. They had lived in Chesterfield before moving to Arizona when Josh was in high school.
The Silvermans had a daughter too, but she died of cancer at the age of 15, said Carol Rubin, director of Jewish Life at the Saul Mirowitz Jewish Community School in Town and Country. The school was formed when the Schechter Day School merged with the Saul Mirowitz Day School-Reform Jewish Academy.
Rubin spoke at a prayer service Friday morning. It was attended by about 70 people and ended in front of the Jewish community school on North Mason Road where they put the American flag at half staff.
“Remind us that we honor Josh by remembering the gifts of his life and incorporating into our lives his passions of country, family and faith,” she said.
Including Silverman, five of the soldiers killed in the helicopter crash were based at Fort Riley. The others were:
Chief Warrant Officer 2 Randy L. Billings, 34, of Heavener, Okla.
Sgt. Peter C. Bohler, 29, of Willow Spring, N.C.
Sgt. 1st Class Omar W. Forde, 28, of Marietta, Ga.
Spc. Terry K.D. Gordon, 22, of Shubuta, Miss.
The sixth soldier, based in Vilseck, Germany, was identified as Staff Sgt. Jesse L. Williams, 30, of Elkhart, Ind.
Fort Riley confirmed that a seventh soldier was injured in the crash, although officials there said they could not release a name because of privacy reasons.
Military officials said that the crash was under investigation and that they didn’t know if the helicopter had a mechanical failure or was shot down.
The deaths make it one of the bloodiest casualty incidents in either the Iraq or Afghanistan wars. In 2011, six soldiers from a Fort Riley artillery battalion were killed in Baghdad. Five combat engineers were killed in 2004 when a bomb exploded beneath their armored personnel carrier in Malahma, in Iraq’s Sunni Triangle.
POLITICIANS REFUSE TO HALT THE BLOODSHED
THE TROOPS HAVE THE POWER TO STOP THE WAR
“The Situation Is Pretty Bad”
“Reality In Helmand Shows The Limits Of Government Control”
“Insurgents Are Moving Openly In The Bazaars” And“Move Freely In Many Parts Of The Province”
“Afghan Army Officers Cutting Deals With TalibanInsurgent Commanders Not To Shoot At Checkpoints”
“Taliban Commanders Even Accompanied Army Forces On A Patrol In The Main Bazaar In Sangin”
Jan. 2, 2014 By Michael M. Phillips in Sangin, Afghanistan, and Nathan Hodge in Kabul; Wall Street Journal [Excerpts]
SANGIN, Afghanistan—
After months of hard fighting, Afghan security forces have come out on top in a key province that for years cost the U.S. and its allies dearly.
Helmand province, in the country’s south, was once a major focus of American troops, an area thick with insurgents and the opium poppies that finance them.
Helmand province looks to be a critical testing ground for how well that transition could proceed in the rest of Afghanistan.
Masses of Taliban foot soldiers attacked this spring and summer in a bid to take over Sangin district; government forces turned them back. Mohammad Rasoul Barakzai, the acting Sangin district governor, describes the year-end situation as “calm,” with only intermittent Taliban attacks.
But the reality in Helmand also shows the limits of government control.
Insurgent fighters move freely in many parts of the province. They continue to mount headline-grabbing attacks, contributing to perceptions of instability.
The Afghan military still struggles with some basic elements of warfare, including evacuation of casualties and resupply of vital materiel, U.S. and Afghan military officials say. In one incident, Afghan units desperate for truck batteries received steering wheels from Kabul instead, a U.S. military official says.
Afghan Army Maj. Gen. Afzal Aman, the chief of operations at Afghanistan’s defense ministry, acknowledges the Afghan dependence on the 49-nation coalition for logistics and intelligence support.
And some junior Afghan military officers in Sangin were recently relieved of command for striking local nonaggression pacts with their insurgent enemies, district officials and residents say.
Few places in Afghanistan illustrate the perils and potential for Afghan security as well as Sangin district—and the town of the same name—which sits astride the Helmand River and farm fields that feed off its waters.
The district, of roughly 50,000 people, has long been a center of opium-poppy processing, and the conflict between the government and insurgents here has been enmeshed with a complex web of rival tribes and drug gangs.
There are plenty of caveats in Helmand. Militant attacks continue in some areas, says one official in the province. “The situation is pretty bad,” the official says. “The insurgents are assassinating people inside government-held territory. The insurgents are moving openly in the bazaars.”
Mr. Barakzai, the Sangin district governor who calls the situation “calm,” acknowledges a recent setback: low-ranking Afghan army officers cutting deals with the Taliban, negotiating with insurgent commanders not to shoot at checkpoints.
In one instance, Mr. Barakzai says, Taliban commanders even accompanied army forces on a patrol in the main bazaar in Sangin.
“This was a mistake committed by two (Afghan army) commanders on the platoon level,” he says. The two officers, Mr. Barakzai says, were relieved of command and are under investigation.
U.S. officers with long experience in Sangin know that amid such uncertainty, military gains can prove fragile.
“Sangin is still violent,” says one Marine special-operations captain with three Helmand tours under his belt. “It will always be a violent place. But it’s nowhere near what it used to be.”
Resistance Action
[Graphic: flickr.com/photos]
Jan 04 2014Khaama Press
An attack was reported in eastern Ghazni province of Afghanistan on Saturday afternoon, leaving an Afghan Local Police (ALP) commander dead.
Local residents and eyewitnesses in the area said that the blast took place in Ghazni city, after a bomber detonated a vehicle packed with explosives.
In the meantime, deputy provincial governor, Mohammad Ali Ahmadi, said the bomber attacked the vehicle of an Afghan Local Police (ALP) commander, Shaheen who was involved in public uprising against the Taliban militants in Andar district.
Mr. Ahmadi further added that the ALP commander was critically injured along with one of his bodyguard in the blast, who later succumbed to his injuries.
*************************************************
No casualties were following two separate explosion rocked capital Kabul late Saturday evening.
The first blast took place in Kart-e-Naw area of Kabul city, following a roadside bomb explosion.
An interior ministry official said no casualties were reported in the first blast which took place near the 8th district police.
The second explosion place in Zanbaq square of Kabul city, close to a coalition forces military base, around 7:45 pm local time.
The nature of the explosion is not clear so far. In the meantime, a security official in capital Kabul who requested not to be named said, the blast took place as a result of a magnetic bomb, and a convoy of the coalition forces was targeted.
The source further added that no casualties were reported following the blast.
Eyewitnesses in the area said the blast took place as a result of a magnetic bomb near the entrance gate of the coalition security forces military base.
IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE RESISTANCE
STOP THE OCCUPATION
Seduced And Abandoned:
U.S. Government Turning Back On Afghan Collaborators;
“A Special Review Committee At The U.S. Embassy In Kabul Has Been Denying Visa Applications On The Dubious Grounds That The Applicants Face No Serious Threat”
Dec 30, 2013By the Editors, Bloomberg [Excerpts]
As the U.S. plans to withdraw troops from Afghanistan in 2014, no man or woman should be left behind. This includes the Afghan interpreters who have guided Western forces through hostile terrain for the last 12 years and now feel their lives are in jeopardy.
Unfortunately, the State Department is rejecting or sitting on a growing number of their visa applications.
Officials who arbitrarily decide that these allies face no undue risk should take a hard look beyond the gates of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul. The visa process needs to be streamlined.
Interpreters are essential guides for U.S. commanders, especially in Afghanistan, a foot soldier’s war in a deviously opaque and complex tribal society. It is virtually impossible for them to remain anonymous: Even if they wear disguises and adopt phony American names, they are often working in their home villages or regions, where close familial and tribal ties betray anonymity.
Reprisals are inevitable: By 2010, more than 360 Iraqi and Afghan interpreters had already died while working as translators for U.S. and allied forces, according to an 18-month investigation by ProPublica and the Los Angeles Times.
This death toll exceeded the military losses in either war of any nation other than the U.S.
The Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project, a legal advocacy group that assists Iraqi and Afghan refugees, recently created a page on Facebook offering legal representation to Afghan interpreters seeking visas; in one week, it received more than 100 desperate replies.
This problem should not exist: Since passing the Afghan Allies Protection Act in 2009, Congress has allocated more than 8,700 special immigrant visas and outlined expedited procedures for granting them in cases where lives are threatened.
Yet as of November, the government had approved fewer than 1,700 of them, leaving a backlog of some 5,000. (The State Department refuses to verify exact numbers, and the Defense Department can’t even say how many interpreters it has used because almost all were hired by civilian contractors who have not maintained reliable databases.)
What is causing the bottleneck? A special review committee at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul has been denying visa applications on the dubious grounds that the applicants face no serious threat.
TROOPS INVITED:
Comments, arguments, articles, and letters from service men and women, and veterans, are especially welcome. Write to Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657 or email : Name, I.D., withheld unless you request publication. Same address to unsubscribe.
MILITARY RESISTANCE BY EMAIL
If you wish to receive Military Resistance immediately and directly, send request to . There is no subscription charge.
MILITARY NEWS
Insurgents Blow Up Gas Pipelines Near Damascus International Airport “Cutting Electricity Supplies Around The Capital And In Mediterranean Provinces”
Smoke rises after explosions at gas pipelines near Damascus international airport, in Erbeen, Damascus January 3, 2014. Explosions hit two large Syrian gas pipelines on Friday near Damascus and the central city of Homs, cutting electricity supplies around the capital and in Mediterranean provinces, officials and activists said. Picture taken January 3, 2014. REUTERS/Diaa Al-Din
Iraq War Vet Makes Colorado’s First Pot Purchase:
He “Has Publicly Lobbied For Legalization And Says Pot Helps Mitigate Problems Stemming From His Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome”
Sean Azzariti, a former Marine who served in the Iraq war and has post-traumatic stress disorder, shakes hands and thanks store owner Toni Fox, after Azzariti was the first to buy retail marijuana at 3D Cannabis Center, which opened Wednesday as a legal recreational retail outlet in Denver. (Brennan Linsley / AP)
Jan. 2, 2014By John Bacon, USA Today [Excerpts]
The new year got a little happier for pot smokers in Colorado on Wednesday as the nation’s first retail outlets for recreational marijuana opened their doors.
“Marijuana does not have to be a burden to our communities,” said Betty Aldworth, deputy director of the National Cannabis Industry Association. “Today in Colorado we shift marijuana from the underground into a regulated market.”
The first sale, orchestrated as a media photo opportunity, was made to Sean Azzariti, an Iraq War veteran who has publicly lobbied for legalization and says pot helps mitigate problems stemming from his post-traumatic stress syndrome. Azzariti, who served six years in the Marine Corps and two tours in Iraq, doled out about $60 at 3D Cannabis Center for an eighth of an ounce of “Bubba Kush” and a pot-laden truffle.