A week ago today our FOB was nearly hit by rockets. Less than a click away rockets hit and killed non-American civilians. This made the news within hours, I suspect because civilians are not expected to keep silent. As well, the powers that be know American bloodshed is the real news getter and opinion maker/challenger in our country.
The next day one of two more rockets hit our FOB. One of our soldiers was seriously hurt and "woke up in Germany." I haven't seen a single note of the incident as it pertained to day two, our soldiers, or otherwise. We were placed in a "communication blackout" for 12 hours. There is of course good reason for this: notification of family and the elements who fired at us using the information for further attack. I know that as I write this the "perps" have been arrested and the family informed.
Recently while serving a rotation at 86th CSH in Baghdad I often saw soldiers come in the ER with severe combat related injuries, who survived, but the incident which caused their bloodshed did not make the news either.
I don't intend to blame the media in this case, if there is anyone to blame besides the "insurgency." My suspicions rest at the feet of our government, which is certainly in a convoluted state, and not necessarily in a state of permanent pure evil as many neo-conspiracy theorists portend. It only benefits the swing of past and current political momentum to make little known of incidents which require less obligation to release, like deaths to service members. Political positions are only silly putty no matter if you sit in the left of right wing of the building. I make no conclusion. I only state my curiosity.
Certainly, it has been reported that November '08 statistically had the lowest numbers for US bloodshed since '03. But for those of us in my company it was the bloodiest since we got here in June. Human perspective and statistical parallax.
No comments:
Post a Comment