Before I get to the meat of this next post, I'd like to know why none of my "follow" buttons are working. So far, I've been able to add "Hyperbole and a Half" to the list of blogs I'm following, which is good if I want to be known exclusively as a fan of absurdist humor and deranged artwork (not that there's anything wrong with that). But whenever I try to follow any of the other blogs I check out, the "Follow" button mysteriously doesn't work. If you have any idea what could be wrong, leave a comment or email me, or whatever it takes to get in touch and fix what ails me.
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The tentative title for this blog (and the video embedded below) is "In Which the Rambo In All of Us Dies...")
"...And Is Replaced By a Suddenly Born-Again Christian Who Realizes The Enemy Could End His Life Suddenly And Painfully. Or Capture Him and Torture Him Slowly And Painfully." I stress the "born-again Christian" part because any atheists in those foxholes are going to start crying out to whichever gods they think will save them.
For those of you who happen to have slow Internet connections, I'll give you a quick synopsis of the video: Big boom. Praying ensues. Big boom. Crying ensues. Another big boom. Praying and crying ensues.
Too short? Okay.
The video is a two-minute excerpt filmed in the middle of combat against an enemy bombarding the Marines' position, which is indoors and could be as small as a house or as big as a military installation. Our noble camera guy is at ground-level, lying down with the soldiers the entire time, so all we see is daylight coming from the door and one or two of his buddies lying stomach-first on the floor.
It begins with one of the personnel, possibly higher-ranking and definitely more collected than his comrades, taking a moment to assess the situation. At least two of them are already starting to break, with one of them praying for the enemy bombardments to miss, or for the enemy to simply give up (as they say, desperate times call for desperate measures). By the minute mark, the other Marine is going hysterical as the bomardments strike closer and closer to their position. By a minute-thirty, Marine #2 has lost any semblance of composure. How this particular skirmish ends is anyone's guess, but the video ends with their in-uniform reverend begging, "Please Lord, help us be okay..."
At the least, this is a nice reminder of the kind of hell war really is. Really, the fact that this is what you might consider an urban skirmish (depending on where this is located) is a nice reminder that terrorists are willing to bring the war to us...or at least, bring the war to those who are willing to die for our freedoms.
"This is what will happen if you don't finish your highschool kids. You'll be sent as cannon fodder to die for the big corps."
The poster of the video is one Jubathe2nd, whose heart seems to be in the right place, but you almost get the sense that he's poking fun at the Marines who are literally pissing themselves at the prospect of getting blown up and buried in a pile of what was probably once their hideout. For those of us who aren't sociopaths, that's really not cool.
He seems to be hinting at the possibility of an all-out military draft, as if to ask, "Would this be your kid in a combat zone?" As one of the commenters mentions, though, you have to graduate from high school before you can even serve in the military, at which point Juba Jr.'s analogy falls apart. I imagine the military could lower their education standards in the case of a draft, but like many of us "dumbed down" Americans, I imagine a full-blown draft as the worst-case scenario, and really don't see it happening in the foreseeable future.
However, what exactly does one's education have to do with one's likelihood to break down and start crying at the prospect of getting blown up, or one's general fear of falling in battle to some terrorist guerrillas with building-busting guns? Yes, I imagine those with a higher education would have the general intelligence to maintain a military operation and succeed in certain, sticky situations where "stupid" people like the Marines featured above might fail, but when it comes to a situation like the kind they had to face, something as mundane as one's education really ceases to be a factor.
To summarize, yes, I understand that a video of our own Marines crying looks bad. Yes, we could afford to have soldiers who are more emotionally stable. And yes, war is a scary, scary thing, and "emotionally stable" goes out the window once you're facing an enemy who has opted to try and blow you the fuck up.
And yes, I think the poster of this video is a sick, sick person. Especially if he feels how I think he feels about the one Marine who is taking the moment to talk to God.
"People should know that US foreign policy is based on how to best protect and increase American interest around the world. In order for it to do so, they use the patriot/ free/ protect America from terrorists/ maintaining freedom card . It is nothing more than using Euphemisms for waging war."
Oh, good, it looks like I'm done writing tonight.
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Note: What you mean the video is from three years ago? Don't tell The Brewsky how to do his job. You'll make him mad, and you won't like him when he gets mad...
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