The Private Jessica Lynch

[thedrifter]

The Private Jessica Lynch


Spend some time visiting with her, and you'll discover not only what really happened in Iraq but who her heroes are, what haunts her and how she plans to find her way back to normal

Posted Sunday, November 9, 2003
Forty steps. Each one is a gamble: lift, lunge, tilt, then land with a stab of the foot she can't feel. The soldier who came out of Iraq on a stretcher and back to the States in a wheelchair can now, seven months later, take 40 steps by herself. Each one is a victory.

It's getting dark and cold in this part of West Virginia. But here in rehab the lights are bright and Jessica Lynch is in shorts, a baggy T shirt and sneakers from Wal-Mart that are a half size too big, to make room for the brace that keeps her left foot from dragging.

"Good, Jessi, that's good." Physical therapist Burt Reed seems about twice her size as he holds her steady, so she can practice walking forward and backward between the padded tables and weight machines. For just a moment, you can imagine they are dancing. And then the time comes when Reed steps back and she's on her own, as if she's walking a wide tightrope, careful, dangerous. "Good, Jessi"— her hands are fists, her jaw is set—"keep going," and you sense she is counting the steps under her breath.

Amid the jagged scars all over her body, there is a neat line of six holes from left knee to ankle, like vicious bites, where the rods of the external fixator held the bones in place for the first two months after her legs were broken.

That came off June 26, she recalls. Lynch has a crisp memory for dates; how long she was in which hospital, which day she made which breakthrough—everything except for the first, darkest moments of her captivity. Of those, she says she has no recollection. Otherwise she is organized, thorough, precise. Perfect qualities for a supply clerk. And she is pale, skinny, with thin, straight legs that look as if they would be easy to snap. Hardly ideal for surviving the most deadly ambush of the war: 11 of the 33 soldiers with her died that day, seven were captured, nine wounded. She's the only one in her wrecked humvee who survived.

Lynch joined the Army when she was 18 because she wanted to see the world. Now it seems as though the whole world wants to see her, hear the truth about what happened to her and in the process confirm their instincts about the war: what went right, what went wrong, what it means. They will have their chance this week with the publication of Rick Bragg's spare, wrenching account of her life and her war. Diane Sawyer went down to Palestine to see her; this week Lynch will visit New York City for the first time, make the rounds, do Letterman and learn whether the toughness she has shown to make it this far will protect her now.

It is a fearsome thing to be turned into an icon, draped with powers and meanings of other people's choosing. To the thousands who wrote letters, sent teddy bears and flowers and handmade quilts, to the millions who prayed for her safety, Lynch is an archetypal American soldier, a symbol of courage under fire. As the challenge in Iraq grows, as the nightly body count reminds us of the terrible risks the soldiers face, people want to show they care: Lynch's is the name they know, and so the letters keep pouring in, and old women press notes scribbled on napkins into her hands when she goes to the mall: "Thank you for your service."

But to others she is useful as a symbol of something else. The news of her rescue, complete with the spooky green night-video footage, came at just the moment when the nation was hungry for good news out of a hard war. "She was fighting to the death," an anonymous source told the Washington Post, in an account of her capture and dramatic rescue that seemed more like a movie pitch than a news story. "She did not want to be taken alive." It was all so well timed, such an emotional turning point, that questions began to rise: How had her unit got lost in the first place? Had she actually fired her weapon or been shot herself? Was it was really such a daring rescue if there was no one guarding her anymore by the time the commandos whisked her out? Before long, she had become a symbol for war critics of many of their complaints: bad information and worse planning; soldiers insufficiently trained or ill equipped for the mission they confronted; a Pentagon willing to stretch the truth to boost morale. One BBC report dismissed the rescue operation as "one of the most stunning pieces of news management ever conceived." And so the uncertainty fluttered around her: Was she a hero, or a pawn?

But to others she is useful as a symbol of something else. The news of her rescue, complete with the spooky green night-video footage, came at just the moment when the nation was hungry for good news out of a hard war. "She was fighting to the death," an anonymous source told the Washington Post, in an account of her capture and dramatic rescue that seemed more like a movie pitch than a news story. "She did not want to be taken alive." It was all so well timed, such an emotional turning point, that questions began to rise: How had her unit got lost in the first place? Had she actually fired her weapon or been shot herself? Was it was really such a daring rescue if there was no one guarding her anymore by the time the commandos whisked her out? Before long, she had become a symbol for war critics of many of their complaints: bad information and worse planning; soldiers insufficiently trained or ill equipped for the mission they confronted; a Pentagon willing to stretch the truth to boost morale. One bbc report dismissed the rescue operation as "one of the most stunning pieces of news management ever conceived." And so the uncertainty fluttered around her: Was she a hero, or a pawn?

However many people are bothered by that question, Jessica Lynch is not among them. She knows she spent nine days in an Iraqi hospital with 10 broken bones, unable to move and leaking blood—and she has only praise for the Army and the soldiers who saved her. "The whole idea that the rescue was staged or the soldiers were shooting blanks, that's just obvious stuff," she says. "Why would you do that in the middle of a war? It's just crazy." She never claimed to have mowed down the attacking Iraqis; she never had the chance—her sand-clogged rifle wouldn't fire. She never said she'd been shot or stabbed, as early reports suggested; it was the doctors in Landstuhl, Germany, who broke the news to her about the full extent of her injuries: the multiple fractures of arm and legs, the spinal damage that robbed her of control of her bowels and bladder—and the trauma that could not be explained by the humvee crash. Sometime after the crash and before she was delivered to Nasiriyah hospital—a time period that could have been as long as three hours—she appeared to have been forcibly penetrated by someone or something: "The exam in Landstuhl," Dr. Greg Argyros, her primary doctor during her 100 days at Walter Reed Medical Center, told TIME, "indicated that the injuries were consistent with possible anal sexual assault."

The Iraqi doctor who saved her life that first day with emergency surgery and blood transfusions, told the Associated Press that during his exam he saw no such evidence. Lynch says she has no memory of what happened immediately after the crash. That's not surprising, Argyros says, because "she was so unbelievably sick and probably in shock for most of the time in the Iraqi hospital."

She does not call herself a hero, because the word hurts too much when so many died, and her best friend's body was pulled out of a shallow grave on the hospital grounds by the same commandos who rescued her. That friend, Lori Piestewa, is her hero, for staying so calm under fire, as are the soldiers who fought bravely all around her. She herself did not fire a shot and spent most of her time in the humvee huddled in a protective ball. Ask Lynch what she would like to symbolize, and there is a long, long pause. "I haven't really thought about that," she says, even if everyone else has. "I guess," she says, searching for the meaning of her story as the soldier recedes and the aspiring kindergarten teacher emerges. "I could be, you know, the person that shows little kids that giving up isn't something that you should do."

Lynch is too intent on moving forward to spend a lot of time looking back. She has read Bragg's book but says she skipped the parts that were too hard to relive, the things that made her parents cry. Ever since she was a child, both her parents say, she was strong minded, determined; that tenacity, so crucial to her physical recovery, may also be what saves her from being crushed by the attention that now surrounds her. "When it's all over," says her father Greg Lynch, "she'll just be an old country girl"—the label a shorthand for the virtues that matter, like kindness and toughness. For all the attention, all the books and banners and presents and parades, her parents understand that Jessica Lynch had become a convenient shorthand for this war, its first name and memorable face. "But there's other soldiers with names and faces and families just like us," says her mother Dee. "I hope people don't forget. They need just as much prayer and support as us. This is not just about Jessi—it's about all the soldiers."

continued.....

[thedrifter]

He talked about the travel, and the training they would get. This was the summer of 2001, before there was even a whisper of war in the air. But "he did not lie to the kids," Dee Lynch says. He said there was always the possibility of war in the future. "But at that time it was before Sept. 11, and there was no terrorism," Jessica recalls, "so we were like, 'That would never happen to me.'"

For someone who loved the idea of traveling, wanted to go to college and believed deeply in duty and service, the Army was a natural choice: and yet pretty much everyone, her classmates, her family, were surprised that Jessica would join up along with Greg. She was, Dee says, "a prissy tomboy, if there is such a thing," the girl for whom, even when she was out playing on the hillside, "her socks and hair bows had to match." In third grade when she broke her arm, the doctor gave her a pink cast, and she went out and got new pink shoelaces for her sneakers. She figures she could have found a job somewhere near home, "but that wasn't me," Jessica says. "I wanted to improve my life and not just be there in Palestine forever. I wanted to get out and do something."

She left for basic training on Sept. 19, 2001, barely a week after the terrorist attacks; she wound up in Texas at Fort Bliss, where she made about $1,100-a-month as a supply clerk, keeping records, ordering toilet paper. She thought it would be good business experience and steady, safe."They told me I'd never probably see the front-line area," she says. It was at Fort Bliss that Lynch found her soulmates: her boyfriend Ruben Contreras and her roommate Lori Piestewa, best friend and protector. Lori was a Hopi Indian, the single mother of two. "We were completely opposite people—two different worlds it seemed like we came from," Lynch says. "But we clicked. She was like my sister, the big sister that I never had."

In January they heard they would be shipping out to Iraq. "Of course I had a mother's sick feeling when I heard the word deployment," Dee says. "But I thought, Oh, she's in supply, she'll be safe, she'll never be close to any actual fighting. I trusted her unit, trusted the Army that she got the proper training." Jessica even had a special advantage. She had grown up with her dad's Kenworth cab-over truck in the front yard; he gets a $1 a mile driving anywhere from Florida to Connecticut. Now she would be the one steering five-ton trucks full of supplies to the front. "It's always in the back of your mind that something can happen," says Greg Lynch. "You wonder, Is the equipment ready? Have they trained enough? I don't know." He knows all the things that can go wrong even under the best circumstances. "They trained with those trucks on cement. Bases don't have sand, and they don't have sand like over there. You put one of those machines in sand for eight, 10 hours. That's when you see what you really got."

What they got, in Jessica Lynch's case, was not just one bad break but one after another in the first days of the war. The battle plan didn't allow for engines ambushed by sand. And judgment and reflexes are not sharpened by three days with no sleep. "To me, we weren't ready," Lynch says. "But obviously they wouldn't have sent us over there if they didn't think we were ready." The 507th Maintenance Company was at the very end of an 8,000-vehicle, 100-mile-long supply convoy. From the start, Lynch says, "it just didn't feel right. It really kicked in once we got into Iraq."

Because it was a support unit, the 507th was equipped for duty behind the front lines—except that the front turned out to be beside and behind and all around them. There were no antitank weapons, no heavy artillery, just a .50-cal. machine gun that—like the soldier's M-16 rifles—didn't work too well, clogged and jammed with three days' worth of blowing sand. By the time her lost convoy came under fire in the streets of Nasiriyah, Lynch's rifle was about as much use as a hockey stick. Their instructions had been to clean their weapons "anytime we got the chance," Lynch says, "but we never really had a chance."

Her unit, says the official Army report on what happened, "found itself in a desperate situation due to a navigational error caused by the combined effects of the operational pace, acute fatigue, isolation and the harsh environmental conditions. The tragic results of this error placed the soldiers of the 507th Maintenance Company in a torrent of fire." During the roughly 11 1/2-hour-long fire fight that they endured, the report concludes, "every soldier performed honorably and did his or her duty."

As for how that battle and Lynch's cameo in it turned into a breathless movie script, that was less a conscious public relations ploy, Pentagon officials say, than "a comedy of errors." According to several officials, a "single-source intelligence report, nonconfirmed," surfaced detailing the 507th's battle, just about the time Lynch was rescued. "It said that our people who ran were killed, and those who put up resistance were captured, and that there was a female who fought to her last breath," a senior Pentagon official said. "It was like a five-line report that wasn't grounded in anything, but it got distributed anyway—and someone exaggerated what it said. It was somebody grasping at straws, someone who was on the periphery and not knowing really what was going on." And that someone guessed that the female in question must have been Jessica Lynch and told the Washington Post. "I think," another senior military official admits, "it was the Army looking for a hero."

You turn down a road that is made, at best, for two skinny cars, to get to her house in the hollow. Greg Lynch grew up half a mile from here, in the house his great-grandmother lived in. He picked out the spot for his own future home when he was 11 years old. "We raised three kids in four rooms, and we were happy and content," Dee says, "but with Jessi's disability, we just knew there was no way." When they learned their daughter was alive but in a pretty broken state, they debated what they were going to do when she came home. "We talked about building her a room downstairs, with a bathroom," Dee says. There were neighbors over at the house, as there always were during those hard days, and they asked if they could help. Next thing the Lynches knew, a team of friends had set to work on the house, as the family headed to Germany on a Heinz corporation jet ("It was my first experience of flying," Dee says, "and it was like a Cadillac!").

Their joy at Jessica's survival smacked headlong into her actual condition. When her parents first saw her in the intensive-care unit in Landstuhl, "we didn't know where we could touch her," Dee recalls. "She's this tiny thing in this big bed, and the first thing I saw was the bag of blood. Then you really know it was serious." The front of her head was shaved, because of a laceration; the perfect bangs were gone. "It was so sad," Dee remembers. She had brought her camcorder—and never took it out of its case. These weren't memories to save. "But we held her hand and kissed her, and she looked up and said, "Hi, Mommy. You made it."

As the doctors briefed them on Jessica's prognosis, they realized they would be taking one day at a time. "I thought, O.K., she's here, she's alive," Dee says. "We'll deal with the rest as we go." Jessi hadn't eaten in days. "She really wanted hot, real mashed potatoes, not those instant ones, and turkey gravy," Dee says. Jessica's memory of those days is more hazy. "I think the whole ordeal was just a terrible thing to happen to anyone," Jessi says. And of the missing three hours she is vague but matter-of-fact. "Since I don't know what happened, I was unconscious through that whole thing, it's like reading a book that really wasn't about me."

She had no idea that during the nine days of her captivity, and then with her rescue, her name and face had been beamed all around the world. She had no idea that the rescue video had been released by the Pentagon. "I didn't think that anyone out there even knew I existed, let alone write me a letter," she says. "I was asking my mom, 'Did I make the hometown Journal?' She was like, 'Yeah, you made it, plus all these world papers.'"

Jessica came home from Iraq via Germany and Walter Reed Medical Center. "It took six of us to move her from the bed to the gurney the first day," her father says. "A week later, it was five. A week after that, it was four. Then she had two crutches. Now she has one. She always did have high spirits. She could always make you laugh." Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld came to see her. "That was rewarding," Greg says. "Not every day that you meet the big boys." The President hasn't called, but Jessica would never expect him to. "He's got a job to do," her father says.

It was at Walter Reed that the Lynches saw for themselves that Jessica is only the most famous of a new breed: the returning soldier who in other wars at other times might have never made it home, given the extent of their injuries, but have survived thanks to better armor, better technology, better battlefield medicine. "You would not believe the number of amputees at Walter Reed," Dee says. "But you would talk to them, and they're just like Jessi. They weren't whining about their problems. They were worried about their fellow soldiers, and they were grateful to be out of there and alive."

continued......

[thedrifter]

During her 100 days there, Bragg first met with Jessica and carefully, gently began to interview her for the book, which he would complete in four months. "The first day I met her, I felt guilty," he says. "She looked awful. It was like she was translucent, like you could see right through her. She was hurting. I didn't want to ask her questions as to how she got that way." Bragg is a Pulitzer prizewinning journalist and author who resigned last May from the New York Times after criticism that he had failed to credit a free-lancer with helping report an article.

Over time Jessica was more able to talk about what she remembered. Bragg chose not to report the story from Iraq; given his deadline, he says, there was not time. The story is told from the whole family's point of view, both what they remember and what the medical records revealed. It was the parents, he said, who felt that the details of her condition and of the sexual assault needed to be in the book, "because if we didn't put it in, the story wouldn't be compete," Bragg says. "It would be a lie."

Lynch finally got home to West Virginia to find her valley decorated with ribbons and flags and prayers for her safety. thank you god 4 saving jessica says the spray-painted banner on the side of the converted barn at the entrance to town. The neighbors had moved, if not heaven, then a lot of earth, to get the house ready for her when she came home. They had scraped mountains of dirt off the nearest ridge to level the front yard and spread it with crunchy new gravel, widened the porches, replaced the narrow doors with double French ones, built a wheelchair ramp and accessible bedroom and bathroom, a new kitchen. There are six American flags hanging from the porch, and a white flag with two red stars that a man from the vfw dropped by, to show that the family had two children in the service. Lori's belongings are in a bedroom upstairs; she and Jessica had stored their possessions together under Lynch's name when they left Fort Bliss, and so the Army shipped it all to Palestine. There will come a day soon when Lynch will have to sort through her best friend's things.

The house may have changed, but other things hadn't. The Lynches made sure sister Brandi got to go to her high school prom, even amid all the commotion. Brandi enlisted in the Army and was supposed to report on Aug. 19. "But Jessi said, 'Don't go,'" Dee says. "And of course Brandi's going to do what she wants." It wasn't easy explaining to her little nieces why Jessica couldn't get down and play under the table with them anymore. "We take it for granted that we can get out of bed, stroll to the kitchen, without a thought," Reed, the physical therapist, says. "Everything Jessi does is a challenge. She has to climb those mountains every day."

Now Lynch spends at least 11.5 hours every day at Mountain River Physical Therapy because the doctors at Walter Reed told her she has a two-year window; after that, what hasn't healed probably won't. Her right hand was useless when she got to Walter Reed; she couldn't so much as brush her teeth or comb her hair. Now she has full use back. She has not recovered control over her bowels and bladder. "Certainly the longer it goes the less likely it is that you're going to recover function, but nothing is impossible," says Argyros.

"Anatomically, the nerves are intact—there's not a spinal-cord injury that would allow us to say this is never coming back." Perhaps the foot will recover as the hand did—but that's a harder fight. She still takes half a dozen pills a day, to help her nerves mend and for pain as needed. "She's going to have a good life just the way she is, but it's not going to be easy," Reed says. "The fight's not over yet."

As for the emotional trauma, Jessi talked with the "repatriation team" in Germany and psychologists there and at Walter Reed. She's not seeing any counselors now, Dee says, but "she knows that it's there for her if she needs it." Dee herself admits to a certain amount of hiding. Asked about her daughter's trauma, she says, "That's another one of those things I just want to shut out of my mind and not think about. And I know that sounds like a coward, but it's just a mom thing. Who do you get angry at? What's anger going to do? We just focus on her. She's alive, she's getting better."

The whole family is working at returning to a place they can call normal: after the interviews are over and the phone quiets down, they will have a chance to write the next chapter. It is something of a relief that people are starting to take the signs and banners down; the one over the courthouse was delivered to the Lynches as a souvenir, blue with yellow ribbons, proclaiming jessi is found. praise the lord. remember our remaining troops. Greg Jr. is still on active duty, and they view his deployment as inevitable. "He'll get his part in all of this," his father says. "You don't like it, but he's got a job to do. Every day we pray that this war will be over." But that doesn't mean he thinks it was a mistake. "People always ask us if we think we went in too quick," he says. "If we hadn't gone in over there, they would have been over here next."

As for Jessica, she still wants to travel (she wants to see Hawaii, she says, and Jamaica ...), go to college, still wants to teach, but only after she has come further in physical therapy and can hope to keep up with the kindergartners. "It's time," she says, sitting on the stationary bike, gritting her teeth. "It just ... takes ... time." She has that now, and other advantages as well. "She is a good kid, and her parents are good people," Argyros says. "If there's anybody who's going to come out of this and get back as normal as she possibly can, it's going to be Jessica."

—With reporting by Mark Thompson/Washington

http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101031117/njessi.html


Sempers,

Roger
:marine:

[bobpage]

Does this ever end? We all serve because we love our country! Wait, she joined for the pay and to get college money. I am a broadcast journalist in a major market with lots of experience. I am...

[Doc Crow]

Lets all just forget about this chick. I come from WV born and raised and I think WV giveing her a free ride is BS but that is me. What about all the other people who did the same thing but just was not in the wrong place with a officer who could not read a map. Look she did her job is it sad she got FUBARD yes how many Vietnam Vets got free rides form their state probably not many. Lets forget about her and go on with the real Hero's

[SheWolf]

Originally posted by Doc Crow
Lets all just forget about this chick. I come from WV born and raised and I think WV giveing her a free ride is BS but that is me. What about all the other people who did the same thing but just was not in the wrong place with a officer who could not read a map. Look she did her job is it sad she got FUBARD yes how many Vietnam Vets got free rides form their state probably not many. Lets forget about her and go on with the real Hero's

well,,,, I agree with some and not with others,,, I think that all our Vets deserve what Jessi got, but guys,, it's not her fault they aren't getting it,,,,

as a Veteran who receives a small disability payment from the VA, I think that all the negativity that has been expressed toward Jessica Lynch is mis-directed,,, direct it towards the states/government that ignores the Veteran,,,

before leaving Active Duty, I was constantly shaking my head over the new recruits coming in,,, in my mind they were joining for all the wrong reasons,, but they joined, and they served...

I have to admit at first I was angry about the attention that Jessica received, but I found I was wrong to be angry at her,,,
it's the system,,,,, I can not really fault her for not turning down the things being offered,,,, and she has an uphill physical battle to overcome....

it wasn't her fault they got lost,, the senior nco's in that convoy have to shoulder that responsibility.....

[bobpage]

True, she is not the reason they were lost. But for those of us she blamed for not "telling" them of impending danger ahead, she should be called out. I WAS THERE on that road. The Army driving with their headlights on at night, with no security, geez. But, they should not throw all the books at her. What has happened is the American tale. A little noteriety will cloud you into believing the hype. Hollywood is full of these nuts. Marines fought and died in Nasiriya because of bad intel from the ARMY. The town is secure we were told. We were duped. And Marines died in a ruse surrender. These soldiers, including Pvt Lynch, surrendered. I cannot find merit in jammed weapons, and all the other excuses. I saw the vehicles. I saw their personal gear. I saw the tools and equipment untouched by Iraqis. I saw the boom box bolted to the console between the driver and a-driver of the hummer in the accident. Makes me wonder, still, if anyone will ever tell the truth. She certainly was not responsible. But she is by no means demanding all the others be in appearances with her. Nor is she being an adult and saying "I cannot take the BS."

The VA and vets not being taken care of is not the issue. She was a POW and she should get a leg up, so to speak, from the VA. What everyone is hopping mad about is this "poor me" stuff. Not the system failing the rest. She could make her biggest impact DEMANDING all of them and her resuers get publically recognized, or go down trying. She is not going to do that. She would lose all the attention. Not lose the benifits the system is giving her.:mad:

[SheWolf]

[i]Originally posted by bobpage [/

The VA and vets not being taken care of is not the issue. She was a POW and she shouild get a leg up, so to speak, from the VA. What everyone is hopping mad about is this "poor me" stuff. Not the system failing the rest. She could make her biggest impact DEMANDING all of them and her resuers get publically recognized, or go down trying. She is not going to do that. She would lose all the attention. Not lose the benifits the system is giving her. [/B]

I have to admit that from the start I turned off all the stuff regarding Jessica because I felt that the others were being ignored,, but I did end up watching the NBC movie and was really shocked that they did not seem to hype it up like I expected,, they showed the weapons jamming,, no John Wayne antics etc.....

and I also felt at first that she should turn down the benny's given to her but then I thought,,, hell,, she might as well take them,,, maybe she should think of a way to share them with her comrades tho'...

I wonder how Shoshanna(sp?) is doing????

As for the Army and it's stuff,,, the Command is definitely lacking,, of course,, with the hit they took after the first war (force reduction),, it doesn't surprise me that they may be lacking in good NCO leadership,, which makes me very sad.....

again tho' (playing the devil's advocate) they were told the "war is over" with just some small "pockets" of resistance,,,,,,, so they might have had a boom box in the humvee,,,,,

[bobpage]

SheWolf, lemme set something straight for all to read. They were not, read not, in the town. No bus pushed in front of them. None of that crap happened at all. They were outside of town and south of the river. The movie was right. THEY SURRENDERED. We were a scant few miles back and would most certainly intervened if help was called for. But the Army is arrogant and undisciplined. And all that bull the movie put out is just that, BULL. Lynch tried to pass it off as the iraqi guys version. Please. Are we that stupid. I will tell you this. The movie was a lie. And if you are a vet, you know that a rifle falling on the deck one time, will not jam it. They did not have real security, nor were they disciplined enough to fight together. All of this is crap. Don't believe the hype!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[bobpage]

Wait, I missed something you said. They WERE NOT told the war was over. The entire 1st Marine Regimental Combat Team was on that highway right behind them. We never heard that crap. Again I say, the movie and her book are lies my friend. Believe or don't. I was there with RCT 1. WE KNOW!

[SheWolf]

Originally posted by bobpage
Wait, I missed something you said. They WERE NOT told the war was over. The entire 1st Marine Regimental Combat Team was on that highway right behind them. We never heard that crap. Again I say, the movie and her book are lies my friend. Believe or don't. I was there with RCT 1. WE KNOW!

ooops my mistake,, I was meaning that the stuff going on right now,, not that the war was over then,,, sorry,,,,

I've got a lot of stuff going on and things sometimes get jumbled together.....

if you guys were just a scant few miles behind, and right behind them,, didn't you hear what was happening????

(just curious)

[bobpage]

It was a little hard to hear over the arty going out all night long

[SheWolf]

Originally posted by bobpage
It was a little hard to hear over the arty going out all night long

oh okay,, just was curious,,,

as for the weapons jamming,,,,

I remember on the range that some would just jam without even being dropped,, and I remember a drill sergeant yelling and screaming about the soldier not having "cleaned" it right,, well, he broke down the M-16, cleaned it,, put it back together,, and it jammed on him too,,, it happens,,,,

when hubby was in the Sinai Desert with MFP Forces,,, he told of a lot of equipment not working due to the desert sand,,,,

[GySgtRet]

Sand or no sand a dirty weapon usually will cause a jam. Most rifles will still work even if they are wet!!!! Just dropping, I don't know about that one. Of course I have been out of active duty service for 10 years maybe things have gotten cheaply built.

[bobpage]

Gunny, believe me, the M16A2 works just fine. The lack of discipline in the Army is your answer. Filthy weapons is more like it. No CLP on the bolt. No the weapons are just fine.

[amorimj]

During the 60's the M-14 didn't jam, even in the mud and rain and the heat!!!

[CPLRapoza]

When I was out in twenty nine palms, on range 400 (that's the rush course). We had to have run it like five times and only cleaned our weapons once and that was upon completion before we turned them back into the armory. There is no way in hell, that those weapons jammed from firing once. We used to pour a little onto the bolt and inside just to prove that it worked. All those things said about the M16 are refering to the M16A1, the weapon that replaced the M14, not the M16A2. Of course there is a big difference between the M14 and the M16, so alot of people over reacted on the way it worked and operated. Most of the stories are falicies.

[GySgtRet]

BINGO....!!!! You got it bobpage. You have to keep your equipment cleaned and maintained.

[GySgtRet]

CplRapoza,

The M-16A1 did have its problems and with TLC and CLP it would still perform, but the M-16A2 was a better weapon.

[bobpage]

Go read the other thread on the real Bronze Star. Marine warriors who made her rescue happen EARN one.

[I/O Error]

Well on the issue of their personal weapons, let's be honest and admit that this was a REMF maintenance company. Most likely they simply had terrible discipline and no practice when it came to caring for their weapon. It's a rotten lousy excuse, but maybe they, "just didn't have time". :D I find it rather sad, but it's hardly uncommon and (theoretically) understandable from the standpoint of a lazy sod.

I sure as hell blame Lynch's First Sergeant though. The CSM and that man need to have a little CHAT about troopie preparedness. :D What, he never checked that his people kept a condom over the muzzle and actually used the dust cover? Sheesh... There's no excuse for that sort of thing, even if you're not a frontline ground-pounder type. The M16 family is finicky about maintenance, no question. However, it is DEFINITELY possible to prevent that kind of mess, and the problems are no where near the level of the first run production models.

Now, about the "hero" thing with Lynch... is this such a bad thing? She didn't ask for it, she's been somewhat bombarded with it regardless of her wishes. Yes, it's total garbage that she's been termed a hero, but it's not her fault in any way shape or form, she didn't ask for it. (And I have to give her SOME credit for attempting to deflect it) If you want to blame somebody, blame the press and the Pentagon. But don't blame them too hard, because the people NEED this sort of thing. The fact is that you always need to, somehow, come up with new ideals with which to convince 18 year old kids to go and get shot at for a living. And we can't only use examples like York, guys like him are pretty damned thin on the ground. If Lynch's story convinces a new generation of fire eaters to stand up and be counted... well I won't complain about it, because we NEED that.

Besides, the people that were there will know the real story, that's the way it's always worked. You can never expect the outside world to really understand the situation, it's just not within their ability. So long as the Service knows the truth, that's all that matters in the end. Hell that's why NCO clubs exist, right? :D The service knows the difference between a Bronze Star earned with blood and one received for primarily political reasons.

[SheWolf]

The service knows the difference between a Bronze Star earned with blood and one received for primarily political reasons. [/B][/QUOTE]

My brother served two tours in 'Nam, and was awarded the Bronze Star for crawling out of a tent to bring in a soldier who was wounded while standing guard,,,, he brought the soldier back into the tent and using a very small light attempted to put the young troops intestines back inside,,,,

the LT in the tent cried like a baby and just screamed for my brother to put out the light, don't shine the light on me....

... my brother threw away his medal because they gave everyone in the tent one,, including the cry-baby lt

[IOError]

I'm not going to say that's not a sad story, it most certainly is. But doesn't just really emphasize what I'm saying? What really makes up the Service have never been the Pentagon or the other high reaches of administrative command; what really makes up the Service is the long-timers (read: NCOs) who would hear a story like that and understand exactly how he felt.

[SheWolf]

Originally posted by IOError
I'm not going to say that's not a sad story, it most certainly is. But doesn't just really emphasize what I'm saying? What really makes up the Service have never been the Pentagon or the other high reaches of administrative command; what really makes up the Service is the long-timers (read: NCOs) who would hear a story like that and understand exactly how he felt.

I wasn't trying to dispute what you said, I more or less agree,,,
for years my brother would not even talk about Nam,,, or even ask/accept any form of government assistance,,, he developed this huge boil on the side of his face, my dad thought it might be due to his exposure to Agent Orange, but my brother refused to have it looked at by the VA.....

now, he does talk a little more about 'Nam and has even joined the VFW...