Is our Western world forgetting how to fight ? Worse than that, is it forgetting how to identify its enemies?

right on Italian4US, The american populace is becoming afraid of war, death, disease and everything else thats not pleasant. but everything cant, be happy and good; part of life is getting through the hard stuff, it makes you strong, but some people in our past made bad choices and now were reaping the consequences, in full toll. Laziness is the root of all evil.

A rose is bueatifull, but it can hurt.

Sometimes I wonder what side the media is on. Cause they sure as hell aren't on our side. Sometimes I think this country needs another WWII or we're headed down the hole.

Situation in Europe is possibly even worse, as far as media are concerned. But there are people with guts, who honor responsibilities and would die before abandoning their allies in a war against terror. Thank God.

Originally Posted by Eric

...Torture is to get up every day to drive a truck of supply along “Roadside bomb alley” after having seen first end what nails, rocks and metallic shrapnels do to an unprotected human body.
Torture is to get up every day to go on foot patrol and expect any civilian to pull out a gun from under its robe and shoot you in the face.
Torture is to see the daily enemy’s lack of respect for human life, lack of respect for his own people that he uses as a shield or kill for propaganda.
Torture and pain is to restore power and water, resume oil production, open a school or build a bridge and see it blown to pieces by the obscurantist the next day.
Torture is to get up every day and be shot at from a hospital, a school or a Mosque and not be able to return fire while your comrades are spilling their blood in the gutters.
Torture is to get up every day knowing that if captured you will be denied any kind of mercy and that even your dead body will be used for psychological effect, returned as pulp or hung from a bridge for the blood thirsty media.
Torture is to remember the faces of the 750 dead and the blood of the 4100 wounded or maimed comrades in arms you accompanied for their last trip home, most of them hit “ when military vehicle hit an improvised explosive device…”, as the Pentagon officially reports it.
Torture is to realize that most of the wounded average 25 years old and many among them are left brain-damaged or blind, or both, from shrapnel and dirt blown to the face by roadside bombs, the “improvised explosive devices” that hit the only vital area not protected by body armor.
Torture is to come back home on short leave and watch biased home media echoing enemy propaganda, or listen to well fed, safe and comfy fellow Americans and elected official question the war the elected government sent you to wage.
Torture is to see heroes like Pat Tillman depicted as morons on MSNBC.
Torture is to be called a “baby killer” , to see Al-Jazeera news and biased hatred broadcasted home, to see the same people that accompanied our soldiers to the carriers, waving flags, cheering and all, now turning their back with disgust, burning the flag or marching for peace. Torture is what all theses contradictory feelings, all that fear, pain, sorrow and anger do to our soldiers back there; it is what keeps them awake and accompany them daily for 365 days. A female US doctor in Iraq was quoted saying: "I go to sleep and dream about them (-the young American casualties-) all night long, awaking in a sweat because something is wrong," Welcome back to Vietnam and remember the German saying: “ Children, enjoy war because peace will be terrifying!”

Do you have any idea of what goes in the mind of our average GI Joe, our good US kid that went on a mission, to protect us?
I know that it is not a place I would like to visit right now!

Amen.

There has been a quite interesting psychological experiment in the early seventies. A group of volunteering students was randomly divided into two groups. Prisoners and prison guards.
The 'prisoners' were given prison uniforms and were locked up. The 'guards' were given guard uniforms and complete control over the prison.
This experiment was supposed to run for three weeks, but it was stopped within one. (six days I believe) It got completely out of hand. 'Prisoners' were being humiliated by their former buddies, yelled at, not being allowed to sleep, hit by 'guards', forced to kiss and touch each other, etc.
These were all 'normal' people. There was no 'war' between them, no buddies of the 'guards' were killed by buddies of the 'prisoners. What happened in Iraq is what happens to people if they are put on a situation like that, and there's no one keep them in check. I wouldn't blame the individual soldiers to much, I'm afraid it's more human nature than most people would like to know or care to admit.