Time Cover Riles Iwo Jima Veterans

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Time Cover Riles Iwo Jima Veterans

April 19, 2008
Stars and Stripes

Here come the U.S. Marines. And they're not happy.
Time magazine, on its April 21 cover in most parts of the world, takes the famous Iwo Jima photograph of Marines raising the American flag, and replaces the flag with a tree to discuss battling climate change.
Some veteran Marines are up in arms.
Donald Mates, an Iwo Jima veteran, told the Business & Media Institute on Thursday that using that photograph to make a point about global warming is wrong.
"It's an absolute disgrace," Mates is quoted on the BMI Web site as saying. "Whoever did it is going to hell. That's a mortal sin. God forbid he runs into a Marine that was an Iwo Jima survivor."
Mates also said making the comparison of World War II to global warming was baseless and disrespectful.
"The second world war we knew was there," Mates told the BMI reporter. "Some say there is global warming, some say there isn't. And to stick a tree in place of a flag on the Iwo Jima picture is just sacrilegious."
Mates served in the 3rd Marine Division and fought in the battle of Iwo Jima, landing on Feb. 24, 1945, according to the report.
The mission of BMI, according to its site, is to audit the media's coverage of the free enterprise system.
Time Managing Editor Richard Stengel appeared on MSNBC on Thursday and said the United States needed to make a major effort to fight climate change, and that the cover's purpose was to liken global warming to World War II.
Lt. John Keith Wells, the leader of the platoon that raised the flags on Mount Suribachi and co-author of "Give Me Fifty Marines Not Afraid to Die: Iwo Jima" wasn't impressed.
"That global warming is the biggest joke I've ever known," Wells told the Business & Media Institute. "We'll stick a dadgum tree up somebody's rear if they want that and think that's going to cure something."

http://www.military.com/news/article/time-cover-riles-iwo-jima-veterans.html?col=1186032310810
 
There's a difference - we're not threatening violence to Time Magazine. The sacrifices of any member of the military should never be used to illustrate a political point, regardless of the high-visibility nature of the event.
 
Personally i think it is less than tactful, and done by people who have real understanding of the sacrifice made by the American Marines to plant their countries flag there. It could also be done to get some cheap publicity knowing that the Marines might create a fuss and then they would get coverage worth millions of dollars of publicity for nothing all over the place.
 
But now it raises a question: Would George Washington have been offended by this?
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or would he have laughed and remembered that it's a nonreal picutre?
 
The Other Guy.........Lets ask the question to the men that fought there. Now what do the soldiers that fought with George Washington think. We still have men that fought at Iwo Jima around and who lost a lot friends there, may be you would like to ask them what they think
 
A bit over sensitive I feel. every body knows the significance of the original picture. No insult was intended nor should it have been taken.

If it was something that was offensive to the memory of those Marines who raised the flag on Mt. Suribachi, like the flag of an enemy state, or perhaps a Cannabis plant, I could understand. What is disrespectful about a tree?

The implication was as I see it, "We fought for our freedom, now we must fight for our planet".
 
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Probably wasn't very good in taste but I also think it might be an overreaction.
It might have more to do with the left versus the right at this point.
 
senojekips said:
A bit over sensitive I feel. every body knows the significance of the original picture. No insult was intended nor should it have been taken.

If it was something that was offensive to the memory of those Marines who raised the flag on Mt. Suribachi, like the flag of an enemy state, or perhaps a Cannabis plant, I could understand. What is disrespectful about a tree?

The implication was as I see it, "We fought for our freedom, now we must fight for our planet".
Click to expand...
+1, well said.
 
I'll say this. As long as it's the Iwo Vets who find it disrespectful I will support their view point. They fought on that Island. They left friends on that Island.

Only three of those flag raisers (the second flag to go up) walked off that Island the rest died there.

If that use of the photo offends them then it offends me. If they feel it disrepectful of the memories of their comrades, then I feel that they are being disrespected.

The guys offended fought across that beach, thru those bunkers and caves across those air fields and up the slope of Suribachi. They earned the right to feel offended at the use of that photo if they find it disrespectful. They earned it thru blood, sweat and tears.

So if the Veterans of Iwo Jima are offended. Then by god I'm offended with them.
 
The picture belong to Time Magazine. It was taken by a photographer from LIFE Magazine which was bought by Time 3 decades ago. Ergo its TIME property.

Nor do I understand the fuss, its simply an anology. They are equating the stuggle at IWO to the Global Warming struggle, nothing more. They arn't trying to diminish what happened in 1945.
 
And if were not the Iwo vets taking offense then I'd call it a non- issue. But it is the Iwo vets.

And while the purpose may be as you have stated. If it offends the Iwo vets then I'll stand by them and Time can go piss up a rope, their property or not although I do wonder what Joe Rosenberg (the photographer) would say about it's use.

While everyone is saying "non-issue. Get over it." they might do well to remember that for the Iwo vet's that photo encompasses a very pivotal and life changing experience for them. It reminds them not of a "struggle" it reminds them of the friends they left there and what they went thru on that island.

Theres damn few Iwo vets left and if they want that memory protected and respected as they see it, I don't see how giving them that in their declining years is too much to ask. Regardless of what statement Time is trying to make.
 
Dont know how to feel about it, but my gut reaction was to find it disrespectful.

"We fought for our freedom, now we must fight for our planet".
Click to expand...

Off-center for so many reasons.

The metaphor between fighting Japan and fighting Global Warming just does not work.
 
senojekips said:
A bit over sensitive I feel. every body knows the significance of the original picture. No insult was intended nor should it have been taken.

If it was something that was offensive to the memory of those Marines who raised the flag on Mt. Suribachi, like the flag of an enemy state, or perhaps a Cannabis plant, I could understand. What is disrespectful about a tree?

The implication was as I see it, "We fought for our freedom, now we must fight for our planet".
Click to expand...

I am going to agree with this there have been countless parodies of this event from the Simpsons to beach landings in Somalia where was the outcry during these events?
 
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