USMC and US Army personnel, enlisted and officers, have been involved in drug smuggling at least since Vietnam. I can't remember the names, but some Major or LTC was actually found dead out there at one of the California bases years ago, and rumors were flying. I think Apacherat even discussed this before. It's hard to get worked up about his case.
My thoughts are that if you as an enlisted man are going to fade the Commander-in-Chief and go against his policies at the border for money, you're just begging for a dungstorm to hit you and deserve a very long stint in Leavenworth Prison.
No. Only one (William Calley) was sent to jail, changed into house arrest two days after his sentence, released three and a half years later. No one else was sent to jail, not Ernest Medina, not Paul Meadlo, not Vernado Simpson, not Dennis Conti, etc.
No it wasn't..I was in the army in 1982 and we had Muslims in the military then and there was definitely no shortage of gay men in and around the posts...Denial of the facts is really not yer forte..
Yes, but it does make it true when there is a mountain of evidence to back up each claim. OTOH, I do understand how trump delusion syndrome creates an impermeable barrier to entry for uncomfortable facts about the Dear Leader.
You're right. I didn't have any interest in My Lai because it happened 60 years ago in another time and place and has nothing to do with the OP. Instead I wondered at the motive of bringing up My Lai, which of course was an awful thing. Like many on this Forum I've grown accustomed to Leftists trying to derail a thread and it has gone past tiresome. You want to discuss My Lai, or any other atrocities from the previous century, then start another thread. Can you understand the rational behind sticking to the subject of the OP?
A "rightie" brought up past times in the very first sentence in the OP! "Not the Marine Corps I remembered."
Why don't you read the second line in the OP "But we were held to higher standards" And what was the reply to that line? - "They sure did at My Lai didn't they?" Which bit don't you understand? Standards so high that they led to the My Lai massace?
Do you feel that My Lai is standard procedure or an anomaly? Does this exception somehow prove the rule to you?
I've found that I can't start a thread without rightists trying to derail it. Lots of that goofiness going on around here. Wow. Really? Someone in Melbourne is up in arms over "liberal rot" in America and our Marine Corps? ... And over a story that has absolutely nothing to do with liberal or conservative politics?
Quite standard procedure actually. Wikileaks showed that - Abu Ghraib. The whitewashed Haditha trial, the shooting of prisoners, the kidnapping and assassination of civilians with whitewashed trial of the culprits, the personal attacks on whistle blowers - "traitor", "unamerican", "should be executed"
My Lai represented a horrific failure of command and leadership from the top. TG the helicopter crew intervened instead of just watching or turning away from the atrocity which has been the norm throughout human history.
So what happened in 1968 and what occurred at Abu Ghraib in 2003, where there were no fatalities, is standard procedure? If that was the case don't you think these incidents would happen more frequently?