When Marine recruiters go way beyond the call

From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer courtesy of WorkingForChange:

Next thing Axel knew, the same sergeant and another recruiter showed up at the LaConner Brewing Co., the restaurant where Axel works. And before Axel, an older cousin and other co-workers knew or understood what was happening, Axel was whisked away in a car.

"They said we were going somewhere but I didn't know we were going all the way to Seattle," Axel said.

Just a few tests. And so many free opportunities, the recruiters told him.

He could pursue his love of chemistry. He could serve anywhere he chose and leave any time he wanted on an "apathy discharge" if he didn't like it. And he wouldn't have to go to Iraq if he didn't want to.

At about 3:30 in the morning, Alex was awakened in the motel and fed a little something. Twelve hours later, without further sleep or food, he had taken a battery of tests and signed a lot of papers he hadn't gotten a chance to read. "Just formalities," he was told. "Sign here. And here. Nothing to worry about."

Click here for the rest.

Lately, I've been reading about conservative outrage with the news media's coverage of the endless wars, which is funny, because on the whole that coverage has been quite bad--we wouldn't be in these couple of quagmires if the media had done their jobs correctly in the first place. But without irony, these right-wing nutjobs keep bitching. Indeed, Eric Alterman reports in the Nation that the "Wall Street Journal editorial page professed to detect 'a basic media mistrust of the military that goes back to Vietnam.'" Are they talking about the same media? I mean, Dan Rather said a few years ago that he would do whatever his commander-in-chief ordered him to do.

Whatever.

The point is that if the media really does have a "mistrust of the military," they would do well to cultivate that distrust. I'll be completely frank: even though the military is manned by numerous honorable and trustworthy individuals, the military as an institution simply cannot be trusted. They lie about virtually everything, from the very top brass all the way down to the lowliest recruiter. In fact, disinformation and secrecy is literally military policy, and this is understood, but uncriticized, when talking about winning the "hearts and minds" of occupied nations. But they lie to us too: domestic support for the endless wars is golden; consequently, they manipulate the media like puppeteers.

It now appears that, because the military is now desperately understaffed, they need to win the "hearts and minds" of potential recruits, too. It's the same thing. Lie, lie, lie. "Apathy discharge?" What the hell is that? Don't have to "go to Iraq" if you don't want to? That's total bullshit. Going to Iraq is precisely the reason why nobody wants to join, and precisely the reason why recruiters are coming close to shanghaiing clueless eighteen year olds.

I know I have a few readers who are young enough to be targeted by these guys. Listen up. Don't even talk to them. They'll tell you all sorts of lies because they are highly pressured by their superiors to make quotas. If you do join, there is a very good chance that you'll be sent to Iraq to fight an unwinnable war. You may not die, and you may not get any limbs shot off, but you will have to kill people who are doing nothing more than what you would do if our country was occupied by foreign troops. This is not a just war. This is not for America or freedom. This is for rich and powerful men who have never even put their lives on the line for their nation. Just stay the hell away from recruiters. They couldn't care less about you, really. You're just a number to them.

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