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Twisterdog
12-20-2003, 11:36 PM
This was sent from the Commanding Officer at MWSS-171 to his marines.

As you read it, ask yourself, "Why don't we ever hear any of this on the news?"


From: Seitz LtCol Scot S
Sent: Tuesday, December 02, 2003 8:40 AM
To: 1MAW MWSS171 All Personnel
Cc: Fenstermacher Col Stephen M; Kirkpatrick LtCol Stephen F; Chase
LtCol Eric T
Subject: ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Marines and Sailors,

As we approach the end of the year I think it is important
to share a few thoughts about what you've accomplished directly,
in some cases, and indirectly in many others. I am speaking about what the Bush Administration and each of you has contributed by wearing the uniform, because the fact that you wear the uniform contributes 100% to the capability of the nation to send a few onto the field to execute national policy. As you read about these achievements you are a part of , I would call your attention to two things:

1. This is good news that hasn't been fit to print or report on TV.

2. It is much easier to point out the errors a man makes when he makes the tough decisions, rarely is the positive as aggressively pursued.

Since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1...

... the first battalion of the new Iraqi Army has graduated and is on active duty.

... over 60,000 Iraqis now provide security to their fellow citizens.

... nearly all of Iraq's 400 courts are functioning.

... the Iraqi judiciary is fully independent.

... on Monday, October 6 power generation hit 4,518 megawatts-exceeding the prewar average.

... all 22 universities and 43 technical institutes and colleges are open, as are nearly all primary and secondary schools.

... by October 1, Coalition forces had rehab-ed over 1,500 schools - 500 more than scheduled.

... teachers earn from 12 to 25 times their former salaries.

... all 240 hospitals and more than 1200 clinics are open.

... doctors salaries are at least eight times what they were under Saddam.

... pharmaceutical distribution has gone from essentially nothing to 700 tons in May to a current total of 12,000 tons.

... the Coalition has helped administer over 22 million vaccinations to Iraq's children.

... a Coalition program has cleared over 14,000 kilometers of Iraq's 27,000 kilometers of weed-choked canals which now irrigate tens of thousands of farms. This project has created jobs for more than 100,000 Iraqi men and
women.

... we have restored over three-quarters of prewar telephone services and over two-thirds of the potable water production.

... there are 4,900 full-service telephone connections. We expect 50,000 by year-end.

... the wheels of commerce are turning. From bicycles to satellite dishes to cars and trucks, businesses are coming to life in all major cities and towns.

... 95 percent of all prewar bank customers have service and first-time customers are opening accounts daily.

... Iraqi banks are making loans to finance businesses.

.... the central bank is fully independent.

... Iraq has one of the worlds most growth-oriented investment and banking laws.

... Iraq has a single, unified currency for the first time in 15 years.

... satellite TV dishes are legal.

... foreign journalists aren't on 10-day visas paying mandatory and extortionate fees to the Ministry of Information for "minders" and other government spies.

... there is no Ministry of Information.

... there are more than 170 newspapers.

... you can buy satellite dishes on what seems like every street corner.

... foreign journalists (and everyone else) are free to come and go.

... a nation that had not one single element - legislative, judicial or executive - of a representative government, now does.

... in Baghdad alone residents have selected 88 advisory councils.
Baghdad's first democratic transfer of power in 35 years happened when the city council elected its new chairman.

... today in Iraq chambers of commerce, business, school and professional organizations are electing their leaders all over the country.

... 25 ministers, selected by the most representative governing body in Iraq's history, run the day-to-day business of government.

... the Iraqi government regularly participates in international events. Since July the Iraqi government has been represented in over two dozen international meetings, including those of the UN General Assembly, the Arab League, the World Bank and IMF and, today, the Islamic Conference Summit. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs today announced that it is reopening over 30 Iraqi embassies around the world.

... Shia religious festivals that were all but banned, aren't.

... for the first time in 35 years, in Karbala thousands of Shiites
celebrate the pilgrimage of the 12th Imam.

... the Coalition has completed over 13,000 reconstruction projects, large and small, as part of a strategic plan for the reconstruction of Iraq.

... Uday and Queasy are dead - and no longer feeding innocent Iraqis to the zoo lions, raping the young daughters of local leaders to force cooperation, torturing Iraq's soccer players for losing games, or murdering critics.

.... children aren't imprisoned or murdered when their parents disagree with the government.

... political opponents aren't imprisoned, tortured, executed, maimed, or are forced to watch their families die for disagreeing with Saddam.

... millions of longsuffering Iraqis no longer live in perpetual terror.

.... Saudis will hold municipal elections.

... Qatar is reforming education to give more choices to parents.

... Jordan is accelerating market economic reforms.

... the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded for the first time to an Iranian -- a Muslim woman who speaks out with courage for human rights, for democracy and for peace.

... Saddam is gone.

... Iraq is free.

... President Bush has not faltered or failed.

... Yet, little or none of this information has been published by the Press corps that prides itself on bringing you all the news that's important.

Iraq under US lead control has come further in six months than Germany did in seven years or Japan did in nine years following WWII. Military deaths from fanatic Nazi's, and Japanese numbered in the thousands and continued for over three years after WWII victory was declared.

It took the US over four months to clear away the twin tower debris, let alone attempt to build something else in its place.

Now, take into account that Congress fought President Bush on every aspect of his handling of this country's war and the post-war reconstruction; and that they continue to claim on a daily basis on national TV that this conflict has been a failure.

Taking everything into consideration, even the unfortunate loss of our brothers and sisters in this conflict, do you think anyone else in the world could have accomplished as much as the United States and the Bush administration in so short a period of time?

These are things worth writing about. Get the word out. Write to someone you think may be able to influence our Congress or the press to tell the story.

Above all, be proud that you are a part of this historical precedent.

God Bless you all. Have a great Holiday.

Semper Fidelis,

CO

mugsy
12-21-2003, 07:19 AM
WOW! I hope that really is the letter or nay sayers will have a field day.

While I really don't like GW, that is really good news. I knew some of that but a lot of it was a very pleasant suprise. I wonder why the powers that be haven't found those things necessary to tell the American people? I, for one, would like to hear both sides of the story and be able to make up my mind from there instead on only getting a slanted perspective and be expected to make an informed decision on that.

Thanks for the positive post!!

Karen
12-21-2003, 08:43 AM
The last time one of these circulated, a news organization traced it back to the supposed guy who sent it, and it was not written by that guy, nor had he heard about it.

I am suspect of all such emails, good or bad, until proven otherwise. I do KNOW that there is good stuff happening over there, via my Active Duty brother (who is stateside), but the line in there "President Bush has not failed or faltered" makes me think it was written by a Republican publicist. What one soldier would have access to all that info, and why put that line in there if you are not over here, and hearing the campaign for the next Presidency?

I'd love to have my suspicions proves wrong, by the way.

Soledad
12-21-2003, 09:28 AM
Well, this sort of thing was proven wrong just a couple of months ago. Not the same letter, though. There were a bunch of letters sent to newspapers for the "Letters to the Editor" section, and they turned out to be basically all the same letter but from different soldiers. When contacted, the soldiers said their superiors had forced them to send it in under their name. The person responsible for it was a Republican officer.

Those Republicans are pretty darn sneaky.

2kitties
12-21-2003, 10:46 AM
I think we all (both sides of this ladies) need to stop posting email forwards disguised as foreign policy. These things- this one as well as that last thing that bashed Bush- are EMAILS! Not much differerent than the ones that tell you you're going to hell if you don't send it out to five people in the next five minutes.

Everyone should make their own educated opinions on their political views based on credible news from various sources and understanding of the issues. Not on email forwards, for god's sake.

Soledad
12-21-2003, 10:56 AM
Great point, 2Kitties.

I guess the difference I see between this one and the Bush-bashing one is that this one claims to be sent by army officials. That seems to add a special layer of deception for me.

2kitties
12-21-2003, 11:01 AM
I don't care if it claims to be sent from the homeless guy outside the mall or God himself. The way I see it is the homeless guy probably doesn't have internet in his refrigerator box and God doesn't spend too much time on the internet either;) People who start these kinds of things via email are troublemakers. Bill Gates will not send you a million dollars and there is no dying kid in England who you can help by forwarding the mail. Some nutjob cooks this crap up and uses cyberspace as his medium for stirring up trouble or promoting his own agenda- or just watching folks like us debate it's merit.;)

mugsy
12-21-2003, 11:23 AM
Not that it really matters in the grand scheme of things and the nay sayers will still trash it....

According to www.snopes.com this letter is "true" in the sense that officer sent the letter to his church prayer group, and somehow ended up being circulated in a couple of different ways. If you want to read it yourself (I don't know if this stuff is copyrighted) it's under politics in snopes. I have a feeling that the statements that were made are true, but the actual letter may be altered. But, I'm sure I'm wrong. lol

Twisterdog
12-21-2003, 10:37 PM
I think we all (both sides of this ladies) need to stop posting email forwards disguised as foreign policy. These things- this one as well as that last thing that bashed Bush- are EMAILS! Not much differerent than the ones that tell you you're going to hell if you don't send it out to five people in the next five minutes.

Ummmm .... Yeah, I'm well aware that it is an email. I never said it was God's honest truth, heard from the horse's mouth, now did I? In fact, the title of my thread is "Interesting EMAIL I received." If reading forwarded emails somehow offends you, then don't open the thread that is CLEARLY labeled as such.

BTW, I received this from my friend's daughter, who is stationed in Iraq.

Believe it, don't believe it. Read it, don't read it. Whatever. But don't tell me I can't post it, simply because it came from email.

Edwina's Secretary
12-22-2003, 08:10 AM
I HAVE read that in the news. Whatever is meant by . This is good news that hasn't been fit to print or report on TV. ???? The capture of Saddam has not been reported??? The Nobel Peace Prize hasn't been reported? Goodness....what paper does this person read??


Furthermore, any commanding officer sending out such blatant (and inaccurate!) political propaganda should be courtmartialed!

I'm all for rallying the troops and raising thier morale but do it honestly!

mugsy
12-22-2003, 09:05 AM
Sara,

Unfortunately, a lot of military feel exactly the way he does. I have talked to Mike extensively about his experience in Desert Storm (which was much more positive than the war in Iraq Part II) and his experience was negative. I have had to point out that there was a huge outpouring of support here. His experience was that when he got off the plane here in the states, some idiot came up and spit on him. I know that in that "letter" there were MANY things that have happened over there that I have not seen reported. I'm sure that there are men and women over in the Middle East and in Afghanistan that are not happy with what's going on, but, it's my opinion that they are in the minority. There were a couple of things that I have seen reported, in all fairness, but the man was only expressing his opinion...I'm not sure that it's worthy of a court martial, but, I could be wrong...I'd have to check with Mike and others on the military code of justice. Ok, I'm done now! :)

Molly

2kitties
12-28-2003, 06:06 PM
Twisterdog, I obviously miscommunicated myself. I did not mean to hurt your feelings, insult you or your intelligence or offend you in any way. My apologies. I was simply making a point to those who do, in fact, take this stuff for truth- and there are plenty of people who do. For instanc, my mother (who is an educated savvy woman) didn't shop at Target for 6 months after the anti-Target emails went around. Finally someone let her in on the scam;)

Twisterdog
12-28-2003, 11:58 PM
Originally posted by 2kitties
Twisterdog, I obviously miscommunicated myself. I did not mean to hurt your feelings, insult you or your intelligence or offend you in any way. My apologies. I was simply making a point to those who do, in fact, take this stuff for truth- and there are plenty of people who do. For instanc, my mother (who is an educated savvy woman) didn't shop at Target for 6 months after the anti-Target emails went around. Finally someone let her in on the scam;)

No need to apologise. It takes way more than that to hurt my feelings. :)

Lady's Human
12-29-2003, 04:59 PM
I'm not going to dissect this email piece by piece, but from personal sources this is largely fact. I can't verify numbers, but a well placed officer would be easily able to gather data like this from open sources. (A public affairs oficer in country, for example)

There is a constant level of disgust within the military (PERSONAL OBSERVATION FROM ONE NCO, NOT OFFICIAL POLICY) for the reporting that has been getting to the states. They constantly report on the casualties, but you never read about the village that now has running water for the first time in 30 years, the schools that have been rebuilt by coalition forces, etc. Watching CNN you would get the picture that we're hated in Iraq and we need to leave. Talk to the troops coming back and it's a different picture entirely.

mugsy
12-29-2003, 09:12 PM
OH thank you!!! A first hand experience! Thanks for the update. Please pass on my and my husband's thanks for what you guys are doing over there.

Lady's Human
12-29-2003, 11:53 PM
You're more than welcome. BTW, add one to that list......After years of being an international pariah, Libya is opening up its country to UN arms inspectors, has made payments to the families of the lockerbie bombing victims, and is in general trying to play nice. Libyan officials deny it has anything to do with the war on terror, but the timing is rather amusing.....

IttyBittyKitty
01-03-2004, 04:44 AM
I'm in no position to contest the veracity of such claims, and I am sure that great things are happening to the Iraqi people now that the reign of tyranny is now over. What strikes me as odd is the fact that Bush has not been extolling all of these wonderful happenings? Especially in the wake of a new election.

Incidentally, his little lap-dog John Howard (our PM) faces re-election in 2004. I will be veeery interested to see what it is that these two will base their new political platforms on.

(Go Mark Latham, Go! The only thing I like about Howard is that he is a cricket fan - not much to base re-election on)

Lady's Human
01-05-2004, 05:35 PM
Bush has (with the exception of the carrier landing) been relatively quiet in regards to ANY political posturing regarding the war. He told admin officials that there would be no gloating in the wake of Hussein's capture, and with a hostile news media (not completely, but it isn't a friendly get together in the white house press room) the story isn't going to get out unless the admin pushes it.

mugsy
01-05-2004, 05:58 PM
As much as I don't like Bush, that makes me happy that he's not trying to rub it in anyone's face. It really has been relatively quiet in the media about Saddam....now they can just focus on us not having Osama...