Breakdown of the Military
Steve Mortillo thinks the world of the leaders of his platoon in Iraq. “They’re some of the most honorable people I think I’ll meet in my life,” he says. “I’ll never forget the camaraderie and the tough times we went through together.” So it hit him hard when he returned from r&r in the United States and was told that while he was gone, his platoon leader was critically wounded by an IED. “The first thing I said, the first thing everyone says, is, ‘Stop lying to me! I don’t want to hear that.’ There’s this feeling of guilt: while you’re living it up back in the States, one of your comrades got hit.” A few weeks later, he was awakened in the middle of the night to be told another comrade had been killed.
Mortillo says the military’s willingness to stage house raids based on flimsy intelligence contributed to the growing American casualties. “I hope the American people can understand the impact that this occupation is having on the military,” he said. “It’s tearing us apart.”
Daniel Fanning served in Iraq with a Wisconsin National Guard transportation unit. When he got there, the trucks had no armor. Only after a soldier embarrassed Donald Rumsfeld in front of the media did the Pentagon sent armor. Fanning was trained in bayonet fighting, which no one has done for decades. He learned how to kick down walls and destroy rooms, but “never one second of culture or language training. We had no idea how to respect (Iraqis).” The soldiers saw third world contractors exploited while American contractors made three or four times the pay of a GI. All of this damaged morale. “I enlisted [after 9/11] to be part of the solution, not part of the problem,” Fanning says, but I feel like I did just the opposite, and many of the people in my unit feel the same way.
Goldsmith saw the World Trade Center towers collapse on September 11, 2001. He enlisted in the Army and went to Iraq in 2005. In Sadr City, he witnessed abuse of Iraqi civilians. He was assigned to take pictures of Iraqis found in a shallow grave, ostensibly for intelligence purposes, but they were only used as trophies by those who received them. After repeated commendations, he was expecting to return to civilian life and college when President Bush announced the “surge,” and the military adopted its stop-loss policy, essentially making Goldsmith a prisoner of war. He tried to kill himself rather than return to Iraq, but survived. He was diagnosed with depression, anxiety, and PTSD, but then was discharged for misconduct as a malingerer. He now delivers pizzas and struggles to overcome his persisting symptoms with treatment through the VA.
A strong supporter of the Iraq War, Lars Ekstrom reported to boot camp in November 2003, six months after graduating high school. Ekstrom's faith in the military and the U.S. mission, however, steadily eroded during his training and subsequent deployment to Iraq. The young corporal became troubled by a lack of accountability on the part of a culture he says is too "indoctrinated" to reform itself. Training was inadequate, equipment and supplies were substandard, and, most damaging, Ekstrom was on the receiving end of a hazing campaign by other servicemen. Disillusioned and depressed, Ekstrom made repeated requests for assistance but was brushed off. Soon, he began to wonder if this and other forms of negligence was a greater risk to his personal safety than the enemy he had been trained to fight. After his discharge, Ekstrom waited six months for VA benefits and continues to overcome bureaucratic obstacles as he seeks treatment for his depression.
Former Marine Matt Howard says the Marine Corps “bases itself on dehumanization and subjugation and abuse of its lower enlisted in order for it to function.” He was severely beaten in a hazing incident.
Howard took part in the invasion of Iraq. He says the very first tank was destroyed by mistake by a Marine helicopter. Fortunately, no one died that time. But the first casualty of the war was a soldier who stepped on a cluster bomblet dropped by Americans.
Howard says American ammunition and armor both contained depleted uranium, which is radioactive. He believes depleted uranium is “the agent orange of this occupation,” and that the military is poisoning its soldiers, the people of Iraq, and the whole world with depleted uranium, because on impact, tiny particles go up into the atmosphere and spread over the entire planet.
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