ADM Mike Mullen, Gen. Pace's replacement, starts Monday

[babylonsister]

Remember his stance now, and watch it morph.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070930/ap_on_go_ot/mullen_at_the_helm

Iraq focus for new Joint Chiefs chairman

By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer 39 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is troubled by the Iraq war. He thinks it has become such a consuming focus of U.S. attention that it may be overstretching the military and distracting the nation from other threats.

When he steps into his new office in Room 2E676 at the Pentagon on Monday, replacing Marine Gen. Peter Pace as the senior military adviser to the president and the defense secretary, Mullen already will be on record expressing his war worries with an unusual degree of candor.

"I understand the frustration over the war. I share it," he told his Senate confirmation hearing.

As evidence of his focus on Iraq, Mullen has told Congress he intends to travel to Baghdad immediately after he takes over so he can see firsthand how the war effort is going.

more...

[glowing]

1. They are so stretched... What these people have done to the military

and their families is disgusting... I have 2 cousin-in-laws in Iraw. The female cousin is over there with her husband. They are residing together in the space of a small college dorm, add the stress of starting your day wondering if you'll make it back home, and a date to come home that was stretched another 3 or 4 months... is simply putting a strain on her marriage that is unreal. The male cousin that is over there is counting the days until he's out of this "damn sand trap".

My sister-in-law is dating a major. He's not over there or going back.. but was one of the first deployed to Afghanistan... He is a graduate of West Point... they threw them over there with no back up and no supplies... At one point, it had been 8 days since anyone had eaten, and they sucummbed to eating a dead dog they found on the side of the road.

They have truly fucked them so badly.

[babylonsister]

2. WHAT??? No food for 8 days, eating a dead dog? I don't doubt

your word, but that's positively disgusting. They sure do have a funny way of supporting the troops, don't they. I'm still lifting my jaw up off the floor.

[glowing]

3. That's what I said... It came up because she had made something

and asked if he'd like it... He said he eats most anything, and anything beats eating a dead dog... that's how the subject even came up.

By the way. They are doing some crazy things in this military. I keep saying why are we doing this, isn't this more dangerous to our national security... (training foreign countries in America and on our bases--next through training rounds--Pakistan).

[babylonsister]

4. Really, if you'd feel comfortable, I think this little story needs its own

thread. I'm sure people would be amazed and appalled. This is the only way we'd hear this 'truth'.

[glowing]

5. I'd prefer to be on the down low... its kind of private stuff related from

a sister-in-law who is dating someone. Its not classified stuff... but I'd hate for anything to come full circle around. I know a few more details, but its not my story and not my place to bring up what's really going on... but when the congress is passing money appropriations and sending money, weapons, etc. to some of these countries...know it also comes with special forces training in our country, on our bases, and on training grounds that Americans are using for our training. It blew my mind away when they said they needed to come up with a training program for Pakistan. Especially, when the Pakistani parliment was trying to pass a motion to jihad the USA.