American soldiers serving in Afghanistan are depressed and deeply disillusioned, according to the chaplains of two US battalions that have spent nine months on the front line in the war against the Taleban.
Many feel that they are risking their lives — and that colleagues have died — for a futile mission and an Afghan population that does nothing to help them, the chaplains told The Times in their makeshift chapel on this fortress-like base in a dusty, brown valley southwest of Kabul.
“The many soldiers who come to see us have a sense of futility and anger about being here. They are really in a state of depression and despair and just want to get back to their families,” said Captain Jeff Masengale, of the 10th Mountain Division’s 2-87 Infantry Battalion.
“They feel they are risking their lives for progress that’s hard to discern,” said Captain Sam Rico, of the Division’s 4-25 Field Artillery Battalion. “They are tired, strained, confused and just want to get through.” The chaplains said that they were speaking out because the men could not.
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Updates:
1:22 pm EDT, October 8th, 2009 – U.S. Encounters Stumbling Blocks in Training Afghans
That comes with having such a knowledgeable, proactive, engaged, committed, dedicated, principled and concerned POTUS & CIC.
mid island mike
POTUS has no military experience. Neither does his 2/IC (Biden). They are also both “gutless” and should be ignored.
I am not surprised to see this morale problem happening because right now the US is being governed by the “flower children” of the 1960’s. “Flower power” was the scream as the US lost the Vietnam war and John Kerry was their hero along with Jane Fonda. Nothing has changed except for flower children growing older, smarter and getting themselves elected as NATO troops grow tired trying to build ideas US “Socialists” expound continually. Peace, love, forgiveness. But the world is not that way.
“Idiots R Us” as Iran laughs in their face and Chavez has wet dreams.
Next year there is going to be a reckoning for those people.
You can take it to the bank and meanwhile (for the troops in Afghanistan) — patience.
You are there for the right reasons and you should never doubt what you are trying to achieve. It’s all about the little kids in a far away country who want to learn and leave the 7th century behind. You are helping them and no soldier on the ground should ever forget it.
Help them — make it happen — and “screw” the CIC.
That’s why you are there.
It’s about the children and education (which is happening).
It’s going to take a bit of time but anything worthwhile does.
I hope my sarcasm in post #1 was obvious.
mid island mike
It was, Mike. My problem. I tend to get far to serious about this stuff.
Maybe I should just shut up.
What does Obama have to do with military personnel who “feel that they are risking their lives — and that colleagues have died — for a futile mission and an Afghan population that does nothing to help them“… do you really think these ideas set in on January 20th or something.
There’s plenty out there to bash Obama about, this is nothing more than very transparent “we hate Democrats“.
Perhaps if the Americans had finished the job when they first went into Afghanistan instead of moving their troops to Iraq many moons ago, things wouldnt be so bad.
Which seems to prove that its tough fighting a war on two fronts.
“Which seems to prove that its tough fighting a war on two fronts”
We need to tell the enemy to stop moving around and just stay put. They should also be told to join a country and put on a uniform and fight like real soldiers instead of a death cult moving around like nomads with a utopian view of their past.
It’s Bush’s fault, soon the enemy will understand our new leadership of Kumbayah “flower power” and behave.
@nomdeblog: And therein is the reason that the worlds super powers have ended up leaving Afghanistan a bombed out wasteland after failing to achieve their objectives, and each time they left fertile ground for the Taliban to take over – a military strategy will not succeed, it has been tried before, and it failed.
“a military strategy will not succeed”
Would agree to the extent it can’t just be a ‘foreign’ military strategy to succeed, although it can ( and did) start with that. But it has to end up with a local strategy to police themselves from terrorism.
That is what worked in Iraq. “The surge” was really about gradually getting enough trained Iraqis to take charge of themselves. It will only continue to work if they defend themselves, we can’t do it for them. Similarly we needed to help the Afghans get there and upon removing the Taliban we actually had a moral duty to help them so far. The question is when does that moral duty end and they decide how to police themselves?