Sir! No Sir! Exposing and Debunking Military Lies from Vietnam to Iraq

Winter Soldier Hearings - Iraq Veterans Share First Hand Accounts of Iraq War During Forum on Capitol Hill

This press release, by Julie Nickson, was distributed by Capitol Hill Press Releases, May 15, 2008

---

Washington, DC - At a forum this morning organized by the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), ten veterans of the Iraq War provided gripping first person accounts of their time spent serving in combat operations. The veterans, who had served in the National Guard, the Army, and the Marines, shared their experiences on the ground at various stages of the occupation and throughout the country. They testified regarding violence against civilians, the destruction of civilian property, rules of engagement, the inadequate training that they received prior to deploying, and the personal struggles with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that many of the testifiers faced upon their return from combat.
"This morning's event was an opportunity to hear not from the military's top brass, but directly from the very soldiers who put their lives on the line to carry out President Bush's failed policies in Iraq," said Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), Co-Chair of the CPC.
"These first-hand accounts really highlight some of the tragic costs and horrific consequences of this Administration's utterly failed policies in Iraq," said CPC Co-Chair Rep. Barbara Lee (D- CA). "We must redouble our efforts to end the occupation and to truly honor our troops by bringing them home."
The veterans were members of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW), a non-profit organization created in 2004 to organize and represent the growing number of active duty service members, and veterans, who have turned against the occupation of Iraq, but continue to face pressure to remain silent.
One of the morning's most gripping testimonies came from Kristofer Goldsmith, a former Army Sergeant from Long Island, New York, who spoke about his own psychological struggles following a stop-loss order that kept him from returning home after serving in Iraq.
"As we were preparing to leave Iraq, we were given a mental screening test, which was supposed to identify possible mental ailments," Goldsmith said in his written statement. "But we were warned by the medical staff issuing the test that 'should you come up positive for mental problems, you could be forced to stay in [Iraq] for three to four more months before you can go home.' Most lied while completing the test because they wanted to get home as soon as possible. No one was held in Iraq any longer due to this test, but in hindsight, it is clear that verbal warning was used to prevent the inconvenience to the Army of having Soldiers that needed medical attention."
The psychological struggles of returning veterans was a consistent theme that emerged throughout the morning, and other testifiers spoke of the strain that PTSD put on their relationships with families and friends.
"The majority of my platoon went through divorces and or separations many of the time with children involved," said Vincent Emanuele, a Marine machine gunner who served in Iraq near the Syrian border. Emanuele also spoke of the pressure that he faced when dealing with his PTSD, "the idea being that 'REAL' Marines do not complain when coming home from combat they suck it up and do the job we are tasked to do," Emanuele said referring to how he and other veterans were treated like outcasts when they sought help. "This resulted in many of the Marines I served with, including myself turning to alcohol and drugs to cope with the horrors of this bloody occupation."
The forum was a follow-up to an event that IVAW organized earlier this year at the National Labor College in Silver Spring Maryland. Dubbed 'Winter Soldiers,' and modeled on a similar campaign during the Vietnam War, dozens of veterans shared their personal stories, and testified over three days on their own experiences on the ground in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"Your testimony this morning should serve as a reminder to every Member of this body that the occupation of Iraq is not something that we can simply discuss and debate in the abstract," Woolsey told the veterans. "You speak today not just for yourselves, but for countless others who have served in Iraq. You are doing all of us a great honor by sharing your stories and unique perspectives."

Shutting Down The Machine - Winter Soldier Rules of Engagement

This article, by Erin Thompson, was originally published by NYC Indymedia, March 26, 2008 and republished by zMagazine, masy 1, 2008

---

On March 14 President George W. Bush spoke from the White House to U.S. soldiers during a video conference about their deployment in Afghanistan. "I'm a little envious. If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed. It must be exciting for you...in some ways, romantic...you know, confronting danger."
Romantic was not the picture painted just a few miles away in Silver Spring, Maryland, during the second day of testimony by U.S. veterans during "Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan," organized by Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW). "For those of you who don't know, those are brains," said Jon Turner, a former Marine, while showing a slide of the inside of a man's head who had been killed by one his friends in his platoon.
Turner and other soldiers on the "Rules of Engagement" panel depicted their tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan as horrifying events in which soldiers indiscriminately killed civilians, wantonly destroyed property, conducted house raids, planted weapons on civilians (in order to be able to classify their deaths as insurgents), and mutilated the dead.
"I want to apologize to all the people in Iraq," said Sergio Kochergin, abruptly breaking off the end of a story about a friend who had shot himself in the shower four days after arriving in Iraq. "I'm sorry and I hope this war is going to be over as soon as possible."
Kochergin's testimony helped establish how the rules of engagement used by soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan lead to many of the atrocities described by the soldiers. The rules define when and how soldiers can fire their weapons or engage in combat. Kochergin described how initially his platoon, which patrolled an Iraqi town on the Syrian border, had to radio to the command post and "If they're doing some sort of illegal activity, we were allowed to take them out."
After a while, though, these rules were abandoned by commanders, who, at one point, told soldiers to fire at any Iraqis carrying bags and shovels, assuming that they were planting explosive devices. Finally, the soldiers were given no rules of engagement at all. "It was up to us to make the decision," said Korchergin, who called that policy "inappropriate."
For many soldiers, the rules of engagement in Iraq were "broadly defined and loosely enforced. Anyone who tells you different is a liar and a fool," said Jason Lemieux, who served three tours in the Marines. While he was initially given rules of engagement that corresponded to the Geneva Conventions, "By the time we got to Baghdad, I could shoot at anyone who came close enough to make me uncomfortable," said Lemieux, who described being so traumatized by the shooting of an unarmed Iraqi man, by a commanding officer shooting "two old ladies carrying groceries," and by fellow soldiers taking potshots at unarmed civilians, that he blocked it all out.
Garrett Reppenhagen, who served in Baquba, Iraq, described a firefight in which U.S. soldiers began spraying bullets into several vehicles of what they thought were armed insurgents. After killing seven Iraqis, the soldiers discovered, to their dismay, that the men were actually bodyguards to the deputy governor. "All these men were not only innocent, they were our allies," said Reppenhagen. "This is the kind of confusion that goes on every day in Iraq."
Jason Washburn described members of his unit shooting an Iraqi woman carrying a large shopping bag, only to find out that, "She had been trying to bring us food," said Washburn. "And we blew her to pieces for it."
Other soldiers emphasized that they were not reprimanded for shooting civilians. "One thing we were asked to do was carry draw-up weapons. In case we did shoot a civilian, we could toss it on a body and make it look like an insurgent," said Washburn. "If they were carrying a shovel, heavy bag, digging anywhere near a road, we could shoot them" within the rules of engagement."
Soldiers also spoke about the callous attitude many soldiers had toward shooting Iraqis. After shooting a man who was being pursued for planting an IED, according to one testifier, the Marines "left his body to rot in the field it was still there two weeks later," said Indiana resident Vincent Emanuele, who served in the Marine Corps in Iraq in 2003 and 2004. "His picture was on the backdrop of a laptop for a screen saver for one of our more motivated Marines."
Jon Turner, a machine gunner who served two deployments in Iraq, described intentionally killing civilians and mutilating the dead. He then ripped off the dog tags around his neck, declaring, "I don't work for you anymore."
"On April 18, 2006, I had my first confirmed kill," said Turner. "I shot him in front of his friend and his father." After the kill, "My company commander personally congratulated me," Turner said. "This is the same individual that stated that whoever gets his first kill by stabbing him to death would get a four day pass."
Turner presented a slideshow, which included close-up shots of Iraqis killed by his platoon, the inside of a young Iraqi's skull, and part of a blown off face, which soldiers had placed on the top of a Kevlar helmet. "It just goes to show you that...we had no respect for their bodies afterwards."
He also presented photos of Iraqis bound in their living rooms during a house raid and described beating and choking men "if they were giving us a problem." In a grisly admission, Turner revealed that he had tattooed the words symbolizing "fuck you" on his "choking" wrist and, "anytime I felt the need to take aggression, I would use it." Although he began his testimony in defiance, Turner ended with a plea. "I am sorry for the things that I did; I am no longer the monster that I once was," he said to a tearful audience.
James Gilligan, who did tours with the Marines in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guantánamo Bay, told of participating in an operation to detain three Afghani herdsmen who were suspected of spotting rocket attacks for "insurgents" in Pakistan. Gilligan witnessed a Marine helicopter gunner open fire on the men while they were fleeing down a hillside.
He also described the looting of gold coins by soldiers at the Iraqi Atomic Energy Agency. The coins, which had the face of Saddam Hussein and the head of the Iraqi nuclear facility on them, were "liberated" by senior NCOs and officers, according to Gilligan, who was told about the incident by fellow Marines. "After we were leaving the country, a lot of these guys were talking about how they were bringing them home." Gilligan explained that the looting of the gold coins was just a small part of the looting he saw.
Gilligan also mentioned his experience as a security guard in Guantanamo Bay. While he wasn't actually involved in any interrogations, he interacted with MPs on the base and heard of stories about how sexual humiliation and waterboarding were used on detainees. In order to visit a "stress doctor" to treat his nightmares related to his PTSD from the Iraq invasion, Gilligan had to visit Camp X-ray, which housed detainees in metal cages "lying out in the open, 23 hours a day" in the extreme heat.
Many of the former soldiers, who were clearly still traumatized by their experiences, challenged the audience of several hundred members of the media, friends, and family, as well as allies in the antiwar movement, to use their message as to end the war.
"They went to Iraq hoping to do good, hoping to do right. We found that we were killing Iraqi people in horrible ways," said Reppehagen. "And most soldiers are going through this whether they've seen an atrocity or not, the truth of the matter is that the war is the atrocity."

Winter Soldiers in the Press (The Indypendent)

Winter Soldier: Friday’s Rules of Engagement Panels

Posted by Erin Thompson , to the Indypendent, March 15, 2008

---

From the White House on March 14 President George W. Bush spoke to U.S. soldiers during a video conference about their current deployment in Afghanistan. “I’m a little envious. If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed. It must be exciting for you … in some ways, romantic … you know, confronting danger,” Bush said.
Romantic was not the picture painted of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan just a few miles away in Silver Spring, Maryland, during the second day of testimony by U.S. veterans during Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan , organized by the Iraq Veterans Against the War. “For those of you who don’t know, those are brains,” said Jon Turner, a former Marine, while showing a slide of the inside of man’s head who had been killed by one his friends in his platoon.
Turner and other soldiers on the Rules of Engagement panel depicted their tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan as horrifying events, in which civilians were indiscriminately killed, both accidentally and intentionally, soldiers wantonly destroyed property, including mosques, conducted house raids, planted weapons on civilians killed by the U.S. military in order to be able to classify their deaths as insurgents, and mutilated the dead.
“I want to apologize to all the people in Iraq,” said Sergio Kochergin abruptly, breaking off the end of a story about a friend who had shot himself in the shower, four days after arriving in Iraq. “I’m sorry and I hope this war is going to be over as soon as possible.”
Kochergin’s testimony helped establish how the Rules of Engagement employed by soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan lead to many of the atrocities described the soldiers. The rules, which are provided to soldiers ahead of any mission, define when and how soldiers can fire their weapons or engage in combat. Kochergin described how initially his platoon, which patrolled an Iraqi town on the Syrian border, had to radio to the command post and “if they’re doing some sort of illegal activity, we were allowed to take them out.”
After a while though, these rules were abandoned by commanders, who, at one point, told soldiers to fire at any Iraqis carrying bags and shovels, assuming that they were planting explosive devices. Finally, the soldiers were given no rules of engagement at all, “it was up to us to make the decision,” said Korchergin, who called that policy “inappropriate.”
For many soldiers in Iraq, the rules of engagement in Iraq were “broadly defined and loosely enforced, anyone who tells you different is a liar and a fool,” said Jason Lemieux, who served three tours of Iraq in the U.S. Marine Corps. While he was initially given rules of engagement that corresponded to the Geneva Conventions, “By the time we got to Baghdad that I could shoot at anyone who came close enough to make uncomfortable,” said Lemieux, who described being so traumatized by the shooting of an unarmed Iraqi man that he blocked it out, a commanding officer who shot “two old ladies carrying groceries” and fellow soldiers taking potshots at unarmed civilians in a car.
Garrett Reppenhagen, who served in Baquba Iraq in the U.S. Army, described a firefight in which U.S. soldiers began spraying bullets into several vehicles of what they thought were armed insurgents. After killing seven Iraqis in two vehicles, the soldiers discovered, to their dismay, that the men were actually body guards to the deputy governor, “All these men were not only innocent, they were our allies,” said Reppenhagen.
“This is the kind of confusion that does on every day in Iraq,” said Reppenhagen.
“Everything that we saw we engaged in,” said Jason Washburn, a Marine Corporal who did three tours in Iraq. “There was really no rule governing the amount of force we were allowed to use.”
Washburn describes members of his unit shooting an Iraqi woman carrying a large bag who was approaching U.S. soldiers, only to find out that she had been carrying grocery bags. “She had been trying to bring us food,” said Washburn. “And we blew her to pieces for it.”
Other soldiers emphasized that soldiers were not reprimanded for shooting civilians, and were encouraged by commanding officers to carry shovels and guns with them that they could plant on civilians shot by the U.S. military. “One thing we were asked to do was carry draw-up weapons, in case we did shoot a civilian, we could toss it on a body and make it look like an insurgent,” said Washburn.
“If they were carrying a shovel, heavy bag, digging anywhere, near a road, we could shoot them,” said Washburn. “We carried the tools in vehicles so that we can toss it on them – within the rules of engagement.”
Soldiers also spoke about the callous attitude many soldiers had toward the shooting of Iraqis. After shooting a man who was being pursued for planting an IED, according to one testifier, the Marines “left his body to rot in the field – it was still there two weeks later,” said Indiana resident Vincent Emanuele, who served in the Marine Corps in Iraq twice in 2003 and 2004. “His picture was on the backdrop of a laptop for a screen saver for one of our more motivated marines.”
Turner, an automatic machine gunner in the U.S. marines who served two deployments in Iraq, described intentionally killing civilians and the mutilation of the dead by marines. The blond-haired young man, with a disarming demeanor began his presentation by ripping off the dog tags around his neck. “I don’t work for you anymore,” he said.
“On April 18, 2006, I had my first confirmed killed,” said Turner. “I shot him in front of friend and his father,” describing how the man looked at him when he shot him and began screaming, “I looked at my friend who I was on post with and said ‘I can’t let that happen’, shot him again… It took seven people to carry his body away,” said Turner.
After the kill, “My company commander personally congratulated me,” Turner said. “This is the same individual that stated that whoever gets his first kill by stabbing him to death would get a four day pass.”
Turner described how when embedded reporters were around, the behavior of soldiers changed dramatically and showed video footage of Marines blowing off steam by gunning down the turret of a mosque.
Turner presented a slideshow, which included close-up shots of brains from Iraqis killed by his platoon, the inside of a young Iraqi’s skull and part of a blown off face, which soldiers had placed on the top of a Kevlar helmet. “It just goes to show you that … we had no respect for their bodies afterwards.”
He also presented photos of Iraqis bound in their living rooms during a house raid and described beating and choking men “if the men were giving us a problem.” In a grisly admission, Turner revealed that he had tattooed the words symbolizing “fuck you” on his “choking” wrist and, “anytime I felt the need to take aggression, I would use it.”
Although he began his testimony in defiance, Turner ended with plea. “I am sorry for the things that I did; I am no longer the monster that I once was,” he said to a tearful audience.
James Gilligan, a serious-looking young man with dark hair who did tours in the Marine Corps in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo, was serious and occasionally angry as he described watching unarmed fleeing Afghans being shot down by a group of “hard-charged and devil dog” Marines. He also described the looting of gold coins by soldiers in Iraq and the use of sexual humiliation and waterboarding of detainees at Abu Ghraib.
Gilligan also described how he was asked to provide targeting coordinates by his commanding officers, despite being unqualified, after his unit was hit by fire. He read the coordinates on a compass next to a large metal machine gun. “I gave the false azimuth [coordinates],” said Gilligan, who broke into tears and paused for a moment. “The top [commanders] took my azimuth as true.”
The unit fired at least six barrages of mortars at an Afghani village, which suffered considerable damage and casualties. “Through translators and interpreters, I was told that our unit had informed the Afghanis, ‘If the Taliban does it again, you let us know,’” said Gilligan.
Many of the former soldiers were clearly still traumatized by their experiences, challenged the audience of several hundred members of the media, friends and family, as well as allies in the antiwar movement to take their message as tool to end the war.
“They went to Iraq hoping to do good, hoping to do right. We found rapidly that that was not the case, that we were killing Iraqi people in horrible ways,” said Reppehagen. “And most soldiers are going through this – whether they’ve seen a true atrocity or not, the truth of the matter is that the war is the

Winter Soldiers in the Press (Alternet)

Winter Soldier: America Must Hear These Iraq Vets' Stories

By Penny Coleman, AlterNet. Posted March 15, 2008.

---

I missed the Winter Soldier Investigation in 1971. At the time I was married to a vet who desperately wanted to put his war behind him -- and he wanted me to help him do it. We were supposed to pretend it had never happened. It didn't work.
Daniel refused to talk about Vietnam. "Talk to your old lady? No fucking way," his friend Bobby Lanz shot back when I said I thought that maybe Daniel wouldn't have killed himself if I had been able to get him to talk about whatever it was that was causing him such pain. "With other vets, you can say, 'shit man, I did all this horrible stuff. You're not going to believe the stuff I did', and someone who has been there will say, 'Yeah, so did I, so did we all.' But with your woman? You start to talk about having fucked some folks up bad, doing awful things, killing people, maybe, and she starts to cry and you don't go there again. You think, Fuck me, man, I don't need to hurt her. This is psychological abuse, so I am going to shut up."
Maybe I wouldn't have understood. Completely. But not knowing was far worse. For decades, I took responsibility for his death. I thought it was my fault. And even if I hadn't been able to understand exactly what he was talking about, I would have understood that he was in a kind of lethal pain. Whether it was that he thought he deserved to die or that he deserved to be put out of his misery, either way, execution or euthanasia, I would have understood that he had been injured in the war. And I would have known where to focus my grief and my rage.
What I kept thinking today, listening to all those who testified at this new Winter Soldier investigation sponsored by Iraq Veterans Against the War at the National Labor College in Washington, DC, is that so much grief and pain for the past 30 years has been mis-directed, so much energy wasted, blaming ourselves and the soldiers we loved for the injuries that we couldn't see. Joyce Lucey, the mother of a soldier who took his own life after returning from Iraq, said that when he left he gave her a coin and told her to hold it like an amulet to keep him safe. She did, but she now understands that even though her son had been returned to her, his soul had been destroyed. "I should have been holding that coin after he came home."
But, she continued, "His voice is silenced. Ours is not." And she quoted Edmund Burke: "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil in America is for good men to do nothing."
Everything I heard today spoke to that challenge, to the challenge of channeling our combined grief and rage into a focused fight that will really, finally make a difference. Clifton Hicks began his testimony by saying that all of the men he served with in Iraq were there for love: love of country, of ideals, of comrades, and "for that they are beyond judgment. I am here," he added, "to judge the war itself."
One after another, veterans told conflicted stories, some with tears, some with rigid control, some with visible shakes, but all with hard-won moral courage and deep sorrow. John Michael Turner began his testimony by telling the audience that as far as he was concerned, "Once a Marine, Always a Marine" was history. For him it is now "Eat the apple and fuck the corps." Then he tossed his dog tags into the audience saying, "Fuck you, I don't work for you no more." Turner's first confirmed kill was on April 18, 2006. He shot an Iraqi boy in front of his father. It took a second shot to kill him. He had a photograph of the boy's open skull. Turner was personally congratulated by his commanding officer, who proceeded to offer a four day pass to anyone who got a kill by stabbing one of the enemy. Turner ended with, "I am sorry for the hate and destruction that I have inflicted on innocent people. I am sorry for the things I did. I am no longer the monster that I once was."
Hart Viges told of having an insurgent, armed with a rocket-propelled grenade, in his sights during a firefight and not being able to pull the trigger. He was frozen by awareness that the fear and confusion he saw on the Iraqi kid's face was exactly what he imagined was on his own.
Adam Kokesh enlisted in the Marines not because he agreed with the war, but because he "wanted to help clean up the mess." Instead of the schools and water facilities his President had promised he would be helping to build, he found himself policing a wanton project of human and social destruction. He manned "snap" check points where Marines in camouflage at dusk shot unsuspecting drivers who had failed to see them. He described feeling "funny" when he had to decide whether or not to pose with the trophy remains. "I wasn't the one who killed this guy." Kokesh was ordered to shoot at Iraqi police and firemen who were out after curfew putting out a fire that had been started by American rounds. That one he managed to stop with his "little bit of Arabic," but Kokesh wasn't optimistic about our prospects in Iraq. "We care so the American people don't have to. As soon as you choose looking good over doing right, you lose."
Clifton Hicks talked about free fire orders in city neighborhoods and the indiscriminate, often vengeful, targeting of cars and civilians, and about riding through the gates of their compound one night, aware that the humvee in front of his had run over a civilian. No one said anything because it had been a long hard day. They had all been in country long enough to feel that the bigger deal was "being separated from your cot" for the hours it would have taken to fill out the paperwork.
Jason Hurt, a medic from East Tennessee, said, "I am a peaceful person, and I drew down on an 80 year old woman. I hate guns. They should all be melted down into jewelry." And he added, if this were happening where he lives, if some foreign occupying force came into his part of the world, "every self-respecting citizen would come out of the hills with a shotgun to defend their country."
Vincent Emanuelli was appalled by the way American soldiers treated Iraqi dead. "Standard operating procedure was to run over them or take pictures."
Sergio Corrigan said that all an Iraqi needed was a heavy bag and a shovel to become a target. And looking back, with a "clear mind and not so much anger," he wanted to "apologize to the people of Iraq."
James Gilligan struggled to tell about the night he saw a flash on a mountainside and tried to call in for fire. But he took his compass reading too close to a machine gun and the heavy metal threw he reading off. An Afghani village was decimated and he will never be the same.
As Adam Kokesh put it, they were all struggling all the time because their morals were at odds with their survival instincts.
These new Winter Soldiers look so young to me. They are my son's age. My daughter's age as well. The last time young soldiers like these tried to get Americans to listen they were ignored. And that can't be allowed to happen again. The message of Iraq Veterans Against the War came through clearly in every tortured testimony. This is an illegal war. It has cost us our peace of mind. The longer we are there, the more of us will be injured. Bring our troops home now.
It is tempting to despair, but as Logan Laituri reminded the audience, Logan who had testified that his unit unknowingly used white phosphorous for training rounds and that it had "a significant impact on the surrounding communities, what Dr. King said in 1967 is equally true for us now. He said that he opposed the War, then in Vietnam, "because I love America. I speak out against this war not in anger but with anxiety and sorrow in my heart and above all with a passionate desire to see our beloved country stand as the moral example of the world."