rjf98

Visit in Feb... Home in March. Might have a tandem rating by then as well. Rich

[rjf98 sucks in air through his teeth] WOW.. .how embarassing. Glad no one was hurt. I'll make sure not to mention it when I talk with them on the phone about some mods to my current .45 Hey JP: I've got a 1911 for sale. If you weren't looking to spend boatloads and want it for target and not carry it's perfect. I have carried it for years, but it is set up with high-profile target sites and a very light trigger if you're interested.

Story please. Have never heard it. I for one don't believe in ADs, but rather NDs (negligent). That doesn't mean I'm saying you're lying, just my beliefe on weapons firing accidently because of mishandling. Please do relate the event as you know it.

Who added me I didn't add myself. Maybe I did add myself Oh well, I would have added myself.

Go with Wilson Combat. You will pay, but there isn't a finer single action .45 auto out there.

What are you thanking me for? Defending your freedom? By saying we aren't safer than we were before you don't think I've actually done that. You don't seem to understand.... there is no difference between the Commander in Chief and those of us in uniform. We are as responsible as he is for what happened. Really what are you thankfull for. Sounds to me like your thankful you don't have to go defend freedom, you just get to reap the benefits of it. Don't waste your time saying thank you when you don't believe in the cause. It's two faced. I've got more respect for the hippies in the 70's that were willing to get tear gassed, bitten by dogs, hit with some police batons, and get shot at for what they thought was right than some two faced person that wants to say "thank you" but doesn't even know the meaning. Hey, thank you for not spitting in my face, but at least when people like you were doing so it was obivous who the A holes were.

HAH!!! You lose Gravitymaster. Michele jumps at my DZ. I get to marry her first No wait.. I'm married Still though.... Way cool way cool

Keep your thanks. Again I state is is contradictory to insult my commander in chief and tell me I'm doing a good job doing his "dirty work." I hope you feel better saying "thanks". What you are really saying is "I know you can't think for yourselves, and even if you could you wouldn't be strong enough to go to jail to not follow orders. Don't worry little sheep I don't blame you." I choose DAILY to follow the orders of the president and bring freedom to others and protect your right to speak out. I don't appreciate your patronizing remarks.

I was asked to offer a "tour of Pendleton." I am more than willing to make the offer. I'll have to put some sort of official tour together. Here's what I'll offer. Those that will be there... or even those that won't, but know me. What do I have to offer that you would bid on. The obvious of coach jumps is there I guess, but surely there is something.

Again, couldn't have said it better. We left them alone after we made a committment to help. Why is up for question. I propose that the public perception that the world would immediately become peacfull and the decision to downsize the military caused the initial withdrawl. A lack of leadership at the highest levels got us back in that country. Poor undesrtanding and a fear of communism. Let's face it, Asian communism isn't former Soviet Union Communism... too many Chinese buisnessmen for that. Human rights records are another matter. Again though. I conceed that a lack of understanding of the enemy created a major problem the second time. To say we weren't fighting for a group of people that were going to die at the hands of communists is silly. Go back and look at the footage. Look how many people we left to die when the last helicopter left the embassy. Again, this is a war that "became" illegal due to a group of elected leaders not holding true to what they believed. Nicaragua was not initially an illegal war. Our commander in chief promissed the freedom fighters we would help them. What was going on was working. When Dewey Claridge and the CIA placed a small "mine" in the harbor suddenly we were some real bad guys. Never mind the fact that it did no damage to the foreign oil freighter and that it was designed to scare and not damage. Let's forget that documents now tell us that our strategy was working and the nicaraguan govt was litterally months if not weeks from succomming to the desired end state. Suddenly Congress tells the president and the national intelligence community it is illegal to do anything but provide defensive measures, food, and medical aid to the contras. A group of determined individuals made choices about continuing to keep their promises to the rebels and damn the consequences. Next Congress decides you can only give medical aid and food, .50cals aren't exactly defensive in nature only. Finally those with strength in their convictions decide to break the law completely. They were caught, they were punished. They suffered for doing what they belived was right and trying to keep a promise our country made that it backed out on. Same Same with AFghanistan. Sorry boys, but you beat the commies and we have to leave now. WTF kind of committment was that?!?! I think they have. That's why they are telling the international community to Fuck off and the president isn't backing off on a timeline that he and his advisors established as the best chance to establish a free Iraq. Even if it is an election year and we have now lost more servicemen and women than we did during major combat operations.

Come come now. Never said it shouldn't be allowed. Just sometimes one needs to act on the strength of their convictions and do what they know to be right, not what is popular. Take a look at my other posts. I'm all for public opinion and even demonstration (peacfull that is). What I'm not for is an elected LEADER who responds too readily to a public that is fickle and can be easliy swayed.

Sorry, disagree with you. based on personal observation of the Iraqi people. History shows us that freedom is contagious. These people have tasted it. They will, over time, develop their own version of it. the surrounding countries and persons will want the same. To say otherwise I believe is to look at the minority, or insult the people of Iraq and say they can't handle freedom. They want us to leave ASAP. They protest to tell us that. I bet those people are happy to have their freedom. We have not won the war, mearly the first battle in a larger conflict. Our actions here will determine the direction of that conflict. If we leave and don't finish the job we have stepped back and cannot be trusted. If we stay the course (regardless of body count or popular opinion) and help these people establish self government then we have taken giant leaps towards winning. Over the course of the last 50 years America has quite a record of backing out when the going got tough. Nicaragua and Vietnam come to mind. Why did we do this? Our leaders allowed public opinion (fickle at best) to change the course that they knew to be the right one. This time in history we (the American people) need to stay the course. Damn the cost, the prize is too high

Thanks to everyone. I eventually used aerostores sight as it did not require flash.

Glad you brought this book up. I've got at least three different translations and I'll be happy to discuss our war in Iraq in relation to this necessary read for all heads of state and any military leader. Tactics: Terror and plenty of WMD. He's used it before most likely he would do it again. Not to mention breaking damns and causing flooding and the natural disaster that creates. Draining swamps and re-diverting necessary irrigation water and causing thousands to lose the ability to grow sustaining food. Blowing up oil wells so that if he can't have them no one can. Draining thousands of gallons of oil into the Gulf. When you're president maybe you could come up with a better plan. We tried.. it didn't work. No one in the military wants to resort to war. In this case we needed it. Point conceded that the perfect general could have done this without a war. Problem is even chinese scholars agree that SunZu believed there was no such thing as the perfect general or the perfect victory. Think we did that. Both strategically and tactically. Strategically we know that Saddam was trying to develop WMD and we also know that he paid money to families of Palestinian suicide bombers. Too big of a stretch for you to see where it would go next? Tactically our lightning strike into the southern Rhamalla oil fields prevented an ecological disaster. We knew that he would destroy those fields. Read any number of accounts of the battle. We absolutely destroyed this enemy. Frontal assaults, faints, turning manuevers, fixing manuevers. Avoiding over 5 divisions of Iraqi army and cutting off their supply lines and defeating them without a fight. This particular passage has to do with the conduct of war, not avoiding war. We conducted this war in an exemplary manner and our generals were damn near perfect. Damn straight... we won. This also explains why Iran and Korea aren't currently in a fight for their existance. Our Commander in Chief knows that now is not the time and that these nations can be dealt with by other means. Again this refers to the conduct of war. Inferior forces refers to either smaller number of troops, or those troops less superbly trained. Read up on the conduct of the war, you will see we applied this rather well with a single Marine division defeating 8 Iraqi divisions. Timing is everything. We struck at night when he wasn't prepared, we kept comming at areas he wasn't defending. We train 365 days a year for what just happened. Couldn't have said it better myself.

Product of poor leadership at the small unit level... it's gonna happen much of the time. this is not the same as the military in general not having a clearly defined mission. If you interview the junior guy and he says the mission is not clearly defined he isn't talking about the overall reason why he is fighting there, he's talking about why he's raiding a farm house that is empty all the time. That happens lots of dry holes before you turn up Saddam. You can bet the soldiers that found that SOB weren't told they were looking for him, but rather a "big figure". President is ultimately responsible for the body count in Iraq as the Commander in Chief. That does not mean he is the supreme authority within the US. That authority lies with the American people. We (soldier or civilian) don't have the luxury of following some leader as the supreme authority. We are all responsible for our actions. Thus the insult by saying a soldier doesn't know why he is there.

We'll I tend to believe we've had this strategy for a while now.... We're still here aren't we

I'd be happy to cite my sources. They are not however news media, but my the books I have chosen to read on terror and the mindset of the terrorist. Contrary to your belief that soldiers simply "do what they are told" we research and try to understand our enemies so that we can win. We want to know the culture because killing the guy with the gun isn't enough to constitute victory, in this case changing thousands of years of political thought is. My library is currently packed up, but the first two books that come to mind are Triumph of Terror, or American Jihad. Maybe (The Bear Went Over the Mountain) Sorry, just can't think of the many more that I have read on the topics.

Start counting numbers any time you want. How many innocents have to die before you are willing to act. 1000, 10000, how about a million? Do we need to wait until our enemy is ready to fight us and can effectively use WMD or Nuclear weapons against us if we attack. NO, I will not allow you to question the validity or the purpose of a fight by counting how many have to die to achieve the victory.

Again... NO... my fellow Marines, Soldiers, Sailors, and Airman dying does not make me question the validity of the cause. Is there nothing you would not willingly die for?

That is your biggest mistake. The WTC WAS the target. The target WAS America's economic success and the symbol of Americas ECONOMIC power and the freedom of other nations to pursue monetary wealth. You are severly misguided if you think that the terrorists are stupid enough to hit a non-military target and expect to achieve military gain. Sure the White House may have been a target, the Pentagon definetly was, but those were "first" times (so yes, the terrorists owe me beer). The World Trade Center was a target in the past. The stated goal of Bin Laden was to strike a blow to the economic power of the US. That economic power comes from a societies freedom to pursue what they want. The system works BECAUSE of peoples natural tendancy to do what is best for them. Never be misguided about what they hate. It isn't the US as a country, it's not our tendency to act in our best interest and not ask the world's opinion (that's what you hate)... it's our FREEDOM and SUCCESS. They hate us because they think success can't come from our type of freedom. They hate us because they used to be a powerful civilization and they can't be again as long as they pursue it through the "holy" koran. They hate it because our success and power only serves to highlight the abismal failure of their type of government.

You can't help everyone. You help who you can. It doesn't bother me at all that some of the reasons or some of the things we were looking for weren't there. As far as "the worlds policemen thing goes" or other nations needing help as well. Not everyone gets treated the same way. We don't do it with economic policy, why would we do it with the military? Your "respect" for me and contempt for my commander in chief are mutually exclusive. Iran, Korea... they will be delt with in time, and in unique ways. Don't know how, but I have confidence that the success in Iraq will be repeated. I don't feel lied to. I don't like being called an idiot who can't think for himself either. Just ask about military moral during the past administrations years. As a general rule it SUCKED. This president is comitted to long term results and is willing to pay the price. So are we.

Hey: Stop telling me I don't know what I'm fighting for. And don't pretend you know. I've been over there once already. Getting ready to go back and I know what I'm fighting for. So do the rest of my Marines. The protest the other day... over 100,000 Iraqis wanting direct elections. Not ONE shot fired. Peacful protests to get what they want. COULD NOT HAVE DONE THAT 7 MONTHS AGO. It's a personal affront to me that you assume I don't know what I'm fighting for. The above is just one reason. Why don't you get off of your high horse and realize that the US military has brought more freedom, more help to those people than any other organization over the last 30 years combined. Hell the UN and red cross STILL wont stay. Why? Because they don't have strength in their convictions. It's not worth it to them to have people die to bring good things to the Iraqi people. I CHOSE to wear this uniform. We did GOOD things, and still are! It's my duty to go, and I believe in the mission enough that I'm ready to die for it. I'm sorry that you don't believe that bringing people freedom is worth dying for. Sounds pretty selfish to me to argue that "we're no safer so it was the wrong thing to do!" CAPT USMC

You know what this means?!?!? BACHELOR PARTY!!!!! Congrats Dave. You've come a long way.

Good sights to design a PD canopy anyone? Can't get Square 1's to load, and don't have flash player on the computer at the office to use paragears. Ideas?

Happy B-Day Mel