Ryan Ginstrom wrote:

> Griping is a right of every soldier,

Thank God someone can understand this.

> and a skill that most take pride in and
> carry out with great skill. I would expect morale to be low with a job like
> those guys have, and having been in both active duty and the national guard,
> I can bet that those weekend warriors are hating life about now.
>
> However, bitching and moaning when the cameras are rolling is another
> matter.

The Stars and Stripes reported on some survey specifically designed to gauge
morale and desire to reenlist, while on the front. It is the Pentagon who
should not be complaining about what they were sure to hear.

There are also serious safety matters making the news like how soldiers do not
have enough flak jackets, thus must share them among a platoon, are using
Vietnam era flak jackets, or are having their mothers buy some and send them
from home; or how helicopters are flying without necessary gear to defend
themselves against attacks just like the ones shooting them down.

Note that these people are not the ones telling reporters they want to go home
to their families or sit out the next war.

I haven't seen "bitching" for the international news cameras. Doing so would be
stupid.

Enlisting is not stupid.

> From what little footage I've seen, it appears that most of the
> soldiers think they are participating in some kind of reality TV show.

Yes, because they didn't really know.

I loved one full page newspaper account of how some soldiers living in one of
Saddam's abandoned palaces suddenly realized that deer were roaming the
grounds.

They killed at least one, and had an old fashioned barbecue. After word spread,
they did it again, IIRC, for some high ranking US officer.