Bodies of Killed Service Members Return as Freight, page 5

First, I apologize for not reading this entire thread, I simply don't have the time. But this is a very important issue.

Over here in this thread; Kerry calls U.S. troops terrorists there's been a debate over what I see as the misrepresentation of Kerry's words, and twisting them into a meaning that conservatives can find offense.

But here in this thread, and in the actions of the treatment of our nation's fallen warriors, we have actual evidence that the current "people in charge" actually care little about our soldiers and their families.
www.10news.com...


So I ask, in the spectrum of perceptions, which is worse:

A politician using the word "terrorize" when discussing our troops...
or
Allowing our fallen to come home like this:



Thanks.

DENYING IGNORANCE BECAUSE OTHERS WOULDN'T

When I first read the story on the Holley family's outrage that the body of their dead son was being shipped unceremoniously to them as freight, I too was outraged. The indignity that represented was more than I could believe, and immediately thought of ATSNN as the appropriate platform to make more public this insensitive move by our own government. I naively believed that others at ATS would share a similar outrage in response to the story. I couldn't have been more wrong.

When I posted this article for submission to ATSNN on December 10, at 09:29, within three minutes, it received its first NO for BIAS vote. My submission contained two simple factual statements:

A San Diego news station is reporting that the military is returning fallen soldiers via freight on commercial airliners. When questioned about the practice, a Defense Department representative said she did not know the reason why that was happening.

Fair enough, I thought, somebody voted no because they didn't really like the subject matter of the article. To some degree, I expected as much and decided to ignore it...

Eight minutes later, I received a Fix Introduction vote. I knew the typical convention for ATSNN articles was to have three sentences...mine contained two. Upon consideration, I recalled that I had seen other articles on ATSNN with just two sentences, and because the source article was so short, decided to leave my submission in its original state.

Fourteen minutes later, I received a NO for Writing vote. Granted, these two sentences were not the most sophisticated sentences I have ever written, but what else was there really to say? They were grammatically correct and contained no spelling errors. Moreover, again, the source article was so short, I didn't think it appropriate to essentially duplicate it.

I let it ride...

Thirty-one minutes later, I received a NO: Not Right vote, and twelve minutes after that, I received another NO: Not Right vote.

Now, I knew the article was in trouble. How something like the subject matter of this article could not be right for ATSNN was beyond me...

In the next eight hours, I received two more NO: Not Right votes. Then by the next morning, I received an additional four NO: Not Right votes and one more NO for BIAS vote.

The article was dead.

The simple facts indicated in the source article were as follows:

Parents (both of whom were prior military) objected that their son would be sent as freight. No American flag. No color guard. And it took the intervention of their Senator to make things right.

In the developing thread, some posters objected to the relevance of the article as news. Some argued that the story itself was a misrepresentation of "how it is done" and claimed it to be a form of politically motivated deceit.

Some asserted personal knowledge and experience of the correct protocol, arguing that the parents were wrong in their expectations. Many responses became sarcastic on this basis alone:

"how could they be shipped - 1st class ????"

"I'm thinking propping them up in a seat or filling the aisles with coffins would probably willy a few passengers out."

"Maybe they should fly every coffin home in its own personal jet."

"It's whining and over-reacting"

"I don't see why an issue is being made of this now except for the media wanting to do anything that they can to cause a controversy."

"should they have a parade?"

Many argued that their version of the facts trumped what the parents were claiming.

Many argued that logistically, it was unreasonable to expect a color guard...that it would be too disruptive to airport operations...

Many personally attacked me, including one who called me a soldier hater and another who argued that I was using the story for my own political agenda.

Then by the 50th post, I was able to retrieve written and photographic evidence that fallen soldiers were in fact greeted by color guards...at commercial airports..at the body's final destination...

But that was not enough...for the most part the denial, the assertions contrary to the parent's representations, the sarcasm, and the personal attacks continued...

I....was....dumbfounded.

When I had initially posted the article, I did so because I deeply sympathized with the pain of those parents. I didn't think it right that our government would ask for so much and literally return so little. It angered me that these parents represented that they got what their son deserved, because they were prior military and knew they had that right to demand it- but that other civilian parents would not fare as well...

The mere fact that a Pentagon spokeswoman said that she did not know why that was happening was indication enough for me that something had changed in the government's policy. In my view, that had to be exposed...

And what better place to do it than ATS? ...or so I thought...

I emailed the senator's office and television station in an attempt to obtain more information...but no response came...of course it's only been two days, but I wanted a response immediately to backup up the claims of these outraged parents...

I researched the web... came across this memorial site of their son, Matthew...read the responses from friends who knew him...the photos...

And the negativity in this thread continued...

And...that...is...when...I gave...it up.

This was becoming toxic to me.

I made a deal with myself that I would not visit this thread again...and didn't...until this happened:

Hannity & Colmes

Guests and Topics: December 13

...Then, a mother and a father whose son died in Iraq tell us of their anguish as their son's body is shipped home on a commercial airliner and labeled "cargo."

Link.

You can listen to the interview ADMIN EDIT - Link to illicit podcast REMOVED

"That's disgraceful, it should have never happened..." -- Sean Hannity

I agree.

...and it's unfortunate that so many felt the story inappropriate for ATSNN. The irony, of course, is that FOX chose otherwise...

I love ATS, and will continue to support ATS...I just wish more of it's members would have supported the Holley's.


[edit on 14-12-2005 by loam]

[edit on 12-14-2005 by Springer]

Originally posted by loam

In the developing thread, some posters objected to the relevance of the article as news. Some argued that the story itself was a misrepresentation of "how it is done" and claimed it to be a form of politically motivated deceit.

It’s because it is politically motivated deceit. This has never been an issue before, and as I personally have stated this is exactly how it has been done since at least the early 90’s. The only reason that this is an issue now is because it involves an unpopular war under a president that many do not approve of. This is not a biased opinion on my part as I personally did not vote for the current administration anyway, and am therefore not defending them. I am simply stating a fact, this is how it is done.

I believe that everything I have said has been backed up by not only other articles that have been added since I last posted, but also other military and aviation persons.

So in what way is this article anything BUT biased?

Originally posted by loam

Then by the 50th post, I was able to retrieve written and photographic evidence that fallen soldiers were in fact greeted by color guards...at commercial airports..at the body's final destination...

Its not standard operating procedure for certain, especially this picture:

[img] i23.photobucket.com...[/img]

In this specific case, they are obviously at the arriving destination and the wife/fiancé was present so they allowed the guard to prep the coffin in the bin out of site (around the corner of the bin. Judging by the door handle, the long thing sticking up, this is bin 3 and 4 on an AA 727 both of these bins are fairly long) before it was presented in front of her. I am sure that they were briefed by the lead or safety agent before being allowed to do this.

Allowing non-airline personnel into the bin would only happen in the rarest of instances for liability reasons alone. However, the airlines are not heartless and would have allowed that if the wife had shown up at the flight and the guards realized that the coffin was not prepped for her to see it. I guarantee that this coffin was similarly shipped, and the guards entered the bin to remove the outer casing and drape the flag before it was moved into the doorway within her sight.

These are very upsetting pictures by the way, I truly feel for this soldiers wife.



The above image is obviously the final unloading of this soldier, I am pretty certain that Green airport is a small airfield, and if you notice the guard is under escort by an Airport Police officer that is slightly visible in a blue uniform behind the guards (He is sticking out slightly to the left of the guard at the right edge of the photo, with the blue hat and no gloves).




This one was taken at the freight house, this is not on the ramp, but usually a building build on the edge of the airfield with ramp access on one side and civilian access on the other. There is plenty of room and safe area for this type of display at the freight house.

Of course with all of these photos we have no clue as to the amount of time that each aircraft had to turn or if they were Terminating flights. We also do not know how busy that the flight bank was at the time that each of these pictures were taken. If you note in the second picture here there is no aircraft behind the white fuel truck, so this was either a low traffic time, or and isolated gate. On most normal ramps, you would have another aircraft on just the other side of that truck with as little as 10 feet between the wings of the two planes.

So I guarantee that none of this would be going on during a major flight bank at JFK airport, but at Tampa for instance there were times that we would only have one flight on the deck, or a plane could be parked at an isolated gate to allow for such activity, but not usually.



[edit on 12/15/2005 by defcon5]

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