Marine Corps
The Commandant of the Marine Corps, James Conway warns that the war in Iraq and a Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan is putting a critical strain on our forces. Some Marine units are headed back for their fourth tour of duty in Iraq, and that grind has prompted General Conway to warn that the burden on Marine families is too much.
Conway believes that we either send fewer Marines into Iraq or recruit more to increase the size of the Marine Corps. Currently, there are about 180,000 Marines on active duty, and they serve seven-month combat tours. They're supposed to get 14 months to recover, but the unrelenting violence in Iraq has prevented planned troop withdrawals.
The strain is not just a personal hardship. Recently, retired Marine Col. Thomas Hammes reported that we've got to get serious about providing our own forces with the equipment they need. He says that the Bush administration has made a fundamentally immoral decision not to provide equipment to save money. Furthermore, Hammes states that we have equipment backed up at repair depots, and repair depots have been told not to work overtime. So we have young men and women training to go into a fight with no equipment.
General Conway was a front-line commander in Iraq, and just before taking the job as Marine Corps commandant, he was on the joint staff planning for the war. At his confirmation hearing this summer, General Conway found an ally in Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, who shares his concern that the supplemental funding has not kept pace with the Marine Corps needs as the war drags on and equipment is used up. Senator Levin a Democrat, will soon take over as chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“Thus do I counsel you, my friends: distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful!”- Friedrich Nietsche
Conway believes that we either send fewer Marines into Iraq or recruit more to increase the size of the Marine Corps. Currently, there are about 180,000 Marines on active duty, and they serve seven-month combat tours. They're supposed to get 14 months to recover, but the unrelenting violence in Iraq has prevented planned troop withdrawals.
The strain is not just a personal hardship. Recently, retired Marine Col. Thomas Hammes reported that we've got to get serious about providing our own forces with the equipment they need. He says that the Bush administration has made a fundamentally immoral decision not to provide equipment to save money. Furthermore, Hammes states that we have equipment backed up at repair depots, and repair depots have been told not to work overtime. So we have young men and women training to go into a fight with no equipment.
General Conway was a front-line commander in Iraq, and just before taking the job as Marine Corps commandant, he was on the joint staff planning for the war. At his confirmation hearing this summer, General Conway found an ally in Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, who shares his concern that the supplemental funding has not kept pace with the Marine Corps needs as the war drags on and equipment is used up. Senator Levin a Democrat, will soon take over as chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“Thus do I counsel you, my friends: distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful!”- Friedrich Nietsche
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