General Discussion

unhappycamper

(60,364 posts) Sat May 26, 2012, 07:45 AM May 2012

U.S. sailor is 3,000th Afghanistan war death

Petty Officer 1st Class Ryan J. Wilson, 26, is the 1,974th U.S. death in the war.

http://us.cnn.com/2012/05/25/us/afghanistan-war-deaths/index.html?hpt=hp_t2
U.S. sailor is 3,000th Afghanistan war death
By the CNN Wire Staff
updated 5:32 PM EDT, Fri May 25, 2012

CNN) -- A U.S. sailor who died last week of medical complications was the 3,000th death among coalition forces in the Afghanistan war, according to CNN's count based on information provided by the U.S. Defense Department and the International Security Assistance Force.

Petty Officer 1st Class Ryan J. Wilson, 26, of Shasta, California, died May 20 in Manama, Bahrain, the Defense Department reported in an e-mail Friday.

Wilson, assigned to U.S. Naval Forces Central Command in Bahrain, was supporting the Afghanistan mission, the e-mail said.

He was the 1,974th U.S. death in the war that started October 7, 2001, and the 3,000th overall death from the U.S.-led international coalition engaged in Operation Enduring Freedom.

unhappycamper comment: Our Nobel Peace Prize President is responsible for at least 1,337 of the total number of American deaths in Afghanistan since February 2009 --> http://icasualties.org/OEF/ByMonth.aspx

I'm puzzled with the "Stay the course" message. Staying the course while the slow-motion Tet of 2012 continues in Afghanistan seems somewhat westmorelandish to me - remember when the US Army proudly declared that the town of Marjah was finally pacified in 2005/2006? Moving forward to 2012, Afghanistan sure looks like the Vietnam I experienced -->
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ben-anderson/transition-to-what-our-ro_b_1471269.html
http://www.stripes.com/news/afghan-market-flourishing-with-coalition-goods-1.178460

I'm also puzzled with President Obama's military budget as well as his stance on drones to kill people around the world. Granted $160,000 isn't all that much for a Hellfire missile but I do not think it's appropriate to kill people because we don't 'like' them.