By Here is an absolutely disgraceful story of an out of control platoon in Afghanistan being accused of a number of crimes to include murder:
Spc. Adam Winfield (left), Spc. Michael Wagnon (center), and Spc. Jeremy Morlock (right).
At Forward Operating Base Ramrod, Afghanistan, some members of 3rd Platoon spent their downtime partying, smoking hash and drinking bootleg liquor.
When Staff Sgt. Calvin R. Gibbs arrived in November 2009, he joined the fun, regaling his new buddies with stories about the things he’d gotten away with in Iraq, one soldier would later tell agents from the Army’s Criminal Investigation Command.
And soon, Gibbs, of Billings, Mont., was joking about how easy it would be to “toss a grenade at someone and kill them.” He proposed organizing a “kill team” to do it, according to court documents.
By around Christmas 2009, officials now believe, Gibbs had hatched a plan with Spc. Jeremy Morlock, of Wasilla, Alaska, and three other soldiers to do just that.
By May, three Afghan civilians were dead and at least one platoon member kept fingers as trophies. And several knowledgeable people say there are “gruesome” photographs of the soldiers posing with the dead. [Army Times]
Make sure to read the entire article for the full story and context of what happened. If this wasn’t published in the Army Times I would have a hard time believing that this many soldiers were allowed to get away with such behavior for so long. This is an absolute failure in leadership that these guys weren’t caught drinking alcohol and using drugs long before the murders happened. I just don’t see how the platoon leader and platoon sergeant didn’t know what was going on? Also I think it would probably be interesting to look further into the past of these guys because you don’t just simply wake up one day and decide to go kill civilians.
This incident also comes at a time when the US military is making a push to implement General Petraeus’ counterinsurgency strategy and I am sure the Taliban would love nothing more then to get a hold of these pictures to insight public outrage against the US military. It will be interesting to see if this turns into another Abu Graib or not.
It is incidents like this where maybe these guys should be handed over to Afghan authorities for trial?
4:03 pm on September 15th, 2010 1
Q: What's better than having AND eating cake?
A: Smoking AND collecting joints.
5:08 pm on September 15th, 2010 2
Minor point: Perhaps soldiers wouldn't be sneaking around drinking bootleg liqour and hanging with undesirable elements if we had a less evangelical leadership and more mature alcohol policies(like our allies).
Major point: Yes, if guilty they ought to fry but I'm not sure about setting the precedent of turning soldiers over to the Afghans.
6:43 pm on September 15th, 2010 3
I have no idea what life is like on a standard FOB, but it sounds like that place was sparely populated and the soldiers had too much free time.
How is that soldiers can get drunk and high on hashish, with smoke billowing out of their quarters and nobody notices?
7:40 pm on September 15th, 2010 4
#3 I somewhat doubt a couple guys smoking a bit of hash results in massive billowing Cheech and Chong like smoke plumes.
But I agree with you. Sounds a bit like they were out on the perimeter, where there are no stars…
7:44 pm on September 15th, 2010 5
#4
From the Army Times article:
8:02 pm on September 15th, 2010 6
8:38 pm on September 15th, 2010 7
Scenarios like this happen more often than anyone wants to admit. The field grades and sergeants major do a really good job of sweeping them under the carpet before the press finds out, though, because they don't make for good OER/NCOER comments.
9:47 pm on September 15th, 2010 8
It was just a minor traffic violation, why make any fuss?
But seriously, it's just a tip of the ice berg. The attitude that they are better because they come from a European civilization (and all the rest are garbage) that's the root of it all.
Hey did you hear about the three American tourists in Itaewon who got arrested for harassing two passing Korean girls, by blocking them off, calling them cheap whores, and then trying to rape them? The men thought the women didn't understand English, now they're in trouble.
10:10 pm on September 15th, 2010 9
In this day and age…I don't if I should be surprised or not…that two Staff Sergeants (E-6 in the Army) were also involved in some way.
10:13 pm on September 15th, 2010 10
Tom – you understand English. What's your excuse for getting buggered by all the 300 pound white guys?
Lemme guess…is it because they come from a European civilization?
10:33 pm on September 15th, 2010 11
#6,
Yeah, I got the same feeling too.
#7,
Definitely.
I remember the publishing ban and how we were all made to look for missing documents during the Somalia Inquiry…documents that conveniently turned up behind a filing cabinet at HQ (Yeah, quite a few of us were disgusted by it, but our hands were tied). I wonder what happened to the Belgian serving in the Canadian military who had the courage to break our orders and speak openly to the press.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somalia_Affair
10:33 pm on September 15th, 2010 12
What are you talking about? I am the white 300 pound guy. How can I bugger myself?
10:35 pm on September 15th, 2010 13
Actually, my son was in this company when it was being stood up at Ft Lewis back in 2007. Luckily he was transferred to a unit at Ft Hood that was a bit better established.
But while he was there, he got to experience first hand the effects of waivers for criminal activity used to widen the recruiting pool. According to him, barracks thievery was rampant, the senior NCO's were the dregs of Ft Lewis, and it was not uncommon to have 8-9 people show up hot on piss tests on a regular basis.
2:26 am on September 16th, 2010 14
Q: What's the difference between a man in the Army and a woman in the Army?
A: The man doesn't claim sexual assault after taking a finger.
3:39 am on September 16th, 2010 15
Abso-f*****g-lutely!!! Anyone remember that scumbag, former PFC Steven Dale Green, from the 101st's 502nd? As a direct result of his role in the murder and rape of that 14-year-old Iraqi girl and her entire family in Mahmudiya, Iraq in 2006, he not only escaped Iraqi justice with his four conspirator buddies by getting life sentences in a cushy federal pen, he got two other enlisted soldiers who were deployed in the same unit long after he got a psych discharge, to pay for his misdeeds. How did they pay for it? They were kidnapped by Iraqis who were formerly loyal to the U.S. forces there, but became enraged by the crime. After having gone missing for days from the checkpoint they were kidnapped from, there bodies were finally recovered by U.S. forces — except without their heads. That's Iraqi justice for ya', and that's exactly what that buddyf****r Green did to everyone. We need to give up these jerks accordingly.
Umm, it's obvious you never served in the Army. That's just par for the course, and has little to do with the Army's waivering on recruitment standards. The real effect of granting of waivers for many otherwise illegible enlistees does not translate to minor things like "barrack thievery" or "hot" piss test results, as such things have been common in the regular army since the days of Johnny Reb. The real effects of downgrading of standards will be people like Steven Dale Green, and the other cannibals being caught and prosecuted for crimes against civilians.
7:52 am on September 16th, 2010 16
Man, oh man, to this old soldier, this is truly a 1970's Deja Vu affair.
8:00 am on September 16th, 2010 17
Next up…Oliver Stone will make a movie and John F Kerry will again don his ribbons on old U S Navy fatigue blouse, testify before Congress about the Army infantry, and throw some one else's ribbons away over a wall.
This affair is scandalous, no doubt about it. However, once I read about a fookin's PFC E-3 fruitbag stationed and working in Iraq managed to download and hand off 100,000 or so classified messages from Afghanistan, I figured we're toast. A E-3 in charge….dang, at least these guys are Spec 4's.
All considered: Now is the time place you head between your knees and kiss your backside adios.
8:07 am on September 16th, 2010 18
BTW…with the information provided so far, sans evidence, I'm not yet convinced this "kill team" crude happened as described. It sounds almost just too much like a bad novel written by a uber CONUS REMF.
We'll see. Meantime practice that head between the knees routine. Dang this stuff irritates me! Guess it shows, eh.
9:30 am on September 16th, 2010 19
I'm somewhat comforted in knowing Muslims would never behave in such a barbaric manner.
9:50 am on September 16th, 2010 20
The military doesn't award any decorations for exposing this type of thing, even though it requires an incredible amount of courage.
As a matter of fact. The kid who took a beat down for reporting this will probably be an outcast and any hope he had for a future in the military is probably crushed.
That's too bad because the military needs more like him to root this stuff out.
9:59 am on September 16th, 2010 21
#19
What these guys were doing was thrill killing. I'm sure if that is allowed under the terrorists code.
10:33 am on September 16th, 2010 22
Nahh under the terrorist code its called jihad not thrill killing.
Please remember the US Constitution stipulates that your innocent until proven guilty. And while I think they probably did it, I'd wait till after the trial to throw them under the bus. The reason we don't like to hand our soldiers over to foreign governments is most of them don't support due process and fair trials. You hand any soldier over to a foreign country when their this pissed off and they almost always turn up a maximum-guilt verdict. If they did it fry them, if not then release it, that is the rule of law.
10:42 am on September 16th, 2010 23
Typo @21. I meant "I'm not sure …"
10:49 am on September 16th, 2010 24
Anyone who accepts killing as part of their job needs to be able to rationalize it in some way. If your only reason is, 'because I can get away with it' or, 'it would be a fun thing to do' then that deserves a special distinction. That's as sign of sociopathy.
11:18 pm on September 16th, 2010 25
I also feel this is just a more serious example of things that go on all the time. I've know few soldiers who who did things that did things that made you wonder what was really legal / justified – but it never turned into news and just fadded into history.
I was fortunate enough to only experience poor conduct / illegal activity of fellow soldiers in minor ways – like "target shooting" (you guess at what) while on deployemnt — rounds where not counted.
Something I often tell people when we're discussing my time the military and my views of it: Many people out in the world put military members on high pedestal just 'cuase they volunteered to wear a uniform. But, just like the rest of the population of the world, there are good ones and bad ones….and exceptional extremes of both ends.
11:55 pm on September 16th, 2010 26
Tom, the biggest racist you have ever met greets you in the mirror everyday. You are a serial liar and bottom feeder who I doubt has ever met a US GI other than the stalking expeditions you set up.
12:16 am on September 17th, 2010 27
"Tom, the biggest racist you have ever met greets you in the mirror everyday."
That's the 300 pound white guy.
1:02 am on September 17th, 2010 28
I had no idea you were white and fat. At least you can lose the weight, however you will always be loathsome.
2:06 am on September 17th, 2010 29
As hard as it may be in this case, they are still innocent until proven guilty. All the "evidence," the fingers and pictures, are yet unseen. Find those, or othr evidence, then full steam ahead.
The reason I encourage us to remember this if from my own time in teh barracks, where things started with a finger, then a mini-mag light, then a fullsize mag light, then a snake light glowing in several unrealistic places from the inside, many with wives we knew wouldn't put up with that, all within 30 minutes of topper. All it took was an audience and a couple of cases of beer.
If they can find the eveidence, though, I say try them in Military court, and if convicted have their sentence start AFTER they have served whatever civilian court comes up with.
6:39 am on September 17th, 2010 30
#25,
just like I said, all this is tip of iceberg, that’s my guess. It’s the typical attitude that I’ve seen before personally myself, which leads to incidents like these. It’s the attitude they are better than these native animals. It’s the manifestation of the racial attitude.
5:30 pm on October 5th, 2010 31
Some more insight into what I referred to in #3:
9:38 pm on March 23rd, 2011 32
Burma Bob… that is hard to believe that the unit was that wild even during there time in the states. It is clear that they had a major leadership problem while on assignment in Afghanistan. I know that area well from my experiences from 2002 – 2009. It is hard to believe that there officer leadership did not see or hear about the problems that where going on with there lower ranks. From what I read is that one of the them wrote there parents and told the Command back at Fort Lewis that this was taking place when the first murder had taken place. It was there lack of motivation and diligence to see the complaints through to Afghanistan. That is the problem that disturbs me with the leadership and the command that are suppose to know what is taking place with there personnel. I think that the blame game is going to happen now and anything that happens from here on out will be blamed on soldiers, marines and sailors by the insurgents because some of us have shown that our lack of morality has changed with the wind. The leadership along with the E-6's that are suppose to know better and lead there personnel in the right direction should be the ones that get the most time. I am not saying that our military do not have personnel that can not figure out the difference between right and wrong or that they can not understand the difference between a lawful order or a unlawful order…. there is just no excuse for this behavior of killing farmers just out of fun. There is enough killing out there to do without killing the ones that are just walking around without a weapon…