Crusaders AD 2012
 

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By Kari Huus, msnbc.com

A recent decision by the Marine Corps to reinstate "Crusaders" as the name of its Fighter Attack Squadron 122 — replacing "Werewolves" — and adopting the red cross of the medieval Knights Templar was blasted as unconstitutional and willfully ignorant by a civil rights group Wednesday.

I don’t know that the Marine Corps could do anything more to fuel the cause of jihad," said Mikey Weinstein, founder of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, a nonprofit organization that advocates church-state separation. "It will directly end up taking lives and maiming members of our military."
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VMFA-122 based out of Beaufort, S.C., used the Crusaders symbol from 1958 up to 2008, when Lt. Col. William Lieblein pointed out that imagery invoking the Christian conquest and colonization of Muslims during the Middle Ages was counterproductive to U.S. soldiers based across the Arab and Islamic world.

"The notion of being a crusader in that part of the world doesn't float," he said, ordering the change to "Werewolves," as reported by the Beaufort Gazette at the time.

Dozens of military members, including Marines in the affected squadron have contacted MRFF reporting that the name has been changed back, and that the symbols had already been painted on the vertical stabilizers of the F-18s.

Weinstein says that members of the military who contacted his group — mostly moderate Protestants and Catholics — felt that the decision was blatantly religious.

"They’re being told, 'the enemy gets to have Allah in their fight. We need to get our Lord and Savior back into our fight'," said Weinstein."

Lt. Cmdr. Wade Weigel, who currently heads the squadron, said he did not think the historic nickname was problematic, according to a report in the Beaufort Gazette on Monday.

"It's a way for our Marines to draw on the service of the Marines before them, and to make their own history under the same name," Weigel told the paper. "As the squadron prepared to celebrate its (70th anniversary), my intent was to return the squadron to the Crusader name since 50 of the squadron's 70 years were under that name. The name change is a reflection of our heritage."

Through the law firm Jones Day, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation on Wednesday sent a letter calling on top Navy and Marine Corps brass to reverse the decision, arguing that the use of Crusaders and the accompanying symbolism violate the Constitution’s separation of church and state, and threatening legal action if it is not changed.

The name change comes just as world media focuses on the trial of Anders Breivik, a Norwegian who admits to killing 77 people in a holy crusade against Islam and multiculturalism. Breivik brandished the Knights Templar symbols in his "manifesto" and YouTube video posted shortly before his bloody rampage.

Shoot, I rolled out on patrol in Baghdad with this patch on my armor:
http://static7.businessinsider.com/i...g-crusader.jpg

The armed forces is no place for this PC BS.
We are (formerly in my case) professional warriors, and as an infantryman I can trace my lineage as such back to these very knights.
tradition is a watchword in any armed forces, second only to mission accomplishment.
I say Kudos to the jar heads for this. I can only speak for the US, but we need to make up our minds about what we want from our armed forces. Do we want them to be well oiled, highly motivated, dedicated hard-core killing machines focused on accomplishing the mission at hand-or rubber bullet toting "peace keeper" cop wann-be's.

Wow, I had no idea the term "jar heads' was still in use :)

Always a treat to hear from the Infantry. Hopefully this will be a topic where warriors of all nations and creeds can post freely.

"Do we want them to be well oiled, highly motivated, dedicated hard-core killing machines..." Nope. Anyone who dumps their morality when putting on the uniform of a soldier is unfit to serve. (And before you ask, no I haven't - but I've seen the results on those who do, and what it does to them, never mind what it does to the enemy: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1758301.stm)

As for claiming to trace your lineage back to Crusaders, yeah, right...

Actually the The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon, more commonly known as the Templars, are an interesting choice as ...

1) they were declared heretical in France and officially disbanded by the church in 1312. They were not exactly exalted heroes of Christendom towards the end.

2) unlike the Hospitallers, who left a humanitarian legacy in the form of St John's ambulance, the Templars were the worlds first corporate bankers, and the first to use control of money to manipulate politics ... which led to their eventual downfall.


To be honest the people who can truly trace their lineage back to the Knights Templar are not the American Marine Corp, it is Goldman Sachs.

Yup. What does history tell us about the Crusades? A series of ridiculous military adventures with no clear goal, no prior understanding of the 'enemy', and no obvious motivation other than as a distraction from domestic problems? You guessed it...

Ha! Quite right about the banking reference. I did not mean to say the Templar's specifically, but rather men on the ground fighting for a cause. From the modern day to the minutemen at Lexington and Concord to Grog the cave man with club in hand. All have a common lineage in that they are men, with their weapons, fighting for whatever cause at hand and the men at their left and right.

As to morality, well that depends on your point of view. It looks very different from the trenches.
You must remember that before all other concerns the driving force is mission accomplishment.
I believe your operating from a standpoint that is is immoral to kill, and to be good at it. In reality for some its just a job description. A rifleman that cant kill the enemy is as useful as a warm bucket of spit. We need the medic to tend wounds, and the supply clerk to get us beans and bullets. We also need them to be motivated and driven to do their job to the utter best of their abilities else others down the line will suffer. For the grunt that means being a highly motivated soldier dedicated to accomplishing the mission, and his mission is... "The Infantry closes with the enemy by means of fire and maneuver in order to destroy or capture him or to repel his assault by fire, close combat, and counterattack."
There is nothing nice about this, and nor is there anything immoral.

Just remember that nothing is absolute, including morality.
For that matter as a squad leader it would be immoral of me to take a soldier into combat that wasn't highly motivated, dedicated, and hard as wood pecker lips willing to do what he had to to accomplish the mission.

EDIT 2: Furthermore...lol...that's the reason behind the lineage, and the history, and the patches and the chest pounding. Its just flat motivation. We compare ourselves to those that went before us and try to live up to the standard they set. For us it was the 11B's in Vietnam, for them it was the grunts at Chosin and Omaha Beach, for them the men at the Marne, etc etc all the way back to those valiant crusaders, who did what they had to do fir their god, King and Country.

"before all other concerns the driving force is mission accomplishment." Exactly. You aren't fighting for any other reason than that you have been ordered to. Why?

If you cant, or I assume more accurately wont understand that then you simply have no base upon which to intelligently discuss military matters.

"I, ----- do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

See to me these words are as close to Holy as you can get. Not much room in there for discourse. I am a servant of my country, first and foremost. I take pride in my service, and in the men that I served with. When my nation calls on me to fight I don't ask why, I surrendered that right when I knowingly singed on the dotted line. I simply grab my rifle, rally my troops and go where I'm told, and do what mission is there waiting for me.

As to "why" people do it, well those reasons are varied. Some do it out of familial tradition, some because they want the college money. I joined because I wanted to serve my country, plain and simple. You don't serve your country, in the military anyway, by questioning orders.
But again if you wont understand that then I'm just typing at a wall...

Oh ya! Actually its the nicest way I can think to refer to marines...:-P

+1 on the rest of that too.

The crusades were a Christian jihad, no more, no less.

CWMV, AndyJWest,

you're not discussing the same matter.

AndyJWest: CWMV is right when it comes down to fighting.
CWMV: Andy is correct when your getting into conflict between your oath and a government turned not only immoral but evil (i.e. in my country between 1933 and 1945 - heartfelt thanks to your ancestors for rescuing us from it, btw.): What do you do when you're ordered to commit atrocities (like German soldiers were then)?

Artist

Ah I see.
Well the thing of it is that this sort of thing happens so infrequently that I Didn't consider it.
US soldiers have the right to refuse to follow an unlawful order.
But ultimately its not up to you to decide. If you refuse such an order you'll be detained and court marshaled. Then your superiors will decide if the order was unlawful or not.
But again, this sort of thing happens so infrequently that its not really worth consideration. The vast, overwhelming majority of soldiers will never receive an unlawful order.
And it doesnt bear much on the subject of the thread. Not much to do with unit symbology/tradition and esprit de corps.

I disagree.

"I, ----- do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

Yup. The words may well be 'close to Holy' to you, CWMV. That people can evoke religion to justify acts they would otherwise not engage in is one reason I am an atheist. As for "You don't serve your country, in the military anyway, by questioning orders", how do you think the United States came into existance in the first place?

By civilians questioning the status quo, raising an Army, and that army following its orders to fight.

It is the civilian populations responsibility to make things as they want them to be by observing the world around them and having their elected representatives act accordingly.
A soldier does not do such things. He is a tool of the people he represents. Of course he may have his own opinion, but it doesn't matter when his people tell him to march.
So if you don't like the war your country is in, don't blame the guys fighting it, blame yourself for electing the men that told the soldiers to march.
Remember-public servants-we serve the will of the public.

Oh and don't throw the religion thing around, its pointless and your not the only atheist here.

From the point of view of the crusaders, it wasn't a war for God against evil?

We can argue about whether people who think like that are deluded, but I do believe that's what was and is thought by crusaders and jihadists.

Given that you compare yourself to a Crusader, and present an oath of allegiance as 'holy', I think it is you that is 'throwing the religion thing around. As for ' electing the men that told the soldiers to march', I didn't vote for the men who gave orders for an invasion of Iraq based on a pack of lies.

I did. If your mad about it, blame me. I stand by my vote. Just pathetic it took two wars. So, I wonder how well oiled the machine really is. Hopefully I live long enough to see the attack on the domestic enemies play out. Seems empty words at this point when you have a government openly and actively engaged in all forms of corruption for so long. But I keep voting and paying my taxes. I think it must be quite difficult in current day for a young man to sign that pledge and volunteer, given all this day to day corruption. But I'm glad somebody is still willing to do it. We haven't lost it all, yet.

Actually the crusades were more of a genocide type battle on both sides. To groups of delusional people worshiping space gods who think theres is best.

Actually - you did.
The chengs beat you strategically everywhere, they even will dominate the pacific in the near future.
Have you ever wondered why they behave like they do?

Party A(USA) spends billions on Army they dont need and on a war which offers nothing in return.

Party B(China) spends almost nothing on its army but billions on infrastructure projects all over the planet(moon scouting too, actually).

What will the the situation be in 20 or 30 years to come?
The chengs will have earned trillions on their projects and almost singlehandedly control all strategic resources on the planet. Given the fact there was no thread in the past decades they also have enough cash to build one huge mofo Army in no time. And they already control their own "business" airfields in every corner of the world.

The USA on they other hand will be bled dry - without the power to counter it. Ever heard of they expression "being on small boat to china"?

Dont believe me?
Why do they buy a shitty old communist carrier? Because they need to know how to build them. Once they figured it out, they can produce them like bakeries donuts.
Same with the china stealth fighter, they dont want to produce a top of the line fighter, they especially dont want to scare the crap out of the todays superpowers. Imho, this is a large scale prototype run. Learn how this stuff works and how fast you can produce it.
If you got blueprints and understanding of the technology, the only two things keeping you back are: Money and manpower. They have both.

just my ¢2

agree swiss, except the part about voting to fight a war with no return. sometimes you just have to do what you think is the right thing and take a chance. it's not about economics or treasure. you see a dictator gassing his own people, shooting people in the head with a smile on his face and you want to make the bad man go away for those people. so you take a risk. it shouldn't have taken two wars to make the bad man go away. so the dice roll, not a yahtzee. but the world knows again we don't like that crap. but we can't fix it all, unfortuneatley. because we are now broke and china has us by the balls. but I would still vote that way again today, even though gas prices have gone way up and my lifestyle fallen since 10 years ago.

Yup, with chemical weapons made from materials supplied by the US (the Ronald Reagan administration had taken Iraq off the State Department's list of State Sponsors of Terrorism, enabling this), along with Singapore, the Netherlands, Egypt, India and West Germany. And of course, the US is still happily backing dictators where it finds it convenient...

I guess there's a bit of truth what Johnny Depp said about US being a dumb puppy.;) But then again, Saddam would have probably bought the sheet from somewhere else I suppose.

As for dictator, I think some people here voted one in! So I have to agree with that too.;)

Well if you like that - get this one,

Britian sold Saddam compaonants to build a super gun so he could he could shoot at Jordan(?). The "pipes" were huge! During the Gulf War the SAS blew it up... :-P

i completely falsify that by war being the biggest bussiness in the world

usa controls 1s t business: war

2nd business: oil

3rd business: drugs

usa is getting the big fish china the samller ones

War only works as a business if you export your weapons systems. If you buy them yourself, the result is not quite so shiny.
Btw, what resources do need to build them, where do you get them from?
And last but not least, who is the USA's largest creditor, and why?


Geneva, hotel room, bathtub.


;)

in a way..

The Church did grant The Templars exoneration from all forms of payment to the Church (even the obligatory Tithing), at their inception, in return for doing the Church's land grabbing in The Holy Lands.
The real problems arouse when the Church wanted to get its (fair share) hands on the huge amount of wealth amassed by the Templars in their trophy runs

Not so much the church, but the french King, who also was massivly indebted to the Templars and who had the Pope in his pockets.

wasnt vietanam war extended so the general motors flourished?

usa makes the best weapons, weapons is number one bussines in the world and there are wars all over

this money gets invested in oil

and then this gets invested in drugs so a plant gets its value multiplied 1000000x

sounds like good bussiness to me but well that if you like printed paper

well but this was what i thought wehn i was 18 now i stimate 99% of the world pouplation have acces to time travel and stages the world for the other 1%, the untouchable by the force of paradox

this video is pure political actuallity:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wz1KLnjKDM

You must have a degree in economics!

roflamo.