There are many public affairs officers throughout the Army, from the brigade level all the way up to the Pentagon. Recently, Fort Lewis (an Army base in Washington state) has announced that it will no longer hold post wide memorial services for individual soldiers killed in action. Instead they will do what most Army posts have done and have one memorial service each month and use that to honor all of the soldiers that have been killed in that particular month. This policy is the decision of the acting commander of Fort Lewis, Brig. Gen. William Troy. Fort Lewis has more soldiers deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan now than it has had at any other time throughout these campaigns. As such, they are losing more soldiers each month. The fort lost 16 soldiers this month, the previous high was 9. As Fort Lewis extends tours and sends more troops into Iraq, Brig. Gen. Troy probably realized he needed to change their memorial service to a monthly ritual in order to conserve money and time (mostly time). What happened after the general made this decision? He wrote a memorandum that left the chaplain and the post Public Affairs Officer to put out the bad news.
Going back to January, the Fort Lewis Public Affairs Officer has had to announce:
- That 6 soldiers were killed in a single roadside bomb (worst attack on a Stryker to date)
- A plume of smoke coming from the ground at Fort Lewis was not toxic to the people living on base
- That the 3/2 stryker brigade combat team will have their tour extended to 15 months
- That the 5/2 stryker brigade combat team will deploy 2 months earlier than expected
Since the Iraq war started public affairs officers are continually given a nice big "shit sandwich," then they are told to bite into it and tell everyone how good it tastes. But, like my mom always told me, "you can't shine shit!"
1 comment:
good one. a certain guy has done all the good manners we've taught the dog. wait, why am i writing - you're not there.
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