Gang Members Coming Home From Iraq And Afghanistan With Military Training

Frank Mann - Being in a street gang is now forbidden for members of the U.S. armed forces. But you might not guess that if you were to visit U.S. military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to soldiers who have recently served there.
Jeffrey Stoleson, a Wisconsin corrections official, returned from Iraq in January with photos of gang graffiti on armored vehicles, latrines and buildings. Stoleson, a sergeant with a National Guard unit, was there for nine months to help the Army set up a prison facility outside Baghdad.

» Click to enlarge image

A soldier flashes Latin King signs.

(National Gang Intelligence Center)

PHOTO GALLERY

Gangs in War Zones

"I saw Maniac Latin Disciples graffiti out of Chicago," Stoleson said, adding that there was a lot of graffiti for Texas and California gangs, as well as Mexican drug cartels.
A Chicago Police officer -- who retired from the regular Army and was recently on a tour of Afghanistan in the Army Reserve -- said Bagram Air Base was covered with Chicago gang graffiti, everything from the Gangster Disciples' pitchfork to the Latin Kings' crown.
"It seems bigger now," said the officer, who previously served a tour in Iraq, where he also saw gang graffiti.
Now back in Chicago, the officer said he has arrested high-level gang members who have served in the military and kept the "Infantryman's bible" -- called the FM 7-8 -- in their homes. The book describes how to run for cover, fire a weapon tactically and do the "three- to five-second rushes" seen in war movies.
"It's scary," he said.
In 2006, Stoleson saw similar graffiti in Iraq during another tour of duty there. That year, the Chicago Sun-Times reported on gangs in the military -- and published several of Stoleson's photos of gang graffiti.
Congress eventually banned members of the military from belonging to street gangs. And last November, the Defense Department added the ban to its rules.
Spokesmen for the Army and Defense Department said they could not provide figures on how many soldiers have been thrown out of the military or otherwise disciplined as a result of gang membership.
Stoleson, who stressed he was not speaking for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections or the Army, said it appears the problem is worse than ever. He warned that soldiers who return to gang life back home are especially dangerous because they know military tactics that they can use against the police and the public -- as a Marine did in 2005 when he killed a police officer and wounded three others in a California ambush.
"Gang members are coming home now with one or two tours," he said. "Some were on the field of battle."
Civilian contractors in Iraq are part of the gang problem overseas, Stoleson said. He said he was involved in destroying a large quantity of drugs confiscated from U.S. contractors in Iraq.
Stoleson, who is a member of the International Latino Gang Investigators Association, said some police departments in California are now tracking whether gang members were in the military.
A second Chicago Police officer, who searches homes for drugs and guns, said gang members targeted by his team are sometimes current or former members of the armed forces. That becomes part of the team's pre-raid briefings because the suspect is an increased safety risk with military training, the officer said.
"We recently arrested a guy in the reserves for crack [cocaine]," the officer said. "He was a gang-banger."
Stoleson said that, on his previous tour in Iraq, he was friends with a soldier who associated with the Maniac Latin Disciples when he grew up in Chicago.
"We talked a lot about it. He said the military was the only way he could break free," Stoleson said.
But those aren't the people Stoleson worries about.
"My problem is the guys who go into the military to continue the lifestyle," he said.
T.J. Leyden, a former white supremacist, was one of those guys. He said he recruited fellow members of the Hammerskin Nation into the Marines when he was in the corps in the late 1980s and early 1990s and sent stolen Kevlar body armor and helmets to fellow skinheads back home.
"I wore white supremacist T-shirts, and I hung a swastika flag out of my barracks," said Leyden, who was kicked out of the Marines for drinking and fighting. "I hated America. The only reason I was a Marine was because they were the baddest of the bad."
Leyden, who lives in Utah now, said he quit the white-supremacy movement in 1996 because he was worried "my sons were becoming me."
He began working against the movement and founded Straight Talk Consulting, giving lectures to students and advising the FBI, the National Guard and other organizations about gangs in the military.
Leyden said his informants have told him that skinheads and street gangs are still entrenched in both the regular military and the National Guard.
"The military needs to wake up," he said.

The End Of Afghanistan

Larry Johnson - We’re done in Afghanistan and so is General Stan McChrystal. McChrystal, who has been on the frontlines of combatting Islamic extremists since 2003 when he was put in charge of the Joint Special Operations Command, has self-destructed with the help of Rolling Stone Magazine. McChrystal’s problem? He’s not a politician and spoke candidly about his political masters to a journalist. That’s a no-no if you want to stay in your job.
Here’s the nuts and bolts of what’s going on:

The top U.S. war commander in Afghanistan is being called to the White House for a meeting with President Obama after issuing an apology Tuesday for an interview in which he took shots at top administration officials and his staff described the president as unprepared for their first one-on-one encounter.
In the article in this week’s issue of Rolling Stone, Gen. Stanley McChrystal also said he felt betrayed and blind-sided by his diplomatic partner, Ambassador Karl Eikenberry.
McChrystal’s comments are reverberating through Washington and the Pentagon after the magazine depicted him as a lone wolf on the outs with many important figures in the Obama administration.
It characterized him as unable to convince some of his own soldiers that his strategy can win the nation’s longest-running war and dejected that the president didn’t know about his commendable military record.
In Kabul on Tuesday, McChrystal issued a statement saying: “I extend my sincerest apology for this profile. It was a mistake reflecting poor judgment and should never have happened.”
McChrystal has been called to the White House Situation Room on Wednesday to explain his comments to the magazine directly to the president, a senior administration official told Fox News. Normally, he would appear on a conference call for a regular strategy session.
The general was making a flurry of calls and decisions in the wake of the article’s publication. Fox News has learned that he fired the press aide, Duncan Boothby, who booked the interview. McChrystal also called Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen late Monday to apologize. Mullen told the general he was deeply disappointed, according to a senior military official at the Pentagon.
He has since spoken with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass, both of whom were described as attention-seekers by an aide in the article. Kerry said afterward that he has “enormous respect” for the general, while a spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai reportedly said Karzai “strongly supports” McChrystal and his strategy.
McChrystal is expected to reach Washington early Wednesday.
The article says that although McChrystal voted for Obama, the two failed to connect from the start. Obama called McChrystal on the carpet last fall for speaking too bluntly about his desire for more troops.
“I found that time painful,” McChrystal said in the article, on newsstands Friday. “I was selling an unsellable position.”
It quoted an adviser to McChrystal dismissing the early meeting with Obama as a “10-minute photo op.”
“Obama clearly didn’t know anything about him, who he was. The boss was pretty disappointed,” the adviser told the magazine.

Gee, Obama clueless about his military chiefs? How can that be (SUPER SNARK)?
You can read the full article here. (You also should take a look at Ed Morrissey’s piece at Hot Air).
McChrystal’s chain of command goes through David Petraeus. While Barack is ostensibly Commander-in-Chief, Petraeus is McChrystal’s immediate boss and should be disciplining his ass for this article. But that’s not going to happen. McChrystal is now a political football and will have to make some decisions. Is he going to pretend that he did not believe what he is reported as saying in the Rolling Stone article? If he does then the thing that has made McChrystal unique–a man of great integrity–will be tarnished.
The real damage here is that this distraction will ultimately make it impossible to sustain our effort in Afghanistan. I know there has been a lot of hand wringing about the continued war in Afghanistan and suggestions that we are losing. But I don’t think that’s true. In the past we always faced a late Spring/Summer offensive by the Taliban. That’s not the case this year (even though our casualties are up). The violence is confined largely to southeastern Afghanistan. We are not in danger of a military defeat.
Politically? That’s another problem. Stan McChrystal understood this part and proposed a strategy based on training and equipping Afghani’s to do the fighting and creating some space where the various Afghan tribes and factions could sort things out. That will be the ultimate outcome. We are not able to impose a government on Afghanistan that is politically palatable to the American people.
Visit http://computers.become.com for the best computer products for the lowest prices on the web. Computer Become has the most affordable prices and best quality. Visit http://computers.become.com. Also, check out Computers Become online specials. This is a offer you can't refuse. Visit http://computers.become.com.

OBAMA"WAR MACHINE" LIAR LIAR

The President Obama is sending 17,000 new troops to Afghanistan so, they can be ready for the heavy fighting in the Spring with Taliban forces. The President will be sending a extra 13,000 later in the year to complete the surge of 30,000 soldiers on the ground in Afghanistan. The Obama Administration seems to be following the same plan as the Bush Administration when it comes to fighting a insurgent war. President Obama did not support President Bush and the "Surge" in Iraq during the campaign and it seems like he, has "Changed" his mind about the Bush Strategy. The President promised the Left-Wing Liberals in America that we would be out of Iraq in 16 months and that he would bring all the troops home from the war and save billions of dollars so, we could have a Socialized Health Care System in America. President Obama should be called "Habitual Liar" by the Left-Wing in America because, we are even more devoted to fighting both wars after President Bush has left office on January 20, 2009. The troops in Iraq will not come home in 16 months and the war in Afghanistan will become a tough "Slog" for the Obama Administration and United States Military. Therefore, I am waiting for the protest all around the world against President Obama for sending more troops to Afghanistan and not ending the war in Iraq by withdrawing all the troops within 16 months. I am waiting for "Code Pink" to start protesting outside of President Obama house in Chicago. I also, waiting for the "New York Times, CNN, MSNBC And NBC" to start writing daily columns about number of soldiers who have died in Afghanistan. The Left-Wing Socialist Media will not criticize the "Messiah" for fighting both wars they will now support the wars because, President Obama is Commander N Chief. Finally, the Left-Wing in America will have to deal with there Socialist Leader fighting the same "War On Terror" that President Bush was fighting against the Islamic Terrorist. President Obama has seen the "Light" and he, is not campaigning anymore because, now he has to protect the American people from these "Clowns".

OBAMA"KEEP DON'T ASK DON'T, TELL" POLICY

President Obama plans to allow gays to to openly serve in the United States military by overturning the controversial "Don't ask, Don't Tell " policy is the first big mistake in his administration. This is the wrong time to try and change military policy when we are fighting two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. This will start a culture war within the United States military and turn a lot of the rank and file military personnel against President Obama who they are already skeptical of because of the things he, said about the military while, campaigning for President . President Obama should keep the same policy in place because, who is going to enforce this policy in a conservative military. This already shows that President Obama is trying to social engineer the military and that is a serious problem with senior officers who will not like this decision because it will break down the confidence in morality of the average soldier. President Obama is falling into the same liberal socialist trap that President Clinton fell into trying to make policy when it is unnecessary. The Gay community in America is eager for a quick repeal of the the "Don't ask Don't tell" policy but, hey have fears that it could take months before the new administration reaches a consensus with lawmakers and the military. Finally, there are some people who say that President Obama can do this quickly but, he could face the same kind of fallout that President Clinton faced when he tackled the devise issue.