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Don’t TAKE FROM TROOPS

I just read the article in the Sept. 14 issue [“Plan would shrink raises to pay for other programs”]. I do not see how the Congressional Budget Office can even entertain a thought of reducing the pay raises of our soldiers.

They state that they are trying to cut pay raises to overstrength military occupational specialties and increase pay to critical MOSs. Most of us in the Army only get the yearly 3.4 percent raise (or whatever they give us).

How can anyone think about not giving the soldiers (all soldiers) a higher or at least the same type of pay raise our civilian counterparts are getting? I don’t see anyone in Congress getting shot at every day for their pay. And they get to go home at night.

I think it should be criminal for anyone to try to save money by taking it away from the soldiers. Stop some of the overspending or stop one or two of the new programs, but do not take money from the troops.

Sgt. 1st Class Glen Tilson

Fort Benning, Ga.

BRING BACK IV TRAINING

I write in regard to a letter in the Sept. 21 issue, which was in response to the Sept. 14 article reporting on the Army’s decision to remove IV training from the Combat Lifesaver course. Chief Warrant Officer 2 Jack Treese (ret.) talks about how well trained he was and how much training he had received; he goes on to say he missed approximately 80 percent of his attempts to gain intravenous access.

I know that I speak for the majority of medics that we as combat medics pride ourselves on our ability to gain IV access in any environment, whether it be the stress of a combat situation or the organized chaos of an emergency room. It is our ability to gain IV access in any situation coupled with our expertise in field medicine and trauma management that has saved the lives of countless soldiers.

Regarding the curriculum change, removing IV training from the CLS course is absolutely stupid. There are many units in the Army that do not have organic medical assets. Removing IV training from CLS curriculum means that units that see combat on a regular basis but do not have a medic with them will have no personnel with the ability to gain intravenous access. This will cost lives.

When administered properly, IV fluids are sometimes the only way to keep a patient alive long enough to reach a surgical team that can further treat the patient’s injuries. My first thought as a medic with three years in a unit comprised mostly of 19D cavalry scouts was what happens when I get injured. If none of the soldiers in my platoon know how to replenish fluids, how am I going to survive the drive to the next echelon of care? I took the time to ensure my scouts were trained above the standard so that if something happened to me I would be confident that they could take care of me. On several occasions when I had patients on the ground, it was my scouts who obtained IV access while I was working on a more severely wounded patient who was bleeding or having airway complications.

Soldiers who are trained properly in bleeding control, airway management and the indications for IV fluid administration will save lives. Cutting IV training out of the CLS class is not the answer.

Spc. Matthew L. Wellington

Fort Hood, Texas

ONE UNIFORM FOR 4 SERVICES

After reading the numerous articles and letters about how ineffective the Army’s current uniform is, I agree that changes need to be made.

I think the issue should not just be change in the Army, but throughout the Defense Department. There should be one uniform standard across the board and every soldier, Marine, sailor and airman should look alike. This will make it easier for any branch to replace uniforms on any post or base.

It will cut research and development costs just by the fact that every branch will no longer be doing their own research into uniforms. If the Marine Combat Uniform is the best then let’s use it. This should apply to any other equipment that is used by all branches of the services. In the long run, the money saved could go into the research of better equipment and other equipment that could better serve the services.

The streamlining of research and development would also allow the removal of excess jobs, again saving money. I could never understand paying 10 people for a job that five people could do or justifying a job because the end result would be the removal of an employee. A good corporation does not work this way and neither should the military.

Sgt. 1st Class Robert R. Weppelman

Fort Sam Houston, Texas

MORE ATTENTION FOR INJURIES

In the past few years and from wars from the past I have noticed soldiers who were put out of the service for combat-related injuries, some so severe that these guys were crippled for life, but some of these guys get nothing but a medical discharge. I’m not taking anything away from guys who got Purple Hearts. I salute them and I’m proud of each and every one of them. But if you got hurt in a combat zone, caused from combat, and put out for combat-related injuries, and it goes in your records that your injuries are combat related, why can’t you get a Purple Heart? The same with traumatic brain injury. I’ll go back to Agent Orange and further to mustard gas. There should be a change. Too many soldiers are getting the shaft, both past and present.

I have thrown this idea at a few congressmen but it has fallen on deaf ears or I’m not going the right route. But I do feel these soldiers deserve more than what they are getting now.

Former Sgt. Daniel Peace

Lawton, Okla.

NEW TAKE ON ‘DON’T ASK’

There has been a lot of discussion lately about the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. This is a policy that needs to be revised. It should become a “Don’t Flaunt, Don’t Abuse” policy.

There are many members of the armed forces that serve our country who are homosexual and are patriots, and they should be allowed to serve. They, however, should not be allowed special treatment nor denied promotions, schooling or other military assignments based on their preference of sexual partner.

This policy should be based on behavior and all members of the services should be held to a standard of conduct that is based on: don’t flaunt your sexual preference, don’t sexually harass others, don’t offer or receive favors based on sexual favors, don’t abuse others because of their sexual orientation and don’t violate the privacy of others.

If the nation decides as a whole to allow domestic partnerships, then they also should be allowed to receive those benefits. In the meantime, because the laws of the nation (with the exception of a few states) do not recognize same-sex couples, they should not be authorized benefits based on their partner.

I am a Christian who believes that homosexuality is a sin and should not be condoned but that does not give me (or anyone else) the right to discriminate against homosexuals. What they do in the bedroom is a matter between them and God, and what straight people do is also watched by God, who will deal with them in his own time.

1st Sgt. Michael E. Befield (ret.)

Evansville, Ind.

we’re not INVITED

Seeing the latest bashing in the news of private security contractors “misbehaving” at the embassy in Kabul brings to mind my recent deployment at the old U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. State Department and private security personnel conducted themselves like every night was a frat party, and the soldiers and other service members were greeted by a police-line tape with a sign that said “private parties — civilians only,” as we, the service members, were bound to General Order No. 1.

It was rather pathetic to see adults old enough to be my parents behaving like plastered girls at a frat mixer, all in the name of “burning off the stress of deployment.”

The fact that this is an example shown to our young troops of the “American way of life” we are protecting is bad enough; to have our faces rubbed in it in the midst of a deployment is stupid.

Keep civilians in a war zone bound to the same regulations to which the service members are held accountable, or get them out of the area. I don’t want my tax dollars going toward building a place for embassy civilians to hold their “keggers.”

Capt. Brian F. Ellis

Fort Bragg, N.C.