Its fun to shoot some people.

[L8 APEX]

Those were to words of one three star General of the Marine corp to press this week. Definately not a person you want speaking to the press. But I like him just the same.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/02/03/general.shoot/index.html

[my2002lightning]

I agree on another spokesperson, but, war is hell and often times it's very ugly. http://www.talonclub.com/forum/images/smilies/cool.gif

Lt. Gen. Mattis must be a fan of Hemingway.

"Certainly there is no hunting like the hunting of man and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never really care for anything else thereafter."

- EH, "On The Blue Water: A Gulf Stream Letter." Esquire, April, 1936

[L1nt2B]

coming from CNN, I'm not so sure I believe any of it anyway....but yeah I could see how that would be fun :D

[r1eater]

I had guys like this as Drill Sergants when I was in the Army. They were warriors just like this guy. Definately not politically correct in any way..

[dboat]

If you have followed this, the reason he likes to shoot them is because they are men that slap women around. You would think the feminists would come out and support this guy.. I do..
Dana

[Moonshine]

Commentary on General Mattis' comments from the New York Post;


>> New York Post

>> February 6, 2005

>> The Truth About War

>> By Ralph Peters

>> In San Diego on Tuesday, I had the privilege of sitting beside Lt.-Gen.

> Jim Mattis, a Marine who knows how to fight. We were on a panel discussing

> future war. And Gen. Mattis, a Marine to the marrow of his bones, spoke

> honestly about the thrill of combat.

>> Mattis has commanded at every level. In Desert Storm, he led a battalion.

> In Afghanistan and then in Iraq, he led with inspiration and courage.

> Everyone on our panel had opinions about war, but that no-nonsense Marine

> knew more about it than the rest of us combined.

>> In the course of a blunt discussion of how our military has to prepare

>> for

> future fights, the general spoke with a frankness that won the hearts of

> the

> uniformed members of the audience. Instead of trotting out politically

> correct clichés, Mattis told the truth:

>> "You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five

> years because they didn’t wear a veil . . . it’s a hell of a lot of fun to

> shoot them."

>> The language wasn’t elegant. But we don’t need prissy military leaders.

>> We

> need generals who talk straight and shoot straight, men who inspire. And I

> guarantee you that any real Marine or soldier would follow Gen. Mattis.

>> What was the media’s reaction? A B-team news crew saw a chance to grab a

> headline at the military’s expense (surprise, surprise). Lifting the

> general’s remarks out of context, the media hyenas played it as if they

> were

> shocked to learn that people die in war.

>> Combat veterans are supposed to be tormented souls, you understand. Those

> who fight our wars are supposed to return home irreparably damaged.

>> HOLLYWOOD’S ideal of a Marine is the retired co lonel in the film

> "American Beauty," who turns out to be a repressed homosexual and a

> murderer. Veterans are sup- posed to writhe on their beds all night,

> covered

> in sweat, unable to escape their nightmares.

>> War does scar some men. Most vets, though, just get on with their lives -

> scratch a veteran looking for pity and more often than not you’ll find a

> supply clerk who never got near a battlefield. And some who serve - the

> soldiers and Marines who win our wars - run to the sound of the guns,

> anxious to close with the enemy and kill him. They may not love war

> itself,

> but they find combat magnetic and exhilarating. They like to fight.

>> That’s fine in movies featuring Brad Pitt as a mythical Greek hero. But

> God forbid that a modern-day Marine should admit that he loves his work.

>> Well, Marines and soldiers don’t serve full careers because they hate

> their jobs. In peace or war, the military experience is incredibly rich

> and

> rewarding. And sometimes dangerous. Goes with the territory. But for most

> of

> the young infantrymen in Iraq, their combat experience will remain the

> highpoint of their lives. Nothing afterward will be as intense or

> exciting.

> And they will never make closer friends than they did in their rifle

> squad.

>> Gen. Mattis may have been unusual in his honesty, but he certainly isn’t

> unusual in our history. We picture Robert E. Lee as a saintly father

> figure,

> but Lee remarked that it’s good that war is so terrible, since otherwise

> men

> would grow to love it too much. He was speaking of himself. Andy Jackson

> certainly loved a fight, and Stonewall Jackson never shied from one.

> Sherman

> and Grant only found themselves in war.

>> WE lionize those who embraced war in the past, but condemn those who

> defend us in the present. George S. Patton was far blunter than Jim

> Mattis -

> but Patton lived in the days before the media was omnipresent and biased

> against our military.

>> The hypocrisy is stunning. Gen. Mattis told the truth about a fundamental

> human activity - war - and was treated as though he had dropped a nuclear

> weapon on an orphanage. Yet when some bozo on a talk show confesses to an

> addiction or a perversion in front of millions of viewers, he’s lionized

> as

> "courageous" for speaking out.>

>> Sorry. It’s men like Jim Mattis who are courageous. The rest of us barely

> glimpse the meaning of the word.

>> We’ve come to a sad state when a Marine who has risked his life

>> repeatedly

> to keep our country safe can’t speak his mind, while any professor who

> wants

> to blame America for 9/11 is defended by legions of free-speech advocates.

> If a man like Mattis hasn’t earned the right to say what he really

> believes,

> who has?

>> Had Gen. Mattis collapsed in tears and begged for pity for the torments

> war inflicted on him, the media would have adored him. Instead, he spoke

> as

> Marines and soldiers do in the headquarters tent or the barracks, on the

> battlefield or among comrades. And young journalists who never faced

> anything more dangerous than a drunken night in Tijuana tried to create a

> scandal.

>> FORTUNATELY, Lt.-Gen. Mattis has three big things going for him: The

> respect of those who serve; the Marine Corps, which won’t abandon a

> valiant

> fighter to please self-righteous pundits whose only battle is with their

> waistlines; and the fact that we’re at war. We need more men like Mattis,

> not fewer. The public needs to hear the truth about war, not just the

> crybaby nonsense of those who never deigned to serve our country.

>> In my own far humbler career, the leaders I admired were those who had

>> the

> killer instinct. The soldiers knew who they were. We would have followed

> them anywhere. They weren’t slick Pentagon staffers anxious to go to work

> for defense contractors. They were the men who lived and breathed the

> warrior’s life.

>> Table manners don’t win wars. Winning our nation’s battles demands

> disciplined ferocity, raw physical courage - and integrity. Jim Mattis has

> those qualities in spades.

>> Semper fi, General.

>> Ralph Peters is a retired Army officer and the author of "Beyond Baghdad:

> Postmodern War and Peace."

[jeff56]

Wonderful article...thanks for posting.