Quote:
Originally Posted by simonmark6
I don't like what happened to these men, they should have been welcomed home properly.
However, MOD regulations specify that Uniforms should not be worn in pubs without prior authorisation. I have been in the pub with uniformed soldiers after Armistace Marches and they have always been specifically told it's OK to serve uniformed soldiers. On Carnivals, where there isn't an authorised pub, the soldiers with us changed before having a drink.
Pubs can be prosecuted for allowing troops in uniform to drink and whilst I disagree with it, it seems unfair to vilify civilians for disrespecting serving soldiers when they are following MOD rules:
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The article didn't mention if the troops were in Class Bs (walking out dress) or in BDUs, so there is some question as to the exact chain of events. The article simply mentioned that after the parade, some 15 soldiers stopped by the pub, the article hints that this was a regular stopping place for the soldiers. So perhaps the pub crew was not entirely to blame?
But there have already been several instances in the US of returning GIs getting the same treatment...A MacDonald's refusing to serve GIs at the drive thru?!?!?! A Wal Mart door greeter, giving soldiers and their families a hard time, because the greeter did not support the invasion of Iraq/Afghanistan, just to name a couple in the last three years. In each case, the management always apoligized, offered gift cards and "retrained" their crews. And then there are those all-so brave individuals who think that the best way to stop a war is to egg the house of a GI, vandalize their car or plant protest signs in their yard (the one that inflamed me was "I hope your murdering son is killed by a IED").
To be certain, there are those individuals who go above and beyond, helping out a GI, one returning veteran on leave from Iraq had missed his connection due to bad weather, some nameless businessman, listened in one the converstation as the GI explained that he was on emergency leave and his wife was in the hospital delivering their first child, stepped forward and gave his ticket to the soldier, and thanked him for his service and then walked away.
Don't blame the soldiers, of all of the professions, the military is the one that really doesn't want to fight a war, after all, they are far too familier with the cost. If you want to blame somebody, blame the politicians who refuse to adopt a long term security policy, not to mention, their knee-jerk antics whenever a crisis blows up. And the sad fact of a demoracy, is that we, the voters, elect these idiots into office, which says alot about the intelligence of many of the voters.
I believe it was George Patton, viewing the aftermath of a bloody fight who stated "I wish that I could bottle up the stench of a battlefield, and store the canisters in Washington, and whenever a Senator or Congressman starts talking about going to war, I could give the dumb SOBs a whiff of the results."