OT: Create Your Own Military Unit!!!

[dragoon500ly]

Well, even I had to set back in awe at the sheer chutzpah of Yupeng Deng who was arraigned in court on charges that he pretended to be a US Army recruiter and bilked fellow immigrants out of thousands of dollars in fees.

You see, Mr. Deng created his own unit, the "U.S. Army/Military Special Forces Reserve Unit" based in Temple City, a Los Angeles suburb with a large Asian immigrant population.

As many as 100 immigrants wore ACUs and Class A uniforms, berets, decorations, ranks and their own unit patch and were even issued fake military ID cards. The recruits were charged "fees" ranging from $300 to $450 to join Deng's reserve unit and had to pay as much as $120 a year to renew their membership.

Deng trained his recruits with mock weapons and even marched his unit at public events including a parade in Monterey Park and even toured the US Midway Museum in San Diego in full uniform.

What finally broke this unit was Deng's claim that by showing their "military ID cards", local police would help the recruits with traffic tickets.

Deng was able to take advantage of the desperation of many immigrants desire to secure citizenship. His act of fraud also took advantage of the DREAM Act, a immigration legislation which would have offered citizenship in exchange for military service, under certain conditions. The DREAM Act died on the floor of the Senate last year, but there is still enough (mis)information about the DREAM Act to allow people such as Deng to take advantage.

Deng faces 13 counts of obtaining money, labor or property under false pretenses and of manufacturing and selling phony identification documents, if convicted, he faces up to eight years in prison. He was also charged with one count of possession of child pornography and he can face an additional three years in state prison for that charge, if convicted.

Just when you think that you have heard everything.....

[Abbott Shaull]

Yeah read about this scum bag about couple months ago when the story first broke. My thought was wow in the shadows of a fairly large City. Makes you wonder what people could do in places like New York or Chicago. Worse yet take Dearborn, MI one of the largest concentration of Arab in the US. *Shudders*

[dragoon500ly]

Yup, one does have to sit back and wonder just what is growing in our cities.

[Abbott Shaull]

No it wouldn't surprise me. Much like I wouldn't be surprise what one could find in almost any Military Arms Room. Many of the Gangs that breed in these Inner-Cities are relatively heavily armed via the black market.

The only reason they don't use their heavy weapons is they don't want to alienate the people who willingly support them by not turning these gangs in.

[HorseSoldier]

Distressing but not too surprising. Up here we have a large Hmong population and assorted other immigrants from places where laws and government work a whole lot differently than they work in a developed nation (when they work at all -- we've got a lot of Dinka refugees from south Sudan, as well). There's a lot of cons and frauds targeting those people because they don't have the same spider sense to pick up on scams the way people who grew up in the US cultural framework do -- and an unfortunate portion of those crimes are backed up with threats of legal action against the victims, having them arrested, whatever, for not participating in the scam.

And they fall for it a lot -- if you grow up somewhere where a rich guy can have a poor guy arrested by slipping the police some cash or calling in a favor from his cousin the chief of police, you carry that framework somewhere in your head even if that's not local rules. So I can easily see this guy claiming that for a modest kick back he can hook up immigrants with membership in a non-deployable reserve military unit that will help get them citizenship. Most of his members are probably from nations where similar kick backs would get you out of conscription or get you promoted if conscripted, so in the victims' heads the script works.

[dragoon500ly]

I understand about how different cultures approach things, what got me is that this guy was able to march in a parade, troop his unit from LA down to San Diego...and nobody so much as blinked.

Ah well, it happened in California...why does anything that happens in Cali should ever surprise me?

"And next on Channel 12 Action Live News! The US Navy's Task Force 273, made up of Berber tribesmen will be launching their latest vessel. The 24-foot Boston Whaler will be christened the USS Fudgepucker, BBGSK-345."

[Abbott Shaull]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

I understand about how different cultures approach things, what got me is that this guy was able to march in a parade, troop his unit from LA down to San Diego...and nobody so much as blinked.

Ah well, it happened in California...why does anything that happens in Cali should ever surprise me?

"And next on Channel 12 Action Live News! The US Navy's Task Force 273, made up of Berber tribesmen will be launching their latest vessel. The 24-foot Boston Whaler will be christened the USS Fudgepucker, BBGSK-345."

You know it doesn't surprise me for two reasons. 1. No matter what some may do, such as hold protest at funerals of service members killed in the line of duty, there are way too many who even among them who still respect a person standing their in uniform. We have been institutionalized since before 9-11 not to question people who show up in uniforms. Any parade I have been too, not only big 'Military' holiday parades, civilians in general respect the uniform (ironically more so than our current sitting President). 2. The Federal, State, Local, and Military high place officials seem to be taking these uniforms at face value.

I am sending you email, because the rest I feel uncomfortable posting in open forum like this. I know lot of us would agree that this is unacceptable, but again you don't know who is reading...

Abbott Shaull

-Hey I would almost any day trade my Maroon Beret to have the honor of wearing Stetson, but hey I more afraid of being stuck in modern day coffin, and not too mechanically incline to be tanker...lol Besides I always wanted to be paratrooper since I was young, and I am sure if I hadn't been injured I would of wised up and re-enlisted into Armor Cavalry MOS after I had finished my first term. Yet due to untimely injury and the rapid draw down after the fall of the Berlin Wall it wasn't too be...

[Legbreaker]

Let them read I say. Anyone low enough to try profiting in this way from those fighting and dying without putting their own lives on the line doesn't deserve any respect at all.
Wearing medals that don't belong to you or your direct ancestors, impersonating a serviceman (current or ex), starting up a private army and passing it off as legitimate are all examples of behaviour which should be severely punished in my book.

[dragoon500ly]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

Let them read I say. Anyone low enough to try profiting in this way from those fighting and dying without putting their own lives on the line doesn't deserve any respect at all.
Wearing medals that don't belong to you or your direct ancestors, impersonating a serviceman (current or ex), starting up a private army and passing it off as legitimate are all examples of behaviour which should be severely punished in my book.

And the Ninth (Short)Circuit Court of (Mis)Appeals considers it to be Free Speech and thus protected by the 1st Admendment.

I know that for the 1st Admendment to work, it has to apply to all. But I also feel that this kind of action/speech is not what the founding fathers intended. These people are not protesting government action, they are simply taking advantage of people. It is nothing more than fraud, outright theft, lying in order to steal...hmmm isn't that against the law or do I misunderstand?

If you take the recent appeal, you have the right to proclaim your graduation from SEAL training, your multiple awards of the Medal of Honor, you can promote yourself from Private to General of The Army, adward yourself a knighthood and a few titles of nobility and while you are busy at the ole computer why not run off a few copies of your new letterhead, proclaiming yourself to be President of the United States. Ah, that's right! If I proclaim myself to be President of the United States and I didn't win the election, then I can be arrested and sent to Federal Prison. The ole Double-Standard!!!

Ah well! This is General of the Army, Sir Dragoon500ly, Prince of Reeses Pieces, Duke of Nothingness, Count Chocolate, winner of the Excellence in Warfare Medal and the I Forget to Duck During Incoming Fire Adward signing off!

[dragoon500ly]

So....

What is the real reason why the Ten Commandments have been banned from America's public buildings?

It creates a hostile work environment to post THOU SHALL NOT STEAL, THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY and THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS in a building full of lawyers, judges and politicians.....

[Abbott Shaull]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

And the Ninth (Short)Circuit Court of (Mis)Appeals considers it to be Free Speech and thus protected by the 1st Admendment.

I know that for the 1st Admendment to work, it has to apply to all. But I also feel that this kind of action/speech is not what the founding fathers intended. These people are not protesting government action, they are simply taking advantage of people. It is nothing more than fraud, outright theft, lying in order to steal...hmmm isn't that against the law or do I misunderstand?

If you take the recent appeal, you have the right to proclaim your graduation from SEAL training, your multiple awards of the Medal of Honor, you can promote yourself from Private to General of The Army, adward yourself a knighthood and a few titles of nobility and while you are busy at the ole computer why not run off a few copies of your new letterhead, proclaiming yourself to be President of the United States. Ah, that's right! If I proclaim myself to be President of the United States and I didn't win the election, then I can be arrested and sent to Federal Prison. The ole Double-Standard!!!

Ah well! This is General of the Army, Sir Dragoon500ly, Prince of Reeses Pieces, Duke of Nothingness, Count Chocolate, winner of the Excellence in Warfare Medal and the I Forget to Duck During Incoming Fire Adward signing off!

I also recall that the Bill of Rights was emplace to protect the Rights of Majority and of the Minority. There is also a thin line where if you are pursuing your Rights, happens to infringes on other in their pursuit of their Rights and Freedoms, then your Rights are trumped.

Much like I hate to say that a certain Church here in the State who seem to feel they have a Right to conduct protest at funerals. Well honestly who Rights are they infringing. The Family and Friends who are trying to pay their last respect. Well as ex-service member, HELL YEAH, it damn wrong, the service member and their family paid the price for these people run their PIE HOLES.

Now these same people if they were throwing blood or other body fluids onto the people who were there to honor, then by all mean, Smith and Wesson, a Colt, or any other point and click device is handy to eliminate the moron is justified. Mainly because they had crossed the line of letting other live and follow in the pursuit of happiness in that there no telling what disease and other thing they may have caught.

Yeah what this BONEHEAD did was fraud and theft. Plan and simple and should be illegal. Much like the Militia movements that were popular around the time Oklahoma bombing, were legal up until the point when they started to collect fire-arms and other things that would make Infantry Company look like they were out-gunned.

If you want to talk about lying and stealing let look at lot of the people who work for the Federal Government and good many of them are elected officials.

What are you talking about we have someone posing POTUS who very thought of being Commander-in-Chief of the military makes him sick on the daily basis. How he got so LUCKY in getting the bastard on his watch is beyond me. Knowing that he wasn't armed when he was shot, will mean some SEAL will lose his Security Clearance and get booted from the navy.

What worries me more, this place was built in 2005. When the Pakistani were claiming he was in the Border regions. There are several retire Pakistani Military Commanders who live in and around the same City. So no matter what the Pakistani President may of said May 1, 2011 in that they supported the action, they now have done about face and declared it illegal violation of their Nation. I would of thought the US taking out Taliban in Afghanistan in 2002 with the greatest of ease, would of had them have second thoughts of hiding him, and what did they think, we wouldn't find out and prosecute an Operation that would make some of the one the Isrealis, British, and Germans have pulled off against terrorist in the last 30 years look like child play.

Former President Bush and his idiots who would leak everything probably knew around 2005-2006 range, and buried it due to minor excursion in Iraq that was nothing more than expensive side show for someone who need something more than a tiny purple pill to boast his ego. Sad, thing is if we would of stay on course with the War on Terror, we could of had the mission completed in Afghanistan and let the tribal members of Afghanistan/Pakistan decide among themselves how long the propped up government in Kabul would last. What should worry people is a government like Pakistan having Nukes when they Government and Military barely control half dozen large Cities and the rest of the nation is control be tribal leaders/warlord or whatever the title of the week are.... Sorry I am getting off my soap box..

[dragoon500ly]

Well now, in yet another shining example of political correctness gone to far...

Some dweeb has come out and proclaimed that the use of a certain Native American name to describe a certain former terrorist leader was demeaning to Native Americans and was intended to forever link the name of an honored warrior to that of this former terrorist.....no lie GI!!!!!

Now, I wan't involved in the decision to launch the operation and so am not privy to the back room dicussion on which minority group to piss off. But I am equally certain that it was not intended as a slur. While the details are still sketchy, most like a random code word was generated to name the overall operation and target IDs were assigned based on that code word.

Sooooo to assist certain dweebs who are paid waaaaaayyyy too much to flap their pieholes, I propose the following....

The overall Operation is named Fluttering Petal. OBL's target code word is changed to Shivering Sheet. Oh wait, I just insulted gardner's and weaver's. Damn! Can't win for losing I guess!!!!!

[Abbott Shaull]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

Well now, in yet another shining example of political correctness gone to far...

Some dweeb has come out and proclaimed that the use of a certain Native American name to describe a certain former terrorist leader was demeaning to Native Americans and was intended to forever link the name of an honored warrior to that of this former terrorist.....no lie GI!!!!!

Now, I wan't involved in the decision to launch the operation and so am not privy to the back room dicussion on which minority group to piss off. But I am equally certain that it was not intended as a slur. While the details are still sketchy, most like a random code word was generated to name the overall operation and target IDs were assigned based on that code word.

Sooooo to assist certain dweebs who are paid waaaaaayyyy too much to flap their pieholes, I propose the following....

The overall Operation is named Fluttering Petal. OBL's target code word is changed to Shivering Sheet. Oh wait, I just insulted gardner's and weaver's. Damn! Can't win for losing I guess!!!!!

It is ironic that this Native America Leader was considered in his time on par to what we considered the now deceased person of interest. I am sure 100 years from now they will call some obscure operation after OBL for much of the same reason. I am sure their will be an outcry about it. American and Brits seem to have a habit of calling operations by random code names. At times they are used as open secrets, others they are just that, to make you wonder what the hell they were talking about in case anyone else who wasn't read in on it to make them to keep guessing. The Code name of this operation did both at the same time... Quite brilliant if you ask me. Kinda like in 1989 at Fort Bragg after Sept. Everyone knew at Bragg that there was this small Special Operation Detachment, other Green Blankets Teams, some Corps assets such as the MPs we kept on rotating in and out, and of course quite a bit of the Division was going to play in tiny country with mostly jungle and one huge canal that we held the title too.

In late November we knew we were like 3 weeks or so out. How did every trooper knew who was going, well it was quite simple. One of the Battalions of the DRB 1 was sent to Jungle training. When your Battalion was DRB 1, 2, and 3 you did nothing but maybe go out to the rifle range for training, and kept busy around your barracks as much as possible. So for whoever had the bright idea to send one of those battalions did so as boneheaded of move as one could. We were lucky Pineapple Face didn't declare war as soon as they started their training cycle. Yet, he foolish kept up with his boneheaded ways.

Now what is ironic how do you invade a county in which you already have 1 Brigade stationed there reinforce by a Brigade size commands of the 5th Mechanized, 7th Light Infantry, and several MP Brigades, Battalions, and Companies, which were reinforce by the long freight train of planes flying out Pope bringing the Green Beenies, Delta, and remainder of two Brigades commands from the 82nd... Hell he didn't realize until inbound traffic of aircraft was overhead that he was in trouble...*Shrug*
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[dragoon500ly]

Originally Posted by Abbott Shaull

It is ironic that this Native America Leader was considered in his time on par to what we considered the now deceased person of interest. I am sure 100 years from now they will call some obscure operation after OBL for much of the same reason. I am sure their will be an outcry about it. American and Brits seem to have a habit of calling operations by random code names. At times they are used as open secrets, others they are just that, to make you wonder what the hell they were talking about in case anyone else who wasn't read in on it to make them to keep guessing. The Code name of this operation did both at the same time... Quite brilliant if you ask me. Kinda like in 1989 at Fort Bragg after Sept. Everyone knew at Bragg that there was this small Special Operation Detachment, other Green Blankets Teams, some Corps assets such as the MPs we kept on rotating in and out, and of course quite a bit of the Division was going to play in tiny country with mostly jungle and one huge canal that we held the title too.

In late November we knew we were like 3 weeks or so out. How did every trooper knew who was going, well it was quite simple. One of the Battalions of the DRB 1 was sent to Jungle training. When your Battalion was DRB 1, 2, and 3 you did nothing but maybe go out to the rifle range for training, and kept busy around your barracks as much as possible. So for whoever had the bright idea to send one of those battalions did so as boneheaded of move as one could. We were lucky Pineapple Face didn't declare war as soon as they started their training cycle. Yet, he foolish kept up with his boneheaded ways.

Now what is ironic how do you invade a county in which you already have 1 Brigade stationed there reinforce by a Brigade size commands of the 5th Mechanized, 7th Light Infantry, and several MP Brigades, Battalions, and Companies, which were reinforce by the long freight train of planes flying out Pope bringing the Green Beenies, Delta, and remainder of two Brigades commands from the 82nd... Hell he didn't realize until inbound traffic of aircraft was overhead that he was in trouble...*Shrug*
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Don't forget, old Manual's personal tarot reader assured him that there was no danger of any US invasion and that it was safe for him to head over to his mistress' house for a light night snack...

[HorseSoldier]

There seem to be two stories floating around concerning the Geronimo thing.

Some accounts of what was said indicate that "Geronimo" was a brevity code for mission accomplished/bin Laden dead.

Other accounts seen to be that bin Laden's personal code name was Geronimo.

Either might be correct, doctrinally. Without transcripts of the exact radio traffic it's a moot point, really, and whatever the context someone's feelings likely get hurt enough to have a whinge.

[95th Rifleman]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

Ah, that's right! If I proclaim myself to be President of the United States and I didn't win the election, then I can be arrested and sent to Federal Prison. The ole Double-Standard!!!

:

How is that ilegal? Bush didn't win the the first election but he still ended up doing a second term.

[Rainbow Six]

Originally Posted by Abbott Shaull

American and Brits seem to have a habit of calling operations by random code names.

For what it's worth it's been British practice for some years for code names to be chosen at random by computer so there is no chance of anyone being able to deduce what the operation entails from the code name.

Also, excercises always have two word code names, whereas actual operations only have one word code names.

[dragoon500ly]

Originally Posted by 95th Rifleman

How is that ilegal? Bush didn't win the the first election but he still ended up doing a second term.

Hate to rain on your parade...but when the news organizations paid for a recount of ALL of Florida's ballots, Bush still won and actually gained 812 more votes.

And to stop the flame wars....I didn't vote for Bush, either time. He was an idiot as governer, he was an idiot as president. I personally feel that while there may have been some justification for invading Afghanistan, since Al-Quida was based there....there was no justification whatsoever for the invasion of Iraq. But the two main movers for that screwup were Cheney and Rumsfield. But placing those two screwballs in positions of power was Bush Jr.'s greatest mistake.