When former NFL star pat Tillamn was killed in Afghanistan, the army announced that he was killed fighting the enemy. Now, it appears 9from what i read), that his death was a tragic accident. Most likely, he was shot by one of his won team 9who mistook him for an enemy sniper). So, I can understand, a lot of people (in war) die from mistakes. But why would the Army concoct a fictitious story, knowing that the truth would enmerge at some point? This is beginning to resemble the story about the female army soldier, who was captured by the Iraqis-she was initially lionized as a hero, who emptied her rifle fighting back. later, we learned a different version.
So, just who is running Army public relations-do they want to make fools of themseleves? :eek:
The “Army” did not concoct the story: some individual or individuals within the Ary who feared a PR backlash concocted the story.
My guess would be that the person(s) who created the story expected/hoped that the truth would be shrouded forever in the cloud of war.
never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence. (Mid-level “manager(s)” (officer(s)) fearing reprisals, either for the screw-up on the battlefield or the possible repercussion from the Pentagon at the news, simply tries to bluff his/their way through a bad situation without considering the ramifications of what was really going to happen.)
It could also be ascribed to civilian employees/official at DoD.
Or, perhaps, higher.
“Killed fighting the enemy” is a pretty loose phrase. Did they say that he was engaged in combat with the enemy and shot by the enemy? Was he in combat?
Either way it’s just stupid, maybe with a dash of Evil[sup]TM[/sup] on the side. And tragic, regardless of Mr. Tillman’s previous profession.
The first and heroic version sticks to the mind better… I bet if you ask around people won’t notice that the “truth” has been discovered about these “real” american heroes. That poor Tillman probably was shot in the back by confused rangers or that the girl was semi-concious when she was taken prisoner.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist generally speaking, but in this case I’m likely to think that it was a top-level cover-up/spin doctoring before believing it was a series of overzealous/CYA-ing middle managers (field officers).
The fact that there is so much paperwork and beuracracy in the military means that a low level coverup would have to be hush-hushed among alot of people.
A high-level coverup could easily be facilitated by classifying information and making it clear to the lower-level officers involved that the “offical” story is the approved version of events. When you have high rank and the “best interests of the nation” on your side, convincing the underlings to go along is alot easier than just the pleas of a Staff Sgt. trying to protect his pension.
The latter sounds like the “simpler” story to envision as true is the latter to me.
When bundled into the fact that he was such a high-profile figure, and there was going to be clearly so much fan-fare and patriotic dogma surrounding his memorials the Amry had far too much at stake to allow the truth out. They have overwhelming motivation to make sure his national televised services and honorariums aren’t seen as cautionary tales against serving.
When you consider the massive shortfalls in recruitment, if all those ESPN broadcasts had been put in the context of a great American lost to a mistake (in the small and large sense) you’re probably see them seriously discussing a draft now.
And yet, there has not been, that I have seen, any evidence that any information was classified or that any troops have been ordered to not talk.
The Army, itself, has been conducting the investigation into the story, something that I would think the DoD would quash if it had been ordered from the highest levels. Report: Evidence destroyed after Tillman’s death
I am not claiming that there could be no DoD involvement, but the fact that the cover-up began the morning after the firefight (when it is unlikely that the DoD would even have learned that Tillman was involved) does not make a persuasive case for high-level involvement to me.
That news of friendly fire was already making its way up the chain of command within days of the incident indicates that they probably had an “oh, shit” moment and screwed up by not coming clean, immediately, but it hardly argues for Wolfowitz or Rumsfeld or Bush sending word to keep it quiet.
Just another dose of sugary propaganda to make the war easier to go down.