You people are absolutely unbelievable.
She got into a bad situation, she fought for her life, was captured, rescued, and returned to health. Now, whether that’s worthy of a medal or not, I don’t know. But I’ll be damned if I’m gonna sit here and say that it was not heroic.
If this doesn’t fit your definition of heroism, I’d like to see what does.
culov is getting towards an answer. She got a medal for the same reason that the character Yossarian gets a medal for bombing fish in Catch-22. It’s about propaganda, kids.
Looking at this story as an outsider, I find the term “hero” a little strong - in that, apart from returning fire, she didn’t seem to do anything that would elevate someone to the level of “valiant” that many other military heroes have achieved.
Having said that, she is clearly a plucky woman, a soldier - which is an indication of greater bravery than me - who has suffered a great deal, so if the media chooses to idolise her, well, that’s the way it is, and I hope it assists her recovery. It doesn’t hurt that she’s cute.
I watched the press conference live, and I was touched that, in addition to thanking the military and her family, she thanked the Iraqis who saved her life.
My definition of heroism is a person knowingly putting them selves at risk of death or serious injury to help another person or people in danger. It could be defending a position from attack, if that defense prevented the attacker from assaulting others. It could be running out from behind cover into fire to help pull an injured comrade back to safety. It could be launching and sustaining an attack against harsh odds. From my definition, Lynch does not reach the level of “hero”. Neither did Scott O’Grady. Both were unable to successfully defend against or avoid attack and both were media darlings.
The Bronze Star is a high personal award (at least it used to be). I know several men who have earned that award, and have done things deserving of a higher award.
She’s a hero because she was helping root out evil and got wounded and almost killed by Iraqi doctors.
She remembers nothing because she had some kind of amnesia (the kind that makes you forget horrible events)( I think).
I think it had nothing to do with her being white. Perhaps being a female, but not because she was white.
Remember they made some of those “black” immigrants from central or south America American Citizens after being KIA, so I see no discrimination. I agree though that it was to keep up the pro-war mood.
Would these doctors be the same ones who saved her life? And donated their own blood to keep her alive?
What???
Perhaps she is, but the media isn’t making a big deal out of it as they are with PFC. Lynch because Lynch was rescued(SP?) and Shoshana Johnson wasn’t. Sorry. You can’t start making judgments based on what the media says. The media is only looking to make headlines and not telling the whole truth. :rolleyes:
All soldiers and civilians that fight for our freedom, and the freedoms of other people, and to root out evil are heroes in my book. I don’t see any racism going on here, but I might see a publicity stunt. People need to stop saying, We shouldn’t have done this, and we shouldn’t done that, and let’s bring our troops home now. The enemy sees these reports and that prompts them to attack our kids and soldiers even more and with more viciousness. (SP?):mad:
Now we are in IMHO…
I feel sorry for the poor lady.
She knows that the Iraqi doctors were looking after her as best they could:
And then hospital staff are shot and abused for their help during the ‘rescue’.
No wonder she wants to be left alone. It would be a humiliating and embarrasing position to be in. She at least deserves peace and quiet. I hope to gods they dont make life worse for her and make a movie out of the event.
According to the lawyer that tipped our special ops where she was said they were going to do something unnecessary that would have killed her.
Her family wants a movie out of it. I did hear about that ambulance and someone got intelligence messed up. Anyway, why did the ambulance just head out in the middle of a war zone without actually sending out a messenger with a white flag detailing the plans? That would have been the smart thing to do. Perhaps, they didn’t even want to bring her back, but did this as a stunt to embarrass the U.S., which the Iraqi government was trying to do.
Yeah, the doctors probably also provided the best care they could just to embarrass the US. Bloody Iraqi doctors…sheesh.
A stunt to embarass the US? What, ‘suicide surgeons’, the latest weapon in the Iraqi arsenal?
I doubt that any doctors, no matter whether Iraqi or American, would knowingly drive an ambulance into hostile fire, risking the lives of themselves and their patient.
-Oli
But what they did was stupid. Also, the lawyer said the doctors were going to kill her.
Did I miss a news flash? The doctors reported being shot AT, but Special Forces does NOT use warning shots. If they were shot at, they would be shot, and likely dead. They use extremely loud noise makers with a brilliant flash of light to stun people.
It was an ambulance driver.
Dr Uday confirms this:
While I may trust the good doctor’s perception and opinion on medical issues within his specialty, the issue of using blanks in a raid of this type was discussed at length here, where I posted on Page 2