War! Huh! What Is It Good For?

Well, I feel I may be slated for this post but it's not going to stop me.

Yesterday it was announced that the 100th Brit has been killed in Iraq since we invaded in 2003 - 31 year old Corporal Gordon Alexander Pritchard. Why is it such a surprise? He was a soldier in the army during a time of war - people are going to get killed. We can't win all the time. He chose to join the army seeing as, thankfully, we no longer have forced subscription so he must have known what to expect. In my opinion it's pretty selfish to join the army without considering the effect on your family and friends should anything untoward happen to you in service. It's also pretty naïve to assume that "nothing will happen to me 'cos I'm British". You join the army to fight, not to sit around drinking and getting paid. Because of that you should expect to fight if you're in the army - why else would they spend hundreds of thousands of pounds training all the soldiers up?

This is not to say that I don't feel sorry for the families of all those who were killed, but before we start mouthing off at the government for sending troops out or asking why he was there at that particular time let's just stop and think for one moment: The soldiers were there because they wanted to be there; they wanted to join the army; they should expect to go to war at some point; they should know that war is not a game - the weapons are real, the blood is real and the pain caused to familes is real too.

Take care

MaFt