Damn.

Via Editor & Publisher…

On February 9, the Savannah Morning News reported: "At least 143 soldiers joined Fort Stewart's 1st Brigade too late to participate in a final combat exercise before their units deployed to Iraq. Last week, one of those soldiers - Pvt. Matthew T. Zeimer, 18 - was the first from the brigade to be killed when he was hit by enemy fire in Ramadi, the stronghold of Iraq's Sunni insurgency.

An eighteen year old Private. An E-deuce, I guess. Time was you had to make PFC before a combat deployment. No time for that anymore. As one of the brigade's NCO's said, "They're basically going straight from basic training into Iraq."

And now we learn it was a 'friendly' fire incident.

Was Pvt. Zeimer killed by other half-trained troops?

Or did Pvt. Zeimer die because he was half trained himself?

Who knows.

I only know that I hate what they're doing to my Army.


Hat tip to AmericaBlog.