Text 17789, 122 rader
Skriven 2008-06-12 15:48:01 av Roy Witt (1:397/22)
  Kommentar till text 17783 av Ward Dossche (2:292/854)
Ärende: Have fun with this one
==============================
12 Jun 08 20:23, Ward Dossche wrote to Roger Nelson:

 RN>> To most of the above history lesson, I say 'So what?'  Your attempt
 RN>> to belittle the awarding of the Congressional Medal of Honor,
 RN>> regardless of what you think or believe, only belittles you in the
 RN>> eyes of others.

 WD> Having gone through the freely available list of recipients of the
 WD> Congressional Medal of Honor, there is no doubt on my mind that
 WD> several were awarded as morale boosters.

So what? Those who didn't deserve the medal, were removed from the list
(1916).

 WD> The "massacre at Wounded Knee" as General Nelson Miles described it
 WD> himself saw a force of 500 US soldiers of the 7th Cavalry all armed
 WD> with repeater rifles, 4 Hotchkiss guns and one Gatling gun pitched
 WD> against an Indian encampment of 120 men plus 230 women and children
 WD> with 10-15 elderly fire arms plus bows, arrows, spears and clubs. A
 WD> main portion of the Indians suffering from smallpox.

OTH, according to General E.D. Scott,

"There is nothing to conceal or apologize for in the Wounded Knee Battle -
beyond the killing of a wounded buck by a hysterical recruit. The firing
was begun by the Indians and continued until they stopped - with the one
exception noted above."

"That women and children were casualties was unfortunate but unavoidable,
and most must have been [killed] from Indian bullets...The Indians at
Wounded Knee brought their own destruction as surely as any people ever
did. Their attack on the troops was as treacherous as any in the history
of Indian warfare, and that they were under a strange religious
hallucination is only an explanation not an excuse."

...excerpts from an official investigation of Wounded Knee initiated at
the behest of Congress, written by General E. D. Scott.

 WD> I'm not inventing these figures, Roger, it's historic fact.

And yet, you show no proof or offer any references of proof. Typical.

 WD> 20 Congressional Medals of Honor were awarded for a military
 WD> engagement which lasted between 10 minutes and an hour. that's a
 WD> medal every 30 seconds to every 3 minutes. It's just

Concerning: Rescindment of Medals of (dis)Honor

Date: June 24, 1996

Dear Mr. Dill,

Thank you for your recent letters, together with signatures and comments
from other citizens via the Internet, proposing that Congress rescind
seventeen Medals of Honor awarded to U.S. Army personnel for actions at
Wounded Knee, South Dakota, on December 29, 1890, and at Drexel Mission on
the following day.

I appreciate why you view with dismay the award of the nation's highest
decoration for valor to soldiers of the United States Army for their
individual efforts in an action that resulted in the death or wounding of
as many as 370 Indian men, women and children. I also appreciate the
concern that these awards can be viewed as diminishing the value of Medals
of Honor awarded for conduct in other conflicts.

The policies and decisions of the United States Government that led to the
Army's being at Wounded Knee in 1890 doubtless can be characterized as
unjust, unwise, or worse. Nevertheless, a retrospective judgement that the
Government's policies and actions were dishonorable does not warrant
rescinding the medals awarded to individual soldiers for bravery in a
brief, fierce fight in which 25 soldiers were killed and 45 others
wounded. Neither today's standards for awarding the medal nor policies of
the United States with regard to Indian tribes are what they were in 1890.

The criteria by which the Medal of Honor is awarded have changed greatly
since the original, ambiguous, nineteenth century authorization for the
medal that gave commanders a wide latitude in choosing men to receive it.
Soldiers could even nominate themselves for the award, and did. Between
1891 and 1897, over 500 medals were awarded for actions in the Civil War,
more than three decades earlier. These awards led to the formation of the
Medal of Honor Legion, and organization of recipients concerned that
wholesale bestowal of the award was weakening the medal's prestige.

In part due to the efforts of the Medal of Honor Legion, President Wilson
in 1916 signed a law that clarified the procedures and standards of proof
for awarding the Medal of Honor. To receive the medal, one must
demonstrate distinguished gallantry or intrepity, at the risk of life,
above and beyond the call of duty. The 1916 law also provided for a board
of retired generals to review each of the 2,625 Army medals awarded for
conduct during campaigns against Indian tribes between 1861 and 1898,
including Wounded Knee. As a result of this review, 911 medals were
rescinded, all because the recipients were judged not to have
distinguished themselves in combat and at the risk of their lives.

In 1990, in an unprecedented action the 101st Congress passed Senate
Concurrent Resolution 153, which apologized to the Sioux people for the
Wounded Knee massacre and expressed support for the establishment of a
"suitable and appropriate memorial to those who were tragically slain at
Wounded Knee." Since then, descendents of the Wounded Knee victims and
survivors, the Oglala Sioux and Cheyenne River Sioux tribal governments,
the State of South Dakota, Members of Congress and the U.S. Department of
the Interior have considered a number of proposals, including a National
Tribal Park, as an appropriate memorial.

While a consensus on a Wounded Knee memorial proposal remains elusive,
efforts to achieve such a consensus are continuing. I support these
efforts in the belief that establishing a well-conceived memorial to the
victims of Wounded Knee is much preferable to attempting to strip
long-dead soldiers of a medal which they might not merit under today's
standards.

Signed, Senator John McCain


Please stop trying to feed us more bullshit, Ward.

                R\%/itt



--- Twit(t) Filter v2.1 (C) 2000
 * Origin: SATX Alamo Area Net * South * Texas, USA * (1:397/22)