In his never-ending quest to declare defeat, Murtha will not rest...

Giving more aid and comfort to the enemy than they know what to do with, Murtha again goes on one of his senile rants...

Murtha Sees New Evidence That War Is Going Badly
By Monisha Bansal
CNSNews.com Staff Writer
August 23, 2006

(CNSNews.com) - Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), a vocal critic of the Iraq war, is using the news about a recall of discharged Marines as another opportunity to demand an immediate troop withdrawal in Iraq.

For the first time since the Iraq war began, up to 2,500 discharged Marines will be recalled to duty in Iraq and Afghanistan to make up for shortages of specialists, the Boston Globe reported.

"This recall is just another sign of how badly the war in Iraq is going," said Murtha in a statement Wednesday. "Bringing these Marines back to active duty after their tour of service was complete shows we are unable [to] recruit the necessary volunteers to maintain troop levels in our armed forces. It also shows that at a time when we should be bringing our fighting men and women home from Iraq, we're sending more over there," he said.

Murtha said young men and women are not joining the military because of war "mismanagement" and "all the killing and maiming in Iraq." In addition to the recalls, the military also has increased the age limit for soldiers, Murtha noted. "If everything were going as well as predicted or depicted by President Bush, Vice President Cheney and Secretary Rumsfeld, we would be fulfilling field commander's (sic) desires of earlier this year to reduce troops. Instead we're going to extraordinary means to increase them," Murtha said.

Well, Mr. Murtha, if our armed forces are so "hard up" for new recruits, how do you explain this?

Aug 11 2006

The Department of Defense has announced its recruiting and retention statistics by the active and reserve components for the month of July. This marks the 14th consecutive month the active duty services have met or exceeded their goals.

Active duty recruiting. All services exceeded their recruiting goals in July.

• The Army recruited 10,890 out of a goal of 10,450 (104 percent).
  
• The Navy recruited 4,043 out of a goal of 4,043 (100 percent).
  
• The Marine Corps recruited 3,197 out of a goal of 2,865 (112 percent).
  
• The Air Force recruited 2,130 out of a goal of 2,121 (100 percent).

Active duty retention. All services are projected to meet their retention goals for the current fiscal year.

But hey--anything to bring down the troops, eh Jack?

Murtha said young men and women are not joining the military because of war "mismanagement" and "all the killing and maiming in Iraq." In addition to the recalls, the military also has increased the age limit for soldiers, Murtha noted.

Again, how do you explain that they have met and/or exceeded their goals, Hanoi Jane Axis Sally Tokyo Rose Baghdad Bob... errr..Jack Murtha?

You sir, support our troops like an arsonist supports firemen.

The 1,200 troops are needed for strategic reasons, not for numeric reasons:

Marine Col. Guy A. Stratton, the head of the Marines' Manpower Mobilization Section, was quoted as saying that the military needs at least 1,200 Marines to fill certain positions in upcoming deployments.

"Since this is going to be a long war, we thought it was judicious and prudent at this time to be able to use a relatively small portion of those Marines to help us augment our units."

Some of the military needs, he said, include engineers, intelligence, military police and communications.

But let's not let the facts get in the way of an opportunity to bash our troops and their mission, eh Jack Murtha?

***UPDATE****

Our own Bones, who is a veteran Marine, adds:

It's perfectly normal. Things may have changed inna details since I was in,
but when ya sign up, do your time and get out, you're still obligated to a
two year inactive reserve status. Means you can be called back to active
duty at any time during that two year period. It's not unprecedented.
Usually, only critical MOS's will be recalled.

On the other hand, they've been raising the enlistment/re-enlistment age
requirement more or less steadily over the last few years. With other things
in mind, the DoD is getting the public used to the idea that this is gonna be
a long term war.

Bones

And Bush himself never said it was going to be short term.

***UPDATE***
Welcome Wizbang readers...

Click here for the main page, to see just how Congressman Jack Murtha's rhetoric is dangerous for his largely military constituents in Pennsylvania's 12th district, not to mention dangerous for America. And visit often, because there's lots more to come...
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Technorati: Murtha, Bush, Iraq