On Tue, 21 Nov 2006 08:39:25 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

You raise an interesting point. If we have 2 million in uniform, why is
the military rotating the same troops and guard units back to Iraq over
and over? Why do we have 2 million in the military? If a majority of
them are not "fighting" soldiers, sailors, marines and airforce, maybe
most of those non-fighting billets should be handled by civilians.

Haliburton maybe?
Maybe I'm wrong, but I see the increasing privatization of the
military as a bad move. An Arab food worker blowing up himself
and some of our guys in a green zone mess hall was an eye-opener
for me. Having large deployments of military not be self-sufficient
allows for too many vulnerabilities.
My experience is navy only, and a while back, but the only civvies I
ever saw on ship/base was yardworkers. And frankly, I always had
an odd feeling seeing yardbirds on my ship. It made me a bit
uncomfortable to think I was depending on them - in this case
boilermakers - for my safety. I knew these guys were specialists,
but it still gave me an odd feeling.
BTW, I would sometimes grab a hardhat, apron and safety glasses of
a yardbird after they broke for the day, put them on and walk around
the ship goofing on crewmates, like showing them a big wrench and
mumbling, "where is the ASROC launcher, I need to fix the nukes."
Even guys who knew me for years didn't recognize me.
Somebody should have arrested me.

--Vic