Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Anti-Obama Group Uses Photo of British Soldiers to Distort Obama's "Bayonets" Remark

This is hilarious.

A Tea Party group already has thousands of likes and shares on FaceBook for this image in response to President Obama's remarks about bayonets at tonight's final debate with Mitt Romney:



First, let's look at what Obama actually said:
"You mentioned the navy, for example, and that we have fewer ships than we did in 1916. Well, governor, we also have fewer horses and bayonets because the nature of our military's changed," [Obama] said to laughter from the audience.
Which makes the message conveyed by the image and text DUMBASS. (Do these dolts know what the word "fewer" means? Crikey.)

But there's more: The soldiers in that photo? They're British. Which means that the über-patriotic Americans who made this image used FOREIGNERS! to make their (completely bogus) point.

Fecking hilarious.

And: the U.S. Army discontinued bayonet training two years ago. Which doesn't mean there aren't still some number of bayonets in our military—which Obama never said anyway.

• Note: As this article clarifies:
But the Army insists it has not abandoned the bayonet. While soldiers may no longer be learning how to fix a bayonet to the end of a rifle and stab an enemy, they are still learning to use the bayonet, just in a different way. 
The Army’s last bayonet charge happened in February 1951 during the Korean War, but there were instances during Vietnam when troops fixed bayonets during intense combat, according to the Army. 
And:
U.S. Army units have not issued soldiers bayonets for deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, said Matt Larsen, the former director of the Army’s combatives program.
So the real message behind the above image? "Doofuses gotta doofus."

2 comments:

  1. Uh, we do still use bayonets, sir. The Army stopped bayonet training in Basic 2 years ago, because not all soldiers are combat troops, but all combat troops (i.e. infantrymen) still get bayonet training in AIT. This isn't really new. As far back as 1984, when I went to US Army Basic Training, regular Army and reservists did not get bayonet training, but those going into the National Guard did. Further, the Marine Corps, where everyone is trained for combat, still instructs recruits in boot camp on bayonets.

    The standard issue weapon on the US military, the M-16/M-4, is still made with a bayonet lug under the muzzle. It serves no other purpose.

    http://www.army.mil/factfiles/equipment/individual/bayonet.html

    As an aside, a little piece of trivia: When US Special Forces invaded Afghanistan in 2001, they used horses. An 18ft tall monument to those soldiers, depicting a US soldier on horseback, was unveiled at Ground Zero just 4 days ago.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2TzT6YLUf8

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Holy crap.

      I'll let your comment sit there as an example, i guess.

      Delete