[truethought88]

"I agree with JoanP that heros should be regarded as such for what they actually did, not for unsubstantiated myths about what some wished they did."

Hero is a funny word, we've all seen it used in many situations. It's been used countless times by the media while refering to professional sports, college sports and highschool sports so I'm not sure what one has to do to truly be considered a hero. I'll tell you one thing though, what PFC Lynch, any other POWs, KIAs or injured military personel have gone through while protecting this country and freedom should be considered very special, reguardless of which word you would like to use to describe it.

[FIREMAN]

To paraphrase an old chestnut...there are those who asire to heroism, and there are those who have heroism thrust upon them.

It is far, far too early to wonder if Jessica considers herself a hero; those whose heroism is unquestioned (firefighters for example) commonly say they were just doing the job they trained for; they didn't seek the status of hero, but we as a people tagged them with that label because we want -- need -- to lift up those we see as having done more than just gone with the flow...those who have done something "I would never be able to do."

Is Jessica Lynch a hero? Is Sgt Riley, who actions of surrender when there was no ability to fight SAVED his remaining fellows? Was Lori Piestewa, Sgt Buggs, WO Mata, or WOs Williams and Young? Not by the commonly held image of heoism on the battlefield as presented by Ahnold and the rest of the popular media; Mohammed certainly IS a hero by anyone's stretch. I'd bet money none of the 8 POWs would call themselves heroes...most likely the 507th crew would be thinking about the 9 who died. HOWEVER, we - the public - have assigned the title "Hero" to all 8 who survived...the title just as arguably belongs to the 9 who died, as well as all the rest of those who served and were wounded/died in this most recent of wars.

Jessica Lynch is the focus because -- as someone else said in another post -- she was the first one rescued in the most dramatic manner, and she was the worst physically injured. Naturally, the American public is going to latch on to her story. We have bestowed the status of hero on her and the others precicely because she volunteered to serve her country - her reasons are not truly relevant -- and because she survived in a situation where many of us could not, despite her injuries REGARDLESS OF HOW SHE GOT THEM (I want to see your report that she was blown out of a humvee, Observer. Substantiate it or clam up).

When my boss is yelling at me or I've had an otherwise bad day, I just think about what Jessica went through at such a young age, and it lifts me because nothing I can go through now can measure up to her experience; if she can survive her ordeal as well as she has, then dam it, I can make it past a little bitching by my boss.

THAT is was a true hero does, either by willful action or by example -- he or she provides something to grab on to when things are tight, and provides some bootstraps to haul yourself up with.

As I live in California, the opportunity to come anywhere close to any of the POWs is slim, nor will I seek that out; if I ever met Jessica I'd probably make a damnned fool of myself. I'll just sit back and take what good things I can from her experience to get me through mine.

Thank you, Jessica Lynch, and all who have gone before you.

[cody evans]

The media itself is now looking at the descrepencies.

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/printer-frie...RTICLE_ID=32410

OPERATION: IRAQI FREEDOM
Spin behind Jessica Lynch story?
Discrepancies in reports of POW's capture, rescue raise questions
Posted: May 6, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Diana Lynne
Hollywood writers could not have imagined a more gripping and rousing story as that of
the Iraqi capture of Army Pfc. Jessica Lynch and the dramatic Special Ops rescue caught
on videotape and instigated by an Iraqi lawyer who reportedly put his life on the line for
hers. But some question whether elements of the saga are more hype than fact, created to
spin the POW's experience to serve political purposes.

Jessica Lynch

An avalanche of movie and book offers reportedly flooded the Lynch family days after her
April 1 rescue amid a Washington Post report of her defiant stand against the Iraqi
soldiers that ambushed her convoy in Nasiriyah on March 23. According to the Post,
Lynch "sustained multiple gunshot wounds" and also was stabbed while she "fought
fiercely and shot several enemy soldiers ... firing her weapon until she ran out of
ammunition." The paper cited an unnamed U.S. military official as saying "she was
fighting to the death."

The front-page story was picked up by news outlets all over the world.

But hours after it hit the newsstands, Col. David Rubenstein, commander of the Army
hospital in Germany where Lynch was taken, told reporters medical evidence did "not
suggest that any of her wounds were caused by either gunshots or stabbing." Lynch's
father echoed that report the following day, telling reporters that Army doctors told him
Jessica hadn't been shot, but suffered arm and leg fractures.

Three days later, an Associated Press report from Germany quoted a medical staff
statement as saying: "There is a possibility [her wounds] were caused by a low-velocity,
small-caliber weapon."

Nearly two weeks after its initial report, the Post quoted a physician at the Iraqi hospital in
Nasiriyah as saying Lynch had sustained a head injury and arm and leg fractures, but
"there were no bullets or shrapnel or anything like that."

The Toronto Star quotes a physician who treated Lynch at the Nasiriya hospital as
describing her injuries as "blunt in nature," possibly stemming from a fall from her vehicle.

"She was in pretty bad shape. There was blunt trauma, resulting in compound fractures of
the left femur [upper leg] and the right humerus [upper arm.] And also a deep laceration
on her head," said Dr. Harith Houssona.

More recent reports indicate Lynch suffered a head wound, spinal injury and fractures to
her right arm, both legs and her right foot and ankle. She is undergoing occupational and
physical therapy at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Bethesda, Md.


Lynch during her rescue from Iraqi captivity


The Post writers couched their report with a cautionary paragraph, which stated that
Pentagon officials said they had heard "rumors" of Lynch's heroics but had no
confirmation. It said the account was based on "battlefield intelligence" and information
from Iraqi sources "whose reliability has yet to be assessed."

In response to critical feedback on the article, Post ombudsman Michael Getler concluded
"what really happened is still not clear." He questioned the "thin sourcing" used in the
article and suggested portions of it were overblown.

"I smell an agenda," he quoted one reader as writing. The reader suggested the Post
account of the ambush amounted to wartime "propaganda."

The dramatic footage of the Army Rangers and Navy SEALs swarming the Nasiriyah
hospital and carrying Lynch out on a stretcher provided a proud moment for the military
and America. The subsequent surge of patriotism muted the catcalls of the anti-war
naysayers.

Military advocate Elaine Donnelly sees another political agenda behind the Post's apparent
misinformation.

"I think someone in the Army – probably a woman – leaked the story to the Washington
Post to spin it," she told WorldNetDaily. "If you plant the story first, it's almost impossible
to turn."

Donnelly, who heads the Center for Military Readiness, is a longtime opponent of
allowing women to serve in combat positions. Donnelly suspects "Pentagon feminists,"
whom she says have actively pursued the advancement of women in the military beyond
the dictates of common sense and at the cost of military effectiveness, are behind the
unsubstantiated report of Lynch's valor and erroneous report of her injuries. She suspects
the information given to the Post was part of an attempt to tip the long-simmering debate
about women in combat in proponents' favor and possibly dampen the potential public
outrage over any future reports of torture.

Recent editorials indicate Lynch's ordeal is critical to the debate. A commentator writing
in USA Today argued it proves "the time is right to blast through the armored ceiling that
keeps women second-class citizens in the military." Another columnist wrote in the
Orlando Sentinel that Lynch's story offers conclusive evidence that "women can be as
fierce as men."

"I would like to know what happened to those men who were shot right away," Donnelly
continued, in reference to the nine members of Lynch's unit recovered from a makeshift
morgue at the Iraqi hospital. Gruesome footage of the bodies broadcast by the Arab
television station Al Jazeera sparked reports the soldiers were shot in the head, execution
style.

Donnelly suspects the men may have been trying to protect the women in the company.
She bases her hunch on interviews of military servicemen and other research she
conducted for a presidential commission studying the impact of women in the armed
forces in 1992.

"Why is nobody asking any questions?" she said. "Something fishy is going on here."


Lynch in Sept. 2000 family photo

For its part, the Pentagon says it will not release the full account of what happened to the
507th Maintenance Company until debriefings are completed with Lynch and five other
company members held captive for three weeks before U.S. Marines rescued them south
of Tikrit. Officials are also interviewing soldiers who escaped the ambush.

On Sunday, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ducked a question about Lynch's
condition.

"I believe that's a matter for her doctors and her family and not for us to talk about," he
said on "Fox News Sunday."

Whatever happened when Lynch's convoy took a wrong turn in the Iraqi desert, most
would agree that Lynch is an American hero for answering the call to duty and putting her
life on the line in service to her country.

But legend precedes reality even for Lynch. The Associated Press reported she told
debriefers in Washington she doesn't remember anything between the time she said her
vehicle was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade and when she regained consciousness at an
Iraqi hospital.

Fox News reports her amnesia extends through the duration of her ten days in captivity,
and that she has no memory of the brutality U.S. military officials believe she endured.

"She basically has amnesia, and has mentally blocked out the horrible things we strongly
believe she went through," one official told Fox.

"These things usually take months – sometimes years – but usually months to eventually
clear up," and the patient recovers, Dr. Isadore Rosenfeld said.

Fox reports the military may have the surviving soldiers from her unit visit her to help
refresh her memory. Officials say she "has to be brought back to reality," since she may be
the last living witness to war crimes in Iraq – crimes possibly committed against her unit
members and herself.

Torture or VIP treatment?

In addition to the issue of how the 20-year-old Army supply clerk was taken prisoner by
Iraqi soldiers, reporting discrepancies raise questions about Lynch's treatment in captivity
and her rescue.

The Iraqi lawyer, Mohammed Odeh Rehaief, who also became an American hero for
alerting U.S. military forces to Lynch's presence at the hospital, conducting surveillance of
the facility and relaying the information back to coalition troops, reportedly put her safety
before his after seeing her being slapped on the face by an Iraqi security officer. The
32-year-old, his wife and their 5-year-old daughter were granted political asylum in the
U.S. as reward for his courage.

NBC News reported coalition forces were told an American soldier was being tortured at
the hospital.

But the treating physicians at the Iraqi public hospital dispute the claims.

The medical team interviewed by the Toronto Star said the Iraqi intelligence officers took
no interest in her.

As they describe, Lynch was given VIP care, which included extra juice and cookies and
the attention of the hospital's "most nurturing" nurse.

"We all became friends with her, we liked her so much," Houssona said. "Especially
because we all speak a little English, we were able to assure her the whole time that there
was no danger, that she would go home soon."

The Nasiriya doctors offer up inconsistent details on Lynch's condition, however, which
leaves room for doubt about the accuracy of their accounts.

While Houssona told The Star that Lynch required a transfusion of two pints of blood, her
colleague Haitham Gizzy told the Charleston Daily Mail – the local paper in Lynch's
hometown of Palestine, W. Va. – that Lynch lost "not a drop of blood."

Gizzy also said Lynch was first treated at an Iraqi military hospital before being transferred
to the public hospital in Nasiriya.

There are no reports regarding what happened to Lynch at that military facility, nor is
there confirmation the "hospital" was in fact a hospital. It has been widely reported that
many of Iraq's torture chambers were disguised as innocent buildings such as hotels and
sports centers.

The rescued POWs told The Post and the Miami Herald they were kicked and beaten
when captured, and were taunted and interrogated by their captors and some feared they
were going to die.

One of the POWs, Army Sgt. James Riley, described the experience as "sheer terror" on
ABC's "Good Morning America" this morning.

The 'big show'

The Star reports the three Nasiriya doctors, two nurses, one hospital administrator and
local residents also ridiculed the U.S. military for its clandestine, midnight raid of the
hospital to rescue Lynch. They claim Iraqi soldiers and commanders left the hospital two
days earlier.

"The night they left, a few of the senior medical staff tried to give Jessica back," said
Houssona. "We carefully moved her out of intensive care and into an ambulance and
began to drive to the Americans, who were just one kilometer away. But when the
ambulance got within 300 meters, they began to shoot. There wasn't even a chance to tell
them 'We have Jessica. Take her.'"

The next night, the sound of helicopters circling the hospital's upper floors drove staff into
the windowless X-ray department, according to the physicians' account. As the rescue
unfolded, the power was cut and the U.S. soldiers blasted through locked doors.

"We were pretty frightened," Dr. Anmar Uday told the paper. "Everyone expected the
Americans to come that day because the city had fallen. But we didn't expect them to blast
through the doors like a Hollywood movie."

"They made a big show," Gizzy told the Daily Mail. "It was just a drama. A big, dramatic
show."

Gizzy and other doctors told the paper most of the Saddam's Fedayeen fighters and the
entire Baath Party leadership had come to the hospital earlier in the day, changed into
civilian clothes and fled barefoot.

"They brought their civilian wear with them," said Mokhdad Abd Hassan, pointing to
green army uniforms piled on the lawn. "They all ran away, the same day."

Were the Fedayeen soldiers long gone from the hospital, or did they flee just hours before
the raid?

The conflicting doctors' reports leave one WorldNetDaily reader suspecting the Iraqi
doctors have an agenda.

"I am very concerned that this young woman will be more traumatized by the media and
critics (who will try and blame her for these inconsistencies) following her recovery," the
reader, who does not wish to be named, wrote. "In other words we need a second 'Saving
Private Lynch'... this one saving her from the media."

[mitch]

Thank you, Joan. A rational view concerning the original post, not sidetracked by media romance.

The sentiment stands: "Good luck PFC Lynch, you'll need it".

Ry Robinson

[mitch]

"Hero"

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=hero

"... endowed with great courage and strength, celebrated for ... bold exploits.. A person noted for feats of courage or nobility of purpose, especially one who has risked or sacrificed his or her life "

Good luck PFC Lynch, you'll need it.

[david_2000_13206]

She broke so many bones in her arm, both legs, foot and ankle, plus ribs and back just from jumping off her armored vehicle to surrender? In your scenario, was the armored vehicle flying 50 feet above the ground during her jump? Maybe she fired until she ran out of ammo, or maybe she was knocked unconsious at the start of the ambush. It dosn't change her hero status. But why make up new versions of the story and create more confusion?

[rebel21]

As I've said before it doesn't matter how she received her injuries. The fact remains that she received them doing the service of her country in a war zone. I don't see all the naysayers running to join the military to defend our country. She's still a hero in my book and always will be no matter how the true story unfolds.

[rebel21]

JoanP,
I also would like to hear about your sources. The Washington Post reporter that was embedded with the troups, and was the reporter to interview Mohammed at the time tells a very different story than yours. I personally will believe the embedded reporters story (which is verifyable) over yours.

[gophergeorge]

Pfc Jessica Lynch is just as heroic as former POW's Pfc Patrick Miller, Sgt James Riley, and CWO's David Williams & Ronald Young; and I see no one calling them anything but heroes. The fact Pfc Lynch was critically injured during a combat operation makes her more heroic; regardless of how the injuries occurred.

There have already been parades in honor of Sgt Riley and Pfc Miller; and there's a huge homecoming celebration taking place this evening in honor of CWO Young in his Georgia hometown.

I've been lurking on this forum for the past couple of weeks, and am frankly amazed at the amount of negative comments regarding her; some outright nasty (such as the recently deleted post by "melfurd"). Pfc Lynch was critically injured, and has suffered immensely for over six weeks. That is all I need to know to realize she is a very courageous young woman that deserves the respect of all patriotic Americans. Pfc Lynch definitely has the respect of myself, and every member of the U.S. military I speak with, regardless of their rank.

[Nebelwerfer]

Jetmaxx,
I agree with your post 110%.

[rebel21]

JetMaxx. I agree 1010% with your post. It's good to see that scanner2 is deleting some of the negative crap that's been posted on these forums. Some of it makes my blood boil. I was always taught that if you don't have anything good to say about somebody, don't say anything at all!!

[FIREMAN]

Fix;

That's the downside of the Internet, of course...cowards and downright cruel people use the anonimity of the 'net to say all sorts of hurtful thing just to get their jollys.

I would never say anything on this board that I wouldn't say in a physical public forum, which DOES include certain suppositions of mine that Jessfan called to task on, although I wasn't as blunt/crude about it as The Naked Truth...I have SOME sense of propriety!

Note, however, that my posts are still here!

I thank you all for the links to Jess Info that have been posted. it is appreciated...heck, I even appreciatge th4e chance to debate (however poorly) with Naked and Yachtsman...those stayed relatively civil!

[rebel21]

Soprano84,
Well it is America and at least those difference of opinions can be expressed in a forum like this. It's just one day I'm sure Jessi will read all this if she hasn't already, and I would hate for it to make her feel bad just because some people get their jollies upsetting people. But I guess she knows that she was over there defending our freedom to express ourselves even if we want to appear as jerks!

[FIREMAN]

Fix;

I agree...I think she'll see that the vast majority of us are just captivated by her ordeal and recovery. We ALL want her to get well and return to the life she wants...it's the discussion betwen the board members that get's a little spirited now & then!

[rebel21]

Soprano84,
A little spirited is OK, but I know both myself and others have received some rather nasty emails complete with name calling and insinuations about family members that is truly unwarranted. You just have to take it with a grain of salt, and consider the source of the nastyness and refuse to respond. That urks them worse than arguing with them.