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| Iraq |
| Military Crimes In Iraq Often Alcohol Related |
| 2007-03-14 |
| In May 2004, Specialist Justin Lillis got drunk on what he called "hajji juice," a clear Iraqi moonshine smuggled onto an army base in Balad by civilian contractors. He began taking potshots with his M-16 service rifle. "He shot up some contractor's rental car," said Phil Cave, a lawyer for Lillis, 24. "He hopped in a Humvee, drove around and shot up some more things. He shot into a housing area" and at soldiers guarding the base entrance. Six months later, at an army base near Baghdad, after a night of drinking a stash of illegal whiskey and gin, Specialist Chris Rolan of the 3rd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, pulled his 9mm service pistol on another soldier and shot him to death. |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #7 There - fixed. |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2007-03-14 22:21 |
| #6 260 non property crimes per year per 200,000 population. That's 880 non property crimes. A little operator precedence problem with the calculator. |
| Posted by: ed 2007-03-14 18:09 |
| #5 So the locals distill moonshine, but we won't send over beer for fear of offending the locals? I don't know which is going to give out sooner -- the wall or my head -- but I'm gonna go find out. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2007-03-14 17:55 |
| #4 Haven't you Americans tried prohibition already? |
| Posted by: gromgoru 2007-03-14 16:31 |
| #3 Today's StrategyPage says: Thus, of the 665 troops who have been convicted of crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001, a third of them were drunk when they committed their crimes. In 2005 there were 11.5 million crimes in a population of 296 million. Of those 10.2 million were property crimes. That gives 7800 total crimes per year per 200,000 population or 260 non property crimes per year per 200,000 population. Multiply by 4 for the numbers of years 200,000 have been deployed to theater. Multiply by another factor (too lazy to look it it up) if comparing only military age males. AFAICR, 80% of US crimes involve alcohol or drugs, so banning alcohol is a good decision, though I would allow some alcohol in controlled R&R areas. |
| Posted by: ed 2007-03-14 14:00 |
| #2 Can't answer your question, Glenmore, but during my ten years in Germany (beer is plentiful) I attended three funerals. One person died in a drunk driving one-vehicle accident, one died in an aircraft crash during training, and one died in a 16-car pile-up in the fog in southern Bavaria. Too small a group to draw any conclusions. Alcohol was freely available in Vietnam, and we still lost people to stupid accidents, untimely incidents, and just plain idiocy, as well as from combat. I think part of the problem in Iraq is that there's no CONTROLLED drinking, where a guy can unwind and safely blow off a bit of steam. Pressure builds, there's no outlet, and you get "incidents". Maybe we need to take these guys down to Diego Garcia once every three months and let them get plastered for a weekend. I don't have the answers, but the problem is clear enough. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2007-03-14 12:46 |
| #1 I wonder how the alcohol-linked crime rate and the heavy drinking rate among soldiers in Iraq compare with those of similar age and sex groups in the American civilian population, or even the military population in a peaceful place or time. Anecdotally, it seems to me a huge proportion of crimes and other demonstrations of idiocy throughout society are preceded by the words "Here, hold my beer." |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2007-03-14 07:24 |