Pentagon Rethinks Photo Ban on Coffins..

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Pentagon Rethinks Photo Ban on Coffins..
9
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 10:48am
Display the flag draped coffins or not?

Coffins of fallen troops arrive at Dover Air Force Base, Del. The Air Force released this undated photo after a Freedom of Information Act request.
Pentagon Rethinks Photo Ban on Coffins Bearing War Dead

See link for entire article.....


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/16/AR2009021601480.html?nav=hcmodule


Every week, Air Force cargo jets land and taxi down the runway at Dover Air Force Base, Del., carrying the remains of fallen U.S. troops. After a chaplain says a simple prayer, an eight-man military honor guard removes the metal "transfer cases" from the planes and carries them to a mortuary van.


The flag-draped coffins are a testament to the toll of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as to the sacrifice borne by those who serve in the military and their families. But this ceremony, known as the "dignified transfer of remains" and performed nearly 5,000 times since the start of the wars, is hidden from the American public view by the Pentagon.


President Obama said last week that he is considering lifting the ban on photographs and videos at Dover, in place since the Persian Gulf War in 1991, raising fundamental questions about the impact of such images on the public morale in wartime.


For Obama, changing the policy would carry some political risk as he ramps up the war effort in Afghanistan with tens of thousands of fresh troops, increasing the likelihood of combat deaths that could produce photographs of numerous coffins arriving at one time at Dover, the sole U.S. port of entry for the remains. At the same time, Obama has advocated transparency in government, and continuing to hide the Dover ritual from public view conflicts with that principle as well as with public opinion on the issue, polls indicate.


"Showing these pictures would remind people of the war," said S. Robert Lichter, director of the Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University. But he added that "what turns people against a war is not knowledge that Americans are dying but the belief that they are not dying for something" worthwhile.


A majority of Americans favor allowing the public to see pictures of the military honor guard receiving the war dead at Dover, with about 60 percent responding positively and a third answering negatively in polls posing the question in 1991 and 2004.


Some families of fallen troops also support allowing the news media to photograph and videotape the ceremony, or at least letting the families decide whether to permit it rather than continuing the government ban.


"I would have loved to see them fly my son back in and give him a full salute," said Janice Chance of Owings Mills, Md., whose son, Marine Capt. Jesse Melton III, was killed Sept. 9 in Afghanistan's Parwan province. She said she is in favor of media coverage of the return ceremony.


"As long as it is done in good taste, and they are showing that the people here in the United States are welcoming them back and saying job well done, that is what I would like to see," she said."<

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 11:37am

As long as it is respectfully done, I think it's a good idea.


Community Leader
Registered: 04-05-2002
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 11:41am
I think it should be done based on the family's wishes.





iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 11:55am

I agree that the surviving family members should have the right to say yes or no to being shown.


iVillage Member
Registered: 01-28-2009
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 12:20pm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1R8qLAmkLU&feature=related

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http://dailynightly.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/11/10/1667099.aspx

HIGHWAY OF HEROES

Posted: Monday, November 10, 2008 1:36 PM by Sam Singal

By Kevin Tibbles, NBC News correspondent

It is not often that you witness something for the first time, and find yourself being moved to tears.

But, that is exactly how I responded one day last summer as I was driving down a stretch of highway outside of Toronto.

I noticed a few people on the overpass standing with flags.

On the next bridge, same thing.

Then there was a bridge with a fire truck on it, and more flags, and more people. Essentially I had driven, I dunno...50 or 60 miles...and there were people gathered on every single bridge.

Fire trucks, police cars, ambulances, pickups, sedans...moms, dads, the elderly, kids.

When I finally got to my own mother's house I asked her what was going on. "It's not a holiday? Is there a celebrity coming? What's with all the people on the bridges?".

She told me that stretch of highway 401 is now referred to as 'The Highway of Heroes'.

Each time a Canadian soldier dies in Afghanistan, fighting alongside Americans in the war on terror, people simply gather on the bridges out of respect.

They stand, maybe salute, maybe wave a flag, to show the fallen combatants family they are not alone.

It isn't political. It isn't organized. It doesn't cost a cent. And yet hundreds of ordinary people come to stand and say 'thanks' each time the body of a soldier comes by.

As we prepare to mark Veterans Day, or Remembrance Day as it is called in Canada, here is a grassroots movement that has simply grown out of respect for those who put their lives on the line.... Lest We Forget.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-22-2009
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 12:26pm

I agree.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-28-2009
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 12:38pm

Were we posting at the same time?

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-22-2009
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 12:57pm
Yes :)

Kate


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Community Leader
Registered: 04-05-2002
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 1:05pm
That would be moving.





iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Tue, 02-17-2009 - 2:35pm
Thank you for your post. The video was most touching.
Showing those that have sacrificed their all need to be recognized & honoured. Not brought back in secret with no public acknowledgement.

 


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