New stupid video scandal in the Bundeswehr

[Skybird]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6556643.stm

The last months and years have seen a series of incidents of racism and sadism in the Bundeswehr, both in recruit training units, and units serving overseas. the general impression is that the rate of such incidents is slowly growing. At the same time, motivation of troops is decreasing more and more, while the (militarily) totally incompetent situational assessment by politicians of the Afghanistan adventure is affecting moral severly, and even feeds a rebellious spirit amongst higher ranking officers. The politicians want the BW to take more and more international responsibility, but keeping financial funding very low at the same time. This gives no perspective to young soldiers as well as old professionals alike, and the general unjustice concerning some young men being drafted, others doing civil service, and a third (large) group doing neither the one nor the other does not help to improve general mood.

what is needed is to give up the concept of a conscript army, increase funding, better and more competent spending of funds that are there (currently still a lot of money is wasted on realizations of projects that base on concepts of fighting a hot war against the Warsaw Pact), better payment for pro soldiers and raising the criterions to accept recruits, and finally decrease the number of international commitments and concentrate on thoroughly modernisation of the Bundeswehr. Technically it is in a very poor, and aged, shape, and the number of ready status-units is constantly declining, for they get constantly cannibalized to keep the oversea equipment running. during the cold war, BW was considered to be a top notch army. Today it is not even second league, in my opinion.

Of course nothing of all this will happen soon, for politicians have decided to go for that damn UN security council seat, and for acchieving that an increase in international military commitements seem to be inevitable.

Since the bundeswehr is operated by a concept we call "citizen in uniform", it also represents social tendencies. Rightwing opinions are booming in some parts of the country, especially the new federal states, and more and more people in general dare to express loudly their anger for the general political course concerning foreigners moving to Germany, also seen in the Islamic and turkish context. That hate and racist paroles are also explained by such shifts in the social environment is meant as an explanation only, not an excuse.

But as so often, I have no doubt that politicians will - again - not listen to this, too. It all we be talked down, and then ignored. Business as usual.

German medias are silent about this new racism-story, btw, although it is an "arch-german" issue. But that Erdogan of Turkey is complainign about Germany not being helpful enough to enforce Turkey's EU membership - this example of maximum arrogance and declaring the negotiations a fake, currently is making headlines in all media. As if we must care for what the Turks think about Germany not being pro-Turkish enough.

Queer world.

[NefariousKoel]

It's a sign of German political correctness.

How many military volunteers does Germany have these days?

I know Germans still have pride in their country, but it's more of a PC/hippy pride than anything. I'm surprised you haven't fully embraced Marxism yet. The subtle way wins, I guess.

I guess I recall happier, more united, times when democracies were friends united against an obvious foe. It's just too bad many democracies and their citizens don't believe it possible to have a foe any more. Even actively deny it. Their militaries are suffering from that outlook in both recruiting and morale mixed with a lot of frustration from the old-timers.

[CCIP]

I still wonder why it is that they, being Germans of all people, chose that illustration of that particular situation :hmm: Something seemed a little fishy.

Personally I don't find anything awfully terrible about the statement itself, I mean whatever. I could be surrounded by roaring Vikings in a Norwegian fjord, or crazed Canadians in a hockey rink or something. But I'd need to be convinced that the mention of black americans in Bronx and not, say, a bunch of thugs in Berlin, is purely incidental.

Political correctness? Yeah whatever. I spit on that, but I think training an army to kill n*ggers should be at least a little disturbing. It suggests a dehumanization tactic, a 'them and us' approach that deeply disturbs me and distances me from some of the views which I don't disagree with (i.e. "Islam is bad") because their dehumanizing implications disturb me ("...therefore let's not feel bad about killing them").

If the example is purely incidental, I'd drop any pretenses.

[Smaragdadler]

That's interesting. I remember a book about the social-history of violence (torture, crimes etc). There was a picture of a target for swiss recruit training from the 1920 or 1930. It depicted ... a naked woman !!! Now, first I thought that's really sick. But there is a method behind it. The aim is to break the psycho-social conditioning of the soldier and make him to follow orders. :hmm:
So you could say this instructor was a very keen one and it only say something about the conditioning of post ww2 Germans. :)
But in reality I think it was just an idiot, who has seen to much junk ami-movies and who wanted play the instructor from Full Metall Jacked... :D
If he had made a scenario about turks and Kreuzberg, then I would say there is something...
I mean - why the ******* BRONX ? That's just unimaginative !

[nikimcbee]

[quote=NefariousKoel]It's a sign of German political correctness.

How many military volunteers does Germany have these days?

I know Germans still have pride in their country, but it's more of a PC/hippy pride than anything. I'm surprised you haven't fully embraced Marxism yet. The subtle way wins, I guess.

quote]

I thought they did...East Germany???:dead: (queue laugh track now):rotfl:

[Smaragdadler]

I thought they did...East Germany???:dead: (queue laugh track now):rotfl:

... in West Germany - 1968.
For East Germany - remember 1989. :)

[GlobalExplorer]

It makes me sick we still have military conscription, of course only for the most underprivileged part of our society = healthy young white males.

[The Avon Lady]

Video link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGY11XvRZcE). :nope:

[GlobalExplorer]

Nice one AL :rotfl:

[The Avon Lady]

Nice one AL :rotfl:
Maybe I just don't understand your sense of humor. :hmm:

[Lurchi]

Video link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGY11XvRZcE). :nope:
So this is the video all this fuss is about?

He even didn't use the "N" word but - fully pc compliant - "Afroamerikaner". I don't have the slightest clue why he chose this ethnic group but this whole thing seems like a joke to me, surely a tasteless one but certainly not worth to be discussed to such an extent :doh:.

This videos only proves that noone has to fear Germany anymore ...

[CCIP]

:rotfl:

That is actually funny.

Now that I've seen it, I really don't see what the fuss was all about. There's such a lack of intensity or any sort of genuine malice in that video, I honestly can't see how it could be considered hugely hateful or anything. It's just dumb.

I agree. I think it was just a bad joke on the instructor's part.

[GlobalExplorer]

I really don't get it. A corporal has to be funny once in a while .. what's the big deal?

This "scandal" is just another pointless episode in a long streak of P.C., anti-military bull**** we have to take.

[Gizzmoe]

I really don't get it. A corporal has to be funny once in a while .. what's the big deal?

I don´t get it either. The video is totally harmless.

[Yahoshua]

The media is running out of brain cells.......

[Smaragdadler]

Wow. That was just spectacular unspectacular. :lol:
Da wurde nur mal wieder "ne Mücke zum Elefanten" gemacht.
Go on - nothing to see here...

[TteFAboB]

The mother-insulting-black-van-riding Blacks from Bronx are safe from the German Army. If you have no idea why he chose them you should watch American football and hang around Virginia's forts more often. It's part of that self-denigrating (!) thing. Look at the sarge. He doesn't look like the biggest German guy in the block. I'd understand this as a compliment if it weren't for the mother-insulting part.

I guess there's no similar case with Turks or Muslims as targets, first because it wouldn't make any sense at all - the best Turkish soldiers were kidnapped Europeans and while Muslims got close to victory their armies were defeated in the end - and secondly because if there was the BBC would only mention this video as a small side-note inbetween the dozens of pages about the massive riots and car burning going on and off in Berlim for weeks.

[Skybird]

Mosquitos blown to elephant-size - maybe, but obviously America is not amused. Both the governor of New York and the mayor of the Bronx have adressed the issue.

German: http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/0,1518,477336,00.html

Taken for itself, the military procedure, as being taught here, is - well, I do not see any point in it. All the fuss made of it could easily have been avoided.

The only question is: why was it filmed at all, and obviously intentionally, privately? I think somebody found it funny to misbehave and make a home movie of it. And that really is a stupid idea. Like it was with those bones and skulls in Afghanistan two years ago.

[Skybird]

the best Turkish soldiers were kidnapped Europeans and while Muslims got close to victory their armies were defeated in the end - .

pointless argument. At Vienna the turks were defeated by weather, and they were just so short away from capturing the city (the walls was already made to collapse and the hole in the wall then was desperately defended). And in France they were superior, too - but then were led by greedy generals who did not want to give up all their spoils and loots and acted inorder to protect these treasure, so it all was not synchonized. Karl's army was inferior, and very much so. By all means - the Europeans were extremely lucky. If both battles would have gone with a bit more of reason and accoprding to hwat was to be expected, we all would be Islamic today, no doubt.

Point is: it was no superiority, but simply luck that saved our ancestors, and us.

[Smaragdadler]

...
The only question is: why was it filmed at all, and obviously intentionally, privately?
...

Yeah it smells. Even more, both the BBC and Spiegel Articles state:

The clip was filmed in a forest in July 2006
...
Der Soldat wurde seit dem Vorfall im Juli 2006


So this is almost a year old stuff, taken out of the closet and blown up on international scale.
The question could be asked: To whom is it useful?

[NefariousKoel]

I really don't get it. A corporal has to be funny once in a while .. what's the big deal?

This "scandal" is just another pointless episode in a long streak of P.C., anti-military bull**** we have to take.

Yep. Slow news day and the politically correct media needed a target. Sickening isn't it?

[GlobalExplorer]

Not sickening - rather detrimental to its cause. Making such a fuss about that kind of juvenile stuff takes a lot of credibility away from the myth: that the Bundeswehr is the major refuge for neonazis in germany.

I mean which army isn't in leaning to the political right? The Bundeswehr is certainly one of the tamest armies in the world, an achievement of a hyper sensitive media.

I actually laughed when the recruit asked "Wo muss ich nochmal .. ?", cause I thought the purpose of the video was to ridicule the Bundeswehr - which it perfectly did. A complete dumb**** with ridiculous camouflage frantically fumbling on his MG - against soldiers like this, even the Swiss Army could conquer Germany any day :yep:

[DeePsix501]

These news hype are indeed sickening. I'm sure someone has said somthing offensive to someone in any military atleast once. On further reading about this in American news sites, it makes me even more sad the way Sharpton and Jesse Jackson hide in the bushes and wait for someone to say somthing that can be taken as racism against black people. Then they pop out and demand that person be fired from their job and publicly humiliated.

I just wish the news reported news. Is that so much to ask? :nope:

[Heibges]

This goes along the lines of "more careers are ended in the O/NCO's Club, than are ever ended in the Field."

When I went through US Army Basic Training in 1988, my Drill Sergeant was singing that oldie but goodie, "See the Lady in Red." In some adjacent parkinglot at Fort Knox, there happened to be a lady in a red dress. Two hours later my Drill Sergeant was standing tall before the man, an was no longer allowed to sing cadences.

[Gizzmoe]

I actually laughed when the recruit asked "Wo muss ich nochmal .. ?", cause I thought the purpose of the video was to ridicule the Bundeswehr - which it perfectly did. A complete dumb**** with ridiculous camouflage frantically fumbling on his MG - against soldiers like this, even the Swiss Army could conquer Germany any day :yep:
You sound like you´ve never been a recruit. I had zero previous experience with firearms, just like 99.9% of my comrades, and I was nervous and totally clueless the first times I used the MG, assault rifle, pistol and RPG. Just like the guy in the video.

[TteFAboB]

the Europeans were extremely lucky.

The Turks were also extremely lucky Europeans didn't have machine-gunners back then. He's training with a machine-gun. He can take 50 Ottoman musketeers down and dozens of pikemen, swordsman or whatever weapon they were holding at that battle. Given enough ammo, a few spare-barrels and a little more training, he can hold one breach in the wall alone at least untill the Turks start using the pile of bodies as meat shields to his bullets.

[Skybird]

the Europeans were extremely lucky.

The Turks were also extremely lucky Europeans didn't have machine-gunners back then. He's training with a machine-gun. He can take 50 Ottoman musketeers down and dozens of pikemen, swordsman or whatever weapon they were holding at that battle. Given enough ammo, a few spare-barrels and a little more training, he can hold one breach in the wall alone at least untill the Turks start using the pile of bodies as meat shields to his bullets.

So what? Don't get why you point at the obvious. We all know (do we?)the machine gun was not invented before the late middle of the 19th century. If the Romans would have had helicopter gunships, the battle in the Teutoburger Wald maybe would have gone differently. :doh:

[TteFAboB]

So telling the rookie that an Ottoman square-formation of innacurate musketeers or lancers is walking towards him puts no greater pressure on his neck than a platoon of care-bears would, while a black van of death full of scary armed guys stopping right in front of him is a little more motivational. That's why I suppose the BBC has an example of a sarge talking about blacks but not about Turks. The only example with Turks would be Turkey shoot, be it the old Ottomans or an unarmed angry mob of young rioters, unless the guy wants to cause a diplomatic incident and go direct for the "there are Turkish soldiers from the Turkish armed forces right in front of you, now shoot them".

[Skybird]

:roll:

I don't have a clue what you are aiming at. as a matter of fact more and more of the young ones over here do not even know anymore who the Ottomans were. we are lucky if they can read and write without too many mistakes, and know how to calculate divisions and multiplications, and maybe in sports can walk backward in a straight line and without stumbling over their own feet. Fact!

[GlobalExplorer]

New developments: Today in the morning news there was a side note that the sarge was fired from the bundeswehr.

Of course the verdict was like "the instructor who was filmed during racist practices has been immediately removed from duty", so the public will be pleased .. as if it mattered that he was just making a stupid, harmless joke.

"Now you're in the Bronx and you're attacked by three tall black afromaericans. For every burst you will shout 'mother****er!' "

I guess you hear ten times more racist remarks from any black drill instructors in the Us Army or elsewhere.


http://www.stern.de/politik/deutschland/:Bundeswehr-Video-Umstrittener-Ausbilder/587138.html

[Heibges]

The US Army is just as PC.

[Tchocky]

Not really a PC issue.

Instructors being idiots, and racist idiots - Bad

overly PC culture - Also Bad

[Heibges]

I fully agree that being a racist is bad.

Sometimes the issue is a little blurry.

The instructor didn't use a racial epithet.

And US Army Drill Sergeants do not make racial slurs, and the Army puts great importance and takes great pride in the Army Equal Opportunity Program. You need to get a comply on you efficiency report or you are up the proverbial estuary without the conventional means of locomotion.

[fatty]

I watched it and laughed pretty hard. I rewound it and laughed again. Seems more like a jab at the rap culture than at black people. But then again, mein Deutsch ist nicht sehr gut. This still seems pretty silly and harmless to me.

[TteFAboB]

I don't have a clue what you are aiming at.

Let's start over. The "africanamericans" need to be tall, so that excludes shorties. Is this why some have complained? The short felt insulted? Former sarge here didn't had this kind of guy in mind:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHNX-cGhOjE

More like:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_rBidCkJxo

But not as nice.

He's not a racist, he's a heightist.

The rest is a side issue dealing with the pretext of using Muslims/Turks as targets. Even if the former sarge here is a racist, he can still hide behind the tall-scary thing. But what excuse would he have to use a Turk? That was all.

[GlobalExplorer]

I watched it and laughed pretty hard. I rewound it and laughed again. Seems more like a jab at the rap culture than at black people. But then again, mein Deutsch ist nicht sehr gut. This still seems pretty silly and harmless to me.

It was stupid and harmless. Every one who has been to at least some kind of military training knows that from time to time this kind of humor is necessary to ease the tension between sergeant and recruits.

Noticed how the "black afromaerican" thing is exchangeable? Who knows? He might as well have told the previous recruit that he is in an east german suburb and three tall, ugly skinheads are trying to set fire to a turkish girl. And he wants him to shout "Arschloch" everytime he shoots one of them. Where is the difference? Of course then nobody would have raised an eyebrow, because we all know that east german skinheads are evil, even if we have never met one.

[Ostfriese]

It was stupid and harmless. Every one who has been to at least some kind of military training knows that from time to time this kind of humor is necessary to ease the tension between sergeant and recruits.

Noticed how the "black afromaerican" thing is exchangeable? Who knows? He might as well have told the previous recruit that he is in an east german suburb and three tall, ugly skinheads are trying to set fire to a turkish girl. And he wants him to shout "Arschloch" everytime he shoots one of them. Where is the difference? Of course then nobody would have raised an eyebrow, because we all know that east german skinheads are evil, even if we have never met one.

I totally agree. When I was in the German Army, we did just the same thing. Back then it was evil Soviets and even more evil East German commies. No one ever cared, and we said and heard things far worse than those. Everybody involved knew that it was just trash talk, and even officers did this sometimes.
But nowadays a Bundeswehr soldier can't even take a dump without some journalists nearby sniffing for a scandal...