Ed Head, Operations Manager of the American Pistol Institute (better known as Gunsite Academy), Paulden, Arizona, writes today via Free Republic:

At the request of the family it is my sad duty to report the passing of our founder, Jeff Cooper. Jeff died peacefully at home this afternoon while being cared for by his wife Janelle and daughter Lindy.

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John Dean “Jeff” Cooper was born in Los Angeles in 1920. He earned a B.A. in Political Science from Stanford., and an M.A. in History from the University of California. He served in the United States Marine Corps during WWII and the Korean War, retiring at the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. After retiring from the service, Cooper worked as an author, lecturer, small arms trainer, security consultant, and arms designer.

He began writing while still in the service, ultimately producing 20 books, around 500 magazine articles and columns, and a dozen videos. Cooper produced books on rifles, big game hunting, and personal memoirs, but he was perhaps best-known for his writings on practical pistol shooting, and for his fondness for the Colt Model 1911 and its variations.

For many years now, Cooper’s Corner -Thoughts from the Gunner’s Guru has been the closing page column of Guns & Ammo Magazine, America’s leading firearms journal. Cooper’s Corner columns were an informal and colorful mixture of decidedly unmelted opinions, anecdotes, and firearms lore. The editors were regularly deluged with indignant letters from outraged readers to the political left of Colonel Cooper, but evidently concluded that the constant controversy was good for circulation. As the years went by, protests grew fewer. Jeff Cooper seems to have successfully functioned as a filter, screening out the element that should not have been reading Guns & Ammo in the first place. For the last few years, more of the letters arriving in response to some highly politically incorrect expression by the Colonel seemed to be viewing Jeff Cooper and his writings with rueful affection.

Despite his salty Marine Corps style of self-expression, Jeff Cooper was a deep and original thinker on his preferred subjects, and he had a gift for finding the better way of putting things. Over the years, he invented a number of very useful neologisms which became widely accepted.

To describe the alternative ways of carrying the Model 1911 pistol, Cooper invented the Condition system of describing the level of readiness of the handgun:

Condition One: a round in the chamber, hammer cocked, safety on.

Condition Four: the chamber empty, no magazine.

He was also the coiner of the invaluable term hoplophobia (from the Greek noun ÃŽu201eoÏu20acλoν “arms” and the Greek verb Ïu2020oβεÏu2030 “to strike with fear”) to refer to the not-uncommon contemporary irrational aversion to weapons.

In 1976, he founded the American Pistol Institute (“Gunsite”), as a training facility for police and military personel, in order to promulgate his personal philosophy of shooting. Its programs soon proved popular with civilians seeking formal self defense training and with competition shooters.

Also in 1976, he founded the International Practical Shooting Confederation, an organization intended to promote and sponsor self-defense-style shooting as a competition sport

He became a member of the National Rifle Association Board of Directors in 1985, and was elected to the NRA’s Executive Council in 2002.

Guns & Ammo is never going to be the same without Jeff Cooper. He will be missed.

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NRA Board of Directors profile (at an anti-NRA site, no less)

Cooper’s Corner at Guns & Ammo

Wikipedia entry

Jeff Cooper bibliography project

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LATER POSTINGS (as of 9/27)

Lt. Col. P, at OPFOR, 9/26, quotes a classic Jeff Cooper line:

In 1492 we threw the Moors out of Spain. Apparently, we didn’t throw them far enough.

Who knew that Glenn Reynolds read Guns & Ammo and Jeff Cooper’s books? I thought he was just a law professor, but he’s probably packing a customized Model 1911 somewhere under his tweed jacket with the leather elbow patches. 9/27

Memeorandum 9/27

Armed Liberal 9/27

Samizdata 9/27

QandO 9/27

UPDATES, 9/30

Front Sight, Press 9/25

Jeff Cooper Quotations – Front Sight, Press 9/26

Owning a handgun doesn’t make you armed any more than owning a guitar makes you a musician.”

Front Sight, Press 9/30

Col. Jeff Cooper finally shot to slide lock on September 25, 2006…

Airborne Combat Engineer 9/30

The tempest in a USMC canteen cup whipped up by MSM’s politically-correct thought police over Corporal Belile’s humorous little song is over. Possibly the Marine Corps still has enough good men simply to laugh the idea of charging a Marine corporal serving in a combat theatre in time of war with violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice for writing and performing a song poking fun at the bloodthirsty fanaticism of the enemy.

Or perhaps Michelle Malkin and the rest of the right side of the Blogosphere directed enough effective ridicule at the uniformed, and un-uniformed, forces of compulsory piety to drive them back into their burrows on this one.

At any rate, congratulations and best wishes to Corporal Belile and his band “the Sweater Kittenz.” Let’s hope they get a better name, and go on to successful post-Marine Corps career of offending liberals and insulting CAIR.

Reuters:

The U.S. military will not punish a Marine who performed an obscenity-laced song to a laughing and cheering crowd of fellow troops in Iraq making light of killing Iraqis, the Marine Corps said on Tuesday.

The Marines two weeks ago launched a preliminary inquiry into whether Cpl. Joshua Belile, who returned home from Iraq in March, violated military law or rules in singing the song, a four-minute video of which was posted on the Internet…

“The preliminary inquiry has been concluded. No punitive action will be taken against Corporal Belile. And there will be no further investigation,” said Maj. Shawn Haney, a spokeswoman at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point in North Carolina.

Haney said the inquiry ruled out any violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Another Marine Corps official, who asked not to be named because details of the inquiry are private, said poor taste, poor judgment and poor timing, not to mention offensive lyrics, do not necessarily amount to criminal conduct.

Wikipedia entry

video link here

lyrics

Newsmax has new and detailed information on the events at Haditha, supplied by military sources, which makes the civilian casualties sound deliberately contrived by the insurgents, precisely in order to makes accusations against US Marines. It’s important to remember that the “Haditha massacre” story originated from accusations made by “activist” sources hostile to the US.

Within minutes of the early morning IED explosion, a firefight erupted between insurgents and Marines. Civilians were caught in the middle of the firefight. Also, although civilians did die, their deaths were the result of door-to-door combat as the Marines sought to clear houses and stop the insurgent gunfire.

Ample evidence proves that a firefight took place. For example, every second of the ensuing firefight was monitored by numerous people at company, battalion, and regimental HQs via radio communications.

Video evidence supports the Marines’ claims. Within a very few minutes, battalion, regimental, and division headquarters were able to watch the action thanks to an overhead ultralight aircraft that remained aloft all day. Photos of some of the action were downloaded and in the hands of Marines and the NCIS.

Some of the insurgents involved in planning the attack and firing at Marines during a daylong engagement have been apprehended and are in custody…

One Knight Ridder reporter called Haditha, a town of about 100,000 people, “an insurgent bastion,” reporting that “insurgents blend in with the residents, setting up cells in their homes next to those belonging to everyday citizens, some of them supportive.”

Knight Ridder said that around the time of an August attack, when a total of 20 U.S. Marines were killed in two days, “several storefronts were lined with posters and pictures supporting al-Qaida. … There is no functioning police station and the government offices are largely vacant. The last man to call himself mayor relinquished the title earlier this year after scores of death threats from insurgents.”

According to an August 2005 story in Britain’s Guardian newspaper, Haditha, under the nose of an American base, “is a miniature Taliban-like state. Insurgents decide who lives and dies, which salaries get paid, what people wear, what they watch and listen to.”

When the Marines first went into the city, they were aware of the tight control insurgents exercised over Haditha. They discovered that the insurgents had freshly paved over dirt roads leading into town under the auspices of civic works projects.

They were, according to a NewsMax source, “beautiful asphalt-surfaced roads” that even included painted lines. The only problem, the source recalled, was that insurgents had laid more than 100 mega-IEDs under that asphalt. And, in order to avoid having to change batteries in the triggering devices, they had wired them into the city power lines lining the road.

It is important to remember that the so-called details of the alleged massacre came from Iraqis and residents of Haditha, a city run by insurgents who have those residents not allied with them under their bloody thumbs.

In the Post story, an attorney for Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich, 26, said that his client told him that several civilians were killed Nov. 19 when his squad went after insurgents who were firing at them from inside a house. He insisted there was no vengeful massacre, but he described a house-to-house hunt that went tragically awry in the middle of a chaotic battlefield.

“It will forever be his position that everything they did that day was following their rules of engagement and to protect the lives of Marines,” Neal A. Puckett, who represents Wuterich in the ongoing investigations into the incident, told the Post. “He’s really upset that people believe that he and his Marines are even capable of intentionally killing innocent civilians.”

According to the Post, Wuterich told his attorney in initial interviews over nearly 12 hours that the shootings were the unfortunate result of a methodical sweep for enemies in a firefight. Two attorneys for other Marines involved in the incident said Wuterich’s account is consistent with those they had heard from their clients.

Wrote the Post: “On Nov. 19, Wuterich’s squad left its headquarters at Firm Base Sparta in Haditha at 7 a.m. on a daily mission to drop off Iraqi army troops at a nearby checkpoint. “It was like any other day, we just had to watch out for any other activity that looked suspicious,” said Marine Cpl. James Crossan, 21, in an interview from his home in North Bend, Wash. He was riding in the four-Humvee convoy as it turned left onto Chestnut Road, heading west at 7:15 a.m.

“Shortly after the turn, a bomb buried in the road ripped through the last Humvee. The blast instantly killed the driver, Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas, 20. Wuterich, who was driving the third Humvee in the line, immediately stopped the convoy and got out, Puckett told the Post, adding that while Wuterich was evaluating the scene, Marines noticed a white unmarked car full of “military-aged men” lingering near the bomb site. When Marines ordered the men to stop, they ran; Puckett said it was standard procedure at the time for the Marines to shoot suspicious people fleeing a bombing, and the Marines opened fire, killing four or five men.

“The first thing he thought was it could be a vehicle-borne bomb or these guys could be ready to do a drive-by shooting,” Puckett said, explaining that the Marines were on alert for such coordinated, multistage attacks.

According to Puckett, as Wuterich began briefing the platoon leader, AK-47 shots rang out from residences on the south side of the road, and the Marines ducked.

A corporal with the unit leaned over to Wuterich and said he saw the shots coming from a specific house. After a discussion with the platoon leader, they decided to clear the house, according to Wuterich’s account.

“There was a threat, and they went to eliminate the threat,” Puckett said.

A four-man team of Marines, including Wuterich, kicked in the door and found a series of empty rooms, noticing quickly that there was one room with a closed door and people rustling behind it, Puckett said. They then kicked in that door, tossed a fragmentation grenade into the room, and one Marine fired a series of “clearing rounds” through the dust and smoke, killing several people, Puckett said.

The Marine who fired the rounds – Puckett said it was not Wuterich – had experience clearing numerous houses on a deployment in Fallujah, where Marines had aggressive rules of engagement.

Although it was almost immediately apparent to the Marines that the people dead in the room were men, women, and children — most likely civilians — they also noticed a back door ajar and believed that insurgents had slipped through to a house nearby, Puckett said. The Marines stealthily moved to the second house, kicking in the door, killing one man inside and then using a fragmentation grenade and more gunfire to clear another room full of people, he said.

Wuterich, not having found the insurgents, told the team to stop and headed back to the platoon leader to reassess the situation, Puckett said, adding that his client knew a number of civilians had just been killed.

As already stated, the Haditha massacre story reported by Time magazine was based entirely on accounts from Iraqis with an ax to grind. The facts of what happened tell a different story. The real story, it will eventually be revealed, is backed up by evidence Time didn’t know existed. It gives the lie to the idea that there was anything like a massacre in Haditha on Nov. 19. Here, for the first time, is the truth about what happened.

NewsMax can verify Wuterich’s account. The site of the IED explosion was in an area well known as an insurgent stronghold, where as many as 50 IEDs were found previously, and from where, on two previous occasions, insurgents launched small-arms fire, rocket-propelled grenades, and mortar attacks on K Company.

Within five minutes of the blast, Marines on the scene reported they were receiving small-arms fire. Within 30 minutes of the blast, and while the house-clearing was still under way, an Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) team en route to the site came under small-arms fire in a known insurgent tactic to ambush first responders.

At the same time, just 30 minutes after the house-clearing, an intelligence unit arrived to question the Marines involved in the house-clearing operation. NewsMax sources say the behavior of the Marines involved gave them no reason to believe anything but what they had been told.

At about the same time a UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) arrived over the blast area and from that moment on, for the entire day , the UAV transmitted views of the engagement to the company command site, battalion headquarters, the regimental HQ, and the division HQ. What the UAV captured was a view of Marines in their perimeter, as they went about doing house-clearing. It was then vectored to the surrounding area to catch any fleeing insurgents. It showed four insurgents fleeing the neighborhood, loading weapons into their car, and linking up with their partners (the ones that had conducted the ambush on the EOD team).

Knowing what we now know about Wuterich’s account, these fleeing insurgents were most likely the same ones who left through the back door of the house he was clearing.

There are photos of this, and they show the insurgents getting back into their car after loading the weapons The UAV then followed them south to their safe house. From that point forward, until about 6 p.m., the safe house was hit by bombs and an assault by a K Company squad. The UAV followed the insurgents who had been inside through town.

The final tally for these engagements was two insurgents killed by direct fire, one killed by GBU bombs, and one detained. The entire action was followed by the UAV overhead…

The Haditha “massacre” being referred to is the 30 minutes to one hour that took place first thing in the morning. The rest of the day’s activities, in fact, confirmed the nature of the morning’s attack.

It is clear that the entire incident was planned and carried out by insurgents who detonated the IED, and then, in a familiar tactic, attacked the Marines responding to the blast — deliberately putting civilians at risk.

This is what happened in Haditha that day. It was a daylong engagement with armed insurgents that involved civilian casualties who died as a result of being caught in the middle of a firefight. It had been reported as a blast followed by a TIC — Marine Corps terminology for “Troops in Contact.” In other words, gunfire directed at the Marines.

Foreign and domestic news agencies are reporting that the US Marine Corps has charged seven Marines and a Navy sailor with murder over the death of an Iraqi civilian.

BBC News

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Crosspatch (a neighbor here in California) recently commented on the work already done by bloggers to investigate the irresponsible coverage of this matter in the MSM.

I have seen bloggers spending hours of their own time digging, fact checking, comparing, and publishing their findings for peer review and discussion. These are people that have jobs and other things in their lives that place demands on their time and energy but have answered what is apparently to them the call of an important mission, a call of duty.

While professional journalists should be doing the work that is being done by members of the general public in trying to get the story straight, we are already seeing results. Respected media giants such as Time are beginning to back off of some of their initial claims and distance themselves from initial sources.

Ladies and gentlemen, I am simply in awe. This spontaneous and most honest display of devotion by members of our community for our service members in seeing they get a fair shake is enough to make an old grouch misty.

Those troops are at risk every day defending us and it is wonderful to see such an outpouring of support when we have a chance to defend them in return. There are too many people out there doing whatever they can to list because I am afraid of leaving someone out and thereby diminishing their contribution, but they know who they are and honestly, it is events such as this that make me proud to be an American.

This is a real living example of the love and devotion America has for their armed forces members. If someone is going to make accusations that would bring dishonor on the institution of our military, they are going to need to run a gauntlet of ordinary Americans who are going to want to make darned sure they have done their homework first.

Unlike times not so far in the past, we now live in an America that really does support its troops, in both word and deed.

To those of you spending your own time and effort on this issue, I thank you with all my heart.

The battle will continue.

Hadji Girl

I was out in the sands of Iraq
And we were under attack
And I, well, I didn’t know where to go.

And the first thing that I could see was
Everybody’s favorite Burger King
So I threw open the door and I hit the floor.

Then suddenly to my surprise
I looked up and I saw her eyes
And I knew it was love at first sight.

And she said…
Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah
Hadji girl, I can’t understand what you’re saying.

And she said…
Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah
Hadji girl, I love you anyway.

Then she said that she wanted me to see.
She wanted me to go meet her family
But I, well, I couldn’t figure out how to say no.

Cause I don’t speak Arabic.

So, she took me down an old dirt trail.
And she pulled up to a side shanty
And she threw open the door and I hit the floor.

Cause her brother and her father shouted…
Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah
They pulled out their AKs so I could see

And they said…
Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah
(with humorous emphasis:)
So I grabbed her little sister, and pulled her in front of me.

As the bullets began to fly
The blood sprayed from between her eyes
And then I laughed maniacally

Then I hid behind the TV
And I locked and loaded my M-16
And I blew those little f*ckers to eternity.

And I said…
Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah
They should have known they were f*ckin’ with a Marine.

Thanks to Raya, who tells us here that the chorus comes from Team America.

LGF

LGF is linking a terrific unmelted USMC song and video, called Hadji Girl, in which the dumb marine who understands no Arabic falls for the beautiful Hadji Girl, whose chorus goes (something like) “Dirka, dirka, Mohammed Jihad…,” clearly amounting to “Kill, kill, Mohammed! Jihad!…”

She lures the love-struck gyrene home to her family’s hooch, where her brother and father are waiting in ambush. The love-struck marine can’t decline her invitation, because he doesn’t speak Arabic. But when she opens the door, the marine hits the floor (he’s not that stupid), because her father and brother shout, “Dirka, dirka, Mohammed, Jihad..,” and open up with their AK-47s. The marine then “grabbed her little sister and put her in front of me.”

“As the bullets began to fly, the blood sprayed from between her eyes, and then I laughed maniacally,” and he leaps behind the TV.

As he shoots the whole gang, sending them “to Eternity,” he is singing at this point himself: “Dirka, dirka, Mohammed, Jihad…” ” Observing, as the moral, that “they should have known they were f**king with a Marine.”

This video has been around for quite a few months, but the gossipy old ladies of the MSM are throwing a hissy fit right now, because CAIR (the Council on America Islamic Relations) is making an issue over the Marine’s song’s political incorrectness.

Go kiss a camel, I’d suggest.

Can you imagine the German-American Bund, or the (Japanese) Black Dragon Society successfully making a public scandal over satirical Marine Corps songs composed during the struggle for Guadalcanal?

Note how the USMC audience recognizes with delight the words of the chorus, and breaks up.

(Song text corrected.)

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UPDATE

CAIR took down the video of the song, but Michelle Malkin produced a video defending Corporal Belile and his song, which includes an improved version of the video, complete with scrolling text of the lyrics 15 June 2006.

June 6 is not only the anniversary of the Normandy Invasion of WWII. It is also the anniversary of the Marine attack on Belleau Wood.

At the beginning of June 1918, the spearhead of the German Army’s offensive had captured Belleau Wood on the Paris-Metz road, only 50 miles from Paris. The American Expeditionary Force launched a counter-attack to stop the German advance.

The Marine 4th Brigade, comprising the 5th and 6th Marine Regiments, was ordered to take the woods. The Brigade began its advance across an open field of wheat, swept by murderous fire from German machine guns and artillery. Urged to turn back by retreating French forces, Marine Captain Lloyd Williams of the 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines uttered the now-famous retort: “Retreat, hell. We just got here.”

His platoon wavered momentarily under heavy fire at the entrance to the wood, but Sergeant Major Dan Daly charged forward, shouting “Come on, you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?” for which, among other actions, Daly received the Navy Cross. (He had, previous to WWI, been twice awarded the Medal of Honor.)

The woods were taken, and retaken six times, by the Marine Brigade against the resistance of more than four German Divisions, including the crack 5th German Guards Divison.

Josephus Daniels, US Secretary of the Navy, wrote:

The marines fought strictly according to American methods – a rush, a halt, a rush again, in four-wave formation, the rear waves taking over the work of those who had fallen before them, passing over the bodies of their dead comrades and plunging ahead, until they, too, should be torn to bits. But behind those waves were more waves, and the attack went on.

“Men fell like flies,” the expression is that of an officer writing from the field. Companies that had entered the battle 250 strong dwindled to 50 and 60, with a Sergeant in command; but the attack did not falter. At 9.45 o’clock that night Bouresches was taken by Lieutenant James F. Robertson and twenty-odd men of his platoon; these soon were joined by two reinforcing platoons.

Then came the enemy counter-attacks, but the marines held…

Belleau Wood was a jungle, its every rocky formation containing a German machine-gun nest, almost impossible to reach by artillery or grenade fire. There was only one way to wipe out these nests – by the bayonet. And by this method were they wiped out, for United States marines, bare-chested, shouting their battle cry of “E-e-e-e-e y-a-a-hh-h yip!” charged straight into the murderous fire from those guns, and won!

Out of the number that charged, in more than one instance, only one would reach the stronghold. There, with his bayonet as his only weapon, he would either kill or capture the defenders of the nest, and then swinging the gun about in its position, turn it against the remaining German positions in the forest.

After the battle, the French renamed the wood “Le Bois de la Brigade de Marine” (“The Wood of the Marine Brigade”) in honor of the Marines’ tenacity. The French government also later awarded the 4th Brigade the Croix de Guerre, entitling members of those Marine regiments to wear the fouragere.

Belleau Wood is also where the Marines got their German nickname of “Teufelshunde” or “Devil Dogs” because of the ferocity of their attack on the German lines. An official German report described the American Marines as “vigorous, self-confident, and remarkable marksmen.”

General John J. Pershing, Commander of the AEF, at the time, said, “The Battle of Belleau Wood was for the U.S. the biggest battle since Appomattox and the most considerable engagement American troops had ever had with a foreign enemy.”

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One of our commenters asked about US press coverage back then. There is an account from the New York Times, June 20, 1918 on the web, which gets the date of the attack wrong, but has some good comments from the Germans:

The prisoners said they were glad of the chance to surrender and get out of the woods, because the American artillery fire for three days had cut off their food and other supplies and they had lived in a hell on earth. The Germans seemed deeply impressed by the fury of the American attack. One of the captured officers, when asked what he thought of the Americans as fighters, answered that the artillery was crazy and the infantry drunk. A little German private, taking up his master’s thought, pointed to three tousled but smiling marines, and said: “Vin rouge, vin blanc, beaucoup vin.” He meant he thought the Americans must be intoxicated, to fight as they did for that wood.

USATODAY has a story quoting marines currently serving in Iraq, warning of the harm being done to US efforts to stop the insurgency by the MSM’s haste to trumpet unproven charges damaging to the reputation of American forces.

Allegations that Marines killed civilians in the western Iraqi town of Hadithah last year could undo efforts to win the cooperation of locals in the volatile Anbar province, some Marines say.
“All it does is make our jobs harder out here,” said Capt. Andrew Del Gaudio, commander of Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment. “Every Iraqi will assume Marines will act like that. It’s a perception that in this part of the world is hard to overcome.”

William G. Zincavage (25 Apr 1914 -2 Nov 1997)
USMCR 4 Sep 1942 – 16 Dec 1945.

Corporal, Third Marine Division, Special Troops

First Marine Amphibious Corps – Solomon Islands Consolidation, New Georgia Group Operation, 1943
Third Marine Amphibious Corps – Marianas Operation, 1944
Fifth Marine Amphibious Corps – Iwo Jima Operation, 1945

A story in the Observer reveals that Clint Eastwood has been directing two Iwo Jima films, both to be released later this year.

(Its author, Justin McCurry, is a seriously annoying pommy twit who applies a leftwing slant to every detail of the news story.)

The first film will be based on James Bradley’s Flags of Our Fathers, a history of the battle focused on the famous Marines’ flag-raisings on Mount Suribachi, one of which was captured in the famous photograph by Joe Rosenthal.

The second film, focusing on the Japanese point of view, will be titled Red Sun, Black Sand.

Japanese Iwo Jima veterans who met Eastwood say they are confident the films will honour their fallen comrades. ‘I asked him to make a human drama, not a war film,’ said 83-year-old Kiyoshi Endo, of the Japanese Iwo Jima Veterans’ Association. ‘I wanted him to show how the soldiers felt when they were fighting and, having read the script, I think he has done that. Who won or lost is not the point.’

The Japanese Iwo Jima Veterans’ Association must be a pretty small group.

SandRat on Free Republic has posted the following alleged item of military correspondence. I suspect that this is just a joke, but the slogans are good.

Subject: U.S. Navy Directive 16134

The following directive was issued by the commanding officer of a naval installation somewhere in the Middle East, and it was obviously directed at the Marines.

To: All Commands
Subject: Inappropriate T-Shirts
Ref: ComMidEastFor Inst 16134//24 K

All commanders promulgate upon receipt.

The following T-shirts are no longer to be worn on or off base by any military or civilian personnel serving in the Middle East:

“Eat Pork Or Die” [both English and Arabic versions]

“Shrine Busters” [Various. Show burning minarets or bomb/artillery shells impacting Islamic shrines. Some with unit logos.]

“Napalm, Sticks Like Crazy” [Both English and Arabic versions]

“Goat – it isn’t just for breakfast any more.” [Both English and Arabic versions]

“The road to Paradise begins with me.” [Mostly Arabic versions but some in English. Some show sniper scope cross-hairs]

“Guns don’t kill people. I kill people.” [Both Arabic and English versions]

“Pork. The other white meat.” [Arabic version]

“Infidel” [English, Arabic and other coalition force languages.]

The above T-shirts are to be removed from Post Exchanges upon receipt of this directive.

The following signs are to be removed upon receipt of this message:

“Islamic Religious Services Will Be Held at the Firing Range At 0800 Daily.”

“Do we really need ‘smart bombs’ to drop on these dumb bastards?”

All commands are instructed to implement sensitivity training upon receipt.

Capital Online reports:

When a shabbily dressed man ran out of a Westfield Annapolis jewelry store followed by an employee screaming for help, Erik McInnis didn’t think twice.

“Anybody sprinting out of a store like that is guilty until proven innocent,” the 39-year-old Marine major said.

He immediately left his two children, ages 9 and 2, in the mall’s play area and chased Timothy A. Laboard, 40, of Baltimore, through the back corridors of the mall.

Jonathan Neff, another father in the play area, said Maj. McInnis “hurdled the row of seats and hit the ground at an all out sprint behind the thief … He was through the doors in hot pursuit before anyone else knew what was happening.”

Maj. McInnis followed Mr. Laboard back into the mall, grabbed his collar, and put him in a rear figure-four choke hold on the ground.

“It was kind of surreal. There I was laying on top of this guy and everyone just kept walking by like nothing had happened,” said the Naval Academy math instructor.

After a few moments, an off-duty FBI agent walked up and handcuffed Mr. Laboard.

Mr. Laboard was charged with theft over $500 after the incident on Monday. Police allege he snatched a $28,000 diamond ring out of a person’s hand inside the Helzberg Diamonds. After Mr. Laboard was arrested, police said he pulled the ring from his mouth and handed it over to an officer.

“I’m a drug addict and I need help,” Mr. Laboard said, according to a police report.

Officials at Helzberg Diamonds were not available for comment.

While Maj. McInnis might teach calculus during the day, he’s still a Marine. He said he also teaches martial arts at the academy and is the officer representative for the school’s Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu club. That, he said, is where he learned the submission and grappling moves he used at the mall.

“I’ve been teaching the stuff to midshipmen for years. I had a better than average chance to catch him,” said Maj. McInnis…

“As hokey as this sounds, I consider apprehending scum bags to be an unwritten statement in my general job description of being a Marine,” he said.