US Marine Corps - A couple of cogs short of a gearbox.
These are the Scout Snipers. They apparently genuinely did not know that Germanic SS Runes - the white on black is a particularly effective touch - have a different meaning to people who have enjoyed even minimal levels of education.
Expect to see this pic heavily used by Russian/Iranian/Whatever anti-American propaganda.
Edit:
"The SS sig runes design was created in 1931 when Walter Heck, a Sturmführer in the SS, drew two reversed and inverted sig runes side by side and noticed the similarity to the initials of the SS. Heck sold the rights of the sig runes to the SS for 2.5 Reichsmarks, and the runes were quickly adopted as the insignia of the Schutzstaffel and became one of the most commonly used forms of SS unit insignia." Wikipedia.
The sig rune predates the SS but was written vertically and apparently was a sky symbol (like the swastika). It was used in Himmler's Nazi mysticism (see Wiligut Runes) and was based on the "Armenean Runes" of 1902. It is not ancient like the swastika (despite claims of links to the Norse alphabet) but an invented German pagan symbol inextricably mixed up with Naziism and its progenitors.
Oh good grief! Are these people stupid...Don't answer that, silly question.
ReplyDeletewow. i`m ashamed to be american.how utterly stupid.
ReplyDeleteDear Lee
ReplyDeleteYou think before this got posted on the net at least one person might have said, "Hold on, chaps. I think I remember these runes from somewhere. Are we sure this is a good idea?"
Dear 9000
ReplyDeleteOh don't worry, stupidity is universal. We have a Tory politician who dressed up as a Nazi for a stag-night and then dozed off during a trip to a Concentration Camp after tweeting theough a survivor's lecture.
J
How one can be so stupid.These idiots carry the most advanced and deadly weapons. I wouldn't let them to use a hammer.
ReplyDeleteAt very best these guys are idiots. I find it shocking how ignorant most people I share citizenship with are... if i wasn't such a strong believer in individualism I'd be embarrassed, but I'm just one person, i can't fix the whole country.
ReplyDeleteI found this: http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2012/0209/Marines-Nazi-flag-was-mistaken-for-their-own
but what I'd like to know is, since the photo was taken in Afghanistan, where did the flag come from? One of these guys had it. It was the property of someone, so it seems at least one of them must have known what it was. I doubt Nazi paraphernalia is the most common or popular thing in Afghanistan. That's pretty suspicious to me. The excuse of "I thought it meant sniper scouts' seems pretty thin.
This kind of thing is more common than most people know or would like to admit:
http://www.salon.com/2009/06/15/neo_nazis_army/
scary stuff.
Dear Cisza
ReplyDeleteStupid is the word that leaps to mind. The swastika is very ancient Eurasian symbol for the sky gods but we don't tend to use it much these days.
J
Tisk,tisk,tisk...I am glad I am not the P.R.Officer for this unit.
ReplyDeleteDear LF
ReplyDeleteDon't worry it says little about the USA. Idiocy is universal and this is merely a noteworthy example. I would not be happy if I was a Jewish, Slavic, black etc, marine on seeing this.
John
Dear Paul
ReplyDeleteDefinitely, the PR man will earn his bonus :)
J
Aside from all the obvious stuff, I bet their CO is also just so proud of them...and all the grief that they have brought down on him while he is busy trying to keep them and others safe in an operational area.
ReplyDeleteDear PMC
ReplyDeleteOh yes, the brass take the honour of the corps very seriously and are inclined to cut up rough when some clown besmirches it.
J.
Being from Germany this is more then just a little irritating.
ReplyDeleteIn a way I can understand that a simple grunt will not know the meaning of the flag, seeing how the US military had to make lots of consessions when it comes to the education of their recruits. But honestly... This is not a flag someone drew in theatre. This is something they must have had made or must have bought in the US and brought along. So I think chances are slim that no officer will have seen it before or during the photo session. Are there really no officers who have enough education in military history to see the significance!?!
Dear DHC
ReplyDeleteOh, it's worse than that. SS runes are apparently moulded onto the guns by Knight armaments.
However, I suspect the unit has a new logo now.
I honstly believe that they had no idea.
J
I agree, John. These guys had no idea. The sad fact is they probably never had any education on Nazism and WW2. It just doesn't happen in the average US school. These symbols just don't carry the stigma in the US that they do in Europe. Some very important things are being lost...
ReplyDeletele sigh...
ReplyDeleteJohn, where did you see the runes were engraved professionally? I've bought stuff from KAC before but this is the kind of thing might end my consumer relationship with them.
As ludicrous as the "we don't know no better" is for the soldiers in question, KAC should've known better before they went engraving these runes on US service rifles.
There was one brain cell between the 11 of them and they lent it to the chap who got himself behind the camera!
ReplyDeleteContrast and compare with the posters on Angry Lurker's blog today, not his fault but bad timing!
Maybe - in time - the internet will civilise war!!! This stuff has always gone on, but now it's too easy to post yourself on YouTube peeing on dead prisoners...and the educational establishment has delivered to the military millions of chaps just intelligent enough to post such stuff.
I wouldn't be surprised if some of the unit did know the origins of the symbol but just didn't care. The guys pictured shoot other human beings in the head for a living; when you consider that it's unlikely that most have the kind of empathy that you might find among the average person. Where the real failing comes in is at some level the officer or officers who are responsible for wrangling these guys didn't step in and say "No pictures with the murderer flag guys, people might get upset."
ReplyDeleteAs the old saying goes, you can always tell a Marine. You just can't tell him much. Megatons of stupidity aside, Chris makes a very very valid point. I've met very nice people in the States (hard-working, family men) who quite enjoyed "shooting towelheads") during the first Gulf war. And that was way before 9/11.
ReplyDeleteDimitri
Whatever I or anyone thinks about the various wars that are going on around the place, all I can ask is do they EVER learn!!!? It´s one thing to actually go to war and all that is involved, but to actually do something so stupid is beyond my comprehension.there is no way that these guys did not know what the symbols mean. They should be taken to task for associating their flag with the connotations of those symbols, and giving the people they are opposing another reason to justify whatever crass actions they take..they might as well just gone and peed on their own flag. Are they trying to make enemies of the whole of the world that doesn´t reckon itsself to be W.A.S.P?
ReplyDeleteIf I or any of my comrades had have done anything even mildly similar we would have suffered very serious consequences...
Disgusting but not entirely suprising.
Cheers
paul
Dear DS
ReplyDeleteAgreed, Nazi symbolism has a far greater impact in Europe than America for obvious reasons.
J
Dear Mik
ReplyDeleteIt was suggested in a British newspaper, probably repeated on from an American media outlet. I should stress that British newspapers are NOT reliable sources. The Knight people could be entirely innocent.
J
Dear Maverick
ReplyDeleteAn interesting point. The immediacy with which video travels around the world is having an effect. CF Assad's problems compared to the ease with which his father could carry out a massacre.
J
Dear Chris
ReplyDeleteYah, you would think someone in the officer corps would have more sense. Oh well.
J
Dear Dimitri
ReplyDeleteHuman ignorance is eternal and universal to all peoples. We just have to live with it.
J
Dear Paul
ReplyDeleteMy guess is that heads will roll and rears will be kicked. The USA values the reputation of its armed forces, as do other first world nations.
J
Silly boys, you'd think they'd be a little bit more clued up than then.....wouldn't you???
DeleteYou would but...oh well.
Delete