I know there have always been marriages between servicepersons and locals. Does the military actually have a righ to forbid the marriage if it takes place on personal time?
quote: PENSACOLA, Florida (AP) -- Two National Guard soldiers who married Iraqi women against their commander's wishes will have to wait at least eight months to return home with their brides, according to a lawyer for one of the soldiers.
The women's visas will take at least that long to process by mail because the State Department is not issuing visas in Iraq, said Richard Alvoid, an attorney hired by Sgt. Sean Blackwell's family.
The wait could be even longer if the military decides to charge the men with disobeying orders, Alvoid said.
Blackwell, 27, and Cpl. Brett Dagen, 37, were Christians who converted to Islam so they could be married under Iraqi law. Their commanders took the unusual step of ordering the men not to marry.
The soldiers, members of the 3rd Battalion of the Florida Guard's 124th Infantry, are expected to remain in Iraq at least until February. The men had wanted to send their wives, both physicians, to the United States sooner because of threats from anti-American Iraqis.
The men have been restricted to their bases since the double wedding in August, and they have not been allowed to see or speak to their wives since then, the soldiers' mothers said Monday.
Capt. Jason Beck, a spokesman for the 3rd Battalion of the Florida Guard's 124th Infantry, did not return a call seeking comment Monday.
Alvoid said he has received word from the Judge Advocate General's Office that charges have not been filed but the soldiers were under investigation.
Lt. Col. Ron Tittle, spokesman for the Florida National Guard in St. Augustine, said earlier this month that the soldiers' battalion commander had been worried the marriages might distract his troops from their mission and compromise their safety.
This I have more of a problem with, it doesn't appear that the marriage was on "personal" time. I do have a problem with the army telling them not to marry at all though, and bias that his officer is portraying.
quote: Couples married while soldiers were on foot patrol An Army spokesman at the Pentagon referred questions to officials in Iraq, who declined comment.
Lt. Col. Ron Tittle, spokesman for the Florida National Guard in St. Augustine, said he did not know whether disciplinary action had been taken or is contemplated, but that the soldiers' battalion commander, Lt. Col. Thad Hill, had said he was worried the marriages might distract his troops from their mission and compromise their safety.
In his letter to Miller, Blackwell said the Army Inspector General's office has told him he cannot be punished for getting married, but that he could be disciplined for disobeying an order.
Other soldiers, including his company commander, were supportive, but Hill and a sergeant major opposed the marriages, Blackwell wrote. He added that the sergeant major told him "Muslims and Christians just don't jive together."
An Iraqi judge married the couples while the soldiers were on a foot patrol, Blackwell wrote.
posted
Any time you have long postings, this is what happens. Half the cities in France started because Roman soldiers married the local girls. It's fighting the tide to try and forbid it.
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posted
To me it smells of racism on the Army's part. How the heck is the local community ever going to embrace you and trust you if you treat them like this? While I can understand not necesarily encouraging it, and being worried about how it effects soldiers job performance at the same time don't you think that relations would be improved if say 1,000 genuine US Iraqi marriages took place?
posted
I agree that this is most likely wrong (I'd have to read more to be sure) I don't think the proposed 1000 mariages would improve out relationship with Iraq (I made a funny! ). If 1000 soldiers married Iraqi women (or men) and stayed there it may help, but they're leaving Iraq.
posted
Maybe getting warm and fuzzy is not what the army wants. If you were a soldier and were given orders about a move on a city the next day, and your wife's grandparents and cousins all live there, what do you do? You betray either your country and the army (bad), or you fail to warn your wife's relatives (also bad).
I think its a matter of "no man can serve two masters", and Iraq is still too unstable to be considered the same master as the US. I mean, it seems like rascism, because they have no problem with soldiers marrying the local girls in Germany, but then, Germany isn't currently a hotbed of organized Nazis.
I can see the army's point. It's too soon to have soldiers there with divided loyalties.
posted
Well the soldiers are still employed by the US army for a specified duration of time.
But of the hypothetical 1000, I'd guess you'd get a few, maybe even 50-100 that did decide to live in Iraq. I don't know if there are any actual statistics on this sort of thing though.
posted
After WWII the soldiers DID marry local girls while it was still a "hotbed of Nazis" So I don't think that argument holds up completely. Though WWII was over in a more complete sense than the action in Iraq is.
I don't know, I guess I can argue both sides, but my visceral reaction is to let the guys get married. I'm wondering if they were specifically NOT given time off when everybody else was in order to prevent the marriages from happening. I don't think they should have gotten married while on a foot patrol, unless there was no possiblity of a day off.
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). If 1000 soldiers married Iraqi women (or men) and stayed there it may help, but they're leaving Iraq.![[Smile]](smile.gif)
