Soldier Takes Four Years To Read Job Description; Deserts to Germany
December 1, 2008 · Print This Article
Andre Shepard was shocked to learn that the Apache helicopter gunships he was working as a mechanic on were being used to kill people. So he has deserted to Germany and is seeking asylum there.
Andre Shepherd, 31, who served in Iraq between September 2004 and February 2005 as an Apache helicopter mechanic in the 412th Aviation Support Battalion, has been living in Germany since deserting last year.
“When I read and heard about people being ripped to shreds from machine guns or being blown to bits by the Hellfire missiles I began to feel ashamed about what I was doing,” Shepherd told a Frankfurt news conference Thursday.
“I could not in good conscience continue to serve.”
Shepherd, originally from Cleveland, Ohio and ranked as an army specialist, applied for asylum in Germany Wednesday, said Tim Huber from the Military Counseling Network, a non-military group which is assisting him.
Does the Army give ASVAB waivers to helicopter mechanics these days or is this douchebag just playing dumb?
The sorry scum needs to stay in Germany. If he ever even dreams of coming back to the U.S. let him spend the rest of his days in prison.
Scum? What’s the point of having a website for supplementing the content of the corporate news? Aren’t the big stories enough for you people?
He was not “shocked.” Right-wingers are the worst offenders when it comes to concealing the barbarism of war behind fancy titles and medals. Thanks to lying recruiters (though they don’t necessarily lie about what the real consequences of the job of killing brown people is) armed with federal money and promises to give people decent-paying jobs and a college education, some people have few choices to achieve the so-called American dream. But it’s so hard to even get desperate people that they’ve been letting in skin heads! Way to go assholes. Clearly the magical fantastical, totally illogical and ahistorical commitment to the military and American imperialism is so supportable that someone who would oppose it and try to research the largely under reported air war in Iraq is “scum.” You people are probably “equal opportunity critics” like the libertarians Trey Parker and Matt Stone of sometimes claim to be.
Thought I’d inject a bit of reality into this pathetic, hipster dick-measuring contest of a website.