Marines pose with the "SS" flag in Afghanistan
To these Marines all Afghans are probably “Sand N*****s” and so they have no issue with posing with a Nazi symbol.
The story below highlights that many Jewish organizations and others are outraged by the photo and are demanding an investigation. My question is how are the above soldiers going to be investigated or held accountable when you have soldiers who have clearly committed war crimes and perpetrated massacres getting off for free or a slap of the wrist?
Groups outraged by Marines posing with logo resembling Nazi SS want new probe, troops punished
(Washinton Post)
The Marine Corps has said it does not plan any discipline because there was no malicious intent. The Marines mistakenly believed the “SS” in the shape of white lightning bolts on the blue flag were a nod to sniper scouts — not members of Adolf Hitler’s special unit that murdered millions of Jews, gypsies and others, said Maj. Gabrielle Chapin, a spokeswoman at Camp Pendleton, Calif.
Military officials learned of the photograph in November and investigated immediately. It later surfaced on a blog of a military weapons company.
In the September 2010 photo taken in the Sangin district of Helmand province, 10 Marines pose with sniper rifles in front of an American flag above a dark blue flag with the “SS” letters.
Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder of Los Angeles’ Simon Wiesenthal Center, said he does not believe it was an innocent mistake and insisted the American public has a right to know what happened.
His organization — one of the largest international Jewish human rights groups with more than 400,000 members — is demanding Obama and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta launch another investigation and discipline those involved.
“That 70 years after the United States Armed Forces helped liberate Europe from Nazi Germany, to learn that a unit of the United States Marine Corps serving in Afghanistan adopted the SS insignia alongside the Stars and Stripes, desecrates the memory of some 200,000 Americans who gave up their lives to defend freedom against that infamous symbol,” he said in a statement.
The Corps has used the incident as a training tool to talk to troops about what symbols are acceptable, Chapin said.
“I don’t believe that the Marines involved would have ever used any type of symbol associated with the Nazi Germany military criminal organization that committed mass atrocities in WWII,” Chapin said. “It’s not within who we are as Marines.”
Hier said it clearly shows more training about the Holocaust and the SS unit is needed.
It was the second time this year that images have surfaced showing Marines acting improperly and forcing the Corps to deal with the fallout. Last month, the Pentagon scrambled to contain the damage after an Internet video purportedly showed Marines urinating on Taliban corpses — an act that appears to violate international laws of warfare and further strains U.S.-Afghan relations. Panetta called Afghan President Hamid Karzai to offer assurances of an investigation, and the top Marine general promised an internal probe as well as a criminal one.
Those Marines, like the ones in front of the flag, fought in former Taliban strongholds in Helmand province. They are based at Camp Lejeune, N.C.
