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Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Pentagon says "nyet" to YouTube, Myspace, blogging

I stumbled across this wonderful soldier blog today, Fight To Survive. I've always been fascinated with soldiers and the military life, especially what soldiers are feeling and thinking. Soldiers are more than just mindless robots as some imagine them to be, they are people as any other, with thoughts and feelings who have a damn hellish job to do. Ever since reading Colby Buzzell's blog and book "My War," I've been hooked on reading soldier blogs. I can understand that the Pentagon must ensure operational security, but most of the blogs I've read would not violate operational security any more than reading books and journals from Vietnam or World War II. In fact you can pick up books about US infantry tactics from World War II, and even the Ranger Handbook and some of the methods and tactics there are still used today.

I think that censoring soldiers' blogs and sites is wrong, especially ones that do not violate any operational security. Morale is getting kind of low, and soldiers do need an outlet to vent sometimes, and I think these sites give them that outlet. Watching funny videos on YouTube and catching up with your family on MySpace is also good for the lads on their days off. Still, it's a bit ironic that the Army has its own official YouTube and FlickR accounts, but they won't allow the individual soldier to use them now.

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