Re-imbursement Program: Troops STILL buying own equipment

Appalling story from the land of History's Greatest National Debt:

WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 - The Pentagon has not completed guidelines for allowing soldiers, their families and charities to be reimbursed for some combat equipment they bought for use in Iraq and Afghanistan, a year after the passage of legislation calling for such a program.

The measure, which allows for groups and individuals to make claims of up to $1,100, called for the Department of Defense to set rules for a reimbursement program by February 2005.

The sponsor of the original legislation, Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, says he plans to introduce an amendment to a defense bill this week to take authority for the program from Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and give it to military commanders in the field.

"We should not be sending our young men and women into harm's way less than as well prepared as their nation can prepare them and provide them with the kind of protection they deserve," Mr. Dodd said. "The Pentagon has never acted on this legislation despite the fact that it is the law of the land."

and...

Army surveys have shown that infantry members spend hundreds of dollars of their own money each year on gloves, boots, flashlights and other tools used in combat.

Meanwhile those shits in the Bush Administration are considering widening the war to include Syria on a selective basis, because as history teaches, war can always be tightly controlled....

However, one option under consideration was bombing several villages 30 to 40 miles inside Syria that some officials believe have been harboring Iraqi insurgents. The officials said the U.S. government has complained to the Syrian government about the matter but has not received a satisfactory response.

One other official, however, said military and other intelligence officers say the intelligence on the insurgents' presence in the villages is "not unambiguous." They said it is not clear whether the insurgents are present as a matter of Syrian government policy or local or tribal hospitality, or simply because insurgents have intimidated villagers.

O my country!