Another Soldier Known for Writings On War Dies in Iraq (Freeper's Son)

RamboLiberal

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Fri Sep-21-07 04:35 PM
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Another Soldier Known for Writings On War Dies in Iraq (Freeper's Son)

Edited on Fri Sep-21-07 04:41 PM by RamboLiberal

Source: Editor & Publisher

Earlier this month, two of seven soldiers who had penned an Op-Ed for The New York Times that expressed skepticism about the war in Iraq were killed in a vehicle accident there. Now another soldier whose writings on the war, but with a more pro-war view, were widely circulated has died in another non-combat related incident.

He is Sgt. Edmund "Eddie" Jeffers. He died on Wednesday in Taqqadum of injuries suffered from an unspecified accident that is under investigation, the Army said.

Jeffers, 23, was in the 2nd Infantry Division’s 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team. This was his second tour of duty in Iraq.

He wrote an essay, "Hope Rides Alone," backing the war in February for the conservative Free Republic web site that gained wide notice. He suggested that the American public was ungrateful.

“America has lost its will to fight," he wrote. “It has lost its will to defend what is right and just in the world...Let’s stop all the political nonsense, let’s stop bickering, let’s stop all the bad news and let’s stand and fight! Isn’t that what America is about anyway?”

Read more: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003644955

Unspecified accident - I'm not going there in an initial post. RIP Sgt. Jeffers - at least you weren't a keyboard commando like most of the Freepers.

On edit - here's link to what he wrote at Free Republic. Read the whole thing - first part is poetic and seems he's exploring the dark moments of the soul - but the rest is hateful to those like us.

Hope Rides Alone
By Eddie Jeffers
I stare out into the darkness from my post, and I watch the city burn to the ground. I smell the familiar smells, I walk through the familiar rubble, and I look at the frightened faces that watch me pass down the streets of their neighborhoods. My nerves hardly rest; my hands are steady on a device that has been given to me from my government for the purpose of taking the lives of others.

I sweat, and I am tired. My back aches from the loads I carry. Young American boys look to me to direct them in a manner that will someday allow them to see their families again...and yet, I too, am just a boy....my age not but a few years more than that of the ones I lead.

I am stressed, I am scared, and I am paranoid...because death is everywhere. It waits for me, it calls to me from around street corners and windows, and it is always there. There are the demons that follow me, and tempt me into thoughts and actions that are not my own...but that are necessary for survival.

I've made compromises with my humanity. And I am not alone in this. Miles from me are my brethren in this world, who walk in the same streets...who feel the same things, whether they admit to it or not and to think, I volunteered for this...

And I am ignorant to the rest of the world...or so I thought.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1797210/posts