Deserting soldier was total coward (From Oxford Mail)

If Mr Bennett would look at previous items in the Oxford Mail, he would know that Joe Glenton was enthusiastic when he signed up and had done one tour in Afghanistan, where he saw the brutality and futility of what we are doing there. He suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and was sent back to Afghanistan too early, even though he told his commanding officer that he was against the war - and was bullied as a result. After being AWOL, he gave himself up and had to spend several months in prison.

Not exactly what I would call cowardly behaviour. But some people are too quick to throw around playground insults like this without any thought or consideration for the human beings involved.

Oxford resident wrote:
If Mr Bennett would look at previous items in the Oxford Mail, he would know that Joe Glenton was enthusiastic when he signed up and had done one tour in Afghanistan, where he saw the brutality and futility of what we are doing there. He suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and was sent back to Afghanistan too early, even though he told his commanding officer that he was against the war - and was bullied as a result. After being AWOL, he gave himself up and had to spend several months in prison. Not exactly what I would call cowardly behaviour. But some people are too quick to throw around playground insults like this without any thought or consideration for the human beings involved.

I'm sorry but if you join the armed forces you sign up to fight for queen and country the guy let his mates down and others that died in his place they are the real heroes not him he will be remembered as a coward regardless of the rights and wrongs of this war they are there until the politicians come to their senses!.

So you're a coward if you refuse to fight in a war that you know is wrong and futile? It seems to me that it takes a lot of bravery to stand up for what you believe is right, rather than simply conforming to what everybody else is doing.

As man has been his own worse enemy, so has this country been its own worse enemy. Over the years we were the biggest load of land grabbing people to sail the sea's of the planet. We then described ourselves as having an Empire. World War Two came along and after that the Empire was changed into a Commonwealth. As independence was granted to various states and nations some went their own way, others stayed with us. After having fought wars here, there and everywhere else you would think that we had learnt our lessons. NO!, we haven't and we continue to this day poking our noses into things which don't necessaraly concern us. Our foreign policy seems to be to meddle in anything that is not ours. The rest of the world take a very dim view of our exploits in recent times, and it is time for us to stop fiddling around where we are not wanted. America is viewed with even great distaste than ourselves, yet we continue to throw our young into combat along side the U.S.A only for them to be , yet once more the victims of "friendly fire". Try telling some young man that its friendly when his body is being torn in half by high velocity machine gun fire. "oh its friendly". I rather think not. So here we are in Afganistan, a war Russia couldn't win, because the USA trained the locals to form a malitia, and now that same group, renamed is fighting us. Spendid....NOT. Completely unwinnable and now we point the finger at Pakistan, oh deep joy, at last, its taken long enough. However its not a serious point as there are no trade sanctions or embargo's put in place to back it up, just hollow words. Again. Meantime soldiers continue to die.
As goes the young man being a coward, no, not at all. Our guys are ill equiped fighting a war that will become a bigger embarassment than the Vietnam war was to the U.S. This war is totally wrong, which is why we are trying so hard to get out, without a military victory. I hope that present and future leaders of this nation will think for a whole lot longer before commiting our young men to such tasks in the future. When I see the French,German,Sanish
, Italian,Dutch and Scandanavian countries commiting forces equal to ours then it will be right for us to join the fight, until then we need to keep our noses out. We have won all of our recent wars, this one we will not, that says something in itself. Perhaps if more of the critics were on a previous losing side they would be less quick to judge.

Oxford resident wrote:
So you're a coward if you refuse to fight in a war that you know is wrong and futile? It seems to me that it takes a lot of bravery to stand up for what you believe is right, rather than simply conforming to what everybody else is doing.

The honest answer is yes you are a coward and yes it does take bravery to stand up for what you believe in, at the same time it takes guts to stand up and fight something sadly lacking in Mr Glenton. Who I hope goes on to live a fuitfull life unlike his fellow soldiers coming home in coffins who have sacrificed their futures.

Diddy OX says that Joe Glenton's fellow soldiers coming home in coffins have sacrificed their futures. Quite true - but what have they sacrificed their lives for? Certainly not peace in Afghanistan, which is as far off as ever, and not being helped by the presence of British or American troops.

Joe recognised the futility of this war and saw the importance of resisting it instead of perpetuating the killing on both sides, which has achieved nothing - except to alienate the Middle East against us.

If this person had second thoughts as to whether or not to fight surely he should have bought himself out of the army instead of deserting, that would have been the obvious thing to do

There is considerable doubt about whether or not you can buy yourself out of the army. It would certainly involve talking to your commanding officer about wanting to leave, and Joe made it clear that his superiors gave him no sympathy and he was actually bullied for expressing his views.

Even if it is possible to buy yourself out, perhaps you can't afford it.

Besides, Joe was a sick man, suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and it sounds as if he didn't know what was best to do - and he was getting no help from superiors.

Why can't you name-callers show some sympathy for a man under stress? Where is your humanity?

I think you'll find that AWOL is when you're missing from your unit for a few weeks, if you're missing for longer it's called deserting, he was missing for 2 years, and I think I'm right in saying that you can purchase your discharge