georgej on May 5, 2007 at 2:59 AM

I don’t really agree that this is some Democrat sourced push. As I mentioned a couple of times the debate is not really about their right to tell their stories, it is about the medium they use to do this.
The concerns about bandwidth and impact on operational traffic as well as the security aspects are real concerns. Two things could happen in my opinion (1) Encourage service people to write their experiences or record on tape/cassette and send those back home (2) More private citizens go to the war zone and report independently of the “MSM” — there are no restrictions on what is reported in this manner
As to the conduct of the service members, not being able to speak out publicly regarding their political view can be frustrating, but it is well briefed from the beginning and we know what we are getting into. When Clinton was in office this would surface periodically with someone getting disciplined for the jokes sent on official channels. Others silently protested by delaying their retirement until after he left office so they would have a different President’s signature on their retirement certificate.

In the civilian world, the caselaw is clear: If you use a company’s equipment or network, they have the absolute right to control your access, monitor your access, read your emails, even record your keystrokes. This applies to your use of their phones as well as their internet connection.

So, knowning how this works in “the world,” I am not surprised that the army or DOD, even, would have a policy of deciding that certain access to certain blogsites or if the content of individual emails were unnacceptable, and that this policy would to civilians as well as servicemen and women.

I’m not even considering the operational security issues as it seems obvious to me of the need to protect the mission and the lives of the troops. This isn’t even new to the military, as every letter home from “the front” was usually censored before being delivered during WWII.

When my son was in Iraq, he was very careful to make sure that he didn’t divulge anything that might be of use to the enemy in his emails home. And I was careful not to even ask.

I share the sense of some that this policy reminder probably originates by a complaint by some Congressional Democrats who are unhappy that some military personal are speaking out at the open sabotage of the war by the Democrats. Letters objecting to the comments of Dirty Harry, Damascus Nancy, and Traitor Johnny Murtha from individuals soldiers, marines, sailors, and airmen, are getting wide distribution via blogs. I even know that there are articles in the UCMJ that prohibit serving military from publicly denigrating the chain of command or members of the government. Google “patricia schroeder miramar” sometime.

So, while I understand all this, I am saddened that this is happening, especially as this appears to be an attempt to stifle serving individuals who are correctly exposing the treasonous behavior of some Democrats in Congress. But, given WHO the Democrats are, and their penchant to silence all criticism, it does not surprise me that they intend to punish serving military who dare to speak out and expose them.

If/when I deploy again, I don’t foresee many problems with my blogging or reporting through Professor Reynolds or Allah. Granted, I am a field grade officer, but still…

Bradky on May 4, 2007 at 11:14 AM

Well said. My client uses Websense to monitor and restrict traffic for exactly the same reasons as the DOD does.

While it is a pain for me to get to my companies webmail, VPN etc when I am on-site, they do it for security reasons not censorship, the DOD is not any different.

The second excerpt I quoted is pretty clear: once you tell your CO and OPSEC officer and get the OPSEC lecture, you no longer have to get permission to blog.

Rick Donaldson on May 4, 2007 at 9:08 AM

DOD has the right to block sites. The commercial email is blocked due to the many viruses and trojans that are brought in via these sites. (Brought in not through malicious intent of the mil user but introduced to the networks all the same)Unless you work in the Info Ops and Cyber Ops areas this is not always easy to understand the magnitude of the threat — don’t take my word for it ask any of your Cyber or IT folks and see for yourself.

The military has to protect its networks. If they can do that and still allow personal use as you described they would. But you should expect that the restrictions on non mil sites will likely increase rather than decrease in the near term.
As for news sources – you can have people at home send you printed or electronic file copies of the sites you mentioned. Old time military vets can tell you about “what it was like” before the internet, Mars stations to call home, and AFRTS programming before cable was allowed on bases.

The policies used to be that “Personal use of government systems was ok as long as it didn’t interfere with work”. My use does not, I still accomplish my job and then some, but they have decided to completely lock out a lot of things.

One example is “MySpace”. It’s nothing more than a lot of personal blog sites, where people chit chat, but they locked it out.

So far, I can still get to my own, this one and a lot of others, but when they lock them there will be a lot of protesting from a lot of workers, because MOST of us get our news from places like Free Republic, here, LGF and other sites.

E L Frederick (Sniper One) on May 4, 2007 at 8:22 AM

Nothing stops them from writing and mailing their observations to friends and loved ones. The only difference is that there may be a week to ten day lag time to make it there.
All news should be reported I agree but the medium is the real debate not the idea that military personnel be allowed to report their experiences.

E L Frederick (Sniper One) on May 4, 2007 at 8:14 AM

But only while they are in theater. Nothing stops them from keeping a journal and blogging to their heart’s content once they rotate back to the US.

armylawyer on May 4, 2007 at 8:12 AM

Good points.

The reaction was typical – the far left saw some kind of conspiracy and the far right saw their version as well. As you are probably well aware the aggregation of certain unclassified information can lay out a classified picture.

The military is over there to get a mission done – not be sources for bloggers who don’t have the stones to go report themselves.

3. The Soldier doesn’t use government equipment when on his or her personal blog.

Exactly how is a soldier supposed to use non-government equipment to blog? It’s not like there is an internet cafe on every corner in Afghanistan or Iraq. You can’t just drive over to a Starbucks in Baghdad to blog. Even if you happen to have your own laptop, the bandwidth is going to be provided by “government equipment”.

This pretty much outlaws milblogging.

The Army didn’t back down or relax anything. The reaction was overblown to begin with. The Army just said “No, we never meant any such thing.”

“BUT WHAT ABOUT THE FREEDOM OF SPEECH??? WHAT IS BUSH HIDING! THEY ARE’NT IN PRISON! IS LIFE THAT BAD OVER IN IRAQ THEY HAVE TO STIFFLE THE SOLDIERS’ FREEDOM????”