Redstate

Posted at 12:52am on Feb. 23, 2008 Obama's Platoon

By California Yankee

During last night's Democratic presidential debate in Texas, Barack Obama told the following "platoon" story:

Here it is in black and white from CNN's transcript the debate:

You know, I've heard from an Army captain who was the head of a rifle platoon -- supposed to have 39 men in a rifle platoon. Ended up being sent to Afghanistan with 24 because 15 of those soldiers had been sent to Iraq.

And as a consequence, they didn't have enough ammunition, they didn't have enough humvees. They were actually capturing Taliban weapons, because it was easier to get Taliban weapons than it was for them to get properly equipped by our current commander in chief.

Now, that's a consequence of bad judgment.

Today the Pentagon weighed in on Obama's platoon. Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters, he
finds Obama's story "pretty hard to imagine":

"Despite the stress that we readily acknowledge on the force, one of the things that we do is make sure that all of our units and service members that are going into harm's way are properly trained, equipped and with the leadership to be successful," he said.

Read on.

Posted in 2008 | Afghanistan | Barack Obama | Democrats | Texas Debate — Comments (19)/ Email this page » / Read More »