ARMY SHUTS DOWN BLOGGER FROM IRAQ

According to VetVoice, the Army has shut down a blogger who was writing about his experiences as a member of the military in Iraq.

Army Shuts Down Popular Milblogger in Iraq
Posted: 02 Jul 2008 12:31 PM CDT
http://www.vetvoice.com/

Wired.com's Danger Room is reporting that the Army has ordered an infantry officer in Iraq to cease blogging and to remove all previous content from his popular blog:

An outspoken soldier who wrote one of the most brutally honest blogs ever to come out of Iraq has been forced to shut down his site, after criticizing his superior officers one time too often.
In Iraq since December, 2007, the pseudonymous "LT [Lieutenant] G," described firefights and combat patrols and tribal meetings and the banality of life on base with equal measures of sarcasm, aggression, introspection, and attention to detail. Within months, his site, Kaboom: A Soldier's War Journal, became one of the military's blogosphere's best-loved voices from the war.

There are arguments to be made on both sides of this deal, and even LT G has accepted some responsibility for the situation going sour. He wrote this a few days ago, before being told to pull his site completely:

Due to a rash posting on my part, and decisions made above my pay-grade, I have been ordered to stop posting on Kaboom, effective immediately. Though I committed no OPSEC violations, due to a series of extenuating circumstances -- the least of which was me being on leave -- my "The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide is Press Coverage" post on May 28 did not go through the normal vetting channels. It's totally on me, as it was too much unfiltered truth. I'm a soldier first, and orders are orders.

So it is.

If you think, please think of us.

If you pray, please pray for us.

The second half of our deployment will be just as challenging and dangerous as the first half.
Thank you for caring. Agree or disagree with the war, if you're reading this, you are engaged and aware. As long as that is still occurring in a free society, there is something worth the fighting for.

I sincerely hope that the Army is only enforcing the regulations out of a sense of fairness to other soldiers who blog.

If they're not--and this just a reaction to criticism coming from within the ranks--then this will stand as just another bumbling example of the poor leadership that has gripped the highest levels of the Army in recent years.

Either way, we'll miss LT G's writing.