doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Bass Pro/Cabelas policy change: no vets' discount

Take your own advice, Dustin. I'll comment as I see fit, based on my experience. A whole lot of people in the Guard and the Reserve were "in the shit" before you were even born. Like WWII. The unit I joined--1/133d Infantry (Iron Man) was one such. If you really knew your military history, you'd know that. More days in combat than, I believe, any Active unit during the war. A Guard tank battalion from MN covered the retreat to Bataan. They'd been in the Philippines for almost a year before the Japanese invaded. Just a couple of examples. The fact that the Pentagon determined not to send the Guard and Reserve to Vietnam was no fault of those of us who enlisted--like I did--when there was only a relative handful of advisers "in country".

After completing my 6 years, I put myself in the position of being sent to Vietnam yet again by joining CIA and getting my ticket punched as an operations officer. Instead, I was selected for an assignment in North Africa . . . while Black September was quite active. Took a couple abortive attempts against us as well, and a bit later killed American diplomats in Sudan. I'm pretty sure you're too young to have missed those earlier generation terrorists. And when it came time to engage Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan, it was CIA case officers who put boots on the ground weeks before even the Special Operations guys arrived. And in Benghazi, it was CIA that saved all those at the State compound who survived the initial attack.

And it apparently never crossed your grunt mind that the role of intelligence--where I did most of my Reserve time post-CIA--was to keep you guys from getting killed. You might want to google the battle of Kolwezi. I was a newly-minted CPT, happened to be in DC supporting our Active counterparts in the Army's Intelligence and Threat Analysis Center (USAITAC). Came time to send someone down to Ft Bragg to brief the 82d Airborne G-2 . . . the Active ITAC branch chief picked me to do it, not one of his "regular" people. At that point, 82d had a battalion on alert getting ready to go. They liked the study and briefing I provided them on Zaire enough that for several months after that, our little Army Reserve MI Detachment out in Iowa City was getting direct requests from the 82d for similar information on other countries in Africa. That went on until people in the Pentagon--apparently with your attitude--didn't think it was right that a Reserve unit ought to be supporting the 82d. Seems to me maybe the 82d kept requesting studies from us because we got the job done, and they liked what we provided.

As for the 5% discount, I'm simply providing information for those veterans here not to expect the discount. Funny . . . I've heard from Active vets on other boards that they're going to reconsider where they shop. But then you probably think I don't deserve my pension and my Tricare For Life because I wasn't "down range" where and when you were. And because most of my time was in MI . . . which, given my CIA experience, seemed to me a case of the Army putting me where I could be of the most value. 82d seemed to agree. So I'll just file your opinion as being ill-informed. Guess you don't even realize that the vast majority of vets have never been shot at. And that some of us "REMFs" were working to make sure they weren't.

GFY Larry, you little blowhard. Anyone who�s been part of any bbs over the last 15+ years that you happen to belong to knows ALL about your service. Lord knows you love to wreck eardrums and eyeballs telling your war stories. Seriously, nobody gives a shit. Tell you what...why don�t you just write out your military experience and accomplishments, laminate them, and when you don�t get your 5%, whip it out and do what you do best, talk and bloviate until their ears bleed and they give you your 5%.

No such thing in my vocabulary as a REMF. Anybody who signed up and served is a vet in my book and deserves our Country's appreciation. Yeah, I'm a vet too; never did a thing brave or important though...Geo

Hey Col, don't worry about answering that loud mouth. I really wonder what kind of troop he was in whatever branch he was in. But with his attitude, I can just imagine. He sure likes to use personal attacks to get his point across, real nice. I don't know what his rank was, but if he was an NCO, he sure didn't read the Creed of the Noncommissioned Officer, let alone act by it.

Thanks BTW for your Intel service, good Intel is a valuable and vital asset to those on the ground.

BTW, he hates me too, so I'm sure I'll be hearing something.

Best,

Greg

Here's the easiest solution, although I'm sure Dustin won't agree: as noted by others above, we're ALL vets. Getting into pissing contests about whose service is "superior" is both stupid and pointless. I could care less whether a vet served just one hitch, Active or Reserve, or was a "lifer". Anyone who served in the last half century or so did so voluntarily. And once you raise your hand and take the oath, your fate--whether you end up in Iraq or Afghanistan, or never get any further than the motor pool at Ft. Leonard Wood or the local National Guard armory--is out of your hands. It's a blank check to Uncle Sam that we ALL signed, and those who aren't vets didn't sign. The VA is there for all of us. A pension and Tricare For Life is there for all of us who put in 20 good years.

Your attitude, Dustin, does nothing but provoke rivalry along the lines of whose is bigger. You obviously think yours is . . . and you're welcome to that opinion. But you're in the same boat with all the rest of us . . . even though you'd like to pick and choose which passengers to toss overboard. Can't imagine how you missed the "One Army" concept. Guys like you are why the Pentagon had to put out the word to knock off the "I'm Active so I'm superior" BS. But there are always those who think it's a good idea to point out our differences and their superiority. We're all VETS. Period. End of story.

A Canadian detective was considered the best intelligence asset in Afghanistan. Look him up: Karjit Sajjan, a Sikh, now Canada�s defence minister. �What set Sajjan�s anti-terrorism intelligence apart was his ability to connect and build trust with local populations, something he�s known to attribute in part to the Canadian military�s openness to turbans. His access granted him special appreciation of the unique dynamics and local conditions on the ground in Afghanistan.

�Sajjan�s intelligence-gathering and analytic skills soon attracted the attention of senior U.S. military and strategic advisors. His opinion letter concerning the Taliban, local warlords and the Afghan opium trade was appended in full in a major 2008 report on U.S. anti-narcotic strategies by Barnet Rubin, senior advisor to the U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. In both 2006 and 2009 Sajjan came under enemy fire, saw open combat and coped with dead and wounded soldiers.
Following Sajjan's second deployment in 2009, U.S. Major-General James Terry, Commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan�s southern provinces, requested that he join the U.S. Command Team for a third deployment 2010, where he served as Special Assistant to General Terry.�

There�s irony here as well. Very few of the military have the chance to enter the pantheon of heroes, as Larry mentioned. Joining up doesn�t get anyone past the gate in Canada. Most Canadians think that way, as do all the vets I�ve known and interviewed

Seems relevant. There was a retailer that had an openness to voluntarily granting a discount. The slap in the face looks to be a singling out of a particular group, just as a policy change would be a slap in the face to your fine Defense Minister. I don't know anything about the Canadian military, have any of the more traditional Canadian troops been disciplined for uniform violations?

Still puffin� Karjit up, eh, King? He�s wasting his time in that Canadian backwater Ottawa. At the very least he should be in Brussels building that imaginary EU army. Maybe get the imaginary troops an imaginary 10% discount on a Force Frappe.


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Don�t need the Pentagon to tell the regular Army to knock off the I�m superior B.S. A good right cross is much more effective and satisfying.

If Sikhs want to fight wearing turbans---and they fight well in every place they bear arms---that's fine with Canada's military. To protect is their religion. Turbans haven't slowed down the Taliban.

I really enjoyed this King, thanks. It's a good thing Canadians don't have a right to arms, you can keep 'em away from the folks with a hot temper whenever they touch a gun. Maybe, if they embraced Christianity, the world would be a better place?

Just kidding, I like turbans too. But, we still have some businesses that don't like the military. Good thing cabela's sells guns, instead of bakes cakes, eh? Otherwise, they'd be in big trouble.