Iraq War
Marine: the war can't be won
Written by Matt Sheehan, AmherstWire.com Tuesday, 29 April 2008 22:28
Editor's Note: This is part of a series of stories generated by a journalism course titled "Politics, Journalism and the Web." Students will be reporting stories from now until the end of the semester.
Ask Sol Black the most important issue the United States faces, he’ll say “The War in Iraq.” Ask him how the government should handle it he‘ll say, “Get out, ASAP.”
Black insists the outcome America desires in the Middle East no longer remains obtainable, an alarming assessment given the approximate $340 million Americans spend each day funding the conflict. With obvious frustration he explains the evolution of the American prerogative in Iraq and the challenges of facing an ambiguous enemy.
UM Marine: 'We need to finish what we started'
Written by Joe Meloni, AmherstWire.com Tuesday, 29 April 2008 21:47
Editor's Note: This is part of a series of stories generated by a journalism course titled "Politics, Journalism and the Web." Students will be reporting stories from now until the end of the semester.
AUDIO SLIDESHOW: Training for combat
Brad Durkin never really liked ceramics class and found little joy in watching the clock count down his final high school days. So, instead of spending months counting to a graduation ceremony he didn’t consider particularly important, Durkin marched into his principal’s office with an odd proposal.
“Once you get into college [during high school], you take easy classes that you don’t care about; like ceramics, all my friends took ceramics,” he says muffled by a soft laugh. “I didn’t want to waste half of my year, and I didn’t care about graduating with my friends. So I asked my principal to write me up a diploma. He typed it up, stamped it; and I brought it to [a marine recruiter]; I left the next day.”
VIDEO: War sways student's vote
Written by Administrator Monday, 28 April 2008 11:59
Iraq the top issue for UMass Marine
Written by Mary Kate Alfieri, AmherstWire.com Friday, 25 April 2008 13:08
Editor's Note: This is part of a series of stories generated by a journalism course titled "Politics, Journalism and the Web." Students will be reporting stories from now until the end of the semester.
When Steve Shepard, a current UMass student, joined the United States Marine Corps in the summer of 2001, he had no idea what was in store for him. “I remember thinking what are the odds a war is going to break out in the next six years, and then six weeks later, 9-11 happened. All of a sudden it was a whole new ballgame.”
AUDIO: A Tragic Personal Experience
After serving from August 2001 to March 2006, it is Shepard’s experience that now has made the war the single most defining issue for him in the 2008 elections.
Soldier says it's too late in Iraq
Written by Stephanie McPherson, AmherstWire.com Friday, 25 April 2008 12:00
Editor's Note: This is part of a series of stories generated by a journalism course titled "Politics, Journalism and the Web." Students will be reporting stories from now until the end of the semester.I was sitting at my butcher’s block in my comfortable rural home, dinner heating on the stove. I was on my laptop, chatting with a friend, discussing what would happen when the 48 hour deadline President Bush set had passed. It was March 20, 2003, just hours before the end of the deadline. I remember wondering, if Saddam Hussein and his sons didn’t leave Iraq, would they immediately start bombing? Was this really going to happen?
Halfway around the world, my cousin, Kyle Frost, of Kernersville, N.C., sat waiting as well. Waiting for the message stating the deadline passed. Waiting for the order to start the attack on Iraq.
Anti-war group wants the U.S. out of Iraq
Written by Eric Athas, AmherstWire.com Friday, 07 March 2008 11:10
There wasn’t much debate Thursday night about whether the or not the United States should withdraw from Iraq, but rather how it should.
About a dozen students attended a public forum hosted by the University of Massachusetts Campus Anti-War Network. For more than an hour, the group discussed “the case for immediate withdrawal from Iraq.”
“I think the way you can tell if an occupation is good or bad, is if it’s an occupation,” said Ross Hogan, of CAN, “and this is an occupation.”
TEACHING IRAQ
Written by Eric Athas, AmherstWire.com Thursday, 10 January 2008 00:00
Dark, medium dark and light shades of green. In a combat zone, these colors are used as camouflage – a way for soldiers to attempt to hide themselves from the enemy. On the University of Massachusetts-Amherst campus, they have the opposite effect. Everybody notices them. A 6-foot-1 colonel saunters into a classroom, decked out in the traditional army colors. On the right side of his chest, in simple black letters: VACCHI.
It’s 9:30 a.m. The class begins. The subject: Iraq. The professor: Lt. Col. David Vacchi. Vacchi puts his right hand over his heart bows to the class. “Salam alaikum,” Vacchi says to the sleepy group of about 26 college students. “Salam alaikum,” the class responds back to Vacchi. Vacchi begins every class with the Arabic version of “hello” meaning “Peace be upon you.”
Vacchi is the director of the UMass ROTC program and a professor of Military Leadership. He served in Iraq in 2003 and 2004 and was assigned to UMass in 2005. After about a semester in Amherst, he said he quickly realized that many people didn’t really know what was actually going on in Iraq.
He said what you see on CNN, Fox News and network television isn’t a correct illustration of the war.
Goldberg asks UMass to 'Give war a Chance'
Written by Eric Athas Tuesday, 08 January 2008 16:00
Jonah Goldberg, editor-at-large for National Review Online and a contributing editor for National Review, spoke to students at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst on Wednesday, Dec. 12, 2007. The event was sponsored by the UMass Republican Club.
