Soldiers May be Punished over Koran Burning

A US military official announcement and supporting media articles indicate as many as 7 servicemembers may be given “administrative punishments” for their role in the riot-inducing religious material burning a few months ago.

That’s the same incident for which Michael Weinstein called the Christian perpetrators to be court-martialed.

As noted at A Soldier’s Perspective, it remains unclear for what any US military member could be punished, particularly since the official US position continues to be that the burning was inadvertent, unintentional, and unknown to the people who actually tossed the bags in the burn pit [formatting original]:

So let me get this straight: mistakes were made but were made because the service members didn’t know they were making them. There was no intent to desecrate the Korans, but President Obama apologized anyway. The mistake was made in honest ignorance of what was being burned and now military leaders are recommending career ending administrative punishment (remember, we’re downsizing and need to shed troops).

Let’s get real. These service members are going to be punished not because they did anything wrong, but because we don’t want to offend anyone by being honest and saying that the reaction to the ACCIDENTAL burning of religious books sparks UNWARRANTED and IDIOTIC protests by extremists making something out of nothing.

We are bending over backwards in the name of political correctness…

That last part is a particularly astute comment, as it was also mirrored by a Congressional report on the issue of the military’s response to the internal terrorist threat.