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March 30, 2013

'You are responsible' - Dying Iraq war veteran takes parting shot at Bush


An Iraq war veteran who lost the use of his legs in the conflict has decided to end his life. Tomas Young has also written a letter to former President George W Bush and ex-Vice-President Dick Cheney, accusing them of being responsible for what happened to him and others injured and killed in Iraq.
When President Bush stood on the rubble of Ground Zero just after the 9/11 attacks in 2001 and pledged to go after those responsible, Tomas Young, 22, took up the call and joined the US Army.
But instead of being deployed to Afghanistan to fight al-Qaeda and its allies, he ended up in Iraq in 2004 following Saddam Hussein's capture by coalition forces.
On the fifth day into his deployment, Mr Young's unit came under fire from insurgents in Baghdad. He was hit and his spine was severed.
After his return to the US he campaigned from his wheelchair against the conflict and in 2007 was the subject of a documentary, Body of War.
But now his condition has deteriorated to such an extent that he wants to put an end to his suffering.
"He felt he's gone as far as his physical shell will take him and he is ready to rest," his wife, Claudia Cuellar, tells BBC World Service, speaking on his behalf because he has difficulty talking and tires easily.
"We accepted a certain level of suffering," she says. But last year his pain and discomfort increased dramatically and he grew weary of repeated hospital visits to treat infections and other ailments.
"He didn't want to do any more procedures or surgeries," Ms Cuellar says.
"I felt like I was losing him emotionally and psychologically. I felt that it was just too hard to get through the course of a single day and we had to have the conversation that people have when..." she said, not finishing her sentence.


"I could sense that he was suffering to a level that just wasn't right for us as a couple. I can keep him around for me, but that isn't fair to his journey.
"It's not that he wants to die - he simply doesn't want to suffer any more," Ms Cuellar says.
But she adds: "He's the person I love the most in the whole world. I will miss this person."
In 2008 Mr Young suffered a pulmonary embolism and an anoxic brain injury due to a reduced oxygen supply that impaired his speech and arm movement. A colostomy operation last year provided only temporary relief.
Unable now to eat solid food, he is fed through a tube in his stomach. The skin on his hips is breaking down, exposing raw flesh and bone.
"That's probably the toughest one for me, to see that deterioration," she says.
Medical marijuana eases his discomfort and gives him peace of mind without the side effects of pharmaceutical drugs, Ms Cuellar says.
Mr Young says he wrote to Mr Bush and Mr Cheney on behalf of the wounded veterans and relatives of those killed and injured in Iraq.
"On every level - moral, strategic, military and economic - Iraq was a failure. And it was you, Mr Bush and Mr Cheney, who started this war. It is you who should pay the consequences.
"My day of reckoning is upon me. Yours will come. I hope you will be put on trial. But mostly I hope, for your sakes, that you find the moral courage to face what you have done to me and to many, many others who deserved to live. I hope that before your time on earth ends, as mine is now ending, you will find the strength of character to stand before the American public and the world, and in particular the Iraqi people, and beg for forgiveness."
Cuellar says of the letter: "We just want to share the story of our struggle, which is the story of the struggle and suffering of so many, so that we can begin to look at the realities of the consequences of war."

She says Mr Young, who is virtually bedridden and in hospice care, cannot legally be helped to commit suicide in Missouri and so will have to starve himself to death.Ms Cuellar moved to Kansas City to be with Mr Young after they met while he was in hospital in her hometown, Chicago, in 2008.
He will continue to take food and liquids until their first wedding anniversary on 20 April. After that they will stop talking publicly about his case and spend time together until they feel the time is right for him to end his life.

8 comments:

  1. I wish all assholes who joined the military, like this joke of a soldier would do the same. He joined during wartime then was surprised that he was sent. Its not the soldiers job to question where he is deplyed or what location. Its mission accomplishment. We needed to beef up numbers for the war effort, and as a result a bunch of pussies were recruited who had no business thinking they were military material. I have worked with and served with plenty who have never bitched or complained, and to that end tried to milk sympathy over what happened due to their choice to enlist. Im glad hes ending his life. It cant happen soon enough. Hes a disgrace that should be ashmed of what a shitbag he is. Try serving with honor and dignity instead of your victim mentality.nobody forced him to enlist. He did so on his own. Take his whiney political beliefs, and liberal bitch of a wife(who clearly is looking for a book or movie deal) and go die somewhere out of the public eye. I have no sympathy for this clown, only disgust over his lack of bearing.

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  2. Mr Young says he wrote to Mr Bush and Mr Cheney:
    "On every level - moral, strategic, military and economic - Iraq was a failure. And it was you, Mr Bush and Mr Cheney, who started this war. It is you who should pay the consequences. "My day of reckoning is upon me. Yours will come. I hope you will be put on trial.
    Jct: Don't we all wish the war criminals could be brought to justice.

    Medical marijuana eases his discomfort and gives him peace of mind without the side effects of pharmaceutical drugs, Ms Cuellar says.
    Jct: Bet he was breaking the law to get relief!

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  3. A very sad story. If only this bro knew before he joined the army that it was the banksters that caused this endless war for profits. It was the mosad and certain elements of our own leadership that caused the 9/11 murders for the justification of the endless mantra of the war on terror. These leader faces are puppets and are only that, puppets tot he banking system that profits from world wars.

    If you read the Protocols like twenty years ago, you would have been surprised to read they would attain all their world domination goals using terrorism. At the time it seemed far fetched. Now, it is all to obvious to even a third grader.

    http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/przion1.htm

    The stupid people listen to the nightly dribble of propaganda and believe everything they see and hear on the TV. If the TV said go jump off a cliff, 95% of Americans would do it. Stupid sheeple better obey their masters orders. This is not the land of the free any more, rather is the land of the oppressed.

    Want proof?

    Watch this:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4I13Cnlpkk

    It is just sick as to what is happening in America today. This kind of story gets no attention, but the kardisian does.

    Wake up people and stop this insanity before you wake up slaves in your own country that is at war with YOU! Oh, sorry, that is already the case. All you can do is live well until you are droned.

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  4. Bush is a dim-witted sociopath, and Cheney is as close to pure evil as you can get this side of science-fiction. I doubt they would care in the slightest.

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  5. When you went to Iraq over 10 years ago. Did you went there shouting, "USA" "USA" "USA" !!

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  6. Raise funds for this poor soul to go to Switzerland and use the services there that can allow a person to die with dignity by taking an elixir of fatal drug compounds and dying peacefully in there sleep as they lose consciousness. Bush and Cheney and all the others need to be hung drawn and quartered.

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    Replies
    1. Along with Pearl, Wolfowicz, Feif, and all the other Israeli dual citizenship holders. We need to get them out of our county and out of the White House. Should not be allowed to hold office. period.
      Anonymous

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  7. Until every trigger puller understands the gravity of each and every bullet, dipensed is a death. These things kill. The standing army we have currently are nothing more than corporate henchmen, they have erased our economy and have men and women clamoring to get in to the henchmen business,killing is my business and business is good- they have created a back door draft, we will alway have wars, police actions, until, everyone of us understands that Smedley Butler was right, war is a raquet,and they will send others children to war to get their profit, when war profiteering is illegal these war will stop.

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