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No. This is bullshit. I am telling you, from personal experience, that there are claims in this article that are completely bullshit, and stand out as being com

No. This is bullshit. I am telling you, from personal experience, that there are claims in this article that are completely bullshit, and stand out as being completely bullshit. Whoever this "journalist" is writing about has sold Buzzfeed quite a cool story, bro. I'm not doubting that assassinations are carried out by mercenaries, which is not even a little bit unusual historically. I only skimmed the last third of the article because it's such outlandishly bad and wholly unbelievable storytelling. And as someone that spent more than a couple of years looking at the universe through black hot thermal, something about that footage is not quite right. I could spend hours unraveling the tall tale Buzzfeed has spun here for you all today. Just a few of the claims that are outright false or smack heavily of exaggerated bullshit: "... the US doesn’t ban mercenaries. And with some exceptions, it is perfectly legal to serve in foreign militaries, whether one is motivated by idealism or money. With no legal consequences ..." False. Totally false. You jeopardize your American citizenship by serving in a foreign military ranked as an NCO or above. It is the exception to do this without huge problems and not the norm. For example serving in the IDF as part of your Return. I know because I personally had an offer to join an allied European military in order to take a teaching position at their infantry school. And the US government is putting people in jail that went to fight in Syria and Iraq with e.g. PKK. "If the [reserve special forces] soldiers are not on active duty, he added, they are not obligated to report what they’re doing." 100% false. You need a waiver signed by your chain of command (up through battalion commander) to do anything remotely like this, which would absolutely need to be approved, taking security contractor work like this, overseas. You absolutely are obligated not just to report to your chain of command but to get a waiver. I know because I personally have friends that did contracting work while in the guard, and I know the hoops they had to jump through. "During a live-fire training mission he led, back in his Navy days, he says he accidentally shot another SEAL." You couldn't "choose to leave the Navy" after that. This would be a huge fucking problem. Probably a discharge. Possibly jail time. "the number of special operations forces has more than doubled since 9/11, from 33,000 to 70,000. That’s a vast pool of crack soldiers selected, trained, and combat-tested by the most elite units of the US military" Seventy thousand maybe if you include all of the REMF POGs doing paperwork, but nobody could reasonably call these people "crack soldiers" and compare them to an 18B. It looks like Buzzfeed as been Buzzfed. Somebody sold them a story that is almost certainly equal parts unbelievable exaggeration and complete and total bullshit. And even if the footage is real -- and I do not believe it is 100% genuine -- they're deliberately zooming in on the area where the "mercenary" is firing his weapon in order to obscure what appear to be rounds landing at his feet. It looks like he's provoked into firing. Do not believe anything these people are telling you. It is almost certainly invented for clicks or some other reason.

jpatokal 8y ago
It's actually quite difficult to lose your US citizenship these days. Per U.S. Code § 1481, it's not sufficient to merely serve in a foreign military, you need to do it "with the intention of relinquishing United States nationality". What's more, per (b) there's an explicit presumption of what amounts to innocent until proven guilty: the onus is on whoever is claiming you've lost your citizenship to prove that you voluntarily intended to lose it, which is really quite hard to do unless you renounced in front of a US consular officer. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1481 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1481
- fapjacks 8y ago
  Actually, swearing fealty to another nation's military by swearing in, in fact, counts as intending to relinquish your US nationality. I have had this discussion with people working in multiple different American consulates, because as I mentioned, I was offered a position teaching at a European infantry school which would have required me to join their military.
  - jpatokal 8y ago
    Nope. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relinquishment_of_United_States_nationality#Serving_in_a_foreign_military https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relinquishment_of_United_State... Or if you want an authoritative source: https://fam.state.gov/FAM/07FAM/07FAM1270.html https://fam.state.gov/FAM/07FAM/07FAM1270.html
    - fapjacks 8y ago
      You're not a citizenship lawyer, I'm assuming, and you're just grabbing these links from (bad) cursory google searching, because this must be some kind of joke? Are you actually reading the links you are posting? I think you haven't actually read them. Both of these links support my assertions. Also, you obviously have zero experience with immigration and citizenship law, and how it works at the consular level. From your very own links: "... provides for relinquishment through 'entering, or serving in, the armed forces of a foreign state' if either the person serves 'as a commissioned or non-commissioned officer' ... " I suppose then you have no real-world experience with any of this (or anything like this) and so cannot otherwise provide anything to support your position. So let me help define some terms for you. A "commissioned or non-commissioned officer" -- what I called "an NCO or above" -- is essentially anyone higher ranking than a common soldier. If you serve in this position, the consular officer you report this to gets to make the call on whether or not this constitutes relinquishing citizenship and every consulate I talked to said it would mean relinquishing citizenship. This is the power of the consulate: They make decisions with recommendations from the government. Since you don't have any experience with this first-hand, and you don't understand the implication, that means you won't be afforded the opportunity to challenge or appeal the decision, since you won't have ready access to the American court system.

jpatokal 8y ago

It's actually quite difficult to lose your US citizenship these days. Per U.S. Code § 1481, it's not sufficient to merely serve in a foreign military, you need to do it "with the intention of relinquishing United States nationality". What's more, per (b) there's an explicit presumption of what amounts to innocent until proven guilty: the onus is on whoever is claiming you've lost your citizenship to prove that you voluntarily intended to lose it, which is really quite hard to do unless you renounced in front of a US consular officer. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1481 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1481

fapjacks 8y ago
Actually, swearing fealty to another nation's military by swearing in, in fact, counts as intending to relinquish your US nationality. I have had this discussion with people working in multiple different American consulates, because as I mentioned, I was offered a position teaching at a European infantry school which would have required me to join their military.
- jpatokal 8y ago
  Nope. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relinquishment_of_United_States_nationality#Serving_in_a_foreign_military https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relinquishment_of_United_State... Or if you want an authoritative source: https://fam.state.gov/FAM/07FAM/07FAM1270.html https://fam.state.gov/FAM/07FAM/07FAM1270.html
  - fapjacks 8y ago
    You're not a citizenship lawyer, I'm assuming, and you're just grabbing these links from (bad) cursory google searching, because this must be some kind of joke? Are you actually reading the links you are posting? I think you haven't actually read them. Both of these links support my assertions. Also, you obviously have zero experience with immigration and citizenship law, and how it works at the consular level. From your very own links: "... provides for relinquishment through 'entering, or serving in, the armed forces of a foreign state' if either the person serves 'as a commissioned or non-commissioned officer' ... " I suppose then you have no real-world experience with any of this (or anything like this) and so cannot otherwise provide anything to support your position. So let me help define some terms for you. A "commissioned or non-commissioned officer" -- what I called "an NCO or above" -- is essentially anyone higher ranking than a common soldier. If you serve in this position, the consular officer you report this to gets to make the call on whether or not this constitutes relinquishing citizenship and every consulate I talked to said it would mean relinquishing citizenship. This is the power of the consulate: They make decisions with recommendations from the government. Since you don't have any experience with this first-hand, and you don't understand the implication, that means you won't be afforded the opportunity to challenge or appeal the decision, since you won't have ready access to the American court system.