Passive Voices and Active Deceit

A recurring characteristic of John Giduck's writing is the use of the passive voice and various literary devices to imply things and then leave the reader to to draw the obvious conclusion. As an example:

"And to walk into a school, and you’ve got 384 dead people, mostly women and children, 186 kids, and many of those kids burned to death in that gym, when the ceiling collapsed in on them, and that gym was collapsed in flames. The smell of that alone, all those kids burned to death, is something you’re never going to get out of your head. Having seen the reality of it, I do everything I can to make sure that’s not my country"

ABIA

Is there anyone reading this that doesn't envision John Giduck crawling through that school while it is still smoking? Does he actually say it? No. It is still quite clear what he wants you to conclude from that passage. This narrative, however, runs counter to the claim of PA congressman Curt Wheldon who stated:

We were the first and, to my knowledge, the only Americans that were allowed into Beslan to visit the school. Our ambassador would visit the North Ossetia office the day after we arrived in Beslan to express the condolences of the American people on behalf of our State Department. 

  Congressman's Testimony contradicts Giduck's claim.

Giduck claims to be doing everything he can to stop it from happening here. How noble. How much money has this noble quest netted Mr. Giduck? I wonder what this is all really about.

 

The way that Mr. John Giduck speaks about combat and war is another interesting aspect of his writing . He avers that "not anyone with Archangel was unfamiliar with blood and the effects of war" on page 34. On page 36 he talks about how the dead of Beslan haunt his dreams every night and how me must return to answer some more questions because "If not me, then who?" A cynical person might suspect that he is trying to build a mythology.

  He later affects the world weary stance of a seasoned combat veteran on Pg.54 describing his entry into Chechnya and concluding that "We knew we were back at war." You see a bit of this experience implied in his advice on preparation as well: "From years in hazardous training and other dangerous undertakings in places like Sudan and Russia, I have learned that some simple first aid items are extremely light, take up little space, and can save lives." (311) It is difficult to read that without coming to the conclusion that Mr. Giduck has experienced all manner of combat and dealt with a wide variety of combat wounds. I won't speculate on what kind of medical treatment he has actually performed.

Similarly on Pp 315-316 he asserts that "No matter the obstacles, close quarters shooting and hand-to-hand training must be developed to deal with realistic terrorist conditions. Every tactical team member must not only be an expert at both skills but at integrating the two seamlessly when bullets are flying. U.S. Special Forces have recently been turning to the Archangel Group for this new, combat essential system and law enforcement needs to as well." That last part reads as though he places Archangel above SF in terms of shooting skill to me. I can only imagine.

Curiously, according to socnet: "US Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School has no record of Mr. John Giduck certified to train any SF Soldiers in hand-to-hand combat or firearms." Thus this claim is contradicted by at least one site that was founded and is run by people with ties to the Special Forces community.  I also have all kinds of theories as to how this integrated weapons and hand to hand combat system might look.

It seems very important to him that his readers understand that he has an intimate familiarity with war. I have my doubts as to how well that would stand up to close scrutiny.