Marine Who Put US Flag On Saddam Statue Depicts Scene

AP via Dow Jones | 4/10/03 | AP Staff

[BunnySlippers]

Marine Who Put US Flag On Saddam Statue Depicts Scene

NEW YORK (AP)--The Marine corporal who was seen around the world as he scaled a 40-foot statue of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad and covered the face with a U.S. flag called the event "a pretty crazy experience."

"I was just trying my best to get the chain around his neck and put the flag on his head," Cpl. Edward Chin, 23, said Thursday on ABC-TV's "Good Morning America."

Chin said he had second thoughts about what message the use of the flag might send the Iraqi people. Some said later it suggested U.S. occupation.

"At the moment, I was just doing what I was told to do by my commanding officer," Chin said. "I had to get the job done just like we've been doing out here in Iraq."

Chin was quickly ordered to take the U.S. flag down and replace it with an Iraqi flag. Moments later, the towering bronze statue was pulled down, and cheering Iraqis tore it to pieces.

"It was a pretty crazy experience watching the whole crowd," Chin said.

Chin and his family are ethnic Chinese from Myanmar, formerly Burma. They moved to the U.S. when Chin was 1 week old and live in Brooklyn. Chin joined the Marines in 1999 and is stationed at the Marine Corps Air/Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, Calif.

In New York, Chin's family - who hadn't seen him since Christmas - watched the events unfold on television.

"I thought, 'Oh, my son, you are making history, you are part of the Iraqis' liberation,"' said his father, Stanley Chin.

His fiancee, Anne Fu, said she knew Chin meant no disrespect when he put up the U.S. flag.

"He wanted to show the Iraqi people that they were free, that they were liberated, that the U.S. was there to help them and that Saddam is over," she said.

"I'm very proud of him," sister Connie Chin told WWOR-TV. "Here's a 23-year-old doing all these amazing things and representing America and representing it well, I think."

(END) Dow Jones Newswires
04-10-03 0957ET- - 09 57 AM EDT 04-10-03

[sauropod]

I just love that AP spin!

[TheConservator]

Assimilating immigrant in the best tradition of the American melting pot bump!

[BunnySlippers]

There is too much flak for placing the US flag on the statue. Our guys have been out in that desert, fighting, dying and getting wounded. They are Americans. It was a natural act.

[BunnySlippers]

Chin and his family are ethnic Chinese from Myanmar, formerly Burma. They moved to the U.S. when Chin was 1 week old and live in Brooklyn. Chin joined the Marines in 1999 and is stationed at the Marine Corps Air/Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, Calif.

In New York, Chin's family - who hadn't seen him since Christmas - watched the events unfold on television.

"I thought, 'Oh, my son, you are making history, you are part of the Iraqis' liberation,"' said his father, Stanley Chin.

Yes, good!

[LilRhody]

Sounds like the Chin's "get it".

Representing America in the best way possible

Wish the liberal media would "get it"

[Between the Lines]

[hellinahandcart]

Guy's from Brooklyn. :)

[rhombus]

Agreed. The "Arab World" needs to get over their arrogance - it's time they start attempting to understand the "American World".

[BunnySlippers]

Just think ... first generation American. Born in Burma. What a great American story!

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[3AngelaD]

Cpl. Chin's flag deployment was the moment I got up from my desk and danced around my office, to the consternation of many who were in the immediate vicinity and heard me screaming, "Yes! Yes! Yes!"

[Grig]

The CNN guy who was there said soon after the US flag was taken down it happened that 'there were no boos but not many cheers either'. So there were no boos at all, BUT THERE WERE SOME CHEERS. Of course, two minutes later it was 'no boos and no cheers' I have it on video and he said it at 6:46pm Baghdad time.

[Kevin Curry]

If this had been a flag that had been flown over the Pentagon on 9/11 (e.g., in the same manner as Congress's flag-to-constituents program) I would have expected Sgt Chin to have highlighted that fact in this interview. It's probably urban legend.

Doesn't matter. This Marine did nothing wring and he deserves no censure. He fought and place his life on the line to help liberate the Iraqis which is far, far more than Chirac, Schroeder, Putin, or ANY of his mad-dog salivating critics did.

[Lady Jag]

I guess some media think that only Iraquis are allowed to display the American flag?

[lsee]

My gosh, it took hours for that huge smile to fade from my face...I was grinning so hard my cheeks hurt! LOL! What a great moment. I taped it and watched it later...and STILL got excited watching it!

[NativeNewYorker]

BROOKLYN BUMP!!!!

[stars & stripes forever]

Cpl. Chin's flag deployment was the moment I got up from my desk and danced around my office, to the consternation of many who were in the immediate vicinity and heard me screaming, "Yes! Yes! Yes!"

Americans needed to put up that flag....enough of political correctness.

[MinuteGal]

I never thought I'd live to see the day when our boys hoisting the American Flag after a major victory would become the subjects of approbium. They should get medals for this act!

If they had raised the sissy-blue UN flag first, the despicable media would have been dancing in the streets.

Leni

[hripka]