I had a soldiers mother tell me today that they (soldiers) are not allowed to keep letters and post cards.  After they are read they were to be destroyed.  I thought that was strange, so I ask why.  Her son told her that if the enemy was to invade, they did not want them having anything that could be used against them.  I found this odd. Is there any truth to this? 

I am not sure what his job in the military is.  But is this so?

I have seen this more than once on anysoldier.   They burn the boxes that have addresses on them for security reasons.

One of my soldier contacts sent an e-mail to all her supporters early last month saying that some Iraqi nationals working at her camp had been caught trying to leave the camp with a bunch of addresses off of letters and packages.  Not to freak you all out, but there is no way to do background checks on any of the non-American workers at the U.S. camps in Iraq or Afghanistan.  Soldiers are instructed to destroy the addresses from envelopes and packages, I don't know about destroying the actual letters themselves.  Not all of them remember or take the time to do so.

As scarey as the thought of some possible Al Queda infiltrator getting my address is, this will  NOT stop me from sending care packages to our troops.

'A life lived in fear is a life half-lived.' 

Lilly

I'm with you Lily!!!!! A few years ago, one of my soldiers told me the same thing. He said that insurgents will take the addresses and write to the people posing as the soldier to get information. I suppose like if you have written for a long while and talked about certain things they may say something similar to it by chance and then you say something not knowing thinking you are talking to your soldier and that could cause a problem. He did tell me he kept the letters though without addresses on them.

I'm not going to let them make me afraid either because if I do then they have won. I refuse to live my life like they want us to. I wish one would come knockin on my door I got something for them as I still have alotta adrenaline pumping

diana

What a horrible gut-wrenching notion!!!!

What about those Walls they have with all our pictures and kids drawings on them?  Maybe they cane be selective?  I always hope our letters reach more than just the one contact.

Diana:

I'm not going to let them make me afraid

Well said, Diana, although I think my perspective may be a little different.  I've never thought of the military as a group of people whose job it is to take all the risks on my behalf so that I can sit safely at home.  I can't think of any reason they should be at risk and I should not, just because they are in the military and I am not.

I think the job of the military is to protect our country, which is something entirely different than protecting me.  I think we are all responsible for protecting our country, whether we are serving in the military or not.  So, they may scare me, but I am not going to worry over any risk to myself when the risk faced by our soldiers is so much greater.

Mary:

To tell you the truth, I would rather not have an insurgent get hold of my name and address.  Perhaps I'm paranoid, but those guys are nutso.  Burning the boxes and letters makes sense to me, or at least the envelopes. 

Which is why I got a post office box for all of my soldier stuff 

I have sent the large bubble wrap envelopes per my soldiers request...Walgreens has them on sale occasionally for 3/$1.00...I think the soldiers send home letters and stuff like that in them... maybe they  send them home rather then destroy them....Just a thought...Pat

Heh. I'm not too worried. Heck, anybody can randomly open the phone book and pick out an address (well...not mine, lol, but still). I used to live in a terrible area of Arizona (murder a day! bars on the windows! oh boy!), so right now, even if my address were stolen by somebody overseas, I still feel WAY more safer than I did back then.

I can't really imagine what information they'd want...but that is an interesting thing to note. I hardly get physical letters, mostly email, but if someone asks me to write to a non-military address, I won't. I'm pretty secretive with my personal details anyway. ;)

I read a post just now that said they save ALL their letters and boxes, so they can respond as they have time.  I guess it just depends on the unit, and how deep in "bad guy country" they really are!

I do use a PO Box that I originally set up for my business though.  It was funny, one day I went to check the mail and my little niece was with me.  I commented that the box was empty, and she remarked "Well, that could be a good thing, right?"  I explained to her that the PO Box was only for "happy" mail--either soldier letters or people ordering stuff and sending money--all the BILLS still come to the street address!

Our paratroopers know our GPS coordinates... that way they can drop in some time if they are ever in the neighborhood.  

The guy I dated always destroyed my envelopes in an effort to keep me more secure.  I don't believe he was requested to do so, he was just being careful.

I wouldn't worry too much about it, though - the nationals in these countries would probably write from Bart Simpson or something *grin*. (reference to the Desert Storm radio announcer in Iraq...)

Regardless, I feel our troops would take care to protect their contacts, especially if they noticed envelopes were being removed from the trash by nationals.