In light of the recent landing of NASA’s Phoenix Mars Mission, let’s take a look at the eventuality of sending humans to the Red Planet. Half a century ago we looked to the military for our first group of astronauts (and yes, I’m sure the Soviets did as well).
It is time to look to them again for our first group of colonists to send to Mars. This time, however, it won’t be the fighter pilots like the Mercury Seven...but instead, the battle-hardened combat veterans:

“Here is an idea: Send battle-hardened, strong-minded soldiers and marines on the long trips into space. We are conditioned to live with the bare minimal (of) life’s necessities and are trained to be prepared for…the worst conditions that any environment could throw at us. Hell, me and my men will go, set up a colony somewhere and await colonists to arrive.”

And we don’t need to wait until the fight against Islamofascism to end to prepare these men and women for Mars. Doing it now would send a message to them that we will transcend their 7th-Century ideas on Life, the Universe, and Everything and move the Human Race forward.
A message they will, sadly, ignore only too happily.