No Greater Love by Erin McLear

No Greater Love

For all the men and womenâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;past, present and future, who have served or will ever serve this country. And to the people who love them.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Combat Rationalization of War. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 The Brotherhood. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Assault of the Senses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Gray Area Guilt. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Anger and Revenge Killing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Euphoria and the Stages of Killing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Committing Atrocities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Intimate Killing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 After Survivor Guilt. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 Experiencing PTSD. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 PTSD and Family Life. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 Hypervigilance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 Traumatic Brain Injury. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 Societal Support. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 Healing Three Gifts for Returning Veterans. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 For Eli by Andrea Gibson. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Preface In the Military, our soldiers and marines are called upon to stabilize nations around the world with peacekeeping operations in places many of us have never heard of prior to the deployment of American troops. This is a reality of the post-Cold War era. In the war against terrorism, warriors assault the remaining threat to democracy: global terrorism sanctioned and fostered by, and festering in, totalitarian nations. In Afghanistan, and around the world, warriors have been called to action to bring terrorists to justice for the murder of nearly 3,000 American citizens on September 11, 2001. When they complete this formidable task, and have routed out terrorism, we will have to rebuild those nations, as we will not be truly safe until they are democracies. To accomplish this, we need peace officers and peacekeepers. Warriors. Warriors to attack. Warriors to defend. Warriors to build, preserve, and protect. Do not limit, my brothers and sisters, the role of the warrior. The stress of combat debilitates far more warriors than are killed in direct, hostile action. It is in this toxic, corrosive, destructive domain of the Universal Human Phobia that we ask our soldiers and police officers to live, and to die. This is the realm of combat. Our warriors are the ones who create Americaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s foundation of safety. They sre the ones who face down the Universal Human Phobia, the most toxic, corrosive, destructive element that can impact our society. They are the foundation of the building, and if the foundation of the building crumbles, the building will fall.

In honor of Veteranâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s day, in November of 2010, Smith Magazine teamed up with the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) to collect six-word memoirs from veterans and families of veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars about the experience of coming home. The results prove to be more chilling, difficult, and inspiring than either organization could possibly imagine.

These stories, however, remain greatly unheard. Without acknowledgement and support, these veterans are floundering. This book aims to bring these stories, these experiences of war to the surface and to encourage you, the reader, to find respect and support for our troops in a time when they need it most.

THEY ARE THE EVIL Our workplace is not some sterile office or humming factory. It is a stretch of desolate highway in a vast and empty land. A guard tower burns in the background. Shattered bodies litter the ground around us. Vacant corpse eyes, bulging and horror-struck, stare back at us. The stench of burned flesh is thick in our nostrils. This was once an Iraqi Civil Defense Corps (ICDC) checkpoint, designed to regulate traffic in and out of Muqdadiyah, one of the key cities in the Diyla Province. Thanks

death was a man and his wife ripped open and

to a surprise attack laughed earlier in the

dismembered, their intestines strewn across

morning, it is nothing more than a funeral pyre.

shattered boxes of candy bars. The entire

We arrived too late to help, and our earnest

platoon hadn’t eaten in twenty-four hours. We

but untrained allies died horribly as the

stopped, and as we stood guard around the

insurgents swept over them. One Iraqi soldier

wreckage, we grew increasingly hungry. Finally,

took a direct hit from a rocket-propelled

I stole a few nibbles from one of the cleaner

grenade (RPG). All that’s left of him are his

candy bars. Others wiped away the gore and

boots and soggy piles of bloody meat splattered

fuel from the wrappers and joined me.

around the guard tower. That was three weeks ago. We’re veterans now, This is our workplace. We began to acclimate 1

proud that we can stomach such sights and still

to such horrors right after arriving in the

carry out our job. It is this misery that defines

country. While on our second patrol in Iraq,

us, that gives us our identity. It also cleaves

a civilian candy truck tried to merge with a

infantrymen apart from everyone else in

column of our armored vehicles, only to get

uniform. Some call it arrogance. So be it. We 2

run over and squashed. The occupants were

call it pride since we believe fervently in what

smashed beyond recognition. Our first sight of

we are doing.

1 In combat, there is often a breakdown

Moral distance, which takes into consideration the kind of intense belief in

mechanical buffer that permits the killer to

key method of removing one’s sense of

moral superiority and vengeful/vigilante

deny the humanity of his victim.

empathy and achieving this “emotional

actions associated with many civil wars.

withdrawal.” Again, some of the mechanisms that facilitate this process include: Cultural distance, such as racial and ethnic differences, which permit the killer to dehumanize the victim.

Social distance, which considers the

2 The primary psychological distance factor utilized in Afghanistan and Iraq was moral

impact of a lifetime of practice in thinking

distance, deriving from moral “crusades”

of a particular class as less than human in

against terrorism. Moral distance involves

a socially stratified environment. Mechanical distance, which includes the sterile Nintendo-game unreality of killing through a TV screen, a thermal

sight, a sniper sight, or some other kind of

in the psychological distance that is a

legitimizing oneself and one’s cause. It can generally be divided into two components. The first component is the determination and condemnation of the enemy’s guilt,

COMBAT RATIONALIZATION OF WAR

which, of course, must be punished or avenged. The other is an affirmation of the legality and legitimacy of one’s own cause. Moral distance establishes that the enemy’s cause is clearly wrong, his leaders are criminal, and his soldiers are either simply misguided or are sharing in their leader’s guilt. But the enemy is still a human and killing him is an act of justice rather than the extermination that is often motivated by cultural distance. 9

Numerous studies have concluded that

conducted with veterans clearly indicate

they think about him that he would rather

men in combat are usually motivated to

the strength of the soldierâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s concern for

die than let them down. That is the bond

fight not by ideology or hate or fear, but by

failing his buddies. The guilt and trauma

of the men and women who put their lives

group pressures and processes involving

associated with failing to fully support

on the line every day. Lose one and it is the

[1] regard for their comrades, [2] respect

men who are bonded with friendship

same as losing a spouse or a brother, and

for their leaders, [3] concern for their own

and camaraderie on this magnitude is

when it is a human who causes the loss of a

reputation with both, and [4] an urge to

profoundly intense.

fellow warriorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s life, it becomes personal.

contribute to the success of the group. 1 Countless sociological and psychological

2 Among men who are bonded together so intensely, there is a powerful process of

In addition to creating a sense of accountability, groups also enable killing

studies, the personal narratives of

peer pressure in which the individual cares

through developing in their members

numerous veterans, and interviews

so deeply about his comrades and what

a sense of anonymity that contributes

COMBAT THE BROTHERHOOD

THE BROTHERHOOD By the end of school, you have learned the ways of the Brotherhood. When you get the

1 No one takes the Long Walk lightly. Only after every other option is extinguished. Only after

Crab placed on your chest, you have thousands

robots fail and recourses dwindle. The last

of new brothers and a few sisters. They are

choice. Always.

unknown but loved. You will travel all over the world together, work together, drink together,

But when the choice comes, when the knife’s

laugh and cry and bleed and fight together. You

edge between folly and reason finally tips,

have a new family. They are all that will sustain you.

training affords a decisiveness to guide your higher purpose. Castleman went so Keener

The Long Walk. Armor on, girded with

didn’t have to. So Mengershausen didn’t have

breastplate and helm and leggings and collar.

to. So I didn’t have to. You take the Long Walk

Eighty pounds of mailed Kevlar. No one can

for your brother’s wife, your brother’s children,

put on the bomb suit alone; your brother has

and their children, and the line unborn.

to dress you, overalls pulled up, massive jacket tucked, earnest in his careful thoroughness. One last check, face shield down, and then into

2 No greater love does one brother have for another than to take the Long Walk.

the breach alone. There is no more direct confrontation of wills between bomber and EOD technician than the Long Walk. Donning the suit, leaving behind rifle and security, to outwit your opponent nose to nose. The lonely seeking of hidden danger. To ensure no more hazards lie in wait to snatch the next soldier to pass that way, the next EOD brother or sister, the next local shopkeeper or taxi driver or child playing in a garbage-laden sewer.

further to violence. Among groups in

killing process (thus diffusing his personal

warriors would tell of their fallen

combat, this accountability (to one’s

responsibility by giving each individual a

comrades: the noble deeds that they

friends) and anonymity (to reduce one’s

slice of the guilt), then killing can be easier.

sense of personal responsibility for killing) combine to play a significant role in enabling killing. Killing another human being can be an extraordinarily difficult thing to do. But if a soldier feels he is letting his friends down if he doesn’t kill, and if he can get others to share in the

Pain shared is pain divided, and joy shared is joy multiplied; that is the essence of the human condition. There has always been

had personally witnessed, the lessons in life that had been taught, and how their lives had been shaped by the life which was departed.

a time for remembrance, a time to touch on that which was good and fine about a fallen comrade. Across the centuries, in funerals, wakes and around the campfire, 11

VISCERAL HORROR The car bomb went off just outside of our FOB,

thrown by the force of the explosion. It yielded

in downtown Kirkuk, on the highway that leads

no clues; any wires, switches, batteries, or

north to Irbil and the peaceful Kurdish lands

fingerprints were burned away in the fire. We

untouched by the war. We felt it in the HAS, a

could have found traces of explosive residue if

shaking rumble like thunder on a clear hot day.

we had had the time. We didn’t have the time.

We had put our gear on and were waiting for

I looked up from the hulk and surveyed further

our security escort even before the call came

out. Chunks of steel frag were buried in a

in to go investigate.

nearby concrete wall. A fully intact artillery

The car had stopped burning by the time

and shape, failing to detonate and instead

projectile, a 130 or 155, probably, from the size we arrived. A twisted black shell, frame, and

kicked out by the blast, was caught in a fence

engine block smoldering, hot to the touch. The

a hundred feet away. We would grab that and

Iraqi Police had cordoned off the scene, yelling

blow it before we left.

at pedestrians to move back. The reverse 1 dichotomy always struck me. The scene of the

“It smells like shit!” I said. And it did.

blast, where so much violence had happened

“Sir, it always smells like shit in this country,”

minutes before, was now empty and quiet. The

answered Castleman.

surrounding neighborhood, peaceful until the attack, was now a roiling cauldron of

He was right. But this wasn’t the normal smell

frustration and anger.

of shit: diesel exhaust, burning trash, sweat,

Castleman and I started the investigation at the

city. We smelled that mix every day. No, this 2

blast hole. The asphalt punctured, wet with a

smelled like actual shit. Human shit.

and grime, the body odor of an unwashed

mix of fluids, some mechanical, some human. The car frame was several feet from the crater,

“Check this out,” called Castleman.

COMBAT ASSAULT OF THE SENSES

He had found the target of the car bomb.

the organ bag in the gut of a Thanksgiving

Bloody shirts and boots of Iraqi policemen.

turkey. It was beautiful, stuffed with the

A pair of pants, dropped or torn off, with

digested remains of an unknown last meal.

a month’s wages in frayed and scorched

Castleman walked over and looked down where

250-dinar notes poking out from a front pocket.

I pointed. The intestine smelled like it was

Hands and feet. Several pools of drying blood.

cooking in a pan.

The smell of shit was stifling, and getting worse. He shrugged. I shrugged back. A quick count of right hands indicated a couple dead, at least. Who knows how many wounded,

We walked off and left that shit-filled colon

pulled out by their fellow police, now dead or

to bake on the black asphalt in the hot Iraqi

dying at the overwhelmed hospital. The Iraqi

summer sun.

cops had already picked up the biggest parts, so any count we made was going to be wrong. It wasn’t worth the trouble to get the exact right number anyway. I continued on. The smell of shit was overwhelming in the afternoon heat. I looked down. “Hey, I found it!” I yelled to Castleman, who was taking pictures of the scene for evidence. There at my feet was a perfectly formed, and entirely intact, lower intestine. The small intestine above and anus below were torn off and scattered, but the colon itself was pristine, and lay there like I had just removed it from

1 Beyond fear and exhaustion in war is a sea

salt of blood and tears as you hold a dear

what he sees around him. It is as though

of horror that surrounds the soldier and

friend in mutual grieving, and you do not

every enemy dead is a human being he

assails his every sense.

know or care if it is the salt of your tears or

has killed, and every friendly dead is a

his. And see what hath been wrought.

comrade for whom he was responsible.

2 Hear the pitiful screams of the wounded and dying. Smell the butcher-house smells

Strangely, such horrifying memories seem

of feces, blood, burned flesh, and rotting

to have a much more profound effect

decay, which combine into the awful

on the combatant—the participant in

With every effort to reconcile these two responsibilities, more guilt is added to the horror that surrounds the soldier.

stench of death. Feel the shudder of the

battle—than the noncombatant (the

And yet, all of this, this horror, is just one

ground as the very earth groans at the

correspondent, civilian, POW, or other

of the many factors among those that

abuse of artillery and explosives, and feel

passive observer in the battle zone). The

conspire to drive the soldier from the

the last shiver of life and the flow of warm

combat soldier appears to feel a deep sense

painful field.

blood as friends die in your arms. Taste the

of responsibility and accountability for 13

KILLING IN A FOG We’re surrounded by coffins. Fresh wooden ones line both sides of the street. In places they’re piled two and three high. Nearby, an old man stoops over two boards as a he swings a hammer. I realize he’s building a coffin lid. More lids lie scattered on the street around him, blocking our path ahead. Cantrell orders us to dismount. Our vehicle’s ramp flops down and clangs onto the street. We sprint out into the brutal morning sun. Buildings still smolder. A battle-damaged house has already been gutted by men wielding sledge hammers. All around us, interspersed among the coffins, women cry and children stare into space. Old men, survivors of Saddam’s reign of violence, the war with Iran, and Gulf War I, regard us with hollowed eyes. We slowly make our way past the house we used as our casualty collection point the day before. Stacked out front are three caskets. I wonder if one of them houses the teenage kid I had to shoot.

In the middle of yesterday’s fight, my squad reached a gated and walled house. Sergeant Hugh Hall, our platoon’s stocky, door-crushing bruiser, smashed the gate and led the way into a courtyard. Just as we got inside, the face of the house suddenly exploded. A chunk of spinning concrete slammed into Hall and sent the rest of us flying for cover. A sudden barrage followed as three Bradley armored vehicles opened up with their 25-millimeter Buschmaster cannons in response to the explosion of the enemy rocket. As the highexplosive rounds tore up the area outside of the house, the din was so intense I could hardly hear. Over the radio, I made out Cantrell yelling— “Bellavia, give me a fucking SITREP.” Cantrell’s voice is the only thing that can rise above the cacophony of a firefight. He has a real gift there. Confused and dazed, I initially failed to respond. Cantrell didn’t like this. “BELLAVIA, ARE YOU FUCKING OKAY?”

COMBAT GRAY AREA GUILT

I finally found the wherewithal to respond. All I had heard was the Bradley fire, so I finally screamed back, “Stop shooting! You’re hitting our location.” “Hey asshole, that wasn’t us. That was a fucking RPG,” Cantrell’s voice booms through the radio. “And here comes another.” The top of a large palm tree in the courtyard suddenly exploded overhead. Cantrell and the other Bradleys immediately returned fire. Bits

this part of the city earlier in the fight. Not

of wood and burned leaves rained down on us.

everyone with a rifle was an enemy.

Hall, already covered with concrete dust, dirt,

The gunman on the roof was teenaged boy,

and blood, blurted out, “Would they kill that

maybe sixteen years old. I could see him

muthafucka already?”

scanning for targets, his back to me. He held an AK-47 without a stock. Was he just a stupid

“Get inside and take the roof,” I holler over our Bradley’s fire.

kid trying to protect his family? Was he one of Muqtada al-Sadr’s Shiite fanatics? I kept my eyes on him and prayed he’d put the AK down

The men moved for the door. As they forced

and just get back inside his own house. I didn’t

their way inside, I peered around the corner

want to shoot him.

and caught sight of a gunman on a nearby rooftop. I studied him for a moment, unsure

He turned and saw me, and I could see the

whose side he was on. He could be a friendly

terror on his sweat-streaked face. I put him in

local. We’d seen them before shooting at the

my sights just as he adjusted his AK against

black-clad Mahdi militiamen who infiltrated

his shoulder. I had beaten him on the draw. My own rifle was snug in my shoulder, the sight resting on him. The kid stood no chance. My weapon just needed a flick of the safety and a butterfly’s kiss of pressure on the trigger. Please don’t do this. You don’t need to die.

The AK went to full ready-up. Was he aiming

Sergeant Hall came up alongside me, saw the

at me? I couldn’t be sure, but the barrel was

AK and the boy, and finished him with four

trained at my level. Do I shoot? Do I risk not

shots to his chest. He slumped against the low

shooting? Was he silently trying to save me

rooftop wall.

from unseen threat? I didn’t know. I had to “Thanks, dude. I lose my zero,” I said to Hall,

make a decision.

explaining that my rifle sights were off-line, though that was the last thing going through 2

1 Please forgive me for this.

my mind. I pulled my trigger. The kid’s chin fell to his chest, and a guttural moan escaped his lips. I fired again, missed, then pulled the trigger one more time. The bullet tore his jaw and ear off.

1 Many kills in modern combat are ambushes

traumatic was that due to the nature of

represent a potential threat, then he has

and surprise attacks in which the enemy

guerrilla warfare, soldiers were often

entered the realm of murder (as opposed to

represents no immediate threat to the

placed in situations in which the line

a legitimate sanctioned combat kill), and

killer, but is killed anyway, without

between combatant and non-combatant

the rationalization process becomes quite

opportunity to surrender. Such a kill is

was blurred. Soldiers are forced to take

difficult. Even if he kills in self-defense,

by no means considered an atrocity, but

these kinds of actions, maybe even make

there is enormous resistance associated

it is also distinctly different from a noble

these kinds of mistakes, and they need,

with killing an individual who is not

kill and potentially harder for the killer

desperately, to have someone tell them

normally associated with relevance or payoff.

to rationalize and deal with. Until the

what they did was right and necessary.

twentieth century such ambush kills were extremely rare in combat. 2 One of the things that could make combat in Afghanistan and Iraq particularly

Being able to identify his victim as a combatant is important to the rationalization, which occurs after the kill. If a soldier kills a child, a woman, or anyone who does not

COMBAT GRAY AREA GUILT

THAT’S MY BROTHER I’m just about to move when it happens. Fitts

of fire. Properly trained infantry-men don’t

is crouched and shooting into the other side

do that in close combat except in desperate

of the compound when his right forearm snaps

circumstances. Faced with the loss of their

back violently. A spray of blood fills the air. He

leader, they have no choice but to turn their

doesn’t break stride. He takes two more steps,

weapons into lethal shower heads.

switches his rifle to his left hand and braces it under his armpit. He fires it like a child’s toy with his one good arm.

A shape appears in the doorway. Fitts fires at the insurgent, triggering his weapon now with his thumb and the ring finger of his opposing

Then his left arm jerks and slumps as another

hand. Sergeant Hall unleashes a volley as well.

bullet strikes him in the left bicep, right above

The enemy collapses in the doorway. Seconds

the elbow. His rifle tilts to the ground and

later, another takes his place. Contreras shoots

he triggers several rounds into the dirt. He

him dead with two well-placed rounds.

staggers, drops his rifle, and falls down. Ten feet behind Fitts, specialist Desean Ellis

The abandoned machine gun in the second-

spins backward and screams. Even from my

story window suddenly tilts down. I see

distant vantage point, almost a hundred meters

the movement and realize what it means.

away, I hear a terrible ripping sound, like

Somebody is manning the weapon now, and our

denim jeans being torn apart. A bullet has

men are in the open. I still have no clear shot.

hit him in the right quadriceps. As he spins

I can’t help. My stomach churns. I rage against

I can see a crimson stain on Ellis’s pants. He

my own helplessness.

crumples to the ground. The gun barks. Bullets erupts all around the Summoning reserves of strength, Fitts

squad. The men scramble for their lives. Fitts

retrieves his M4 rifle and regains his feet. He

has no chance. I see him double over as blood

pumps four or five quick shots into the house

fountains from his right knee, his third hit. He

as he stumbles forward. Behind him, his men

sags into the dirt, blood pooling around him.

go “cyclic” with their automatic weapons’ rate 1 I cannot believe what I’m seeing. Fitts, my closest friend, has been shot three times, and I’m powerless to help. Searing heat ripples down my spine. I lose feeling in my legs. I can’t move. I can’t think. All I can do is watch in horror. I think of Fitts’s wife. She’s back home pregnant with their third child. How am I going to explain this day to her?

1 The recent loss of friends and beloved leaders in combat can enable violence

been a recurring theme throughout history, 2 Among groups in combat, accountability and it needs to be considered in the overall

(to one’s friends) and anonymity combine

on the battlefield. The deaths of friends

equation of factors that enable killing on

to play a significant role in enabling killing.

and comrades can stun, paralyze, and

the battlefield. The soldier in combat is a

emotionally defeat soldiers. But in many

product of his environment, and violence

circumstances (which is one of the well-

can beget violence. This is the nurture side

known response stages to death and dying),

of the nature-nurture question.

the loss of comrades can enable killing. Revenge killing during a burst of rage has

COMBAT ANGER AND REVENGE KILLING

I can’t look but I have to.

barrel to assure that anyone who uses it again will only hurt themselves, I notice my entire

Fitts is lying facedown in the dirt about ten

boot is bathed in blood and gore.

meters from the house’s front door. Misa launches another 40mm grenade into the

By all rights, Colin Fitts shouldn’t even be in

machine-gun nest overhead just as two men

Iraq. Three bullet wounds is usually a ticket

charge out the front door.

to a medical retirement and a disability check. Not for Fitts. He flowed through the casualty

To my amazement, Fitts grasps his M4 again

pipeline from Diyala and Baghdad through

and opens fire. He still has plenty of fight left

Germany before landing at Walter Reed

in him.

Army Medical Center in Washington, DC. He stuck around stateside long enough to see his

I decide I need to move. I get to my feet and

third child born, then bullied his way back to

zig down an alleyway, then turn a corner. I

Germany where a friendly sergeant gave him a

stop short. I ‘ve come right up behind a man

pass on his PT test.

smoking a cigarette. His golden armband denoting membership in the Mahdi militia has

One summer day, he showed up again. There

fallen around his wrist.

was no fanfare, but I’ll never forget him

He doesn’t notice me. He’s preoccupied with

morale soared. Lieutenant Colonel Newell even

Mr. Ray-Ban on the roof only a few meters

decorated him with the Bronze Star for valor.

limping back into the company area. My

away. His back is to me. He casually continues to smoke, with his AK strapped over his right

The truth is Fitts should not be back with us.

shoulder. At first I think I’m hallucinating.

His body has not healed completely. He walks

Does this jackoff think there are unionized

with a limp. His arms ache. His leg is always

smoke breaks in battle?

stiff, and there are times I find him in great pain.

My weapon comes up automatically. I don’t even think. In the second it takes to set the

2 It is hard not to love a guy who will sacrifice this much for you.

rifle on burst-fire, my surprise gives way to cold fury. The muzzle makes contact with the back of his head. Fuck a zero. I can’t miss now. My finger twitches twice. Six rounds tear through his skull. His knees collapse together as if I’d just broken both his legs. As he sinks down he makes a snorting, piggish sound. I lower my barrel and trigger another threeround burst into his chest, just to be sure. He flops to the ground with a meaty slap. His head bobbles back and forth. He snorts again. I convince myself that this is the man who shot FItts , and I am roused to a full fury. His face looks like a bloody Halloween mask and I stomp it with my boot until he finally dies. While I spike his weapon, bending the

THE THRILL I take another look down the street.

1 I scream at the top of my lungs. It is a victory cry. I am euphoric. I have killed the enemy and

Never hit a man when he’s down? Bullshit.

survived. Infantrymen live on the edge. We are

Show me a better time.

It makes us feel more alive, more powerful.

Combat distilled to its purest human form is

We can use it or be victimized by it. We either

hyper alert, hyper aware of our own mortality. Death is ever-present, our constant companion.

a test of manhood. Who is the better soldier?

let the violence swallow us whole or it will

Who is the better man? Which warrior will

drive us insane.

emerge triumphant and which will lie in a heap in the street? In modern warfare, that man-

As infantrymen, our entire existence is a series

to-man challenge is often hidden by modern

of tests: Are you man enough? Are you tough

technology—the splash of artillery fire can

enough? Can you pull the trigger? Can you

be random, a rocket or bomb or IED can be

kill? Can you survive?

anonymous. Those things make combat a roll of the dice. Either you die or you don’t; your

Yes.

own skill doesn’t have a lot to do with it. But on this street and in these houses, it can be

I feel loose inside, like my vital organs

man-to-man. My skills against his. I caught him

have been rearranged by the euphoria that

napping and he died. That is how the game is

consumes me. I scream again. Battle madness

played. Tomorrow I might be the corpse in a

grips me. Combat is a descent into the darkest

heap on the street. But tonight I am alive, and I

parts of the human soul. A place where the

rejoice in that fact.

most exalted nobility and the most wretched baseness reside naturally together. What a man finds there defines how he measures himself for the rest of his life. Do we release our grip on our basic humanity to be better soldiers? Do we surrender to the insanity around us and ride its wave wherever it may take us? Yes. I embrace the battle. I welcome it into my soul. Damn the consequences later, I am committed, and there’s no road back.

When soldiers do kill the enemy, they

Cocking and taking the safety catch off of

thrill can be greatly magnified. For some

appear to go through a series of

this weapon is a complex process, but once

combatants, the lure of exhilaration may

emotional stages.

it is off the actual pulling of the trigger is

become more than a passing occurrence.

fast and simple.

A few may become fixated in this stage and

The actual kill is usually described as being reflexive or automatic. Usually killing in

1 The stage immediately following reflexive

combat is completed in the heat of the

killing is the exhilaration stage of euphoria.

moment, and for the modern, properly

The adrenaline of combat can be greatly

conditioned soldier, killing in such a

increased by another high: the high of

circumstance is most often completed

killing. What hunter or marksman has not

reflexively, without conscious thought. It

felt a thrill of pleasure and satisfaction

is as though the human being is a weapon.

upon dropping his target? In combat this

never truly feel remorse. Those who are truly fixated with the exhilaration of killing either are extremely rare or simply don’t talk about it much. There is a strong social stigma against saying that one enjoyed killing in combat.

COMBAT EUPHORIA AND THE STAGES OF KILLING

I cup my hands to my mouth and take a long breath. “You can’t kill me!” I rage into the 2 night, “You hear me fuckers? You can’t kill me! You will never kill me!” I am the madness.

2 If the demands from authority and the threatening enemy are intense enough to overcome a soldier’s resistance, it is only understandable that he feels some sense of satisfaction. He has hit his target, he has saved his friends, and he has saved his own life. He has resolved the conflict successfully. He won. He is alive! Subsequent kills are always easier, and there is much more of a tendency to feel satisfaction or exhilaration after the second killing experience, and less tendency to feel remorse.

THINGS I DON’T TALK ABOUT I am a Christian, but my time in Iraq has 1 convinced me that God doesn’t want to hear from me anymore. I’ve done things that even He can never forgive. I’ve done them consciously; I’ve made decisions I must live with for years to come. I am not a victim. In each instance, I heard my conscience call for restraint. I told it to shut the fuck up and let me handle my business. All the sins I’ve committed, I’ve done them with one objective: to keep my men alive. Those kids in my squad, those kids of mine, they are everything. My wife doesn’t understand this job or why I do it. My son is too young. My dad wouldn’t get it if I tried

to explain. My mom would have a heart attack. The need to keep my men alive makes everything else negotiable, and everyone and everything a potential threat. My mind flashes to April 9 again, when we burst into a house full of men, women, and children. I separated the men. The children screamed. The women sobbed hysterically. My squad found AKs and an RPK machine gun in closets around the house. They were still warm, and the men reeked of gunpowder. They laughed at our situation as our Bradleys fired and rockets boomed outside. One man waved his finger and mockingly lectured me. “Geneva Conventions. You must do good, Amreekee. You good Amreekee.”

In reality, the problem of distinguishing

enemy who fights to a “noble” death

becomes a noble enemy. But if at the last

murder from killing in combat is extremely

validates and affirms the killer’s belief in

minute he tries to surrender he runs a great

complex. If we examine atrocity as a

his own nobility and the glory of the cause.

risk of being killed immediately.

In the heat of the battle, however, it is not

Execution is defined here as the close-range

spectrum of occurrences rather than a precisely defined type of occurrence, then perhaps we can better understand the nature of this phenomenon.

really all that simple. In order to fight at

killing of an individual that represents

close range one must deny the humanity of

no significant or immediate military or

one’s enemy. Surrender requires quite the

personal threat to the killer. The close

Anchoring one end of the spectrum of

opposite—that one recognize and take pity

range of the kill severely hampers the killer

atrocity is the act of killing an armed

on the humanity of the enemy. A surrender

in his attempts to deny the humanity of

enemy who is trying to kill you. This end

in the heat of battle requires a complete,

the victim and severely hampers denial of

of the spectrum is not atrocity at all, but

and very difficult, emotional turnaround

personal responsibility for the kill.

serves as a standard against which other

by both parties. The enemy who opts to

kinds of killing can be measured. The

posture or fight and then dies in battle

COMBAT COMMITTING ATROCITIES

I couldn’t leave them in the house with one of my soldiers as a guard, as we were already short of men. I couldn’t leave them alone either, They would have shot us in the back as we left. I decided to flex-cuff them to their front gate, and return for them after the fight ended. But as we left the house and advanced

their home. I did it to keep the kids from

up the street, a wave of machine-gun fire

getting harmed, but also to deny their father 2

ripped over us. I looked back. The four men

a chance to say good-bye. My brothers who

had somehow broken loose from the gate and

died in the field got no such opportunity to say

were running for it in all directions. A Bradley

good-bye to those they loved, and I will afford 2

cut one down and as the 25mm shells hit him,

none to this man. I wanted him to die alone,

he exploded. His flex-cuffed arms spun across

shrouded in smoke, choking on his own blood.

the street and smacked to the pavement.

Their father, utterly despondent, stared at me

One bound insurgent started to crawl back to

with pleading eyes as the white smoke filled

his compound. A bearded man from another

the air around him. He died without another

house ran out to cut his flex-cuffs loose with

chance to see his children. I robbed him of his

large pruning shears. I moved into the open

final earthly joy. I delighted as I watched his

danger area and shot the rescuer repeatedly.

life ebb away. It felt just.

My rounds sparked off his shears as they shattered into pieces. Machine-gun fire raked the ground around us. The flex-cuffed insurgent doubled over, hit by an errant enemy bullet. Writhing in pain, he began to scream only feet away from his own house. His family heard him, and two sobbing children came out to see what had become of their father. I tossed a smoke grenade that scattered the children back to the safety of

There are many benefits reaped by those who tap the dark power of atrocity. One

1 Murder and execution can be sources of

He must deny the guilt within him, and he

mass empowerment. It is as if a pact with

must assure himself that the world is not

of the most obvious and blatant benefits

the devil has been made. In these execution

mad, that his victims are less than animals,

of atrocity is that it quite simply scares

situations strong forces of moral distance,

that they are evil vermin, and that what

the hell out of people. The raw horror and

social distance, cultural distance, group

his nation and his leaders have told him to

savagery of those who murder and abuse

absolution, close proximity, and obedience-

do is right.

cause people to flee, hide, and defend

demanding authority all join to compel the

themselves feebly. The term “terrorist”

soldier to execute, overcoming the forlorn

simply means “one who uses terror,” and

forces of his natural and learned decency

we don’t have to look very far—around the

and his natural resistance of killing.

world or back in history—to find instances of individuals and nations who have succeeded in achieving power through the ruthless and effective use of terror.

2 He must believe that not only is this atrocity right, but it is proof that he is morally, socially, and culturally superior to those whom he has killed. It is the

The soldier who does kill must overcome

definitive act of denial of their humanity.

that part of him that says that he is a foul

It is the ultimate act of affirmation of

beast who has done the unforgivable.

his superiority. 23

COMBAT COMMITTING ATROCITIES

3 What have I become? I am a killer now. I want to kill. I yearn to kill my enemies. Am I beyond redemption? I think about my soldiers again. I see their faces and think about when I was their age. They are ten times the men I was. Not at that age. I once was a meek boy with a cowardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s heart. Not here. Not anymore. Now I am a lost soul with hell on his shoulders. And I am coming.

And the killer must violently suppress any dissonant thought that he has done

3 Human life is profoundly cheapened by these acts, and the soldier realizes that

But we must not deny it. If we look around the world carefully we will find somebody

anything wrong. Further he must violently

one of the lives that has been cheapened

somewhere wielding the dark power of

attack anyone or anything that would

is his own.

atrocity to support a cause that we believe

threaten his beliefs. His mental health is totally invested in believing that what he has done is good and right. It is the blood of his victims that binds and empowers him to even greater heights of killing and slaughter. Those who choose the path of atrocity have burned their bridges behind them. There is no turning back.

The sheer horror of atrocity serves not only to terrify those who must face it, but also to generate disbelief in distant observers. Whether it is ritual cult killings in our society or mass murders by established governments in the world at large, the common response is often one of total disbelief. And the nearer it hits to home, the harder we want to disbelieve it.

in. It is a simple tenet of human nature that is difficult to believe and accept that anyone we like and identify with is capable of these acts against our fellow human beings. And this simple, naĂŻve tendency to disbelieve or look the other way is, possibly more than any other factor, responsible for the perpetuation of atrocity and horror in our world today. 25

I stagger backward, pain radiating from my groin The pain drives me into a fury. I realize I’ve dropped my rifle. I can’t see where it fell; the smoke is getting thicker, and it is so acrid my eyes start to water and burn. I leap at my enemy. Before he can respond I land right on top of his chest. A rush of air bursts from his mouth. I’ve knocked the wind out of him. I tear at my body armor and get it The Kill

opened. With my right hand on the sleeve that holds my five-pound front armor plate, I grab

The wounded Boogeyman stirs. He’s flat on his

the insurgent’s hair and ram his head forward,

back, but he still holds his AK in one hand.

jamming his chin into his chest. He’s pinned in place now. All I have to do is finish him.

I step forward and slam the barrel of my rifle down on his head. He grunts and suddenly

I beat him with the inside of my armor plate. I

swings his AK up. Its barrel slams into my jaw

smash it against his face again and again until

and I feel a tooth break. I reel from the blow,

blood flows all over the inside of my shirt. He

but before I can do anything he backhands me

kicks and flails and screams. Every scream

with the AK. This time, the wooden hand grip

gets cut of by another blow from the plate. He

glances off the bridge of my nose. I taste blood.

struggles under me. An arm lashes out. Fingers scratch my face. I ram the plate harder into

I back off and wield my M16 like a baseball

him. He keens and howls, yet he refuses to

bat. Then I step back toward him and swing

submit.

with everything I’ve got. The front sight post catches him in the side of the head. I wind up

Somebody answers him in Arabic. The voice

to hit him again, thinking that at the very least

comes from the roof above us.

I’ve stunned him. As I get ready to swing, his leg flies up from the floor and slams into my crotch.

Oh my God. My back is to the door, I don’t know where my weapon is, and there’s more coming down. “Shut the fuck up!” I bash his face again. Blood flows over my left hand and I lose my grip on his hair. His head snaps back against the floor. In an instant, his fists are pummeling me. I rock from his counterblows. He lands one on my injured jaw and the pain nearly blinds me. He connects with my nose and blood and snot pour down my throat. I spit blood between

The link between distance and ease of

illustrate the relative ease of long-range

defined as a range at which the killer is

aggression is not a new discovery. It has

killing. As we draw toward the near end of

unable to perceive his individual victims

long been understood that there is a

the spectrum, we begin to realize that the

without using some form of mechanical

direct relationship between the empathic

resistance to killing becomes increasingly

assistance—binoculars, radar, periscope,

and physical proximity of the victim, and

more intense. This process culminates

or remote TV camera. Killing done at this

the resultant difficult and trauma of the

at the close end of the spectrum, when

range is less resisted by soldiers and rarely to

kill. This concept has fascinated and

the resistance to stabbing becomes

never results in instance of psychiatric trauma.

concerned soldiers, poets, philosophers

tremendously intense, and killing with

and psychologists alike.

bare hands becomes almost unthinkable.

At the far end of the spectrum are bombing

The spectrum of the killing process begins

able to see the enemy, but is unable to

and artillery, which are often used to

at maximum range. “Maximum range” is

kill him without some form of special

“Long range” is defined as the range at which the average soldier may be

COMBAT INTIMATE KILLING

my teeth and scream with him. The two of us 1 sound like caged dogs locked in a death match. We are.

“Esqut! Esqut! Esqut!” I am hysterical now as I try to tell him to shut up in Arabic. He screams on. I hear footsteps on the roof. I do not have long.

He hits me again and I nearly fall off him. Somehow I hold on. I’ve got to slow him down

The Kevlar comes down again. This time I

or he’ll get the upper hand. I punch him in the

connect. It’s a crushing blow to his face. Blood

face; my fist meets gristle. Then I remember

splashes both of us. We’re slick with it. He

my helmet. I’ve still got my helmet on.

grabs my hair and tries to punch me again. I bash his face yet again with the Kevlar.

I yank my Kevlar off my head. My night-vision goggles go flying into the room. I don’t need

“Terra era me!” That’s my broken Arabic for

them anyway. With both hands I invert the

“stop or I’ll shoot”

helmet and crack his face with it. He shrieks with pain. I bring it up again, but he’s swinging

I’m not sure what I expected to accomplish

his head from side to side and I don’t aim my

with that. He claws and scratches at me. My

next blow well. The helmet glances off his

elbow burns. My jaw, mouth, and nose spew

shoulder and hits the floor. I can see that he’s

blood.

older than the others in the house. His hair is flecked with gray and he’s got age lines

1 My voice isn’t human anymore.

creasing his face. Neither is his. We’ve become our base, animal selves, with only survival instincts to keep us going. I slap one bloodied hand over his mouth and jam all my weight down on it. For the moment, it muffles his calls for help. “Es teslem! Es teslem! Es teslem!” I’m almost crying now as I tell him in Arabic to surrender. He thrashes and kicks. weaponry—sniper weapons, anti-armor

“La ta quiome!” My voice is just about gone.

missiles, or tank fire. Here we begin to see some disturbance at the act of killing, but snipers doctrinally operate as teams, and like maximum-range killers they are protected by the same potent combination of group absolution, mechanical distance,

He lashes out at me. He lands some blows, but my left hand never leaves his mouth. My right hand comes up. I see his eyes grow wide. He tries to shake his head, but I’ve pinned it in

and physical distance. Yet for all its

place. Like a claw, my right hand clutches his

effectiveness, there is a strange revulsion

throat. I feel his Adam’s apple in my grasp. I

and resistance toward this very personal,

squeeze, squeeze, squeeze.

one-on-one killing by snipers. 27

A choked scream—or was it a plea? I can’t tell. He kicks and bucks. His hands beat against me. I can’t get enough pressure on him. He’s still strong, still in the fight despite everything I’ve done. I cannot break his throat. I don’t have the strength. But I can’t take my left hand off his mouth. If I do, he’ll call for his buddy on the roof again.

“Esqut, esqut.” I whisper. Shut up.

“Midrange” is the range at which the soldier can see and engage the enemy with rifle

his victims as they die. Not having to look

permits—the trauma grows even worse,

at one’s victim should make this killing

fire while still unable to perceive the extent

since some of the psychological buffer

method that is largely free of trauma, if

of the wounds inflicted or the sounds and

created by a midrange kill disappears upon

the soldier does not have to look at his

facial expressions of the victim when he

seeing the victim at close range.

is hit. In fact, at this range, the soldier can still deny that it was he who killed the enemy. At midrange we see much of the euphoria stage. Even at midrange, the remorse stage can hit hard. If a soldier goes up and looks at his kill—a common 28

occurrence when the tactical situation

“Hand-grenade range” can be anywhere from a few yards to as many as thirty-five or forty yards and refers to the specific kill in which a hand grenade is used. A handgrenade kill is distinguished from a close kill in that the killer does not have to see

handiwork, and if it were not for those screams. The emotional trauma associated with a grenade kill can be less than that of a close-range kill, especially if the killer does not have to look at his victims or hear them die.

COMBAT INTIMATE KILLING

He opens his mouth under my hand. For a second I think this is over. He’s going to surrender. Then a ripping pain sears through my arm. He clamped his teeth on the side of my thumb near the knuckle, and now he tears at it, trying to pull meat from bone. As he rages against my right hand, his Adam’s apple still in my clutch, I feel one of his hands move under me. Suddenly, a pistol cracks in the room. A puff of gun smoke rolls over us. The bullet hits the wall in front of me. Where did that come from? Does he have a sidearm?

I lunge at him, putting all my weight behind

I cuff him across the face with my torn left hand. He rides the blow and somehow breaks my choke hold on him. I bludgeon his face. He tears at mine.

the blade. We’re chin to chin now, and his sour breath is hot on my face. His eyes swim with hate and terror. They’re wide and dark and rimmed with blood. His face is covered with cuts and gouges. His mouth is curled into a

2 We share a single question of survival: Which one of us has the stronger will to live? I pounce on him. My body splays over his and I drive the knife right under his collarbone. My first thrust hits solid meat. The blade stops, and my hand slips off the handle and slides down the blade, slicing my pinkie finger. I grab the handle again and squeeze it hard. The blade sinks into him, and he wails with terror and pain.

grimace. His teeth are bared. It reminds me of the dogs I’d seen the day before. The knife finally nicks an artery. We both hear a soft liquidy spurting sound. He tries to look down, but I’ve pinned him with the weight of my own body. My torn left hand has a killer’s grip on his forehead. He can’t move. I’m bathed in warmth from neck to chest. I can’t see it, but I know it is his blood. His eyes 2

The blade finally sinks all the way to the handle. I push and thrust it, hoping to get it under the collarbone and sever an artery in his neck. He fights, but I can feel he’s weakening by the second.

lose their luster. The hate evaporates. His right hand grabs a tuft of my hair. He pulls and yanks at it and tries to get his other hand up, but he is feeble. “Just stop! Stop…Just stop! Rajahan hudna,” I plead. Please truce. We both know it is just a matter of time.

1 “Close range” involves any kill with a projectile weapon from a point-blank range, extending to midrange. The key factor in close range is the undeniable certainty of responsibility on the part of the killer. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the term “personal kill” was used to distinguish the act of killing a specific individual with a direct-fire weapon and being absolutely

trauma occur at this range. “Where you

recognize that killing with a knife is

can hear ‘em scream and see ‘em die, it’s

significantly more difficult than killing

a bitch.” 2 Oftentimes the death inflicted on the enemy during a close-range kill is not instant, and the killer finds himself in the positions of comforting his victim in his last moments.

sure of having done it oneself. The vast

As we bring the physical distance spectrum

majority of personal kills and the resultant

down to its culmination point we must

with the bayonet affixed to the end of a rifle. Many knife kills appear to be of the commando nature, in which someone slips up on a victim and kills him from behind. These kills, like all kills from behind, are less traumatic than a kill from the front, since the face and all its messages and contortions are not seen.

He gurgles a response drowned in blood. His left hand grabs my open body armor. He pulls at the nothing inside my vest. His fingers scratch weakly against my ribs. It won’t be long. I keep my weight on the knife and push down around the wound in staccato waves, like Satan’s version of CPR. His eyes show nothing but fear now. He knows he’s going to die. His face is inches from mine, and I see him regard me for a split second. At the end, he says, “Please.” “Surrender!” I cry. I’m almost in tears. “No…” He manages weakly. His face goes slack. His right hand slips from my hair. It hangs in the air for a moment, then with one last spasm of strength, he brings it to my cheek. It lingers there, and as I look into his dying eyes, he caresses the side of my face. His hand runs gently from my cheek to my jaw, then falls to the floor. He takes a last ragged breath, and his eyes go dim, still staring into mine. Tears blur my vision. I can hardly see him now, but he looks peaceful. 3

Why did he touch me like that at the end? 3 He was forgiving me.

At hand-to-hand range the instinctive

he gained more than mechanical energy

shifted. Instead of shooting at a uniform

resistance to killing becomes strongest.

and mechanical leverage. He also gained

and killing a generalized enemy, now the

While some who have studied the subject claim that man is the only higher-order species that does not have an instinctive resistance to killing his own species, these

psychological energy and psychological

killer must shoot at a person and kill a

leverage that was every bit as necessary in

specific individual. Most simply cannot or

the killing process. In some distant part of

will not do it.

man’s past he acquired this ability.

hand-to-hand combat situations bring this 3 As men draw this near it becomes belief into question. Man has a tremendous

extremely difficult to deny their humanity.

resistance to killing effectively with his

Looking in a man’s face, seeing his eyes and

bare hands. When man first picked up a

his fear, eliminate denial. At this range

club or a rock and killed his fellow man,

the interpersonal nature of the killing has

COMBAT INTIMATE KILLING

At first I felt cheated. When I got home, I knew the signs to look for, the indicators that one is having trouble readjusting to American life. I even sought out those signs, secretly hoped for at least a few of them. Instead, the bulk of the horrors initially faded, and it was with a drop of regret that I saw them go. I had always heard combat was a life-altering event, and my pride wanted my experience to qualify. If a little jumpiness came with the mark, so be it. I had needed to go back, and now I needed it to count. Instead, as the homecoming parties ended, and the hangover faded, and I cut back on the cigarettes, life returned to a surprising normal relatively quickly. After a couple of months home, the slam of a car door no longer made me jump, and I didn’t look for IEDs on the side of the road while driving. I left the military, got my civilian job as a trainer, taught EOD technicians without flashbacks or distraction. The vigilance lapsed, comfort returned, and a sigh of relief eventually came unbidden. Perhaps I don’t measure up with those that came before after all, I thought. Perhaps it was only delusion or adrenaline in the moment that led me to believe so. You aren’t so special, Brian. This won’t be the defining episode you had hoped for. Time to move on with life. I guess I made it back in one piece. But I didn’t. I had a blown-up brain, a foot in a box, and Crazy lurking around the corner. I just didn’t know it yet.

AFTERMATH SURVIVOR GUILT

My Crazy was waiting for me, stalking, hiding

each day for the rest of the week, packed it in

in the shadows and on the edge of my vision. I

my carry-on bag on the airplane, and brought it

see it now, in retrospect. Some old habits that

home. Still the Crazy didn’t subside. I twitched

never did go away. Some memories that stayed

and gurgled all the way to the emergency room

fresh. Until one day, seemingly out of the blue,

when I could stand no more.

it surprised me walking down the street. I stepped off a curb normal. I landed Crazy.

1 I don’t deserve to be Crazy. Not that I’m too good for it, but rather not good enough. Not

There is no explanation for why I went Crazy

enough tours. Not enough missions. Not

when I did. I don’t know why that was my day.

enough bodies. Not enough IEDs. Not enough

Nothing had happened. I had been out of the

near misses. No friend dead in my arms. No

military for over two years. I had been home

lost limbs. No face exploding in my rifle scope.

for even longer. The wars continued without

Plenty of other guys did more, endured more,

me: brothers deployed, came home, died,

and came home in worse shape. They deserved

survived. Shouldn’t I have gone Crazy when

it, not me.

Kermit died? When Jeff died? But I didn’t. My day was February 6th, in the Pearl District, in

I’m still scared of the soft sand. I didn’t

Portland, Oregon. The day my chest swelled

earn Crazy.

and never released and my overactive mind eradicated all sensible thought and temperance.

What did I assume it would be like, once I

The day I went Crazy.

came home?

The strangeness of the feeling struck me first,

A Goldilocks state of solemn pride.

then the discomfort, the unease. I continued up the street, among the trendy shops and bars.

Remembering those that came before, telling

My eye was twitching by the time I sat down

the story of their valor, a satisfaction in having

for dinner in a McMenamins restaurant. Three

done my part, and a successful life to follow. A

beers and dinner and the Crazy feeling didn’t

single tear at the Veterans Day parade once a

subside. It followed me to bed in my hotel

year, and otherwise, dignity and bearing and

room, kept me awake past midnight, and then

no more.

greeted me before dawn. Beyond unsettled, beyond distracted. I took it to work teaching

2 The combat soldier appears to feel a deep

1 The first response of most people upon

with guilt because no one ever told him

seeing sudden, violent death is relief;

that the normal response of most people

they are relieved that it did not happen to

upon seeing violent death is to focus on

for what he sees around him. It is as though

them. Say a soldier’s partner or buddy is

themselves, and to feel relief. His midbrain

every friend dead is a comrade for whom

sense of responsibility and accountability

killed and his first thought is, “Thank God

is in charge—the part concerned about his

he was responsible. It is not unusual for the

it wasn’t me.” Later, when he reflects on

survival—and it sends out a message, “Hey,

survivor to think that he was spared at the

his first response, how do you think that

that could have been me.”

expense of another and feel a heavy sense

will make him feel? Guilty. He is consumed

of debt to the one who is gone. 35

AFTERMATH SURVIVOR GUILT

I managed no such balance. Instead, I vacillated

That thought leaves me stricken with grief. I

from breezy inattention to the inescapable

know now is not the time to mourn. We have a

rush of Crazy. What I would give for the initial

battle to win, and I must repress the pain to be

flippancy again.

able to do my job. My mind torments me with images of Faulkenburg in that street. At times 3

Emerson was right. Life does consist of what

like these, a good imagination becomes your

you spend your whole day thinking of. I think

worst enemy.

of the Crazy all day now, either in the forefront of my mind, or as a shadow that follows me,

If they can kill Sergeant Major Faulkenburg,

always there if looked for. The life of the

how have I survived? He was so much more

mind used to be a joy but now it is a cursed

skilled than I, so much more experienced

downward spiral, the Crazy feeding on itself,

than almost every other soldier out here. Is

growing and amplifying unless I run it into the

this more about luck than skill? If it is, we’re

ground or meditate it away. I can’t exercise or

all only one bullet away from Faulkenburg’s

practice yoga all day, and so the Crazy creeps

undeserved fate.

back, first one intrusive thought, then another, until it writhes again at full boil.

I dwell on that for a while, and ache with vulnerability. Life seems so perilous, so fragile

If life is what I think about all day and I’m

now—I just don’t understand how he can die

Crazy all day then my life is now Crazy.

while I survive. For the first time since we entered the city, I am forced to recognize

2 Faulkenburg was our first Angel, the first

my own mortality. In doing so I get a glimpse

American to die by enemy fire in the Second

of what Fitts must have been going through

battle of Fallujah.

all along.

Was Faulkenburg’s body the one I saw in the

Does Fitts face these thoughts every night?

street last night at the breach? Was he among the dead I saw the Iraqis cover up and carry

April 9 must still prey on him in the darkness.

away? Did I witness his last moments and not

I’m sorry I ever ragged him about it.

even realize it? The mortars fall. The man-eating dogs bay. The night never ends.

Some survivors make every effort to stay in the shadows to avoid drawing attention

3 If a soldier is a survivor and does not proceed carefully, there is two ways

to the fact that they survived. Some may

he can spin out of control: through

feel some distorted sense of not being

inappropriate aggression towards other

worthy, and that their daily concerns are of

and inappropriate aggression towards

little matter; they may even feel guilty for

himself. Soldiers must guard themselves

having needs at all. Survivor guilt can be

against both.

extraordinarily toxic. 37

AFTERMATH EXPERIENCING PTSD

What is the Crazy like? How does it actually feel? Do you remember the last week of school before summer vacation? How it felt as a kid to be almost done for the year, but not quite? The only thing standing between you and You are sitting at a small desk, bathed in

summer is this exam, and there are only three

sunlight, by a wall of windows, one open to let

of you left in the classroom. Everyone else is

in the waning cool breeze. Your armpits begin

finished and gone, completed their tests for the

to moisten in the still classroom air, and a

summer, but you remain as time runs out. The

single drop of sweat forms on your forehead

American history exam swims before your eyes.

as the school starts to heat. Lawn mowers buzz

The gulfs of Mexico and Tonkin blend together.

in the distance, and you get the first smell of

How can you take this exam when every atom

summer: cut grass on a warm day. It smells like

in your body screams to escape outside into

soccer games, catching crawfish in the creek,

the sunshine? You long to run and play, though

and dreaming of sneaking off to kiss your

you haven’t played in years. You take the exam

middle-school crush behind the big oak tree in

as quickly as possible; the goal becomes to

the neighborhood park. It smells like playing

simply finish, and the grade is secondary. Your 1

street hockey with your best friend all day

heart pines for the fresh air, and your chest

long until his mom calls you inside to stay for

fills until ready to burst. You have to finish...

dinner. It smells like girls in short shorts and

this…exam …now.

bikini tops. It smells like you’ve waited nine long months to smell that smell. It smells perfect.

My Crazy is just like that. Except, when you do finally finish the test, hand it in, sprint from the exam room, grab your book bag and run outside…there is no relief. There is no 1 relaxation. You feel no different. You’re just Crazy in the god damn sunshine. Every day. All the time.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of

is that the veteran experiences the

Victims of PTSD have been known to treat

Mental Disorders defines Post-Traumatic

symptoms of the disorder over a period of

persistent symptoms of increased arousal

Stress Disorder (PTSD) as a reaction to a

at least one month, no matter how long

by self-medicating, through alcohol or

psychologically traumatic event outside

after the incident has occurred.

drugs, often leading to severe depression.

the range of normal experience. The disorder may be especially severe or longer lasting when the stressor is of human design. 1 To be at risk for PTSD, one must be exposed to a traumatic incident in which two things occur. First, the incident must be a life and death event that involves actual or threatened death or serious injury to themselves or others. The second element is for one to respond to the exposure with intense fear, helplessness, or horror.

Although Castner’s symptoms surfaced

Depression also occurs when a

a substantial amount of time after his

combatant’s well of fortitude dries up.

return from Iraq, he still experienced them

Reactions to a host of stressors suck the

consistently for months, which indicates

will and life out of a man and leave him

that they were severe enough to classify

clinically depressed. The opposite of

as PTSD.

courage is cowardice, but the opposite of

2 Difficulty falling asleep is one of the persistent symptoms of increased arousal

fortitude is exhaustion. When the soldier’s well is dry, his very soul is dry.

that wasn’t present before the trauma as

In the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual

defined by the Diagnostic and Statistical

of Mental Disorders, to be diagnosed with

Manual of the American Psychiatric

PTSD, one must persistently re-experience

Another characteristic of a veteran with

Association, that can be an indicator of

a traumatic event. This can happen

PTSD as established by the Diagnostic and

PTSD in a patient.

Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders

through recurrent, intrusive, distressing recollections of the event or intense 39

I am sitting in my Old Counselor’s tiny office at the VA hospital in Buffalo. She looks sad.

2 I lie in bed blown up like a balloon, my chest distended and full. The Crazy feeling has filled

And concerned. She always looks concerned.

me to the brim in the darkness of my bedroom,

I’ve just related how the Crazy feeling expands

alone next to my sleeping wife. My left arm

when I stand in line at McDonald’s. And in

has gone numb again, left eye twitching as I

airports. Definitely alone in airports. In an

attempt to close it. The gurgling in my back is

unknown crowd, the need to move away…

growing, first low, then on my upper left side. My heart beats loud, hard, sporadic. I miss a

The Crazy feeling hasn’t stopped since that

beat. Speed up, catch up. Miss two. A catch-

day, the day I went Crazy. It’s been four months

up again. The more I miss the more the Crazy

now. It never gets better; it never goes away.

feeling grows.

But it does get worse. 3 High, full, boiling sea. My Old Counselor is scribbling on her pad as I am telling the story of trying to get some

I sit up, turn my feet over the side of the bed,

lunch while out on the road on a job in Texas.

and just try to breathe. My lips tingle and my

“Triggers,” she writes on the off-green top-

head spins. My wife has found me on the floor

bound spiral legal pad. What does “triggers”

before, face to the pine, a divot on my forehead

mean? I doubt she is talking about the one on

where I hit the dresser corner on the way

the rifle I have strapped to my chest, snugged

down. I lie back down to avoid a repeat.

up tight to my right shoulder.

My heart bumps, skips, and gurgles. My jaw aches and I check again for loose teeth. My

“I wasn’t sure before,” she says, “but I am now.” “What are you sure of?” I ask. I fidget with

eye twitches. And again. The Crazy feeling builds and builds. It never stops, it never ends,

my flip-flops. I have a bad feeling I know

there is no relief. My helium chest is light as

the answer.

a feather. The weight of the ceiling is a granite

“You have PTSD,” she says.

block pushing my chest into the bed.

Fuck. I am Crazy.

What the fuck is happening to me?

psychological distress at exposure to

crying fits or fits of extreme anxiety or

swings. One often noted response is Ganzer

internal or external cues that symbolize or

terror. There will also be such somatic

syndrome, in which the soldier will begin

resemble an aspect of the traumatic event.

symptoms as hypersensitivity to sound,

to make jokes, act silly, and otherwise try

increased sweating, and palpitations. Such

to ward off the horror with humor and

fatigue cases set the stage for further and

the ridiculous.

In this case, Castner relives only memories from his experiences in the war and responds largely to external cues, such as his boots or his gun. Manifestations of Psychiatric Casualties Fatigue Cases This state of physical and mental exhaustion is one of the earliest symptoms. Increasingly unsociable and overly irritable, the soldier loses interest in all activities with comrades and seeks to avoid any responsibility or activity involving physical or mental effort. He becomes prone to

more complete collapse. If the soldier is forced to remain in combat, such collapse becomes inevitable; the only real cure is evacuation and rest. 3 Confusional States Fatigue can quickly shift into the psychotic

Conversion Hysteria Conversion hysteria can occur traumatically during combat or posttraumatically, years later. Conversion hysteria can manifest itself as an inability to know where one is or to function at all,

dissociation from reality that marks

often accompanied by aimless wandering

confusional states. Usually, the soldier

around the battlefield with complete

no longer knows who he is or where he

disregard for evident dangers. Upon

is. Unable to deal with his environment,

occasion the soldier becomes amnesiatic,

he has mentally removed himself from

blocking out large parts of his memory.

it. Symptoms include delirium, psychotic dissociation, and manic-depressive mood

AFTERMATH EXPERIENCING PTSD

I sit on the couch at home, dark night filling the picture window behind me, Crazy sloshing in my chest. I stare at the bottles in front of me. Twitch. The left eye has been bad today. My relief is spread across the tabletop. I start drinking as early as I can now, as early as I can justify it. Not every day, but more and more. On the days when the left eye is twitching at its worst, it consumes all thoughts beyond the boiling Crazy. And today is the worst yet. Fluttering and jerking, a pounding pulse under the eyebrow and swish of the lower lid. I’m an animal driven

mad by relentless distraction, not of buzzing insects but of my own body betraying me. Uncontrollable. Intolerable. Just like the Crazy feeling. A couple after lunch. Two bottles of beer before dinner. Twitching through my spaghetti. Two more during dishes. I start to help with the children’s baths, then give up as my eye distracts me from differentiating between the soap and the shampoo. Twitch. Another bottle before the hockey game. Twitch. To the couch and more beer. Twitch. Twitch. I don’t notice that my wife has already gone to bed. I sit now, alone, and open another. The number of empty beer bottles on the coffee table is growing. Twitch. Twitch. 5 Please let it stop. Twitch. I quickly finish and stumble slightly as I put the glass down. The spinning room slows my eye and pounding heart both. Twitch. Crazy. Twitch.

The last beer in the carton. How pathetic would I look to my brothers now? How would I explain it? Drinking to keep my eye from vibrating out of my skull. Alone in the dark. And scared. Twitch. Stillness. A fall. And then nothing. My brain has been torn and ripped by explosions, memories of my children stolen or faded, blown apart in each blast. So how do I remember every inch, every second of the move to a call? I am surrounded by reminders. They come unbidden, springing to mind. Every pair of boots I own are sandy. My rifle is always waiting for me. My childrenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s first steps are my walk to the truck.

Often, hysteria degenerates into convulsive

rest, degenerating into an inability to

and so on cannot be controlled. Eventually

attacks in which the soldier rolls into fetal

concentrate. When he can sleep or rest,

the soldier is likely to take refuge in some

position and shakes violently. A soldier

the soldier is often awakened by terrible

type of hysterical reaction that allows him

may become hysterical after being knocked

nightmares. Ultimately the soldier

to escape psychic responsibility for his

out by a concussion, after receiving a near

becomes obsessed with death and the

physical symptoms.

miss, Hysteria can also show up after a

fear that we will fail or that the men in

wounded soldier has been evacuated to

his unit will discover that he is a coward.

a hospital or rear area. Once he is there,

Generalized anxiety can easily slip into

hysteria can begin to emerge, most

complete hysteria. Frequently anxiety

often as a defense mechanism against

is accompanied by shortness of breath,

returning to fight. Whatever the physical

weakness, pain, blurred vision, giddiness,

manifestation, it is always the mind that

vasomotor abnormalities, and fainting.

produces the symptoms, in order to escape or avoid the horror of combat.

5 Obsessional and Compulsive States

Character Disorders Character disorders include obsessional traits in which the soldier becomes fixated on certain actions or things; paranoid trends accompanied by irascibility, depression, and anxiety, often taking on the tone of threats to his safety; schizoid trends leading to hypersensitivity and

These states are similar to conversion

isolation; epileptic character reactions

hysteria, except that here the soldier

accompanied by periodic rages; the

These states are characterized by

realizes the morbid nature of his symptoms

development of extreme dramatic

feelings of total weariness and tenseness

and that his fears are at their root. Even so,

religiosity; and finally degeneration

that cannot be relieved by sleep or

his tremors, palpitations, stammers, tics,

into a psychotic personality. What has

4 Anxiety States

AFTERMATH EXPERIENCING PTSD

happened to the soldier is an altering of his fundamental personality. The key understanding to take way from this litany of mental illness is that within a few months of sustained combat some symptoms of stress will develop in almost all participating soldiers. A nation must care for its psychiatric casualties, since they are of no value on the battlefieldâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;indeed, their presence in combat can have a negative impact on the morale of other soldiersâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and they can still be used again as valuable seasoned replacements once theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve recovered from combat stress.

There are two of me now. The logical one watches the Crazy one. The The Crazy one one Crazy The Crazy Crazy one one The Crazy one is living the life. The The Crazy The Crazy one one wakes up, and wonders if today I will be Crazy. And the answer is always yes. The The Crazy Crazy one one dresses the kids, packs lunches, drives them to school. The TheCrazy Crazyone oneshowers, eats, cleans. The The Crazy Crazy one one flies to work, trains soldiers, flies home. The The Crazy Crazy one one sleeps next to my wife, goes to hockey practice, checks math homework. The The Crazy Crazy one one runs and runs and runs. The Crazy one is always Crazy. The Crazy one But the logical one can step back and observe. The logical one watches, waits, comments. The

But the logical one is powerless, trapped, a

logical one knows there is another way. Knows

shade looking over the shoulder of the Crazy

that this life is not a life. Knows I used to

one frantically whirling. It can only watch, as

enjoy things, even some of the things Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m doing

my chest fills, and my stomach boils, and my

now. Knows that there must be a cure for the

head comes off, and I simply endure from

Crazy. Knows that the Crazy must not always be,

minute to minute.

simply because it is right now, at this moment. There was a time before the Crazy. The logical one knows there must be a time after.

In the darkness of my bedroom, at night, when I try to fall asleep, the top of my head comes off. My chest fills and floats, the ceiling crushes down, and my head cracks open. In a clear line, from temple to temple, around the back of my skull, it lifts free. I can feel it release and open. The spider crawls off the back of my head and runs to the ceiling. I feel every leg detach, as the body forms from the rear cranial knob, and the massive gray hairy spider runs across space and walls and over the foot sitting in a box in a corner. Living with the Crazy feeling is intolerable. When I awake in the morning, I open my eyes and try not to move. It is the only time all day that the Crazy feeling is not overwhelming and all powerful. It hasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t had time to build throughout the day, and for a brief second, it lies still. I wish my whole day could be that first split second.

AFTERMATH PTSD AND FAMILY LIFE

The Crazy feeling distracts from every action, poisons every moment of the day. It demands full attention. It bubbles, and boils, and rattles, and fills my chest with an overwhelming unknown swelling. My misery compounds. Instead, my first thought is always the same. Will I be Crazy today? Will Will I be ICrazy today? Will today? I be Crazy today? be Crazy Will Itoday? be Crazy today? Will I beWill Crazy I be Crazy today? Will I be Crazy today?

I wake every morning hoping not to be Crazy. Every morning I am. I grind through. Month follows month.

And the answer is always “yes” before my feet hit the floor, children screaming, wife

This is my new life. And it’s intolerable.

rushing to dress for work, my day an agonizing marathon of eye twitches, rib aches, heart

I can’t do this.

gurgles, and chest fullness until I can struggle back to oblivion again, in that bed, eighteen hours later.

I am alone in my full bed. Alone with the Crazy, in the bed where the spiders crawl out of my head and the ceiling presses down to crush

When I make breakfast for the children, I feel Crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. feel crazy. When I drive them to Ischool, I feel Crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy.

me. Always bubbling, always boiling, always intolerable, the Crazy feeling swells me to bursting again. I’m crawling out of my skin. It’s been three and a half months now. The Crazy hasn’t let up yet.

When I sit in front of the computer, fixing PowerPoint slides, I feel Crazy.

My wife rolls over and pretends to be asleep. We have gone to bed without speaking. Again.

When I wait for dinner to finish cooking,

She is wearing a yellow T-shirt as a nightgown,

I feel Crazy.

the words “Kirkuk, Iraq” emblazoned across

I feel crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. When I get on a plane, I feel Crazy. I feel I feel crazy.crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. feel Crazy. crazy. When the foot sits in the box, II feel I feel crazy. I feel I crazy. feel crazy. I feel crazy. When I read my children a book before bed, I feel crazy. I feel crazy. I feel Crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. I feelI crazy. feel crazy. When I lie next to my wife at night, II feel feel Crazy. crazy. I feel crazy. I feel crazy. And then I fall asleep and do it all over again.

the front in bold black letters. You get a T-shirt

Why?

for everything now. Running a race. Opening a bank account. Giving blood. Elbowing your neighbor to catch a shot from a pop-gun at a minor-league baseball game. I even have one for fighting the Battle Creek forest fire in South Dakota. A T-shirt for a forest fire. Why not one for fighting a war? My wife is alone in our full bed too. Her husband, the father of her children, never came back from Iraq. I died in Iraq. The old me left for Iraq and never came home. The man my wife married never came home. The father of my oldest three children never came home. If I didn’t die, I don’t know what else to call it. I liked the old me, the one who played guitar, and laughed at dumb movies, and loved to read for days on end. That me died from a thousand blasts. Died covered in children’s blood. Died staring down my rifle barrel, a helpless woman in the cross hairs and my finger on the trigger. 1 That me is gone. The new me is frantic and can’t sit still. The new me didn’t laugh for a year. The new me cries while reading bedtime stories to my

1 Not only is the soldier impacted by post traumatic stress disorder, but so are the soldier’s spouse and children as the soldier begins to lose interest in the things he used to enjoy. In an effort to control his bubbling and boiling emotions, the soldier shuts them off, or at least believes he does.

just the bad emotions, so instead they are all shut down. This means the veteran can no longer experience joy or happiness because he has become controlled. 2 With his emotions walled in, he feels detached and even estranged from others. Although he has loving feelings

The reality is that the soldier builds a wall

for his family and close friends, he cannot

around these feelings. The fear and anxiety

communicate with them. He cannot say

still bubbles and boils, but they are now walled in. The soldier cannot shut down 46

“love” because it cannot climb over the height of his walls.

AFTERMATH PTSD AND FAMILY LIFE

children. The new me plans to die tomorrow. The new me runs almost every day, runs till knees buckle and fail. The new me takes his rifle everywhere. The new me is on fastforward. The new me is Crazy. The new me has a blown-up Swiss-cheese brain, and doesn’t remember all of the old me. But he remembers enough. Enough to be ashamed. Enough to miss the old me. Enough to resent the old me. Resent the way everyone mourns him, while I am standing right in front of them. 2 Do you remember when Daddy used to? That daddy is gone. He doesn’t do those things anymore. Do you remember when we used to be happy? Husband isn’t happy anymore. Maybe my wife should pull out the letter I left for my sons and read it to them. Maybe it would explain why Daddy didn’t come home. When you go to war, and die, and come home Crazy and with a ragged brain, you get to watch your family carry on without you. Everyone longs for the old me. No one particularly wants to be with the new me. Especially me.

AFTERMATH HYPERVIGILANCE

I am at home, sitting on the landing on the

So I sit at the top of the stairs, with my rifle,

second floor, staring down the narrow, quiet

and wait. I have picked a good spot. The narrow

flight of stairs below me. My new son is

staircase has created a funnel, a choke point,

sleeping in his crib in his blue room behind

where I can kill anyone coming up to the

me. He is three days old. Tiny and pink

second floor.

and perfect. And helpless. Totally helpless. Someone could wring him like a rag and pull

My son is defenseless so I will defend him. I sit,

him limb from limb. Someone could pinch a

and wait, and finger my rifle, and watch, all night.

little skin on his fat belly, twist and tear, and gut him like a shot duck. They could shake him until his head tore from his neck. 1 The Crazy stirs, and shows its spidery head. That can’t happen. I won’t let it happen. No one will kill my son.

1 In a veteran, the midbrain, or the unconscious mind, has learned to

A warrior should be vigilant and alert—he should be the one who sits with his back

bypass logical thought process and

against the wall. However, this unabated

has established conditioned reflexes,

tension, which begins as a psychological

or sympathetic nervous system (SNS)

issue, can cause long-term physical health

responses, instantly, without having to

problems as his endocrine system pours

be told to do it. This is a powerful survival

out a steady stream of hormones and other

mechanism in combat. However, Castner’s

chemicals, attacking the body over a period

reflexes have carried over into his personal

of years.

life and relationship with his child.

The medical doctors and researchers first noticed the phenomenon in Serbia and Bosnia,

1 The soldiers had a new kind of wound, a kind not previously recognized because no victim

following the war in the early 1990s, the first

that had ever received one survived long

conflict in which modern western armies with

enough to tell about it. The name for this new

modern armor and equipment met modern

condition? Blast-induced Traumatic Brain Injury.

western medicine. Soldiers on both sides survived explosive detonations that would have killed in World War II, Korea, or Vietnam. Body armor and helmets caught frag, armored vehicles survived blasts, and soldiers walked away seemingly unhurt from what would have been death sentences two decades before. But they were not unhurt. The symptoms of their injuries only appeared later. Doctors in Serbia noticed odd combinations of complaints from veterans of the Balkan War in the old Yugoslavia. Headaches that wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t go away. Lost memories, or challenges forming new ones. Personality changes. The inability to make a decision or solve problems. Sleeping disorders, insomnia, or nightmares. Some had mild complaints that merely hindered daily life. Some could barely function at all.

1 Traumatic Brain Injury has been called the signature injury of the Iraq War. Many troops return from service suffering from PTSD from the incident that lead to this Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). 2 Blast waves tear up memories and functions. They leave holes where a soldierâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s identity used to be. He loses parts of his past and has trouble retaining the present or remaking a future. The strong, capable soldier loses the ability to sleep,

AFTERMATH TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY

TBI had previously been known to aging

human tissue—it moves at a speed related to

football players, boxers, or victims of car

the density of the material through which it

accidents and falls from high places. In

is traveling. Air is not dense, and so the blast

each of those cases a concussion occurred, a

wave moves relatively slowly, though still

condition familiar to doctors and lay people

several thousand feet per second, depending on

alike. During a concussion the brain slams into

the type of explosive used to produce the blast

the interior of the skull, either because a hard

wave initially. Concrete walls and fluid filled

object struck the skull directly, or because

organs are dense, however, and the blast wave

the skull was moving very quickly and then

speeds up in these materials. The damage to

came to a sudden stop. The initial symptoms

the material, and thus the body, comes at the

of concussions are well known: headaches,

barrier between dense and airy substances.

vomiting, disorientation. The long term effect, concussion-induced TBI, is less understood,

Imagine you are standing too near a car bomb

but sustaining multiple damaging incidents

detonating on a city street. When the blast

increases the risk for permanent debilitating

wave enters your gut, it speeds up through

brain damage and Parkinson’s-like effects.

the outer skin of the human body, through the fluid-packed muscle of the abdominal wall, and

But the skull and brain are built to survive

into the colon. But there it finds open air, and

injuries of this type. There is an evolutionary

slows down, causing shearing, ripping, and

need for our tree-dwelling ancestors to still

tearing. The same trauma occurs when the

find food after an accidental fall to the ground

wave reenters the opposing colon wall, and

on their heads. Concussions are natural events

so on throughout the body. At each density

that our body is prepared for. Blast waves from

junction, sheer force and rapid expansion

a detonation, on the other hand, are not naturally

and contraction cause devastating injuries.

occurring. We have no intrinsic defenses.

Small and large intestines hemorrhage and bleed internally. Kidneys disconnect from

A blast wave is a glorified sound wave, and

fragile connecting tissue and fail. Delicate

obeys all the same basic laws of physics. It

alveoli rupture and fill the lungs with blood,

can bounce and reflect. It dissipates rapidly

suffocating the victim. And in the brain, even

over distance. And it can travel through

small blast waves can have large consequences.

objects, like the human body. When a blast

Scientists and doctors once considered the

wave vibrates through a substance—walls, cars,

brain a big fluid-filled organ, no different in this respect than your liver, and relatively resistant to blast damage. Then Bosnia happened, and injured veterans presented never-before seen symptoms of brain trauma. When a blast wave enters the head, it speeds

can’t discern or differentiate among voices and noises, becomes easily distracted, gets tired, cries randomly in public, and doesn’t know what to order for dinner.

up at each threshold, through the skin and the skull and the bag of cushioning fluid that surrounds the two main lobes of the brain. Then the wave encounters tiny nerve endings,

Those with blast-induced TBI can

neurological fibers, and slight synapses. Faced

experience fatigue of many varieties and

with a couple of billion density junctions, it

intensities. This fatigue isn’t like being

shears, strains, rips, and tears its way to the

tired after a long workout—instead,

back of the skull and out the other side.

this fatigue is being so tired the soldier cannot get out of bed, into the shower, cannot make breakfast or summon

1 The soldier who experiences this trauma is often unaware of it. If he is caught close to a large detonation then fragmentation damage to the rest of his body is the first concernâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;he may be bleeding from amputated stumps or body puncture wounds. If he is in an armored truck, he may be thrown about inside the steel box, slamming his helmeted head into the ceiling and suffering a standard concussion in addition to any blast-induced damage. In both cases, it is only after the immediate acute injuries are treated and survived that the longterm TBI nightmare becomes apparent. The most insidious damage, however, occurs during missions where you think youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re fine. Where you see the pavement erupt in front of your vehicle as you scream down a lonely Iraqi highway. The driver notes the danger too late, tries to stop and swerve, but the windshield suddenly fills with smoke and debris as the

AFTERMATH TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY

blast wave overwhelms the front of the truck. Your chest thumps, your ears ring, and your head splits under the weight of the crack. Chunks of asphalt embed themselves in the armored glass, and pieces of bumper and grille and headlight are torn and scattered. Your front tire thuds into and out of the newly created crater as your vehicle finally grinds to a halt. You pat yourself down; all fingers and toes accounted for. No blood or missing pieces. Your harness kept you locked to your seat. The radio jumps to life. Are you all right, the convoy commander wants to know. Is everyone fine? You look at the driver, he looks at you. You both laugh, as the adrenaline takes over and you start to shake. Fuck yeah, you’re fine. 2 Luckiest sons of bitches on the planet. But you are not fine. Inside your head, nerve connections that used to exist have been torn and broken. If the blast was close and more damage done, you may have lost parts of high school geometry, the coordination needed to tie flies for your fishing reel, or the ability to make decisions at the supermarket about what meat to buy. If you are lucky, you only lost your son’s first steps or the night you asked your wife to marry you. And if you are a bomb technician, one of my brothers, chances are you don’t have only

3 I’m not just Crazy. I have a broken brain exhausted from fixing itself.

one lucky scrape, only one detonation where you were a little too close. You have dozens. Or hundreds. Spray-foam-encased EFPs that detonate while you are trying to disrupt them. Daisychained 130-millimeter artillery rounds that hit your vehicle on the way to a call. Truck bombs you choose to detonate, but must be unnervingly close to, watching and guarding and keeping children from drawing too near

the energy to dial a phone. Some have difficulty completing the most basic tasks of daily living. Some just have trouble concentrating, doing a complicated task

in a dense city center. Large-scale demolition

for long periods of time. Their brains

to destroy hundreds of tons of stockpiled arms

literally hurt because they are tired.

found in caches. Detonations in training when

3 They have had to work much harder, fire

you are preparing to deploy in the first place. Every day, something is blowing up. Every day, your brain rips just a little bit more.

neurons over a much greater distance than before the injury. Their minds and bodies are exhausted from the process. They hurt in a way that overwhelms the ability to communicate.

I read in my hometown newspaper that a local art gallery, the big one at the college, has a new exhibit. It’s an antiwar piece, a mix of media 1 that demonstrates how terrible conflict is. The paper says it’s earnest and powerful and contains Truth. I decide to go. The room is small. A video plays on the far wall, continuously scrolling a list of names. Names of our dead. Black bags hang on strings from the ceiling, like giant popcorn necklaces, filling half the room. Each bag is supposed to hold the name of a soldier. More names of our dead. There are a lot of bags.

The artist has a narrative posted on the wall, an explanation of the piece. It talks about the moral choice of being a soldier in war. It says 2 soldiers, when confronted with the horrors of war, have to make a choice: To fight or not. To participate or not. Suicide, it says, is the only moral choice.

As with veterans of the Vietnam War,

kind of warfare has more in common with

condemned by contemporary society.

PlayStation games than with Hue City or

Many of the dead veterans go unnamed,

Seoul in 1950. Or Fallujah in 2004.

unrecognized by the very same society in which the media have done much to perpetuate the myth of easy killing and have thereby become part of society’s unspoken conspiracy of deception that glorifies killing and war. Although the media has tried to justify the cause of the war in Iraq, it masks the war’s true horror. 1 Those who sacrificed are being ignored by the World War II and Vietnam generations

Even those who read the paper or watched the evening news didn’t get it. The reason for that was clear: the type of reporting in Iraq left much to be desired. The majority of the journalists covering Iraq stayed in the Baghdad hotels, where Arab stringers with dubious motives fed them their raw material. 2 The warrior class, bleeding in Iraq, has

that are now holding seats of power in

been painted with two brushes: that of

American government.

the victim and that of the felon. They

Most Americans had no idea what was

spoiled by one-sided, sterile air wars. That

veterans of the Iraq War are often

appreciate neither.

really going on in Iraq in 2004. Some didn’t

As displayed by the huge amount of

want to know. For years America has been

affected veterans from the war in Vietnam, rationalization of the war participated

AFTERMATH SOCIETAL SUPPORT

The Crazy feeling explodes in my chest and makes my head spin. I start to shake. 3 Maybe it’s right. Maybe I’ve made the wrong choice all along. I know what I did. I know what I wanted to do. And now it’s caught up with me. I can’t live like this. Not my whole life. Not the rest of my life like this. With the Crazy. Something has to change. It has to end.

After I returned home, I witnessed another battle raging on the television over Iraq. From Washington, the rancor and defeatism over the war shocked me. As other veterans of the Global War on Terror started to trickle home, we shared the feelings of the disenfranchised. We who sacrificed were being ignored by the World War II and Vietnam generations now holding seats of power in our government. I joined Wade Zirkle in forming Vets for Freedom, a nonpartisan political action committee dedicated to supporting our troops in bo th Iraq and Afg hanis tan . I want to 3 bel iev e the war is a noble effort, but I fear it may end ignobly.

in was extremely important to help the

• A careful adherence to codes and

• Reunions and continued communication

veterans normalize and re-enter society.

conventions of warfare by both sides,

This can be done through traditional

thereby limiting civilian casualties

individuals whom the soldier bonded

processes that were ignored following

and atrocities

with in combat

Vietnam, when soldier instead came back to a hostile environment. These processes involve:

• Rear lines or clearly defined safe areas

(via visits, mail, and so on) with the

• An unconditionally warm and admiring

where the soldier can go to relax and

welcome by friends, family, communities,

depressurize during a combat tour

and society, constantly reassuring the soldier that the war and his personal

• Constant praise and assurance to the

• The presence of close, trusted friends and

soldier from peers and superiors that

confidants who have been present during

he “did the right thing” (One of the most

training and are present throughout the

important physical manifestations of

combat experience.

this affirmation is the awarding of medals and decorations) • The constant presence of mature, older comrades (that is, in their twenties and thirties) who serve as role models and stabilizing personality factors in the combat environment

• A cool down period as the soldier and his comrades sail or march back from the wars

acts were for a necessary, just, and righteous cause • The proud display of medals. 3 There is nothing worse than a soldier returning from the war, having done only what society had trained and ordered

• Knowledge of the ultimate victory of their

him to do, only to be greeted by a hostile

side and of the gain and accomplishments

environment in which he was ashamed to

made possible by their sacrifices

even wear the uniform and decorations

• Parades and monuments

that became such a vital part of who he was. 55

Three gifts that you can give returning veterans that will last them a lifetime Colonel Timothy Hanifen, USMC The combat phase of the campaign in Iraq is winding down and now the hardest job of all begins—winning the peace. Soon many of our fellow citizen-Soldiers, Airmen, Sailors, Marines, and Coast Guardsman, both active and reserve, will return home with their units or as individuals. All have served and participated in an extraordinary

In combat, warriors must psychologically

campaign of liberation, fought in a manner

distance themselves from the humanity

that reflected not only the determination

of their opponent during the fight. The

of the American people to do what was

adversary becomes a target or an objective

necessary but also reflective of our value to spare life whenever and wherever possible. As these veterans begin returning home, people are asking themselves what they can do to celebrate their return, honor their service, and remember those who have fallen in the performance of their duty. After every war or major conflict, there are always concerns about the emotional state of returning veterans, their ability to readjust to peaceful pursuits and their reintegration into American society. People naturally ask themselves, “What can we do or what should we do?” The purpose of this message is to offer that there are three very important gifts that we personally, and collectively as a society, can give to these returning veterans. They are “understanding, affirmation, and support.”

experiences will shape each of them and our society in large and small ways for years to come. Though we were not there, our comprehension and respect for their “truisms” will be part of the gift that will truly last them and us for a lifetime.

or any number of derogatory epithets that separates “them from us.” Combat becomes merely business—a job that has to be done, part of your duty, and killing—a necessary result. It’s a team job that needs to be done quickly, efficiently, unemotionally and at the least cost in lives

The truth every combat veteran knows,

to your unit, to innocents and with the

regardless of conflict, is that war is about

most damage inflicted in the least time to

combat, combat is about fighting, fighting

your adversaries. Then you and the team

is about killing and killing is a traumatic

move forward again to the next danger

personal experience for those who fight.

area and fight. The only sure way home

Killing another person, even in combat,

is by fighting through your opponents as

is difficult as it is fundamentally against

quickly and efficiently as possible. Along

our nature and the innate guiding moral

the way you quietly hope or pray that your

compass within most human beings.

actions will: be successful; not cause the

The frequency of direct combat and the

loss of a comrade; not cause the death of

relative distance between combatants is

an innocent; and that you won’t become

also directly proportional to the level of

one of the unlucky casualties yourself. You

combat stress experienced by the surviving

stay despite your fears because the team,

With “understanding,” I am not speaking

veteran. Whether the serviceman or

your new family of brothers or sisters, truly

of sympathy, empathy, consoling or

woman actually pulled the trigger, dropped

needs you and you’d rather die than let

emotional analysis. Rather, I offer that

a bomb or simply supported those who

them down. You live in the moment, slowly

we, to the best of our ability, need to

have, I’ve yet to meet any veteran who has

realize your own mortality and also your

comprehend some of the combat truths

found and found their contribution to or

steadily rising desire to cling to and fight

learned and experienced by these

the personal act of killing another human

hard for every second of it. You keep your

returning servicemen and women.

being particularly glorious. Necessary—Yes.

focus, your “game face” on, and you don’t

Their perspectives and their personal

Glorious or pleasurable—No.

allow yourself the luxury of “too much

decided and then we mustered the political and societal willpower to send these brave young men and women into combat in hopes of eventually creating a better peace for ourselves, for the Iraqi people and for reflection” or a moment’s “day dreaming”

an entire region of the world. More than

about home, loved ones, the future or

anything else, the greatest gift you can

your return. You privately fear that such a

personally give a returning veteran is a

moment of inattention may be your last, or

sincere handshake and words from you

worse because of you, a comrade’s last.

that “they did the right thing, they did

So if I may caution, please don’t walk up to a combat veteran and ask him or her if they “killed” anyone or attempt well meaning “pop” psychoanalysis. These often-made communication attempts are awkward and show a lack of understanding and comprehension of the veteran. They also reveal much about the person who attempts either one. Instead, please accept there is a deep contextual gap between you both because you were not there. This chasm is very difficult to bridge when veterans attempt to relate their personal war experiences. Actual combat veterans are the ones least likely to answer the question or discuss the details of

what we asked them to do and that you are proud of them.” We need to say these words often and the returning combat veteran truly needs these reassurances. Also please fly your flag and consider attending one or more public events with your families as a visible sign of your support and thanks. Nothing speaks louder to a returning veteran than the physical presence of entire families. Those Americans attending these events give one

if you can’t give them an equivalent job

of their most precious gifts—their personal

because of downsizing then extend them

time. Numbers matter. Personal and

with your company for three to four

family presence silently speaks volumes of

months so they can properly job hunt.

affirmation to those you wish to honor. The third gift is “support.” Immediately

their experiences with relative strangers.

upon return there will be weeks of

Most likely they will ignore you and feel

ceremonies and public praise applauding

as though they were truly “pilgrims” in

the achievements of returning units and

Please take a personal interest in them and their families and use your extensive list of personal and professional contacts to help them land a better job—even if it is with one of your competitors. The gratitude they will feel for you, your personal actions

a strange land instead of honored and

their veterans. But the pace of life in

appreciated members of our Republic. So

America is fast and it will necessarily move

accept and don’t press…

rapidly onward towards the next event.

For everyone else, the greatest gift you

Here is where your support is most needed

can give to continue support will take 10

to sustain the returning veteran and you

seconds of your time. In the years to come,

can make the most difference in their lives

if ever your paths cross with one of the

Don’t ignore them or the subject. Please feel free to express your “gladness at their safe return” and ask them “how it went or what was it like?” These questions are open-ended and show both your interest and concern. They also allow the veteran to share what they can or want. In most cases, the open door will enable them to share stories of close friends, teammates or some humorous moments of which they recall. Again, just ask, accept—but don’t dig or press.

and your company is beyond words.

for years to come. Continue to fly your

hundreds of thousands of veterans of this

flag. If you are an employer, then simply do

or any other conflict, then simply shake

your best to hire a veteran who is leaving

their hand and tell them “thanks” and that

service or if he or she was a guardsman or

“they did a great job!” Your words show you

Reservist, welcome them back to a new job

understand, you affirm their service and

within the company. All reserve personnel

you continue to support them. Teach your

know that the economic life of the

children to do the same by your strong

company has continued in their absence.

example. Though veterans may not express

It has to do so in order for the company

it, every one of them will be grateful. If

to survive and prosper. They also know it

this message rings true with you, then

The second gift is “affirmation.” Whether

is likely their jobs have since been filled.

let us each give these returning veterans

you were personally in favor of the war or

Returning veterans are always unsure

these three gifts that will truly last them

against it no longer matters at this point.

whether or not they will find or have

a lifetime.

As a Republic and a people we debated, we

employment upon return. As an employer

Literature Cited Bellavia, David. House to House: A Soldier’s Memoir. New York City: Free Press, 2007. Print. Castner, Brian. The Long Walk: A story of war and the life that follows. New York City: Doubleday, 2012. Print. Grossman, Dave, and Loren Christenson. On combat: the Psychology and Physiology of Deadly Conflict in War and in Peace. 3rd ed. America: Warrior Science Group Inc, 2008. Print. Grossman, D. On Killing, the Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in war and society. 3. New York City: Back Bay Books, 2010. Print. Imagery Cited Photo found on “Introduction:” Oliva, Mark. Marines hold tight the flag that draped over the casket of Major Douglas A. Zembiec. 2007. Photo on “Combat:” Palu, Louie. Garmsir Marines. 2008 Pg 9: Fuentes–Contreras, Grover. Sergeant Bregel. 2011. Pg 14-15: Palu, Louie. The Void of War. 2009. Pg 24: Baxter, Jonathan. Scratch and Sniff. 2005 Pg 31: Leeson, David. Untitled. 2003. Photo on “After:” Turnley, David. In Times of War and Peace. 1991. Pg 34. Thompson, Richard. Brain Drawings. 2012. Pg 36. Ryan, Elizabeth. Pg 38. Saunders, Brian Lewis. Self Portrait on Bath Salts. 2012. Pg 48. Found on American Women Veterans. Untitled. Pg 52. Prinsler, Roland. Madness. 2012. Photo on “Healing:” Getty Images. 2011.

This book was designed by Erin McLear in the spring of 2013 at Washington University in St. Louis with the help of Sarah Birdsall and Scott Gericke. Erin compiled, combined and edited the text, gathered the imagery, and letterpressed the large scale type. The typefaces used are Arvo and Strada Sans, as well as a variety of handset letterpressed type. It is printed on Mohawk Ultrawhite Superfine Eggshell Finish 80lb Text.