Those You Leave Behind in Combat Whom You Can’t Leave Behind

Canada Free Press ^ | 11/11/14 | Michael Fumento

[Sean_Anthony]

Saint Michael the Archangel: "Defend us in battle" and "be our protection" against wickedness

It’s Veterans Day in America, yet there are progressively fewer to venerate. Most of the World War II generation is gone and even the older Vietnam vets are reaching average life expectancy. Relatively few Americans have served in Iraq or Afghanistan, and most of them never saw battle. Yet even as explaining combat to a civilian is like describing the sky to somebody blind from birth, we “brave few,” as Shakespeare famously put it in Henry V, feel compelled to try anyway.

Ask a veteran what combat is like and you’ll get as many different answers as there are vets. Still, the clichés hold true: “All your senses are heightened;” “It’s a mixture of fear and excitement;” “It’s the most alive you’ll ever feel;” and yes, Winston Churchill’s famous declaration that “nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result.” After being the proverbial ducks in a shooting gallery in one particularly vicious ambush in Iraq, the men I was with and I began laughing hysterically upon reaching safety.

[Eva]

There is absolutely no veteran’s ceremonies or remembrances going on in our county. In WA. My husband is scheduled to sell poppies at the grocery store, but that is it.

[ComputerGuy]

...Relatively few Americans have served in Iraq or Afghanistan, and most of them never saw battle...

Same thing with Vietnam vets - only one in ten or so was ever in combat. We're all vets, though; we went where we were told to go and did what we were told to do. I love them all...except for that pogue postal clerk who stole my chocolate chip cookies.

[Mathews]

Pogue... haven’t heard that one in a long time! Lol.

[ComputerGuy]

SF

[rfreedom4u]

Questions to never ask a vet:

1. “You’re a mother/wife/father/husband, how could you leave your family while you were deployed?”
2. “Do you have post-traumatic stress disorder?”
3. “What’s the worst thing that happened to you over there?”
4. “Have you ever killed anyone?”

At the first family reunion when I got back I was introduced to everyone as a retiring vet. The lady who did the intro asked me while in front of everyone “Did you see any action?”

I looked at her dumbfounded at first and collected my thoughts enough to say, “It was interesting.”

[Billthedrill]

“Have you ever killed anyone?”

I've been asked that a couple of times. I usually answer "Not until just now."

[Mathews]

Hooya!

[rfreedom4u]

Yeah. A few additional responses are:

1. Not lately.
2. I’m getting close.
3. Why? Do you have someone in mind?

[trisham]

My husband and I watched “Lone Survivor” yesterday. I very much recommend it.

[Chainmail]

I remember my buddies asking me “how many people did you kill?” And “what did it feel like, to kill somebody?” when I got back from my first tour in Vietnam. I just stared at them and didn’t answer. They weren’t anyone I wanted to deal with anymore.

I also remember some woman on the periphery of an anti war demonstration yelling at me “I’ll never let my son join the Marines!” (I was in uniform). I told her that I didn’t ask my mother when I joined and that when her son became a man, he won’t ask either. Really annoyed her.

[JW1949]

My reply has always been:

(silence)