“...nobody over here really comprehends is the absolute ruthlessness of what really goes on there...”
It’s interesting you’d say it that way. My father never talked a lot to anyone about his European tour. (’42-’45’)-however in later years, I asked and he told me a great deal.
As far as ‘ruthlessness’ is concerned, though he was deployed in some real ugly places, he was not brutal or violent.
The only time he looked ‘ruthless’ was when I asked him about Malmedy. He was in the neighborhood immediately after the fact and got this far-away, cold and hard look in his eye when he said: ‘The war started for me at Malmedy’. He had been at Normandy, fought in the hedgerows and by the time he reached Malmedy, he understood that he had to shoot-to-kill because he could NEVER be made a prisoner.
Americans are raised as Christians for whom it is a sin to kill. So, it took the murder of unarmed prisoners for many US soldiers to feel the war was going to be ‘ruthless’
We are not ruthless evil people, we see good, we strive to do good, even in the midst of ugliness.
Imagine going to your job everyday and when you get home, you are told, you really didn’t do anything. The strides you see first hand are negated by people who say you are the cause of the misery.
This BS, we support the troops but not the war is laughable.
I have been in situations where people have been talking about the WOT, I also get the e-mails and photos directly from the sources and it doesn’t matter, nobody wants to hear it, they’d rather hear if from CNN.
Really who is isolating who?