When I was enlisted in the Army I became quite accustomed to following orders. Life is pretty simple in the military, you just have to show up at the right time and place and be wearing the right uniform. Other than that not a lot is left up to you. You are told what is expected of you, and most of the time you get minute by minute instructions on what you’re supposed to be doing so as to eliminate any guess work. It starts in basic training where you have zero freedom. You spend your time shooting targets in the shape of a human head and torso and continue with stabbing a human shaped dummy while yelling, “KILL, KILL, KILL!” They do a very good job of taking normal people and transitioning them into soldiers who can kill another human being. I went through this transition, and it was a change, but I didn’t find it very difficult.
This course of action is necessary in order to have an effective military. It seems barbaric to some people, especially those with no sort of military experience, but it is absolutely necessary. The world is an imperfect and often times violent place, and conflicts and wars are inevitable and sometimes war and fighting is the only way to ‘keep order.’ When diplomacy fails or isn’t an option then countries, or regions, or tribes go to war, and it’s never pretty but such is the world we live in. I remember relatively early in my deployment when I shot and killed the first person of many that we eventually had to dispatch of. We were ambushed and being shot at with fully automatic AK-47 assault rifles from two different directions. I didn’t sit and think about it, I didn’t hesitate, I just aimed and fired until I saw one of the shooters get hit, and then I looked for another one. I was capable of this because of the training I went through and because of what the Army had turned me into. This was necessary because of the decisions I had made and the position I had put myself in.
On the other hand, the military does a terrible job of taking people like myself, people who were trained to kill, put in a situation where I was required to kill repeatedly, and preparing myself for the more difficult challenge of reintegrating myself into a society where people know about war, see it on the news, Google the grisly images and then wonder how anyone could ever do that. How could someone go through what I and thousands of other veterans went through and come out the other side ‘normal’? Is it even possible? When we were within days of leaving Iraq we started the coming home process with what was called a ‘reintegration class’. It was a 30 minute briefing about how when we get home we shouldn’t beat our spouses or spend all of our money on stupid things. It was a pretty simple message, but not everyone fully grasped it as there were a number of guys I knew who experienced some unfortunate legal problems when we got home.
When we finally got home, we went were hurried through our post-deployment medical assessment in which we were required to sit with a psychiatrist. There was no base line for them to compare any results to, just a few simple questions like; do you want to hurt anybody or yourself? Do you have nightmares or flashbacks? How often do you drink alcohol? After we told them what they wanted to hear, we were free. It was similar when I was discharged from the Army. I was essentially left to my own devices and to figure things out on my own. Of course I’d been a civilian before, but after engaging in combat during a war, killing people, and seeing the real version of death and destruction that you see in the movies I just couldn’t remember how to function. I had a lot of skills, but no direction.
It took me a while to realize it after being discharged, but I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t the only person who had those types of experiences, and I certainly haven’t been the only veteran to face challenges after the military. The military is going through historic changes before our eyes, but I think one of the biggest points of focus should be to improve the transition of veterans back into civilian life. We’re a proud bunch and have a LOT to offer society; unfortunately many veterans are discharged and left on their own in a situation where very few will succeed.
drfarwell@hotmail.com