Glamour? What “glamour? There is NO “glamour” in war, ANY war. There’s no glory in it either. This is not a movie; it’s not a video game. It’s real. Picture this: you are hot, dirty, tired, and sleep deprived; so is every man with you. You’ve been on patrol in the bush for over a week. The terrain is rough, difficult. In some places you can’t see more than 10 feet. There are trails, but the enemy is watching those and they’re probably booby trapped, so you stick to the roughest terrain you can get through. You head is on a swivel, all your senses are alert for any sound or movement that is out of place. Your web gear cuts into your shoulders, sweat is dripping into your eyes. Scared yet? You should be...it’s quiet...too quiet.. there’s movement you caught out the corner of your eye, and then...
Your world explodes. To your right, there’s a sudden burst of automatic weapons fire! Right in front of you an enemy pops out of the bush, then a second. Your unit and his just met, neither expecting it. He starts to raise his weapon; you fire a split second before he does; his round goes just over your head as he falls. You dive to the side and hit the dirt...where’s the second one? Your guys open up; second enemy is down. More muzzle flashes to your front, how many are there? You hear bullets hitting the brush and trees all around you; the ones that come close make a buzzing sound like a wasp whizzing past your head. Where are your guys? You can see the guy to your left, and the guy to your right; you can hear the others firing...you hear a grenade explode, and the machine gun to your right stops firing. You crawl to a better firing position, still firing at the muzzle flashes to your front. Occasionally you hear the soft thump and a scream as a shot hits another bad guy...there’s a scream to your left, one of your guys is down...you hear someone yell “Medic!”. You notice another one of your guys down, thrashing around, screaming in pain...and then the fire from the other sides stops...it’s over, just like that. You regroup, two walking wounded, but none of you died today. You carefully walk over to the enemy position. Your mouth is dry; you smell and taste burnt gunpowder (you’ll never forget that, ever). You count six enemy KIA scattered around; one's still moving, so you finish him with a round to the head...can’t take a chance on him playing possum, and rolling over with a pistol, knife or grenade. The rest of them bugged out...you see a couple of blood trails, where they dragged off their wounded. You can smell blood; did you know it has a smell? It does, and you won’t forget that either. You search the bodies for personal effects and anything intel might be able to use...
You call in for a dust-off, you have 5 clicks to the extraction point; good, you’ve got plenty of daylight to get there. It’s only then that you notice you feel weak, and you’re shaking; you can’t stop shaking...you fall down on your knees and puke from all the adrenaline running through your body; now you have time to feel the fear...today was a good day, nobody died, on your side...
Now, for all you armchair generals and Rambo wannabes, you have just experienced a “low-intensity firefight”. You weren’t fighting for freedom, or flag, God, country, motherhood and apple pie, or medals or glory, or any of that bullsh*t. You were fighting for you and your guys to just survive another day; and you sure as hell don’t feel like some hero, you feel like warmed-over dogsh*t... the good news is you’ll live to see another sunrise; the bad news is, that in a couple of days or a week, you get to go back out and do it all again... I left out the really gory stuff; you really don’t need to know that; and this battle only lasted maybe two minutes; it can be worse...a LOT worse. When the war is done, you get an added bonus; the memories of what you’ve seen, heard, smelled, felt and had to do, and a lot of guilt and unanswered questions about why you’re still alive and others aren’t, are burned into you soul and your brain, and they will forever be a part of you; a part you’ll wish to God you could forget, but never will, for the rest of your life...so if you go into combat, you better be damn sure that you’re fighting for something worth dying for...and worth living with it, if you survive...
