Time Passages
April, an American serviceman (Wash Post):
“I hope we don’t get to the point where we are so jaded we start rolling down the streets in tanks and shooting at everything that moves,” said Capt. Chris Chown. “If you start to lose that sense of humanity, you’ve lost your mission.”
November, an American serviceman (Knight-Ridder):
One guy talked about guard duty in Kosovo one day and getting angry about being there, in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of nothing. He saw a mentally ill child who always came to the gate, asking for candy. The soldier told him to come over, and then he punched him as hard as he could, over and over, just to see if the kid would come back the next day. When he did, the soldier beat him again, laughing.
After that story, Laird told the soldier he was a coward and an ass.
More, from the same article:
Spc. James Barney, who drove the Bradley that carried Sims’ body, stood by the vehicle outside, talking to himself. “We need to just finish it, level the whole damn city,” he said. “I’m tired of this place, I’m tired of this shit.”
More:
“Being in our track and smelling him — I’m glad I never saw his face,” Ward said of Sims.
On his way out, Laird turned and said he’d been thinking about his son.
“I don’t want my boy to know his daddy’s a killer,” he said. With that, he picked up his gun and walked out the door.
More:
More bullets flew by, and the mortar rounds grew closer. Capt. Kirk Mayfield, of the recon team, yelled, “Everyone behind the truck.”
Standing next to his Humvee, Mayfield screamed for U.S. mortar strikes on the five-man team. After the ensuing rumble, a voice called over the radio: “Can I get a battle damage assessment?”
“An assessment?” the reply came. “There is no more building.”
More:
“F—— Hajji,” he muttered, using grunt slang for Iraqis.
What’s the penalty for asking too much of people?
UPDATE: From a reader letter to Flit:
It’s seems an odd exchange. Then once inside, Sites tells the lieutenant that these men were the wounded from the day before. The officer goes outside to radio in a report and the now-famous event then unfolds… but even though significant time unfolds in Sites’ narrative after the firing of that additional shot, the lieutenant doesn’t reappear — despite presumably being close enough to have heard the shot and be able to tell it was from inside the mosque.
