Awaiting what lies ahead. . .

"You are not going on a deployment, let me make that clear. You are going to War" - Chaplain Morris

It has been an interesting week with a lot of random things going on, notably the two day course I had on critical incident stress debriefings.

The course that we had was geared towards medical personnel but also included other job specialties. The course was intended to give us some knowledge on how to hold what they call a "defusing" after a critical event (ie: loss of a fellow soldier or killing of an Iraqi insurgent/civilian). The Army is attempting to reduce the amount of PTSD and other mental health related issues for this war. Soldiers sometimes need to talk about critical events that occur and hopefully this will reduce the mental side affects of war.

I think that I actually gained a lot of insight from this course, more so than I have from any other class or training event. Chaplain Morris, who was a special forces intel officer in Iraq, shed a lot of insight into what to expect and what the mentality of the insurgents is. Few people in our company have really been to war, this is where we are going. As soldiers of the US Army we have a lot of weight to bear, including the reality that we may have to kill someone to protect the innocent. Our enemy believes we are the infidels and we have invaded their land, we are evil and they are fighting for what they believe is true. I watched a recruiting video by a terrorist group caught off the internet by an intel officer and it really makes you step back a bit. Clips are shown of US soldiers being murdered, Americans killing insurgents, and of course the twin towers falling as they laugh in the background. Do you know where this was made? England. The terrorists have an unlimited pool of people willing to sacrifice themselves to kill me, a US soldier.

As medical personnel we not only have to take lives, but save them. This is as personal as you can come to another human being. Our goal is to help heal the people of Iraq and bring everyone home alive.

Nick

P.S.- Since I will be leaving soon, stop sending mail to the Mississippi address. I will get an APO soon and I will give that as soon as I know it.