Fight, Kill, Die! It Makes These Guys Happy.
June 8, 2009 by Alien Trucker
Control freaks, power addicts and adrenelin junkies, have we got the job for you!!! Own the road! Visit people’s homes without an invitation! Do what you want as you will be issued a high powered assault rifle AND a bunch of friends to back you up!!! All meals provided and clothing too!!! Even a small check each month to help your family back home!!!
You really don’t want the wife/husband nagging you daily do you? The everyday mundane tasks of child rearing can be someone else’s job. Yours can be exerting fearful control over other people who don’t look like the folks in YOUR neighborhood back home!!!
Sound like something you would like? Well…just come sign on the dotted line and all of your dreams will be realized!!! The military is the life for you!!!!
(disclaimer! PTSD and other combat related psycological problems will be totally ignored and treatment will not be available when you do get home…if you really want to come back, that is)
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While I have known that the companies like Blackwater and Halliburton hire(d) their mercenary soldiers from the militaries of the world I have never really thought about these folks much. The NEWSWEEK article, Love Is A Battlefield: For Some Soldiers, There’s No Place Like Combat, gave us an inside look at how these guys think.
Some feel a duty to their country and continue serving long after their first deployment is over. But it seems the majority of these soldiers need to be in that kind of a situation to be happy. Their homelife is boring after living on the edge for awhile and the need for the constant rush doesn’t go away that quickly. The war front is much more appealing to them. They have all of their decisions made for them and they just do what they are told. No worries if the decision is a bad one, someone else made it for them. Besides they get to bully people and shoot them if they piss the soldiers off.
Now, I am in no way suggesting that all of the soldiers have this need to continue a war life. In fact it is probably the exception rather that the rule. Most of what I got from the article is that those interviewed seemed to think they couldn’t be a “man” unless they were in that situation constantly. And that they feel that only the pussies go to shrinks and admit to the PTSD the war has caused them. That in itself is a symptom of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
It’s the thrill of the kill for these few. Apparantly the way I was supposed to feel when, as a teen, my dad forced me to go hunting. I never got that thrill because I didn’t do any real hunting. As I was too young to go to Viet Nam and had no desire to live a military life at any time, I never had those experiences that made me unhappy in the mundane workaday American life.
The combat veterans I have known over the years were happy not to be in those situations either. They did their duty to their country and returned, happily, to the place they had fought for. The freedoms they were told they were fighting for were mostly intact and the knowledge they had served all of us was enough for them. It isn’t that way for some I guess and that kinda makes me sad.
As a peaceful old guy I may never understand this kind of mind frame. But sitting here in the peaceful environment of my living room (complete with the 1967 Grateful Dead playing on the jukebox), understanding is far from me. It’s a mystery to me why anyone would want to live that life. But for those with that desire, or need, I guess there will always be a war or forceful conflict for them to fight.
And be happy….I guess.
Edit: After writing this post I came across this article. Seems some of the guys just can’t take it here or there. I am saddened at this.
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The military does have to brainwash people to comply with their program and program them to think in terms of us & them. We must have an enemy to overcome, thus confirming the aggressive mindframe.
Someone else pointed out in history, the warriors were usually a little older. Mature. Minds developed. In our country they take *kids*… 18 year old and put them in “the battlefield”, physiologically, their brains are actually still developing.
It may be the case too, that because they are more immature, they are easily tricked into signing that line for enlistment.
Having a kid that was in nigh school in he last decade, I can say they are ruthless in their recruitment tactics. Some schools allow them full access– ie recruiters can go hang out in the cafeteria, they are given classroom time to make recruitment presentations (to a captive audience!).
I know of this firsthand because my kid came home one day & said he is considering joining the military to pursue a career as a musician.
Yep, his band class had a recruiter talk about how you can be a musician & get paid for it in the military.
I was livid! First I had to tell him this is how they trick people into signing…. the recruiters will ask – what do you like to do?
Sports?
Video games?
Play music?
ou can do what you love & join the military!
Plus that elusive carrot on the stick– College money.
I can’t tell you how many front page soldier death notices I have read saying Soldier XXX joined to get the college money.
I had to put up a royal fuss, and officially request that recuiters be reigned in.
Why were they given more access to students than any other recruiter be it college or business?
Now the captive audience (classroom presentations) had an interesting twist–
they said they told students they could leave if they wanted to. Oh in a perfect world, the whole class would have got up & left the classroom.
But if you are the only one, it is uncomfortable, and may seem disrespectful, etc.
Here was the clincher on that one…. the recruiter said He gets “in trouble from his boss if the kids don;t fill out the name & address cards he;d passed out”.
Even though we filled out every official form saying we did not want our minor child to be solicited to be recruited, the first mailed brochure came when he was age 15.
I was sooooo angry I wanted to rip p & burn the damned thing.
But instead I filed it.
We have a flurry of recruitment mail… from every branch of the military- Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Ntl Guard, ROTC. Full color, glossy brochures with real marketing savy,
Before I knew it we had enough of these to make a large collage, which we framed & submitted to the local art show, in a piece titled *Nightmares*.
At the time, the Iraq occupation was already in full swing. There was an Army Soldier who did sign up for that musical career. He was making a court appeal because he was stop lossed- ie being made to stay in Iraq beyond the term of service he’d signed up for. Multiple tours of duty in a war zone.
I was able to show my son where this musical career might lead to.
My son went on the be an avid anti recruiter.
Because the school allowed recruiters (they have to to get Federal funding & they have to give the military the student info), they also allowed anti recruitment, the principal was progressive.
Another high school had a military mobile recruitment RV park in front of the school. They did not ask permission….. the school district has since banned them from coming to school district property.
They give out free t shirts, gym bags, & dog tags.
My son said they actually give out free body bags & toe tags.
** Powerful photo by the way
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