In the end, my story, in Iraq and afterward, is about more than just killing people or even fighting for my country. It’s about being a man. And it’s about love as well as hate.
The Navy disqualified me when my physical revealed that I had pins in my arm from the rodeo accident. I tried arguing, I tried pleading; nothing worked. I even offered to sign a waiver saying that I’d never make the Navy responsible for anything that happened to my arm. They flat-out turned me down. And that, I concluded, was the end of my military career.
No SEAL has ever actually admitted feeling pain since the beginning of Creation.
I was raised with, and still believe in, the Christian faith. If I had to order my priorities, they would be God, Country, Family. There might be some debate on where those last two fall – these days I’ve come around to believing that Family may, under some circumstances, outrank Country. But it’s a close race.
They were driven by more than just religion and adrenaline, even more than blood lust. They were already halfway to Paradise, in their minds at least.
I was tempted to get up and run over to the bell that would end my torture – if you ring this bell, you’re taken in for coffee and a doughnut.
The Navy did not promise that I would be a SEAL; I had to earn that privilege. What they did guarantee, though, was that I would have a chance to try out. As far as I was concerned, that was good enough, because there was no way that I was going to fail.
The good people of this world are very far from being satisfied with each other and my arms are the best peacemakers.” – Samuel Colt, 1852.
I don’t know how high I went, I don’t wanna know. Heights are not my favorite thing. It makes my balls go in my throat just thinking about it.
I’d put him in the spot where he got hit. It was my fault he got shot. A hundred kills? Two hundred? More? What did they mean if my brother was dead?
Helping each other out, that’s America.
I signed up to protect this country. I do not choose the wars. It happens that I love to fight. But I do not choose which battles I go to. Y’all send me to them.
States HarperCollins Publishers.
Isn’t religion supposed to teach tolerance?
Medals never tell the whole story. And like I said, in the end they’ve become more political than accurate.
As far as I can see it, anyone who has a problem with what guys do over there is incapable of empathy.
It’s true that it can be difficult to sort out civilians from insurgents in certain situations, but here the bad guys made it easy for us.
My guys were going back to war and I was flying home. That sucked. I felt like I was letting them down, shirking my duty. It was a conflict – family and country, family and brothers in arms – that I never really resolved.
You need skill to be a sniper, but you also need opportunity. And luck.
Please don’t tell my momma I died in pain, he muttered... He died right then. He didn’t even live long enough to hear my lies about how everything was going to be okay.
Rank is a funny concept in the Teams. It’s not disrespected exactly, but it’s clearly not the full measure of the man.