To the Fallen
By U.S. Army Sergeant John McCary
Dear all,
We are dying. Not in some philosophical, chronological, ‘the end comes for all of us sooner or later’ sense. Just dying. Sure, it’s an occupational hazard, and yeah, you can get killed walking down the street in Anytown, USA. But not like this. Not car bombs that leave craters in the road, not jeering crowds that celebrate your destruction.
It’s never been a fair fight, and we haven’t always played nice. But not like this. No one leaves the gate looking to kill, or looking to die. No one wakes up in the morning and says, “I sure hope blowing up a whole group of Iraqis goes well today.” That’s for suckers and cowards, people afraid to delve into the melee and fight it out, to sort it out like soldiers.
They’ve killed my friends. And not in some heroic fight to defend sovereign territory, not on some suicide mission to extract a prisoner or save a family in distress. Just driving downtown to a meeting. Just going to work.
When you’ve held a conversation with a man, briefed him on his mission, his objective and reminded him of the potential consequences during the actioning of it, only to hear he never returned, and did not die gracefully, though blessedly quickly, prayerfully painlessly… you do not breathe the same ever after. Breath is sweet. Sleep is sweeter. Friends are priceless.
It is also now undeniable, irrevocable, that you will see your mission through. You will strive every day, you will live, though you are not ever again sure why. I, we, must see it through to the end. They have seen every instant, every mission, every chore, every day through, not to its end but to theirs. They died standing with their friends, doing their jobs, fulfilling some far-flung nearly non-existent notion called duty. They died because their friends could’ve died just as easily, and knowing that… they would never shirk their duties, never call in sick, never give in to fear, never let down. Their lives are lost, whether as a gift, laid down at the feet of their friends, or a pointless discard of precious life… I doubt I’ll ever know.
I’m ok, Mom. I’m just a little… shaken, a little sad. I know this isn’t any Divine mission. No God, Allah, Jesus, Buddha or other divinity ever decreed “Go get your body ripped to shreds, it’s for the better.” This is Man’s doing. This is Man’s War. And War it is. It is not fair, nor right, nor simple… nor is it over. I don’t care about bloodlust, justice or revenge. But we will not give up. We cannot. Our lives are forever tied to those lost, and we cannot leave them now, as we might have were they still living.
We have… so little time… to mourn, to breathe, to laugh, to remember. To forget. Every day awaits us, impatient, impending. So now we rise, shunning tears, biting back trembling lips and stifling sobs of grief… and we walk, shoulder to shoulder… to the Call of Duty, in tribute to the Fallen.
© Copyright John McCary. All Rights Reserved.
This excerpt of “To the Fallen” from Operation Homecoming, edited by Andrew Carroll.
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On this Memorial Day, with so many of our men and women in uniform finding themselves in harm’s way, I encourage all of us to take just one moment from our BBQs and picnics in order to give a thought to them and, more importantly, to all those who have given everything that was in their power to give — to the efforts of freedom, to the call of duty, to their friends and comrades, and ultimately to us all.
This day is about far more than just this war. For just one day, we should be able to put aside our vast differences and give a thought of respect, and profound thanks, to the Fallen and their families.
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U.S. Forces Wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan: 25,378
Coalition Forces Killed in Action in Iraq, Memorial Day 2006 – May 27, 2007: 969
Coalition Forces Killed in Action in Afghanistan, Memorial Day 2006 – May 27, 2007: 195
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