Just read an article in the NY Times talking about soldiers coming home from Iraq, and how some are having trouble re-adjusting:
For the soldiers of the First Brigade, accompanied by this reporter during their surge into Baghdad in the messy aftermath in June and again now that they have returned, coming home has been a far more complicated, even conflicted, experience than it seemed it would be back in Iraq when they thought of little else.They have returned to wives and girlfriends, husbands and boyfriends, and to new babies born while they were overseas. They have returned to families who lived in fear of the news and could not stop following it. They have returned to face emotions they expected and others they did not.
Sergeant Jordan, whose scouts fought in some of the First Brigade's fiercest clashes, seethed with anger at the lurid curiosity of those who would never know what he now knew.
"The first thing he asked me was, `Did you kill anyone?' " he said after the gathering in the auditorium, referring to someone he asked not be identified. "Then it was, `How did it feel?' What kind of stupid thing is that to ask?"
The article struck me, because a week or so ago I watched a movie called "The Best Years of Our Lives" that took a look at the lives of three WWII vets after they came home from the war. A lot of what the NY Times article describes could have been taken directly from that movie. Nightmares, marital problems, kids they don't recognize, dealing with disabilities, etc. They even had people telling them that their service in the war had been a waste of time, with the growing threat from the Soviet Union.
Amazing.
Posted by Jason at September 12, 2003 08:50 AM