Osama bin Laden’s Death And My Reflections On War

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When the Towers fell, I had been out of the Army for less than a month.

I had just moved back to Columbus, Ohio.  I didn’t have a real job (I was doing painting and other labor for my landlord), I didn’t have a car, and I was basically enjoying my newfound freedom.  And the first thing I thought when I sat on a barstool to watch the CNN coverage about the planes that had crashed into the World Trade Center was. . .

Shit.  They’re going to call me back.

I’m embarrassed to admit that at that time I wasn’t thinking about the thousands who died in the attacks.  I didn’t dwell on the devastation of New York.  My first thoughts were of how fast I was going to be back in an Army uniform and drawing my weapon from the armory.  I wondered if I would get a phone call or a letter or a knock at my door. . . However it would happen, I was certain I would be ordered to return to duty.  And I was not happy about it.

I enlisted in the Army on what I’ve sometimes called a “deal with the devil” – three years of enlisted service in a combat job specialty cleared all of my student loan debt.  And after law school, that was $65,000 worth of student loan debt that was cleared.  I signed on the dotted line, played the good soldier role, wiped away my student loans, and then checked out when my three years were up.

Sort of. . .

Every initial enlistment in the Army (at least when I was in, I have no idea what it is today) is not for three years – it’s for eight years.  You subtract your active duty years from the total to get your “inactive ready reserve” time. . . so for me, that was 3 years active duty subtracted from 8 years total time, leaving 5 years inactive reserve.  And that was 5 years of inactive reserve duty as an infantryman that just happened to begin within 30 days of the Towers falling.

Shit.  They’re going to call me back.

But it never happened.  No phone call, no letter, and no knock on the door.  I stayed home.  Some of my friends weren’t so lucky.  And that weighs on me in mixtures of fortune, relief, and guilt every day.

As the war started and the line between hunting terrorists and finding mythical weapons of mass destruction blurred, I saw reports of my old division (4th Infantry Division) serving important roles including providing perimeter security for the Special Forces Group that captured Saddam Hussein.  By this time I had settled into my shirt and tie life as a government lawyer and was spending a good portion of each workday trolling the internet lists of those killed in action, looking for names of my friends.

And the wars dragged on. . . Iraq, Afghanistan. . . Was there really any difference to those of us sitting in the comfort of our dry cleaning and cable television and air conditioning?

We watched the news stories of the rescue of Jessica Lynch, the death of former NFL star and Army Ranger Pat Tillman, and the torturous pictures from the Abu Ghraib prison and thought we got a taste of the horrors of war.  Some of us watched our friends return “home” to Court Martial hearings and prison time or domestic violence charges and restraining orders – a part of them forever lost for having pulled a trigger or seeing their comrades dismembered or killed from others doing so.

And it all started with the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 – masterminded by the man who was triumphantly shot in the head a few days ago and then buried at sea, Osama bin Laden.

Or did it start before then?

Or is it still not finished?

Regardless of conjecture, half-guesses, and conspiracy theories, I hope all those who serve our country return home swiftly with as much of their original selves in tact as possible.

Safe travels to you all, whenever that may be.

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