Brothers in Arms

…And in other news, word out of Afghanistan this morning, 4 more American soldiers were killed this morning when a roadside bomb was detonated near their highway checkpoint. This attack now raises the death toll in Afghanistan to 97 for the month, making it the deadliest month since the war started. There is already a sharp outcry coming from several Senators in Washington to send more troops in support of the war effort. Here to discuss this topic and how this issue could potentially damage the President’s approval rating here at home are our political experts….

We sat in the living room, I on the love seat, and Dad across the room on the larger couch; both of us numb to the words that the show’s host had just said so calmly, as though this was nothing more than a side note of the day’s daily news. It seemed as though the violence and destruction had become routine, a dry and boring topic that nobody wanted to hear about, yet one that nobody could ignore. It was the last thing on everyone’s mind, yet the first thing to be brought up in conversation. Political pundits bickered back and forth for what felt like hours, pouring out the same old arguments we’d all heard time and time again.

The liberals need to wake up and smell the coffee. We’ve got to bring more troops into Afghanistan and Iraq. There’s simply no way that we can cut and run from the situation we find ourselves in now. What the political Left fails to realize is that if we were to cut and run, the Middle East would fall into a state of chaos and confusion, with Iraq and Afghanistan being the epicenters

How many more lives are we willing to give in a war that no body no longer wants? We’ve got ourselves into a lose, lose situation. There’s no reason for us to be over there, not a single one. This is just another example of the Conservatives’ agenda here in the United States and across the globe as a whole.

As we continued to watch, being bombarded again and again with views from the “super conservative Right” and the “ultra liberal Left”, my Father weighed in with his view on the whole situation.

Four soldiers killed. Could have been worse I suppose, I mean it could have been ten or twenty, the way it was when I was your age, during Vietnam and that whole mess. Hell if you think about it, four doesn’t really seem all too bad, considering the alternatives. I'll tell ya one thing though, we keep goin’ down this road, raisin all that hell and fuss over there, this country won’t’ be long for this world. You’re grandpa said it a few years back, and boy I’ll be damned if it ain’t comin’ true. You just wait Kyle, this country is in for a big awakening, you just wait and see.

I didn’t care. I didn’t care what the news was telling me. Iraq and Afghanistan were way over on the side of the globe, out of sight out of mind. I didn’t care about the different so called “experts”. They did nothing but yell and carry on about secret “agendas” and the polarization along party lines within the Congress. I didn’t care what my father had to say either. It was nothing but another useless piece of information that really wouldn’t affect me one way or another, and therefore wasn’t even worth my effort in listening. I didn’t care, period.

I didn’t care that is until the war hit me. Rocked me to my core, took my world and flipped it upside down, leaving me in a state of concern and disillusionment with the war, and with American government as a whole. Not one, but two of my cousins were shipped over to Afghanistan within three months of each other. Cousins? No, more like brothers. Kids that growing up, had taught me how to throw a perfect spiral. Kids who had taught me how to wrestle and to shoot a BB gun. Kids who spent enough time and stayed enough nights with me at my house to constitute their own room and bed.

Now they were gone. Shipped across the seas to fight a foreign war in a foreign land, living their lives day to day with the constant fear of mortar fire and sniper rounds. Tossing grenades towards an unknown enemy replaced tossing football with me in the backyard. Riding patrol on hummers through Afghani villages replaced riding fourweelers across the pastures of the farms. Standing on guard duty outside of a marine barrack, waiting for a surprise attack replaced sitting in a deer stand in the middle of the woods, waiting for the thrill of a monster buck.

Growing up, my cousin Zach and I had shared a passion for the outdoors and professional wrestling. Rarely a day at lunch in our elementary school's cafeteria went by without us discussing the previous night’s action from the WWF. We even had our own mock-wrestling matches, which usually always ended with Zach winning by way of a pin. To me, Zach was beyond cool, the kind of kid that the guys want to be and the girls want to be with. He looked after me too, all the way through middle school and  once I got to high school, making sure to get me in with the good crowd and to keep a watchful eye out for me during my freshmen year.

It was the end of my sophomore year when Zach told the family he was enlisting in the Marines. Working as a diesel mechanic hadn’t panned out and the concrete business wasn’t looking too fair either, so he figured he’d take his chances with the Marines. Once he’d left for training, the conversations back here at home always turned to what was happening with Zach. When was he going to ship out? Did we know where he would go when he did? What had he said the last time he called? Over and over again we played out these conversations, trying to stave off the news that we all knew would one day      come.

Then it happened. As my aunt Susan stepped out of her truck I could tell something was bothering her. She didn’t seem like her normal, upbeat and outgoing self. Instead, she seemed more reserved, almost as if she were walking in a daze. As she sat down at our dinner table, she took a slow look around, took a moment to muster up the strength and then proceeded to explain what all she knew. The phrase “Afghanistan in two months” nearly stopped me in my tracks. A few months later, I would relive this situation.

Cousin doesn’t accurately describe what Korry is to me. To me, he is so much more than that. Korry is like the older brother that I never had, only he’s more than that; closer than brothers if that is at all possible. Growing up, Korry would spend the summer with us on our family’s farm, working in the tobacco fields alongside the rest of the family. He would stay with us for weeks at a time, and blend right in to the family so that to an outsider, he looked like a third child in the Mills household. Anytime the family went on vacation, Korry went too. Anytime we went to a Reds game, Korry came with. No matter what it was, he was there. From the very start, Korry had himself a rough road in life. Never the brightest or most intelligent kid in his class, school didn’t come very easily to him. No matter how hard he tried, he just could never seem to succeed or do well in the realm of academia. He and I had discussed college a little bit, but by then he had his fill of school. Just a few short weeks after Zach had let us know about his plans for the Marine Corps, Korry informed us that he had enlisted in the Army and would be shipping out very soon for basic training.

A few months down the road, Korry sent me a text telling me he’d be coming home for a few days and that he wanted to go to lunch one day, just me and him. Of course I agreed and on the following Friday, he and I met at our grandparent’s house in Independence. From the minute he walked in the door, I could tell something was up. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but every little thing he did tipped me off that something wasn’t quite right, something was bothering him. I knew he wouldn’t say anything in front of Mamaw, Lord knows she worried enough about him as it was, so I waited until we were alone at lunch to try and find out what was up. As we sat in the little corner booth of the Independence LaRosa’s, he explained to me what it was that was eating at him so intensely.

Kyle, Kyle I want ya to promise me somethin’. I want ya to promise me that ya won’t tell Mamaw or Papaw, or hell any of the rest of the family what it is that I’m about to tell ya. Can ya do that for me? Good. Kyle, I’m leaving for Afghanistan in about a month, shipping out the last week of October. Goin’ over as part of a security detail for one of the Generals over there. If it wasn’t now, it was gonna be this time next year, and actually, this is supposed to be about the safest way to go over. You can tell your mom and dad if ya want, just kinda let em’ know what’s goin on. I’ll come out there Sunday night and explain it all myself. Just promise me you won’t tell Mamaw or Papaw. In the shape Mamaws in, I think it’d push her over the edge if she found out. Only people who know are my dad and brother, and now you, and I wanna try and keep it that way. Promise me that Kyle.

I sat there stunned. I could hardly eat the rest of the pizza we had ordered. It was hard to look at him and not think about it, to try and push the thought of his leaving out of my head for the brief time we would have together before that day finally came. My brother, my older brother, the one kid who had taught me what it meant to persevere in life, what it meant to really be a man, my partner in crime, would be on the other side of the world in just a few short weeks. First Zach, and now Korry.

That Sunday night was a hard one on the whole family. As he explained to us in full detail of what was about to happen, I could see the tears well up in my little brother’s eyes. We faked smiles and joy through dinner, trying to pretend as if we hadn’t heard what he just told us. Just like old times out at the house. After several minutes of hugs and goodbyes, he finally walked out the door, hopped into his black GTO and like the midnight wind, was gone. Dad sat sulking out in the garage, chain smoking cigarette after cigarette to try and numb the worry and concern growing inside of him. Walking back into the kitchen, I could see the tears rolling down my mother’s cheeks, confusion and fear written across her face.

 As I sit hear now, writing this blog, I wonder what they’re doing now. Are they driving along a desolate highway as part of some convoy through the desolate Afghan desert? Are they standing guard, waiting and watching for any signs of enemy activity? Are they camped out, gazing up at the stars, the same stars that dot the sky every night, half a world a way here at home? Since they’ve left, I find myself paying closer and closer attention to the news from the war effort. Anytime a report comes out of Afghanistan, anytime I see the words “…American GI’s killed today…”, anytime I hear the representatives from the Left and Right battling back and forth about what the best strategy is for the war, I find myself gripped to my TV, thinking and wondering to myself was it Zach or Korry that they were talking about.

 Since the start of the war a few years go, the focus on the conflict has shifted dramatically. No longer are we as a nation shocked or horrified by the ever-growing death toll of the war. It’s become something almost common place, a tool to be used by either political party against the other. Anymore we view the war in purely political terms, without stopping to think about what it really means when an American soldier is killed in the war. We don’t stop to think about the mother sitting at home, wishing for nothing more than her son or daughter to be brought back to them. We don’t think about the now widowed mother of two who has to somehow find away to support her family without the love of her life there to help her along the way. We don’t think about the younger brothers, whose childhood idols and role models were taken away from them in the blink of an eye.

Before the war hit me directly, I wasn’t too concerned with what was going on in the Middle East. I had no reason to be scared or afraid of what was happening across the globe. Out of sight, out of mind right? But now that two of my family members, two of my closest friends, two of my brothers are over there, my view has completely shifted. We as a country need to stop seeing the war from a purely political standpoint and start looking through a more personal perspective. After all, people, living breathing, human beings, fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters are doing the fighting, not numbers and statistics.