From the abyss of the Iraq War (1): 'Mom ... I have killed a man'
November 24, 2010 - When I attempted to inquire about what had happened to him in Iraq, the former Marine replied in a calm but firm tone. "I don't want you to ask me about the war. Please don't take photos, either." He had already recounted his experiences for the book "Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan," a collection of eye-witness accounts by war veterans. "On April 18, 2006, I had my first confirmed kill. He was an innocent man. I don't know his name. ... During the incident (as) he walked back to his house, I shot him in front of his friend and father. The first round didn't kill him after I'd hit him in his neck. Afterward, he started screaming and looked right into my eyes. ... I said, 'Well, I can't let that happen.' I took another shot and took him out." "I was a monster." He collected "souvenirs" of dead Iraqis--noses and other facial parts--and placed them atop his helmet and had commemorative photos taken. The front seat of a vehicle driven by another soldier in his platoon was splattered with brain tissue from an Iraqi he had killed...
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From the abyss of the Iraq War (1): 'Mom ... I have killed a man'
BY KAZUYA MATSUMOTO STAFF WRITER
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Jose Vasquez (Kazuya Matsumoto)
Asahi.com, November 24, 2010
Word reached me that there was to be a gathering of U.S. veterans who had served in Iraq.
When it came to my attention, I headed to Pennsylvania.
The journey by train from New York took about 90 minutes. I got off at Philadelphia and searched for the address on foot, eventually arriving at a small building with a pizzeria on the first floor and a rental studio on the second. This was the venue for the meeting.
In the studio, returned soldiers and their supporters sprawled out on the floor chatting. After a while, I noticed that the men were moving into a room in the back in twos and threes.
"What's about to start?" I asked the organizer of the gathering, Lovella Calica, 29.
"The veterans are learning how to write down their experiences of war as they happened, as a way of healing themselves. First they deconstruct themselves, so they can reconstruct themselves later."
I came to understand what she meant after meeting a former Marine at the gathering.
* * *
When I attempted to inquire about what had happened to him in Iraq, the former Marine replied in a calm but firm tone.
"I don't want you to ask me about the war. Please don't take photos, either."
He had already recounted his experiences for the book "Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan," a collection of eye-witness accounts by war veterans.
"On April 18, 2006, I had my first confirmed kill. He was an innocent man. I don't know his name. ... During the incident (as) he walked back to his house, I shot him in front of his friend and father. The first round didn't kill him after I'd hit him in his neck. Afterward, he started screaming and looked right into my eyes. ... I said, 'Well, I can't let that happen.' I took another shot and took him out."
"I was a monster." He collected "souvenirs" of dead Iraqis--noses and other facial parts--and placed them atop his helmet and had commemorative photos taken.
The front seat of a vehicle driven by another soldier in his platoon was splattered with brain tissue from an Iraqi he had killed.
The Marine in front of me had lost so much weight since his picture was taken for the book that he looked like a different man altogether. His entire being exuded human frailty and suffering. His soul was clearly deeply scarred.
I felt deeply affected by him, and was lost for words.
"I write poems at 3 o'clock in the morning," he said as he handed me a collection of his work.
One of the poems stayed with me in particular.
It was written to his mother.
"You never taught me how to hate,
Only how to love, but mom,
I have killed a man.
...
It hurts mom. I still think
About it everyday ... ."
For quite some time he had been wracked by strong feelings of self-denial that he described as "psychological torture," and struggled to escape them. In his poetry collection, he described how he felt when he discovered writing poetry as a means of expression.
"I've found my own voice at last."
I met with one of the people who put "Winter Soldier" together, Jose Vasquez, 36, of IVAW (Iraq Veterans Against the War), at his office in New York.
As he listened to the intense experiences of the returned soldiers, for a time he fell into a depression.
"It was a very grueling process, as if I had become possessed by their pain."
* * *
The following line appears in the poetry collection written by the former marine.
"I wrote my first poem on a beach in 2006 at a time when I was on the edge of self destruction."
On the battlefield in Iraq, he must have been trying his hardest to play the role of a "strong" Marine. However, when he returned to the United States, his true identity as an ordinary, kind young man was pushed to the brink of disintegration.
According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, of the approximately 1.1 million soldiers that have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan, around 130,000 have developed Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and are receiving treatment for it, like the former Marine.
No weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq. The "unjust war" created a deep abyss in that country.
What happened there? In order to get closer to the truth, I set off on a journey that took me to the United States, Europe and Iraq itself.
* * *
Editor's note: This marks the first installment of a 23-part series titled "From the abyss of the Iraq War" that originally ran in the vernacular Asahi Shimbun.
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:: Article nr. 72155 sent on 25-nov-2010 01:55 ECT
www.uruknet.info?p=72155
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