A Veterans Experience - Essay Example

Section/# A Veteran’s Experience Oftentimes understanding the plight of the veteran’s experience is something that cannot be easily told from a non-personal prospective. Throughout the years, many people have struggled to relate the nature of war and the way that the veteran interacts with such a construct based upon a more broad and non-personal perspective. Although such approaches are useful in helping to gauge the overarching and shared effects that factors such as battlefield stress impact upon the individual soldier, this particular approach is not helpful in understanding the dynamics and nuances of the individual soldier’s experience. Accordingly, this brief analysis will consider the case of veteran Justin Harman and his experience within the theater of the Iraq War as a means to better understand, identify with, and interpret the feelings, emotions, and occurrences that had a profound effect on the formation of his view of the situation. Justin Harman was born on the 1st of October 1975. Immediately after completing high school in 1993, Justin joined the military. His military career was cut short by a debilitating knee injury which caused him to have an honorable discharge for medical purposes. Although he had considered going back to the military once his wound had successfully healed, there always seemed to be something that stopped him from taking the final steps to re-enlist. However, a full 10 years later, after the attacks of September 11th, 2001 and at the outset of hostilities between the United States and Iraq, Justin could no longer take the emptiness and lack of purpose that had seemingly defined his life during the interlude between his earlier service and the present time. Before deploying to the theater of war, Justin underwent basic training in Mississippi which consisted of 8 weeks of gruesome physical exertion in the heat of the summer sun. As such, even though Justin had previously completed basic training when he was in the service back in 1993, the time between his periods of service had been so long that it required him to complete this step again. Accordingly, even though he was much older than the average recruit, it was necessary for him to get up just as early, run just as far and just as hard, and complete all other levels of basic training to the same degree as the younger recruits. Yet, even though the training was highly difficult, Justin still harbored within himself a strong desire to complete it successfully so that he may soon be in the theater of conflict. However, the decision to go back into the service was not easily made. For instance, Justin had to make the difficult decision to leave his young fiancé; knowing full well that he would likely have to leave her for an extended deployment in the very near future due to the obvious factors that were leading up to the Iraq War. During his time back in the service, Justin served for another year and a half. During this time, one of the most difficult experiences that he relates is concentric upon the fact that in the event that any service member within their region was killed, outside communications would be shut down for a period of two or three days. Such a hardship as losing a fellow service member is itself difficult to bear; however, the inability to contact his fiancé or other loved ones and tell them that he was safe and enjoy being able to speak with them was taken away multiple times in any given month. This aspect of the deployment placed a high degree of hardship on the veteran as the monotony and hardship of daily duties were compounded by regular communication blackouts. However, Justin’s anticipation to “liberate” the nation of Iraq was greatly dampened when he and the other troops saw the nature of the welcome they received. Rather than being able to work to build a nation who they had been told had suffered under one of the most brutal dictatorships that the world had seen, the soldiers were greeted by incessant partisan violence, gunfire, RPG attacks, and roadside bombings that took a small but measurable toll on the personnel and moral of the coalition forces. It was in just this situation that Justin was forced to live, work, eat, and sleep. Moreover, while he was in Iraq, Justin was charged with being a bodyguard for the chaplain that was in service of their base. The state of confusion and complete disaster that the war had affected is adequately related by Justin when he describes a situation in which, while he was guarding the chaplain, there was a shootout between Iraqi security forces and the Iraqi police in which served to jar his confidence in the mission and role that he was playing in brining regime change to the nation of Iraq. Justin goes on to describe that the daily life within the base was so highly regimented and mechanized that it began to reduce his estimation of his own humanity. The pallor of the conflict, the desert sand, and the difficulties of the job all had a profound effect in the way that he identified with his role within the conflict. Justin related that the monotony of the base life was broken up at times by the ability to enjoy occasional leisure activities provide by the DOD. However, these activities, although fun, were short lived and helped to dull the boredom and monotony of the experience but a little. Similarly, Justin relates that he and his platoon were often on the receiving end of very powerful sandstorms that swept through the desert and battered each of the bases he was stationed at (Lovejoy 1). The experience was unique for him, like no doubt for most of the other troops, in that they had never before had an experience similar to this. He described it to one of the most painful experiences one can imagine if only one square inch of one’s skin was left uncovered. Justin goes on to relate that during his time in country, he spent a great deal of time between multiple bases as the nature of his job required him to travel extensively within the country. At nearly every base with the exception of one, the rocket fire, gunshots, roadside bombs and all of the other aforementioned factors were a fixture of daily life. This helped to provide a strong impression on Justin as he began to see the conflict from a more nuanced perspective than he would have had he spent the majority of his time in country in but a single base. While in country, Justin was primarily responsible for infrastructure improvement programs. However, unlike one might assume the infrastructure improvements were not intended for the local Iraqis but rather for key American interests within specific zones. This clear disconnect between the missions as stated and how it actually unfolded served to further differentiate the way in which Justin viewed the struggle. Of consequence to all of these experiences which have been related is of course the degree to which they have impacted upon him with respect to how he coped with his experiences upon returning home. As with most soldiers, Justin described his return home as the very best part of the entire experience. Beyond being able to see his family, Justin reports the extreme honor he was greeted with when he returned home and people would give he and his compatriots a standing ovation and show their respects for the hard-work and sacrifice that the soldiers had had to endure in order to complete their mission. The experiences related by Justin help to highlight the multi-faceted experience of the soldier’s life. Rather than portraying a picture of broken and betrayed soldier who returns with little meaning in life and deeply conflicted regarding his role in the struggle, Justin has mixed emotions but mostly has a positive view of the role he played within the conflict. Furthermore, rather than portraying an overly patriotic idealistic version of what Hollywood oftentimes tries to relate, Justin is the embodiment of the individual that can take both the good and the bad, analyze them, and come to a firm determination regarding how he felt regarding certain key issues. Work Cited Lovejoy, Sonya. "The Auburn Plainsman - Veterans Take Time Reflect on Service and Sacrifices." The Auburn Plainsman - Veterans Take Time Reflect on Service and Sacrifices. N.p., 12 Nov. 2012. Web. 25 Nov. 2012. . Read More