My dad and brother are “War Heroes” and my dad used to tell me that you can always tell the guys that never killed anyone. They’re the ones that talk about it. That give high fives and joke about it. That are all gung ho before the fight… he said a perfect example of soldiers before they had to kill anyone is the little white kid in that movie “Unforgiven”. Just talked so much shit and acted like such a bad ass and didn’t respect or even recognize the real killers around him… glorified it. Made it something super cool.

He said in Vietnam he would watch all the troops act that same way, getting loaded on the trucks… and then he said on the way back, no one said a word.

My brother told me that the one thing that changes after you kill someone — is everything . And you don’t get it back. You never go back to who you were.

Great story. I love old guys like that. I’m so glad he told you all those stories , write them down, just like this and tell them to your kids.