I served, and killed, in Afghanistan
A former U.S. soldier and security contractor speaks about the mental impact of war
by Justin Heath Cannon
I was involved in a shooting in Afghanistan while working as a security contractor in 2009. Two Afghan civilians died and one was wounded.
It grieves me that anyone had to die from my actions, let alone these silly wars. At the time of the shooting, it was my fourth tour in a war zone, and my second to Afghanistan as a civilian. My first two were as a U.S. soldier, first to Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003.
In 2009 I’d been part of a two-vehicle convoy giving interpreters a ride. Our lead vehicle was struck from behind by a silver Corolla, which then sped away. My driver had gone to the other vehicle to check for casualties. We noticed a similar vehicle speeding down our lane in the wrong direction. We perceived it to be the same car coming back to “finish the job.” We shouted, showed our weapons, and then began firing.
Hind-sight sucks. It was likely not the same car. I still don’t know why they were going the wrong way and didn’t follow our commands, but I suppose that’s coming from my perspective. I’m sure the last thing an Afghan wants is an American pointing guns at him in his own city and yelling at him.
I was imprisoned in the U.S., and spent some of that time in solitary confinement. The case was covered by media. I wrote about solitary here.
I’ve learned a great deal through the years, and what I’ve “unlearned” has been equally valuable. I’ve seen lost innocence. Wasted youth. Emotional and psychological trauma. If the statistics are correct (and if anything they are lower than reality), then about 22 veterans killed themselves today. Think about that for a minute. More troops die at home than in war… yet we still focus on an external threat. There’s something wrong here.
I despise all the macho faux-patriotic cries to go seek vengeance by killing every brown person in the desert. In my heart of hearts, I know that within my lifetime no pull of the trigger, no mile walked on patrol, nor any loss of life has secured one single freedom for you.
Most warriors join the fight with honorable intentions… and maybe that’s what really counts. But was I one of them? I’m not really sure. Like many grunts who joined before 9/11, I wanted to shoot stuff and blow things up on Uncle Sam’s dime and not go to jail for it (ironic, right?).
Then everything changed.
By the end of my first tour, my belief in the rhetoric was chipping away. In the beginning, I honestly believed what I was being told:
“They hate us because we are happy and free and democratic and our women vote.”
“We have to kill them over there before they kill us at home.”
“We have to liberate these people and spread peace and democracy.”
I believed it so much that I preached it. I believed that I was fighting for our freedoms — but if you ever tried to express those freedoms by disagreeing with me or offending my sensibilities, then I would smash you. Physically or verbally. I thought I was a sheepdog, guarding the flock. Maybe I was… but somewhere in the process I had developed rabies. I had become dangerous.
I can’t really tell you why or when. I know war can change a man. There’s a certain thrill about almost being killed that’s pretty hard to duplicate. It’s like the ultimate victory. Destruction becomes habitual, and when we no longer can destroy others we turn on ourselves.
Taking lives is a grey area. It reinforces your superiority when it’s justified. You learn not to question.
And then you come home.
You made it back. Others didn’t. You’re mostly okay with living, but you mourn. You have these weird moments. Sometimes you hear things that aren’t there. Sometimes you hear things that make you tense up.
The smells are the worst. You’re filling up your gas tank and fumes mix with the dust in the air… before you know it, you’re in Baghdad. Cooking on a grill is unpleasant the first few times, as you remember vividly what burnt hair, flesh and body fat smells like.
Driving is weird. Sometimes you’ll snap back and wonder how long you’ve been somewhere else… it happens more often than you’d like to admit.
You zone out a lot. You have these weird memories of things that didn’t even happen. You don’t sleep much, if at all, except for when you shouldn’t.
You have a hard time figuring out what to do in life. You might spend a decade bouncing around jobs and dropping out of school. Your social life is kind of awkward. You often take things too far.
You find comfort in a bottle, maybe more. Sometimes you legitimately don’t want to talk about it. When you do start talking, a strange thing happens. You downplay some events while exaggerating others… sometimes to the point of making things up completely. I don’t think I’ve met anyone who knows a soldier that hasn’t “seen” a baby suicide bomber, an animal-humping villager, or a waterboarding-induced confession… including those that never went outside “the wire,” what we call the perimeter fence of a camp or base.
It’s what we don’t talk about that’s the problem. Questioning our policies. Sexual assault on our own troops. Bad shoots. War crimes on our part. Killing civilians and making enemies.
Some of us get through it. Some of us haven’t yet… Still others never make it.
We’re overwhelmed by surviving the horrors of war only to come home to a divided nation. Those of us disillusioned with our foreign policy and our lust for power are degraded. We’re turned away or given the runaround by agencies whose purpose is to care for us when we come home. We watch our benefits being put on the chopping block by idiots who don’t understand that many of us are surviving on welfare and food stamps. We watch our own brothers and sisters sleep in the rain while money flows across the ocean.
Feeling as though life made more sense in combat.
Failing at relationships. Failing at work. Failing at school.
Failing at life.
Waking up every day just trying not to become another statistic…
Until one day, after everything that you’ve survived and every accomplishment you’ve made, it all just doesn’t matter anymore. Maybe you finally choke down the perfect cocktail. Maybe you find one last use for that 550 cord you’ve been carrying around. Or maybe you just blow your brains out in the Veterans Affairs parking lot – a last one-finger salute to the bureaucracy that failed you.
I think of those who ended their lives after having them shattered. I may consider it a selfish act, and always unacceptable. I may feel that they gave up too soon and that there is always a way out.
Yet, I also feel that we as a nation failed them.
I remember the 22 warriors who lost the fight, today.
The author’s perspective does not reflect that of AJ+. This is part 2 of a two-part submission from Justin Heath Cannon. His first piece discussed his experiences in solitary confinement while imprisoned in the United States.
