The fall of Kabul
I got this message from a friend. After I left Facebook I lost touch with most former friends and colleagues, but she and I have continued to share Christmas greetings and such. I understand that remaining in touch individually takes much more work than a group format, but I have been willing at this point to sacrifice quantity for the quality of my relationships, even distant and casual ones.
First some back story. I know I can be long-winded, but I really think some context is important to understanding this message from someone you don't know. One of the units I worked with at SHAPE was an Army Intelligence group that served as NATO's spooks. Somehow I was able to gain enough of the commander's trust for him to allow me in to deliver Army-required training for them. This led to my being able, during the Gillibrand-inspired panic over sexual assaults in the military, to broker a deal whereby we, my garrison, would share my friend as a Sexual Assault Victim Advocate/Response Coordinator. Much has been made of my propensity for firing incompetents, but this turned out to be one of the best staffing decisions I ever made. She was an SFC when we worked together and retired as a MSG after I did. Now she has 3 little girls about 5-14 years old. She had been in and out of Afghanistan multiple times when we met, mostly gathering intel among tribal women. Of course, she didn't share many details with me, but we talked a lot. At that time she was still very angry about one incident. That anger may have been why she was no longer being sent in by her unit. Basically, she was called off by someone outranking her from reaping some vengeance on an Afghan man who had sexually abused a young child from a family she had been working with. Just a note - he was not Taliban, ISIS or Al-Qaeda. She was furious with the man and understood why she had been ordered to hold her fire, but struggled with reconciling her duty, as expressed by her leaders, to just stand by as corrupt monsters had their way against innocents when she had it in her power to make him at least pay. It was a very real moral dilemma for her for years. I once saw her in dress uniform with all her ribbons and badges and spotted a purple heart. She never told me and I never asked about the nature or circumstances of her injuries. By the time I met her she had declined several reassignments to the Pentagon and other commands that would have led to rapid promotion. She decided instead to stay put, in garrison, to ride it out until she could retire at 38, which is why I even got the chance to work with her. I suspect that her loss of faith in the mission had almost as much to do with her decision as falling in love and wanting to start a family did. Just as an aside, she is an immigrant from the Caribbean.
Now, to her message;
"I know I have friends who are very worried about me right now. Don't be, or if you feel the need pray for me and those that will get left behind. But if you send me anything in sympathy I will remove you from my contact list. All week friends, family, colleagues and even strangers been concerned about my reaction to the events in Afghanistan. Don't even thank me for my service. I have hated that phrase for years, but said nothing because I thought it was coming from good people who just didn't know what else to say. Those good people would probably be horrified to know what my service actually involved. If you really care about veterans never casually say that to one again.
For the record I am fine. Disappointed and mad about the FUBAR it has all become (I won't spell that out for you if you who don't know what it means), but I am fine. As a mother I hate to think about the desperation that drives Afghan mothers to toss their babies to just any armored up foreign service member carrying weapons. I also feel bad for those service members who will carry the memories of the experience with them for the rest of their lives. Without your sympathy most of them will get through just fine like warriors always do, in their own way. I would like to think I would have protected my girls better than the women I worked with who handed their girls over to monsters, but I say that as I type this on a computer in a nice house in an American suburb before I drop one of my girls off at karate class and another for a piano lesson. Yes, I am mad about the current situation, but I have no regrets about my service even though I wish I had served under more honest top leaders. I was not able to save Afghan girls from abuse, but I still believe I helped keep some of our fighting force safer at least for awhile.
Until yesterday I've been able to keep it all together as well meaning folks thanked me for my service and tried to console me. That was until church yesterday when a member who had never spoken to me before asked how I felt. I wanted to scream HOW DO YOU F**ing THINK I FEEL? I didn't.
I hope you will understand why I don't want to hear your condolences. If you don't or can't bring yourself to mind your own business FU. Sorry, - not very Christian of me I know, but with some friends you don't need enemies. I'm not sorry to see you go. This old warrior will work things out for herself."
See why I like her?