Slice-o-Life: The Red Badge of Courage

Slice-o-Life: The Red Badge of Courage
by Mike Madias, Clinical Sociologist and Columnist

September 6, 2002

Columnist Mike Madias "It is an awful thing to handle the still warm body of a man you’ve just killed. It feels like God has you under a powerful microscope, and is minutely examining the wrinkles and hidden recesses of your soul. It is a moment that is sad, solemn, and utterly lonely. And it clears away all differences among men.

"This man was an enemy no longer. He was now my brother -- as, in reality, he had always been -- and I was the instrument of his death.

Whatever he desired in life, whatever his hopes and dreams had been for the future, they were now over. His desires would go unfulfilled.

"God almighty, I am so tired. I was only in my early thirties but I felt like a man who carried the weight of ninety years."

From "Inside Delta Force" - by a founding member , Eric L. Handy, Command Sargent Major USA (Ret.)

War has its own aesthetics, its own romance. It is easy to become enthralled by it. I believe that there are civilians that advise the present administration that may be entranced by the visions of war. Others, including retired military men hold their thrall in check.

The closest I came to being in the Army was as a war protestor during the days of the Vietnam war. I did a short stint in the merchant marine, as a ships chaplain.

I started to get a better understanding of bloodlust when I was a practicing pastoral counselor in southern California. A good number of my clients were returning veterans.

There was the guy who was intent on suicide, and we walked around the lake at MacArthur Park. He had an Army Issue 45 caliber automatic pistol in his hand. As we walked, he was going through the process of considering his young life and the prospects for his future. I walked along side, had my arm around him, now and again I would hold him, embracing his body and the gun.

As a minister, I was clinician in a substance abuse agency that made house calls. A recovering junkie grunt was my client. His parents had called the agency and said that their son was armed and was waiting at his house for me to arrive. He was planning to shoot me during my visit and then kill himself. I went anyway, and did my job, gave him a session that went way beyond the standard 50 minutes and got him to give me his weapon.

`There was the guy who had been in the Special Forces who told me about cave warfare in Nam. In his confession, he told how he had seen the death of his friends at the hands of the Viet Cong and NVA. He had been part of a an assault team that saw action that included the cold blooded slaughter of civilians. It was a pre-emptive attack. He did not know if the villagers were VC or not. And for a moment, as he fired on them it did not matter if they were hostile. They were just targets.

Years later, this veteran could not sleep at night, so he came to me to make his confession. Me, a minister in the Church of Universal Life: ("Please send $5 to Modesto California for your ordination documents-thank you and God Bless").

It turned out that he was stuck in the instant when he killed women and children. He dealt out death first hand. It was not a matter of calling in an air strike on a suspected Viet Cong position. He was a direct witness of his own war crime. He looked at the people, right in the face, and they looked at him. And then he let loose a few dozen rounds and thought that would be the end of the confrontation. It wasn’t the end.

He could rationalize that he saved his brothers from death. Maybe he did. But that did not matter enough to let him get rest. What remained for him was not the glory and romance of war but the terror, the grief and the guilt. The residue of a thrall.

I had compassion for these broken warriors.

But there was one situation where I acted coldly and without compassion. I was taking a confession from a vet in a Hollywood hotel conference room. The client calmly told me that he intended to go to his own room immediately following out conversation and set up a snipers nest at the window and use a rifle to kill people walking along Hollywood Boulevard. There is a code of ethics for therapists that talks about confidentiality. All psychotherapists and men of the cloth are supposed to follow it. I decided to violate the code.

This deluded man turned out to be a Neo-Nazi; he thought that he was a sniper in a "Death’s-Head" SS unit attached to the Afrika Korps. I figured that if he was delusional enough to think that he was under the command of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, he might be persuaded that I was a comrade in arms.

I am a history buff and I humored him, fed his delusion and took on the role of being an SS officer..

I am a dark skinned Greek, with Jewish roots on my fathers side of the family. I do not now, and never have looked like a Viking prince.

But, I remembered my readings of Nietzsche. I remembered reading William L. Shirer’s "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich." So I could Nazi-name-drop all night if it would have been necessary. During a short session break, I called hotel security. Then I accompanied this whacko to his hotel room where he showed me his arsenal. Impressive.

We drank some beer. Toasted Hitler here and there and finally the cops came to the door and took his sick ass away. I had defeated an enemy. I was glad to take this guy down.

You might ask, why did I risk my life. I did not know then. I figured that I was a hot shot clinician, a top gun for God. The truth is that I loved the dipping of my toes into a mild semblance of mortal combat. I loved the smell of napalm in the morning.

I have had many clients that suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. I have worked in drunk tanks, jails, psychiatric wards, and in private practice.

I failed in one case where a war veteran who was my client left session, went home and blew his wife and kids away and then killed himself. He never voiced his intention to do anyone harm. I blame myself for the death of that client and his family; and for other clients, that died before their time. It sometimes keeps me awake at night and contributes to me being a self righteous columnist.

It is all about death, haunting death that keeps a man from his sleep. And memories that can lead a man to murder and suicide.

For these poor grunts, the war never ended. Tet was 35 years ago and it was two weeks ago as well.

It has been decades for me too; but I had managed to forget those patients, their stories, and go on with my life. That is because I was not there with them dodging incoming ordnance in Cambodia, or Somalia, or Bosnia. And that also is because I chose to get drunk a lot when I lived in Hollywood.

A few months back, I started doing research on domestic militias, skinheads, neo-Nazis, and the Christian Identity movement. But my curiosity got me interested in the field of "non-conventional" military action: the SAS; Seals; Rangers; and the Delta Force.

I ordered a number of books on elite fighting groups, and counter terrorism. I subscribed to Soldier of Fortune magazine. Tonight I finished reading"Inside Delta Force" written by Eric L. Haney, one of its founding members. Delta Force is America’s elite counter-terrorist military unit.

What surprised me was the author’s melancholy: missing dead comrades; anger at the suits who did not understand the consequences of war. He spoke of efforts and the actions (not always successful) that sought to avoid collateral casualties. He spoke both of pride and regret. He called this mix "honor." And he wrote it so well that I started to understand.

I have found some "gung-ho lets go out there an kill us some al-Qaeda gooks" type material on Soldier of Fortune Magazine. A good share of jingoism. One issue of SOF had this ridiculous interview with Pat Buchanan. (If there is ever to be an American Hitler, it is likely to be Pat Buchanan.)

But the overwhelming emotional content of the combat memoirs I have read in books and in magazines is one of melancholy. It was as if I were reading Matthew Arnold’s poetry, and not the musings of John Wayne in "Back to Bataan."

What made these warrior heros, who were walking the streets of Hollywood, so tragic was their psychic ambivalence. They knew and hated the destruction that comes from combat, yet they loved the bond that they shared with their comrades, their brothers in arms. The were enthralled by war. They did not like war, but they loved it.

And so, after serving their country in its regular and its elite forces, many were committed to a life of nonviolence and silent passivity, only sharing their feelings with each other, and now and again with their respective confessors.

War is beyond my comprehension, but it is not beyond my empathy. War enthralls. It cannot be understood; and yet, there remains the lure and the repulsion.

In a debate on foreign policy, about when and how the US can manipulate and force the ouster of a hostile regime, I trust the opinions and judgements of the military, before I trust the Foggy Bottom crew in the State Department.

The Pentagon has its share of desk jockey senior officers, but since September 11, even they have experienced live combat. If anyone has the justification for seeking bloody vengeance, it is the men and women who work in that fortress. Nonetheless, many of them would suggest care, caution, consideration and methodical exercise of war as a last option.

There are a number of retired warriors. Some of these were decorated and honored in "welcome home" parades all around the heartland.

But, some have returned their medals to the Army. Others have left them against a wall in Washington DC. The old soldiers who are quoted by the press advise the administration to approach the upcoming war with prudence. They have the lust for enemy blood, of course. But they have the discipline and will not surrender to their aggression.

Perhaps I should go back, seek employment in a drunk tank or psychiatric unit of the Veterans Hospital. Maybe I can help. This war will bring a new cohort of combat veterans; headed to hospital wards and outpatient psychiatric clinics. I feel compelled to leave something behind, a legacy of good work-something to lean up against the wall in DC.

I am not exactly changing the world, sitting here at this desk, with my laptop computer.

"So I say to you all: Maintain courage. Have hope. Be patient, but at the same time be vigilant. And tonight, when you are safely in your beds, in those last few moments before you go to sleep, give thanks to whatever deity you speak to, that we have a group of men who readily go in the worst of harms way, and are prepared to lay down their lives, if that’s what it takes, so that you can live a life without fear."

Eric L. Haney, American Citizen, Soldier

Shalom,

Mike

"And good night, Ms. Nightingale, wherever you are."

Photo of Mike Madias courtesy of the author

A clinical sociologist living in the Metropolitan Detroit area, Mike's work has appeared in The Detroit News. He may be reached by e-mail at DetroitHardball@aol.com.