Profile_Essay

One thing I have never understood as an Infantryman deployed to Iraq as soon as I left High School was all the guys who wanted to go so bad. They all seem to have some sort of restless spirit inside them that wants to experience something new. They all thought it was going to be a fun and great experience. I really think they wanted to kill the Taliban. But as soon as the soldier wakes up after a 14 hour plane ride and takes their first step onto the dry soil of Iraq, thoughts of whether they have awoke in Hell or not usually circulate through their mind and tears of fear and reality fill their eyes; all while trying to hold their breath because of the burning pain they feel as the fiery air seems to singe their nose hairs. The climate is completely different than the United States and it almost feels like you are on a different planet; a planet where the temperature gets up to 139 degrees in the day and 40 degrees at night; a planet that is completely covered with brownish red sand except for the few rivers and lakes. The winds can literally knock someone off of their feet and the sandstorms sting and sometimes cut up the face. This is all not to mention the fact that the average infantryman wears approximately 35-45 lbs of gear when they go on missions in Iraq. They have to wear their full Battle dress uniform, their combat vest with Kevlar body armor and usually a backpack or rucksack. They also have to wear their heavy Kevlar helmet and carry their M4 or M16 rifle or some carry the bigger M249 Saw (Squad automatic weapon) or M240B machine gun which is really heavy. The weapons and anything of metal structure gets so hot and blazing to the touch that soldiers always have to wear gloves also. They either wear the gloves and are a little hotter or not wear them and burn your fingers on everything. So, by the end of their 12 hour shift, they are pouring sweat and have usually drunk 2 or 3 gallons of water if not more. It is extremely easy to get heat stroke or sun stroke in that kind of climate. The average off day for a soldier in Iraq is often miserable also. When a soldier is not on missions, they are usually working out in the small and hot weight tent or- depending on if they are lucky enough to be staying in trailers with electricity and AC instead of tents with little AC- are watching bad quality movies on their TVs or computers all day. They also have the tendencies to think about home a lot or even worse, mark each day off on a calendar. That kind of behavior usually makes a soldier even more miserable than they already are. They can also walk up to the trailer with all of the phones in it to try to call home. Most of the time the phones are all being used so they have to stand in line for long amounts of time. I have had many friends and have heard of many guys who have also gotten those “Dear John” letters from their wives or girlfriends. In case you are unaware of what a Dear John letter is, it is when someone’s wife or girlfriend breaks up with you, files for divorce, or just lets you know that they are cheating on you while you are on the other side of the world and can’t do a single solitary thing about it. You can’t even go home on leave until your original time has come. I actually had a guy in my company shoot himself in the head with his 9mm pistol 3 trailers down from me because his wife filed for divorce. My girlfriend when I was in Iraq led me to believe that she was pregnant with my son for the full 9 months she was carrying him until she gave birth, had a DNA test and told me that the baby boy was not mine. I was heartbroken and was stuck in Iraq to do nothing but try to somehow continue focusing on my job and my mission. I was always praying to God that my men and I go back to camp that day safe and unharmed. I had to pray for that every single day while I was there. The worst part about Iraq is not the weather, homesick or fear of death. The worst part is the way those poor children have to live. The poverty is outrageous and children run around in trash filled areas barefoot. Many of them will come up to soldiers and beg for food or anything that an American will give them. They are very grateful of anything they get because they don’t get very much. They have to go to the bathroom on the sandy and very dirty ground, they have to take baths and bathe in dirty streams and lakes and the poor children are always dirty and barefoot. They all seem to play soccer very well though, but all their soccer fields are covered with trash. Everybody should be so grateful and feel very blessed to live in the wonderful United States of America. To conclude, I wish that teenagers or anybody that wants to go overseas to fight in a War, whether in Iraq, Afghanistan, or anywhere there is conflict, would think very hard and be rational before they make any decisions. The moral of this essay and life lesson that I want to portray is that there is really no place like home. I want kids, teenagers, and adults to be happy and blessed to live in this wonderful country. The United States really is the best country on earth to live. We have freedom, we have democracy and we have money to make our country comfortable to live in.