FYI to all: no such thing as a "Good War"--never was, never will be-- until we learn to stop trying to solve our conflicts with anything other than peaceful mediation.
Read a summary, verbatim, without comment, of statements by most of the major figures, before, during, and after WW2 and then tell me if it was "Good"--HUMAN SMOKE, by Nicholson Baker.
Also read his article, WHY I’M A PACIFIST, in the May 2011 issue of HARPER's. Yes, we can change.
9
I think that WW II was a very different experience from the wars that came before and after.
My father was a teletype operator in the Signal Corps. (Who knows what a teletype machine is?) When he was wounded, he didn't apply for a purple heart because he didn't want to worry my mother. But in the Signal Corps, he was never too close to the front lines (always a mile or two back), but he and a friend had a second, full time job, helping the Jewish communities of Morocco and later Pisa, Italy.
My father didn't speak about the fighting much. But he did tell us how he supported the Jewish Communities. One example was when he went to the commanding general to complain that the army had provided electricity to the local church but not the synagogue, or when he got the army to repair a broken examining table for the local community's physicians. I've posted some of his war pictures at http://solutionsny.nyc/SF3.pdf.
6
50 years ago before deploying as a 19-year-old soldier with the US Army to Vietnam, my dad - a WWII combat veteran - gave me some good advice. He said to me during a private conversation, “Son, when you return to the States from the war, do the following: (1) make sure you have documented with the US Army any and all medical problems you might have, (2) receive your ‘mustering out’ pay, (3) turn in your jungle fatigues and (3) then walk away from the US Army and the war and never, never, never look back!”
After serving in Vietnam for 19 months, I returned to the States, was discharged from the US Army and then followed my dad’s advice and never looked back.
I will always be humbly grateful for that ‘combat tested and proven’ advice which my loving father gave to me. It enabled me to ‘put the war behind me’ and then go on with my life.
9
With the possible exception of doing so in order to protect the psyches (Greek for “souls”) of young child civilians trapped in an active was zone or worse (think: excellent 1997 film “Life Is Beautiful”), no one should be told that making, fighting, or surviving actual war is an “adventure”. An intense and life and body and mind shattering challenge, perhaps; but not an “adventure” and certainly not what children, who think literally, should be understanding an adventure to be. (Some cynical adult Warrior might sarcastically refer to a specific mission as an “adventure” but that is entirely different and is understood to be a sarcastic euphemism.)
Using “your adventure” to describe what is actually intense combat — killing, maiming, and capturing and imprisoning the enemy, while simultaneously desperately trying to protect yourself, your brothers and sisters in arms and civilians from the same fate — reminds me of the pre-1st Gulf War and pre-9/11 military recruitment commercials on tv. They presented the military as primarily a way to get paid to travel abroad (like a vacation of sorts),; an extended camping trip complete with fun jumps over logs and streams and rappelling and helicopters; or a way to help pay for college or make some extra cash. No voiceover or tiny-typed disclaimer at the bottom of the screen pointing out that the job was literally life- and limb-threatening (and mind-threatening in too many cases). Just fun and adventure...
6
My father is a Vietnam veteran (yes Aussies went all the way with LBJ too). He met and married my mother after he got back (she worked at Veterans Affairs) so my brother and I have no experience of him being away. He almost never talks about it. I know very little about his service, except that he drove a truck. Yet, I can say that the war lived with us everyday. He never slept. If so I much as went to the bathroom at night, I’d hear “whose there, whose there” at the slightest sound. He was always tired, stressed, moody, on edge. You never knew if he’d laugh with you or bite your head off. I thought this was normal, that all men were like this. I loved him, but I was scared of him. All our neighbours were veterans families too from WW11, Korea and Vietnam. What I’m trying to say is that the children of veterans get a second-hand experience of the aftermath of war. While the book seems inappropriate, maybe your daughters are using it to try to connect with you, to understand you, to break the silence. Young as they are, they may understand far more than you think.
12
I hope that the author will, in time, be able to tell his daughters what happened over there, but hopefully before he passes on.
I'm glad however, that you made it back to the U.S., so that you are surrounded by you wife and 2 daughters.
6
Thank you Zach for sharing this experience with us. I have difficulty comprehending a children's book about the war in Afghanistan. The concept seems entirely alien to me. As you well know, no one comes home from war unscathed and how to explain that to children is, at best, difficult. Why we entered Afghanistan knowing it has been referred to by historians as "the graveyard of empires" is beyond my comprehension. Semper Fi.
9
First, a salute to a fellow Marine "grunt" and his comrades, for their service. I served with the 5th Marines in Vietnam: from what I can gather the only difference was Vietnam was greener in the rainy season and communication back home was all handwritten.
I was fortunate in the fact that I had no children then: how can you explain in words the unexplainable? Later, when my children and their friends were growing up I felt obligated to tell them how I viewed "my adventure" with as much accuracy as I could to counteract the picture presented in media. I use the term not in any heroic sense - it was an event in my life unlike anything I could have imagined, I have been forever changed by the experience, and I was very lucky to have left Vietnam only wounded and not in a bag like some of my friends. How do you convey the concept that one is never more alive than when fighting for one's life, and how do you convey what tallying up the costs, your casualties, is like when the fight is over? How do you convey what being a combat infantryman feels like fighting a war that no one back home seems to care about?
I believe that the talks were beneficial for them and probably cathartic for me. For my children, now grown, Vietnam's ancient history, one more oddity of their old man. Neither of them served in the military, and that's alright by me.
42
Thank you for talking to your daughters about your deployment. My father served 3 tours in Vietnam and the rules in our house were simple, we didn’t tell Daddy how we suffered while he was gone and he didn’t talk about what he was going through over there. My dad passed away 15 years ago and I have his medals and his USMC sword but I’ll never have his whole history.
66
I encourage you, Sir, to write your own book. Not just for your daughters but for all the daughters whose fathers didn't come back.
25
I served for 18 months in Afghanistan as a senior DOD officer in Kabul, but my service could in no way compare to that of 99% of our Marines deployed to that country, or Mr. Bell's. They were almost always placed in the most dangerous areas and under the worst conditions. That said, I have so many issues with this article. Mr. Bell voluntarily joined the USMC as a rifleman in the mid-2000s when the US was heavily, militarily involved in two different war zones. Did he not expect to be deployed? While deployed did he not believe he would use his weapon to kill another human being? It's hard to believe that he didn't. I admire his efforts to intelligently and critically examine his past, but there have been few changes to the way wars are fought....and I believe that every young man seeking to the join the USMC knows that. But, equally disturbing is a school library that offers books like this to such young people.
You served in two of the worst possible places, in one of the biggest hellholes in the world. And you survived. Try to focus on the positive aspects of the friendships you developed with brothers in arms who served in the same difficult circumstances, and try to forgive any failings you feel of your service. War is hell....everyone knows that. You and I volunteered to go to hell, so now we have to reconcile that fact with life in the real world.
8
Main Stream Media is for people who eat out at McDonalds. Se what your Wife got for a Toy at McD.
http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/UnNews:Parents_denounce_new_Happy_Meals_toys
Taliban wanted to ban Poppy growing, and Bush led a war to restore Opium production.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/drug-war-american-troops-are-protecting-afghan-opium-u-s-occupation-leads-to-all-time-high-heroin-production/5358053
The emotional difficulty of revealing ever more complicated truths to my child pale in comparison to Mr. Bell's. I salute him for his efforts.
Enough of the glorification of war. Where are the children's books that say war is Hell?
12
Just curious if that book has a chapter written from the Taliban perspective. If you choose to go into a peaceful farming village, use them as shields, hide behind them, perhaps hold some hostage to your presence, do you turn to page....120 to get your war crimes trial? Or do you turn to page 2018 and get to sit down for peace talks while still making war?
And to all those veterans sooo tired of being thanked for their service- try to turn to page....1976 for.....spoiler alert....what it’s like to never being thanked, recognized; being called baby killers, .....
2
Thank you.
2
Marine;
War is hell. Like you, I also fought with the Marine Infantry, but in Fallujah, Iraq. My daughters ask me what I did there. I dont really have answers that satisfy their elementary school minds. I used to say I fought Dragons using my NCO sword in foreign lands. I didn’t want to tell them about shooting people from fortified positions or seeing comrades get struck by IEDs.
I am proud of my service and will not allow the enemy to negatively affect my or my family’s life. I will not let them win. I will live a happy and productive life in a free country where my daughters have the opportunity to be either doctors that cure cancer, or enlist in the Marine Corps as infantry platoon leaders.
This is an amazing country. I wouldn’t endorse the choose your own adventure book either, but I am glad its out there. It might just help someone else or educate a future politician about the perils of war.
Happy Birthday Marine!
Semper Fidelis,
SSGT C, RCT 5
8
A very powerful and honest article by an honorable man. As General Sherman said: "War is cruelty and you can not refine it." All you can do is your duty and hope that you were sent to fight a war that has purpose.
6
Keep writing -- you have the gift.
11
savage in the night
nightmares riding
o’er the fields of dreams
if i could only kill the ----
beat
beat
beat
breathe
breathe
breathe
i crouch at the doorway
peering out in black marked grey
stunned in stark silence
i wait for dream to return
i fear dream will return
return
return
return
7
The military -industrial complex is present in EVERY aspect of American life.This is propaganda to numb our youth of the death and destruction of war.Open your eyes and you find everywhere .Watching the beginning of any sporting event with it's patriotic nonsense is sickening then sad. Those beautiful planes that fly over have only one purpose causing death and destruction There I got it off my chest.
9
Thank you for writing this piece. Can it get any worse than using a cruel war this count should not be part of to write adventure stories for children? Is it a surprise that these children become immune to violence before they are teenagers? Shame on who writes and punished these books..... they should all be deployed to Afghanistan for their own adventure..... preferably with their children....
1
I liberal must have written that book. One who hates the marine corps but lives under the shroud of the safety they provide.
An adventure.....wow. Not for this Marine it's wasn't..the extent that some people are out of touch is unreal at times.
4
@There
It has Zero to do with being a liberal. There are plenty of liberals who have served in and/or support our military.
It’s hate-filled, lazy stereotyping that too often divides Americans. Try not to feed into or buy into that bad habit.
18
@There
I could reasonably be called a 'screaming liberal'.. although frankly I don't really scream ever. My husband of 20 years is a combat disabled Marine.
I am sick to death of being told that 'liberals' don't respect the armed services and the hardships they encounter in the various conflicts around the world.
That particular book was written by a Sci-Fi author and a sports nut. Are they liberals? Who knows. I'm pretty sure that they are just churning out words to support their families. In this case they should have chosen different ones.
8
Perhaps Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet On The Western Front is a more accurate depiction. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHMWIqwS3Vg
7
Thank you for talking, nut just to your daughters, but to all of us. Please keep speaking and reminding us that the news we here in 30 seconds is about people.
I don't know what more I can say.
3
The library book is wrong. Inappropriate. Time enough later to grapple with this country 's repeated military follies. Now is the time to jump and sing and lose oneself in the lives of jo and the rest of the Little Women.
6
I cannot tell from your comments: do you think you made a mistake? Do you now believe you would decline to go to Afghanistan? Would you decline to enlist knowing you might be ordered to go there?
It is decent of you to acknowledge the flaws of a book given to children which distorts the reality of war. It is likewise decent of you to acknowledge the need to correct the false impression that book creates. You have learned.
Now, Marine, take the next step and declare that you would never again do what you did in Afghanistan. Only when you and all those like you decline to participate in those acts of evil will we be safe from the enemies who hate us as well as the false narratives leading us to hate in return.
4
Books about military experiences and killing people are totally inappropriate for children who are 8 to 11 years old, no matter what the publisher is pushing.
This book sounds like a military recruitment fantasy to normalize the unthinkable, to make WAR acceptable to children, to place it in their minds as some sort of normal activity, because Daddy did it.
How about we wait until they are mature enough to understand the Red Badge of Courage.
Talk to your therapist about killing and trying to avoid being killed while you volunteered for the military, not your young children.
4
I have not read a piece so honest and so devoid of sentimentality in a very long time. Lately, I have been only scanning the Times, desperate to find something to read that is not steeped in self indulgence, sentimentality and is not a rehash of the most common cliches raining on us every day. This piece stands out . Thank you to the author and thank you to the Times.
8
If we're going to educate kids about war, for God's sake, be accurate. Explain how watching people blown up changes your mind and outlook forever. Explain how a "near miss" from a shell can still scramble your brain like a shaken bowl of jelly. Let's talk about the high suicide rate of returned veterans. The act of dying in a war is probably the easiest thing to do.
And don't forget the thousands of innocent people caught in the middle - left maimed, starving, and homeless.
Talk about how insane the whole thing is....
8
This should not happen. This should stop. Books about the war that make it an 'adventure' and about 'choices' (kill or not to kill). And the war itself.
It's obscene, both war and books for kids about the war.
Humans are so stupid. But this father is smart. Do not participate. Tell them the truth when they can understand - no, that's not right. I'm 67 and I don't understand. May they NEVER understand. And keep their humanity.
Thank you for writing this.
11
Thank you for writing this. Please keep telling your story.
2
“There is no parenting book that explains how to walk your daughter through the standard operating procedures for sniper fire.”
We all wish there were never reason for a child (or adult) to think about such things, let alone a child as young as 8. It makes me wonder how this “book” was vetted for age appropriateness. I can’t imagine any of the 8 y.o. kids I know being able to cognitively and emotionally process that which even seasoned warriors and philosophers still grapple with.
It also strikes me that the author-producers and the publisher either acted irresponsibly or are psychologically clueless — given that it seems not to have occurred to them that probably the kids most likely to read/use/see their “book” would be the very kids whose parent(s) were involved in the Afganistán War, and all the more so kids who hear that it features a battle zone or Battalion in which their parent(s) or other family members were engaged — and died or are living with the many non-trivial consequences thereof. The inappropriateness of the “adventure” paradigm and title, and of introducing the topic of war crimes becomes all the more salient and, for the families, damaging. 8 y.o. and even 11 y.o., especially those who‘ve had to cope with months or years long absences of a parent who is away because and for the benefit of all the rest of us, needn’t have to wonder, after using a cavalierly constructed computer program (which is what such “interactive” “books” are), if dad’s a war criminal
1
Loved the article. Made my stomach turn a bit reading about choosing to shoot or not. You sound like a great father.
3
Children are not adults. They should not have to think about the gruesome facts about war. Why would you want to frighten them? Children are only children for a short while. Don't fill their heads with horrors they have no control over. I would not be engaging them in a conversation about this book.
2
Thank you for saying what many many feel.
3
Marine, Reconsider what you tell your girls. Your experiences are yours (ours) to bear, and whatever their current ages, they will not understand. How you live your life in front of them is what prepares and protects them. And however well meant, your openness will neither inform them or rectify our national blunders.
Semper fi.
1
Powerful. It's astonishing that anyone would be so misguided as to publish the children's book that the author is talking about. Just because the mind boggles, I searched and found it instantly on Amazon. Appalling.
3
I recall a quote, I think from Saint-Exupery: "War is not an adventure. It is a plague, like typhoid"
8
Thank you. My grandfather served from 1940-45 for Australia. While we learned a little more in his final years when he was one of the only people left to speak for his brothers, he spent most of his life trying not to talk about the details, and I would never claim to know or understand everything he experienced.
"Choose your own adventure" in the context of war is horrifying. My grandfather signed up at 17, he didn't choose his adventures. The few times he did were the hijinks he pulled to get demoted again after he was promoted (yes, this occurred multiple times!) for his acts of "heroism," which for him were just instances of brothers taking take of each other... he hated being called a hero, he reserved that for the fallen.
Now he's gone, I can call him a hero. But I'll be honest, it's not because of what he did or didn't do in the Middle East or the Pacific, it's because of who he was his whole life: a man who re-enlisted after the war was over and retired army, who never abandoned his brothers - they were my great-uncles, and he loved them and his families as much as his own, which was with everything he had - and the man who had to leave the table when I was 16 and brought a Japanese exchange student staying with us to dinner, because she looked just like... a clearing, we saw each other... I got my shot off first... I had to... I'm not crying... go back to dinner.
He knew it wasn't a story for a child, because he was one at the beginning of it. Lest we forget.
4
Thank you for your personal, emotional and sobering take on war and parenthood. All the qualities of a real man.
3
The killing machines of nations need to have citizens willing to go out and kill the “enemy”. This willingness has been fostered for ages in boys and young men with the story that war is an adventure and having war heroes who tell their stories of daring and courage while fighting and killing other “bad” men. It is no surprise that young school age children are reading this type of material; all the more effective to plant these ideas in the subconscious. Imagine instead that children were given books with the idea that all people are my brothers and sisters. Brown skinned people, pink skinned people, Jewish people, Muslim people, Catholic people, etc. All the people of the world are my brothers, sisters, friends, families. Perhaps then we won’t have as many soldiers killing each other just so a few can profit.
2
I was in Helmand from 2009 through 2011, working at the Lash PRT. During this time the U.S. was spending $1billion a year, just in Helmand. Once a week we gathered to remember those U.S. and British infantrymen lost to IEDs. "We will remember them."
Several times I found myself riding on a Marine Osprey ferrying Afghans "insurgents" who had been caught planting IEDs -- emaciated, shoe-less, clothed in rags. The going rate was $5 to plant an IED.
Not a fearful opponent.
Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan -- our military-industrial complex continues making promises they can't keep. Why do we listen?
17
Society inevitably sanitizes war, unfortunately.
Sometimes, it's glorified; but at least sanitized.
It's useful to educate society what a horror it is.
If you haven't read it, I'd suggest Chris Hedges' "War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning."
2
Students, especially those with relatives in the armed services, want to learn about this topic. I would be grateful to discover more titles for them that are thoughtful. Three I respect are The Wall by Eve Bunting, Patrol by Walter Dean Myers, and Almost Forever by Maria Testa.
2
There have always been popular literature and movies that sensationalize and romanticize war. Creating a false impression of war as an "adventure" is what DOD propaganda is all about. In order to supply the fodder of war, there must be willing and eager participants, especially when there is no draft. Books, video games and movies that glorify war and the military are staples of enlistment. Indoctrination of impressionable youth makes every recruiters' job that much easier.
1
Afghanistan will always be "what for"..or "why did we sacrifice so many..and for what". This is the question many ask now and in the future. For those of us who endured, it maybe more pronounced, especially if some of our brethren did not return home alive.
Many who served spent more than 15 months of agonizing "what for"..while the bad guys once in awhile got lucky.
In short, we will miss them all as we approach 18 years of sustained combat where every year our Soldiers/Marines died...
3
I am appalled at such a children's book. I'm sorry your daughter had to look at a picture and decide if she should shoot the people portrayed there. As if it were a game. I'm also sorry you have had to live through your military service in that area twice, once with a child asking you impossible to answer questions. I greatly admire your article and your humanity. I'm sure your daughters will learn well from you. Blessings.
1
History has not been well and truly taught for decades unless one understands history as a complex series of testosterone-scented conquests.
Understanding the reasons for (and strategies of )war has never been easy. Maybe it was never possible. And, in America, since the elimination of the draft, few understand military life because most people have no exposure it except via drama or virtual exposure.
Politicians add to our blur because most of them cast all vets as heroes in order that they themselves be seen as "patriotic", serving their own purposes.
So...thank you for sharing your vantage point, Marine. May it contribute to our fuller understanding of national defense and of duty to nation and, ultimately, to a national identity whose integrity requires no warfare...
from a Vietnam-era vet who joined the Army
to stop the war from the inside
This piece points to some of the problems with and caused by our society’s near-worship of anything and everything electronic and, especially, computerized.
And it pints to some of the benefits of “old-school” (aka old fashioned) media and methodologies — such as paper books and in-person parent-child conversations.
The mindless application of all things “tech” and it’s mindless use by us need to stop. Ironically, as recent NYTimes articles reported, many of the creators and purveyors of such products guard their own children from using them. There are many lessons to be learned from these observations. And they include a new kind of exploitation of children and of the non-CEO class — a kind of intellectual-emotional exploitation.
2
I didn't go to Afghanistan but I have seen the elephant. I don't want to think about what I saw and did, I don't want to talk about what I saw and did. I just very much, fifty years later, would like to get a good night's sleep without having to think about. Just once.
War is not a game.
2
Only someone who has never served in actual active combat would describe it as a benign “adventure”
Actually, no civilian who’s had to face the challenge of surviving in a heavy combat zone would ever describe it as an “adventure” either — except, maybe, to their own child there with them, as a means to save their child’s psyche from the soul-crushing realities in which they have been thrown.
4
Brilliant -- confirming that the net damage of most of our wars is to us. Thank you for this post. Your honesty in front of your kids and the nation are commendable.
1
“There are no do-overs in war.”
Thank you for writing this. I don’t feel we know enough about all the people who went and fought in Afghanistan and Iraq. Keep on telling the stories so hopefully your daughters and the world’s children don’t have to read another ‘adventure’ book about war.
1
It might prove to painful to tell children the truth, that they may find out the hard way in later life. Our wars in Asia -- which Ike warned us against -- are fundamentally money-making ventures for the military-industrial-complex (he used that term) bigwigs and the international oil barons. He warned us never again to commit troops to the mainland of Asia. No one listened.
3
The Bell family photo is priceless. I thought his response, “Daddy helped fight bad guys and slept outside” to his young daughters’ question of what he did while he was gone was simple, direct, honest reply. Maybe it’s me but I am alarmed that a children’s book called “War in Afghanistan: An Interactive Modern History Adventure,” was written, much less targeted for children aged 8-11 and available in local libraries.
Equating this current unresolved war in Afghanistan to a “modern history adventure” for young kids to become interactive with is reckless and age-inappropriate to say the very least. Since when is war “an adventure”? There is a stark difference between simplifying vs. inaccurately labeling and describing an experience or encounter such as serving in the military and engaging in combat.
While I thought Mr. Bell was on point when he stated that “there is no parenting book that explains how to walk your daughter through the standard operating procedures for sniper fire” I was troubled that a 10 year old is even thinking about much less discussing the topic of snipers and its possible implications.
I honestly believe in the importance and the value of a parent who has or is presently serving in the military to share honest and open conversations with their family about their various experiences and encounters. But at the same time, I firmly believe such a conversation should not even get started at such a young, innocent and impressionable age.
6
This is a wonderful piece of writing, the kind of writing that those who send young men and women to war should read, ponder, and be touched by.
1
I’m at a loss understanding why anyone would think that this kind of a book is appropriate reading for a 10-year old.
2
Enlisting to go to fight in Afghanistan is a choice one makes.
It is in effect an agreement to accept a government job that mostly involves killing other people and putting yourself in peril of being killed, maimed, traumatized and left psychologically wounded for life.
In 1968 I was determined to enlist and fight in Vietnam. Only my father's persistence in getting me to enroll in community college changed my decision.
Today, I see war vets with mixed emotions.
I am sympathetic to those who did not survive or came back with life-changing physical and mental wounds.
Yet, I am clear that they made a decision to take a paid government job. It was a job that often required the taking of lives and risking one's own.
Thus, they and they alone are ultimately responsible for whatever happened to them when they took the job.
Working for the government is not "service" as I understand it. Volunteering one's time to help our nation's needy is service. Working for free to feed the homeless is service.
I can't see how sending troops to Afghanistan is in our nation's interest. I understand the stated intent, but the result is that we have lost thousands and spent hundreds of billions to no good end.
Afghanistan remains a basket case.
2
During Vietnam, had there been people such as you, sir, who could bring to light their experiences, we might have avoided the wars since then. Thank you for your service and sacrifice - we will always be in your debt.
2
If there is anything more dishonest and disgusting than having someone who has not been to war --and especially in combat-- try to tell a veteran what they went through, it is for those same people to "educate" the veteran's children with what is little more than candy-coated lies.
If you really want to teach American children about war, perhaps the textbooks should be written by the citizens of the countries in which the war takes place, and especially by those survivors whose bodies and lives were shattered. Then let an American writer try to make sense of why your father or perhaps a friend's father or mother doesn't want to talk about it, or acts strangely at times for no apparent reason.
There is a reason why combat veterans are reluctant to open up. Accept that quirk. Better still, respect it. Books like the one Cpl. Bell describes are not helpful to the Bells of America, and are even less so to the children of these men and women.
4
I went to Vietnam December 4, 1967 to join the 173rd Airborne Brigade as an 11C, a mortar crew member in C/3/503. The only people i ever killed there were two civilians, a woman and her child. I fired, with a machine gun, at a target I was ordered to fire at knowing the foolishness of the order. They were collateral damage. But for the luck of getting into medical school in 1974, I would likely be one of the myriads of my former veterans, haunted forever by that memory. Thirty-six years as an ER doc have healed me. As with all physicians I have memories of lives lost too, wondering if somehow I could have done more. But the lives saved make me at peace with that and the Vietnam experience, particularly with so many more lives saves than lost. I wonder how it can be that I am and have been sort of playing God in this whole process. But I never did. I did my best, in combat and Medicine, to respect life and to offer those dying without hope of cure the dignity of dying without all the hoopla of a code, with their ribs crushed during CPR, often on patients often in their nineties.
14
As somebody who, as a reporter, spent time in Vietnam, Lebanon & Yugoslavia, I completely understand Zachary Bell's distaste for the book about the Afghanistan War that his children brought home.
On the other hand, it might not be a matter of the empty, superficial "media" but of the particular talent involved.
John's Green's "The Fault in Our Stars," written for children 14 and up, is as good an introduction to the ravages of cancer as just about any work written for grownups.
And Lois Lowry’s "Number the Stars" and Karen Ackerman's "The Night Crossing" are remarkable books for children about, of all things, the Shoah.
And, of course, Art Spiegelman's "Maus," one of finest memoirs of the Shoah, is packaged as a graphic novel, for grades 6-8.
I have no idea if any terrific children's books about combat exist, but if they don't maybe Mr. Bell should consider writing one. He seems to have all the goods.
5
I wonder how many veterans who have actually experienced combat became more compassionate and more cautious about the use of military force?
1
Thank you Marine Bell. Poignant.
As Veterans Days approaches it would do all Americans a service to consider how we too often turn war, and our role in it, into trite pieces of entertainment. A child's book is no place to deal with the complexities of war. To teach to children that questions arising in battle are answered with simple Yes or No's. That the consequence to a bad choice is a do-over.
That there is a "look" to the bad guys. That every thing we do as a nation "over there" is as simple and clean as turning a page onto a clean, blank page.
Its time we stop romanticizing war, and the very real humans we send into them. Time to stop trying to deliver easy and trite explanations to their complexities. To dismiss the real impacts, not only on our soldiers and their families, but to the people who live where we deem it okay for us to intrude and too often leave in a shambles of destruction and irrevocable death. Places we make worse. People we make angry and bitter and without means to pursue their personally chosen destinies.
Veterans Day should be about honoring our soldiers. But at the same time, we should contemplate why we keep sending them places we shouldn't. Places we cant fix by force. Places with real people, even if we don't understand their ways. People who breath the same air, look up at the same sun, and want their children to sleep peacefully.
Honor the Vets.
But also honor the people our leaders forced them upon as well. They are forever linked.
6
Thank you for your thoughtful perspective. As a middle school English teacher, I am always seeking great books about every subject for my classroom shelves. Many students (mostly but not all boys) are drawn to books about war. Kids want to test themselves against hard questions; they want to think about how they would respond in a crisis. (They read about natural disasters, cancer-stricken teens, and endless bullying plots for the same reason). That said, a typical and age-appropriate book doesn't put kids in the driver's seat of the plot: they watch characters make decisions, and they think about why those characters make certain choices. They are learning to listen to the voices of experiences foreign to their lives. "Pick Your Adventure" books may engage a lot of kids, but they skip the step of learning from real or fictional people who have had the experience.
11
It is refreshing to read such a forthright piece about a topic that never really gets discussed in any meaningful way. The normalization or even "adventurization" of what happens in war is not what true combat veterans need or want to hear. This sanitized normalization of war and the inevitably antiseptic "Thank you for your service" response is exactly what always prepares our society to do it all again without a true appreciation of the consequences. Almost half a century ago, those of us who saw combat in my own generation's war, returned home to a confused and at best indifferent nation. Though it was painful at the time, I think I now prefer the indifference and silence we received to what you describe in your piece. I am very glad that you made it back to raise your daughters with such an earnest perspective. The integrity that comes through in your piece is your greatest gift to them and to the nation.
27
We all owe you and your comrades in arms so much, more than we can ever give. Thank you for giving us the truth. You are a great person, a great father and a great American. May peace be with you.
15
War divides a population into those who were there and those who weren't. Especially: into those who have seen combat and those who haven't.
I am in the latter group.
Born in the early weeks of WWII, I first learned that war was a great adventure. Especially, combat film rocketing of enemy trains. As a teenager, I bothered veterans for their stories. In time, I learned that many didn't want to talk.
We lived in Navy towns, and the WWII sailors, so big to a kid, and so stern, were the greatest of heroes to me.
A lifetime later, I encountered the Navy Monument in downtown DC.
Seeing the figure, I went up to the very slightly oversize statue of my hero-sailor with his sea bag.
And I was stunned: he was a boy. A very brave boy, doubtless grown beyond his years in the murderous upheaval of a necessary war.
That's as far as I've gotten, to touch those who have lived those times. To learn here some more from a Marine of a much later war.
Maybe vets can't teach civilians what war is. But, they can tell us what it isn't . Not an adventure. Not a routine to recite for the unknowing. Not with God on our side.
Sometimes necessary. Thus the WWII boy/man in DC. Sometimes not. Thus the waste of our precious young people, the reward for their trusting loyalty.
The Marine carries truths the young must hear. For his daughters, yes. But still more for each generation of teenagers, who might well be touched by an honest hand, or by a frivolous one.
30
It has 4.5 stars on Amazon.
We do not have such books for kids in Germany. As a half-American, I am always amazed about the differences between our two countries.
Now, I am very much into history and military history due to our family history. I did not only study it.
Yet in my opinion there is a big difference between history -- and war entertainment. I suppose that these "trends" come with a number of other war glorifying trends such as video games (that I enjoyed myself), but, from a theoretical point of view, why would you make a difference between a children's book about war and a war video game that is played by kids? Kids aged 8 to 11 play Fortnite and watch it on twitch nowadays; of course they watch then Black Ops 4, and in a few days Battlefield 5.
I am very positive about video games, but I think that... children's book feel weird because it is such an old medium.
My kids are younger, 3 and 6. I agree with the author that you need to show your kids what the difference is. Make them understand, enlighten them. Prepare them for all kind of social difficulties in a society, which is your task as a parent, actually. Real war is different and far more complicated compared to, say, a crime or war film or TV series, right? Why are parents against crime and war, yet they watch crime films?
Of course, the interesting is why would anyone write an entertaining "interactive" children's book for school kids? After all, violent video games are secretly played by kids.
7
Thank you for this honest, honorable and necessary article. Acclimating children to war like an adventure, just like many video games, normalizes horror and deeply questionable policy. You present the inevitable conflict inside any returning warrior to civilian life and giving your children an understanding that will serve them to think about values and realities , and most of all the emotional toll on all - warriors and civilians. There are no winners in war - especially in endless, retaliatory wars, now approaching two decades. May sharing that help ease the haunts and grief.
33
We did not have kids books like that when I was young, we saw the newsreels at the theater, that was WWII, and the movies made them so that almost everyone wanted to go, but then came Korea and our friends came back crippled and what was called shell shocked then. I was in the AF and did not have to fight, but just being on a mission was enough to leave you stressed for days afterward.
My father in law had been a WWII fighter pilot in Europe, my wife talked about how he would wake up yelling about them being on his tale. I had one friend who had been on the ground in Korea, the slightest pop would cause him to act like he was ready to shoot someone.
Later I worked for a company that ferried troops back from Vietnam, we wondered if they would be able to return to a normal civilian life, many of them could not.
Most of the heros we knew had acted without thinking about it, they had gotten mad, or so scared they just did whatever seemed possible, no one wanted to be a hero, they just were.
War is nasty, mean, there is no glamor to it, it is not Kipling's wars, no one we knew wanted the memories, they tried to erase them, but they never go away.
36
@David Underwood
Rudyard Kipling pulled strings to get his son John into the army, because he thought the military made a man out of you.
Unfortunately, the two sides were more evenly matched in WWI than in Kipling's imperialist adventures, and machine guns changed things. John's face was blown away, he died blind and screaming, and was buried in an anonymous grave.
John's death changed Kipling. He wrote, "If any question why we died, / Tell them, because our fathers lied."
So Kipling's final message is, "Don't lie to your children about war."
4
“Watching my daughter navigate escalation of force and rules of engagement made me sick. Seeing combat reduced to a common-core multiplication math problem detached from the harsh realities of war left me in a state of shock.”
While the author’s reaction is compelling and registers with how most readers already feel about war, the terrifying reality is that many other folks will find the format and topic refreshing. It’s a sign that the military industrial complex keeping this country financially afloat may be its undoing (remember Trump’s live risk-benefit analysis of whether to accept Saudi money for arms sales in the wake of the Khassoggi killing). Worse yet, we are raising a new generation who have full knowledge that we are in a state of perpetual war, and who are conditioned to begin “othering” people against whom the US wages war. That’s considered acceptable children’s material?
48
Mr. Bell, You are a talented writer, a careful thinker, and sound like a good dad.
Thank you not just for your ethical service and fine, reflective writing, but also for the strength and courage and care it takes to be a kind and caring parent trying to raise strong, kind, ethical and resilient girls.,
Here’s to all the parents of their generation and to these kids’ generation not needing to face the dilemmas and horrors of war or destruction or life-and-limb-and-soul-threatening conflict!
46
A significant fraction of humanity cannot rise above their fundamental base nature. They cannot be salvaged or reformed. Their cognitive architecture plus their conditioning makes them unworthy of the challenge for charting new realms of existence. Extinction awaits. We are encountering the great filter.
11
A very interesting piece; please keep writing and talking about your service. My dad joined the Canadian Army in 1940 and served in the Italian campaign from 1943-45 and he never spoke of it. He had problems with alcohol his entire life, went through three marriages, and managed to alienate most of his children until the last 15 years of his life,
A few years before he died, he told us the story of his best friend who was waiting in the chow line and was killed by a German shell, along with a bunch of other guys. By that time, it was just a quiet matter of fact conversation, but we could see it pained him.
35
From your description of the book, I find it irresponsible that anyone would write a book about war as a "choose your own adventure" type story. Most people caught up in a war, soldiers and civilians, have little choice. Not to mention, as "Saving Private Ryan" showed,who dies or suffers serious injuries is often totally random, not a choice.
I was born in Saigon during the Vietnam War and have heard about the war since I was a child. While I think war can be discussed with children in an age-appropriate way, this book is not it.
89
You're a hero, and what each young man should strive to emulate.
You have a beautiful family, you deserve all the best.
Thank you for what you've sacrificed for all of us.
31
He mentions how his battalion killed civilians. He’s a hero?
A beautiful piece. Keep on writing.
68
Really thoughtful article. I sincerely wish you all the best in your struggles to make sense out of the war for yourself and your family. The country needs to read more articles written by soldiers like yourself. Thank you
118
A rather wrenching story, to be honest.
But I am hoping the old adage "they grow up so fast" applies in this case. Soon enough your daughters will be older, and more able to at least begin to understand the horror of war.
I am guessing, at that point your prior somber and uncomfortable demeanor during their childhood years about your service will suddenly make sense to them, and they will see you as the serious and wise father you were, and are.
I wish your family the absolute best.
55
Thanks much for your thoughts here, Mr. Bell. We never had such books growing up in America after Korea and Vietnam. What a strikingly odd country this has become.
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