Matt Gallagher doesn’t so much contribute to The Rhino Den in the traditional sense of the word. It’s more like we rip off his stuff because he’s a damn good writer and a combat vet. Here’s his latest – a review of the controversial book ‘The Operators.’

It’s impossible to read The Operators, Michael Hastings’s new book about the Afghanistan War, without contemplating the amount of adoration and contempt it is going to generate in the coming weeks. It’s a polarizing book about a polarizing war for a polarized nation. Despite that, it demands to be read by both audiences and everyone in between. Its origins reside in “The Runaway General,” Hastings’s 2010 Rolling Stone article about Gen. Stanley McChrystal and his inner circle, which led to the general’s very public resignation from the top position in Afghanistan. Like it or not, this is a book of great consequence, not a pop-culture puff piece, which some of its deriders claim it is. The Operators seems destined to join the pantheon of the best of GWOT literature, not just for its rock-and-roll details, but for its piercing chronicles of a world gone mad.

Though The Operators covers much more than Hastings’s drunken tour through Europe with “Team America,” that remains the heart of the narrative. Understandably so. Unlike in “The Runaway General,” Hastings identifies the sources of the lightning-rod quotes, from Joe “Bite Me” Biden (Jake McFerren, McChrystal’s longtime friend from West Point and top political adviser) to “We co-opted the media on [Iraq] … You could see it coming. There were a lot of us who didn’t think Iraq was a good idea.” (McChrystal himself.)

One of the overarching themes of The Operators is the growing military-civilian divide in an era of an all-volunteer force. Typically, writers and journalists explore this divide at the ground level, where returning veterans and the society that produced them struggle to reconcile. As wrenching as those stories may be, Hastings has higher aspirations—right at the top, where a new general’s team and a new president’s team vie for influence and only seem to find misunderstanding and distrust.

“The guilt that many felt for not serving was covered up by an uncritical attitude toward those who did,” writes Hastings, both about the disconnect at the highest levels of power and what he coins the media-military industrial complex. As embarrassing as some scenes are for McChrystal and his subordinates, it’s really some of Hastings’s comrades in journalism (I couldn’t help but think of Thomas Friedman’s infamous “Suck on this” clip) whom he most takes to task, lambasting their lack of critical thinking and hard questions in exchange for continued access to the movers and shakers of the war effort.

READ THE REST HERE

by Mister Twisted

I started to write this article in the vein of the last couple, whereby I would give a rundown of the candidates and how ridiculously bad they all are, but I confess, I lost motivation — and creativity. The simple fact is, I’m sorry.

Why am I sorry? Because I work in politics. And the sad reality is that the political process and what it produces saddens the shit out of me. I talk to people on a daily basis that plead with me by saying things like “why can’t you send out plain, well-written arguments that lay out the facts in black and white?” You know what? I would love to. But the unfortunate truth of the matter is that politics is not about ideas; it’s not about who has the most logic on their side or who has the most well-reasoned argument. Very little of that even matters because it’s about something else entirely.

It’s about marketing.

I’m not joking. If you want to learn how politics truly works, watch a few episodes of the HBO series Mad Men. Now take out the hot red head and that’s what politics really is — sending messages to people through various sources of media that they will ultimately respond to.

It’s the exact same methodology that companies like Pepsi, Nike, Coors, and Ford use. They can’t make an advertisement that lays out all the logical reasons why their product is good because nobody would respond. Instead, they use hot girls, edgy photography, hip music, and a cool catch-phrase to get your attention.

The end result of all of this being, of course, that you see numerous commercials and receive countless emails telling you that the world will, in fact, come to an end if you do not vote for them or their cause. They operate on the premise that you won’t give them money or vote for them unless they scare the crap out of you.

Possibly even more depressing is the reason why political personalities and groups do this — because it works.

Consider that the average American does not study history, has little interest in politics outside their immediate realm, and was never part of the government or those charged with protecting it (hence the .45% Ranger Up shirt). The average American is not what we would call “informed.”

Another way of saying it is, if you’re reading this, you’re not an average American.

You were probably in the military or in law enforcement (or at least know someone who is); you probably take the time to read something every day; you like to be informed; you care about more than just the score of the game; you have drive to be better. If you didn’t have all of this, you wouldn’t come to a site named “Ranger UP!”
So where does this leave people like you and I? People who know that things can be better but are aggravated to no end about the process required to get it that way. I used to carry an M4 through crappy village after crappy village for my country, and now I’m writing fund-raising letters for political causes making less money than I was as an lowly NCO. And that’s saying something. I have to go to a Brazilian jiu jitsu class and have my 300 pound Black Belt instructor kick my ass on a regular basis just so I can feel like I’m doing something.

My point is this: We’re not normal. People who hang out on sites like this and find humor in things like Tim Kennedy answering his door with an M4 and having a plan to kill everyone in the room are a minority. Unfortunately, some of us start feeling pressure to change that “abnormality” in order to conform; to start down the long, dreary road of “compromise.”

Don’t.

Just don’t do it. Embrace the fact that you know more about the world and find “political incorrectness” funny as shit sometimes. Be arrogant about the fact that you know what’s right and you are willing to fight for it. And don’t let the marketing of politicians and interest groups tell you otherwise.

Be informed. Be smarter than the ones running for office and those helping them — it’s not hard, and you’re probably already there. Just don’t feel the need to change it when they say “well, that’s not how we do things here…” The reality is, it should be YOU who are telling them how “we” do things here.

Don’t accept the platitudes of politicians telling you that we need to “compromise” to get things done — we don’t. Call them out on their stances. Check out what they have actually stood for — and more importantly, voted on — in the past instead of listening to them speak or debate. Refuse to accept their fancy speak and slick campaign slogans — vote for what they’ve done, or don’t vote at all.

There will, as usual, be a huge campaign for people to get out and “just vote.” Nonsense. Here’s the blunt truth: crappy politicians who don’t represent you don’t deserve your vote. Make them know it.

Politics, in its essence, is about the adjudication of power. But here’s the ultimate irony: those who understand sacrifice, those who aren’t afraid of the world out there, those who challenge themselves to be better, we already have power. We just need to be careful in who we let share it.

Mr. Twisted

In today’s day and age, we are bombarded with a corrupted image of “peace.” Peace signs appear on clothes and every child has heard in school that violence never solves anything. When war does break out, we see hordes of people marching to oppose it (sometimes using violent means to do so); people who are oblivious to the results of retreat or surrender. Echoing the sentiments that cropped up during the War of 1812, we hear “peace at any price” over and over again, or even the naïve sentiment that there can be no negative results from retreat, only positive; while fighting on to win will be not only bad for the nation but also immoral. They ignore the sentiments of great military minds that understand war more than they ever could, such as Eisenhower who said, “When you appeal to force, there’s one thing you must never do – lose.” They care not that they might be helping people that intend to kill them, as George Orwell explained, “Pacifism is objectively pro-fascist. This is elementary common sense. If you hamper the war effort of one side, you automatically help out that of the other. In practice, ‘he that is not with me is against me.’”

It is easy to understand the repulsion that people feel to violence and war. Dave Grossman explains, with his analogy of sheep, sheepdogs, and wolves, that the vast majority of people are incapable of doing violence to others except under great stress or duress. For those like me, who have seen it first-hand it is horror enough to be described as hell on earth.

It is silent tears shed while standing in a hot metal building, staring at the rifle braced between two boots and holding up a helmet, representing a fallen friend. It is the same emblem tattooed on a back to mark the memory permanently on skin in ink, or a black bracelet with a name and date, or a simple memory of one who fought next to you and never made it home.

War and violence is dead innocents; men, women, and children. It is bodies shredded by a bomb with flesh and bone and guts scattered by the blast of some random explosion in a random and God-forsaken place while blood pools on hot pavement or soaks into thirsty ground. Its bodies pierced with bullets or blades and unbearable agony and fear, suffering and cruelty beyond what any normal person can imagine.

It is also acts of sacrifice, courage, and superhuman bravery and love. It’s the calm smile on an old NCOs face as he crawls over a rooftop for fear of snipers in order to offer his soldiers some more ammunition; or the slightly sadistic grin on his face as superior firepower pounds an enemy’s defenses into dust while he stands there offering his troops the first hot food they’ve tasted in days. It’s a soldier fighting back exhaustion to simply stand his post and watch for a threat that may or may not materialize in the dark. It’s an officer putting a brave face on an impossible situation; men sharing their last bit of water and food with each other along with the raunchiest of jokes to lighten the mood when anyone else would be screaming to be let out of this horror. Its men and women putting their own lives on the line for someone they’ve never met, to try to simply give that person a slight chance at a slightly better existence than what they enjoyed before.

In its simplest form, war is simply killing other people for the sake of one’s country. As General Patton put it, “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his”. In its simplest form, violence is simply applying force to another to achieve a desired result. George Washington said, “War – an act of violence whose object is to constrain the enemy, to accomplish our will.” In Law Enforcement and the military it’s called “Use of Force”. It’s so effective that we create all sorts of necessary and sometimes self-defeating rules to govern it. If violence never accomplishes anything than why do we have to create rules to control it? “Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor and the contrary opinion are wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and freedoms.” -Robert A. Heinlein. For those who love to quote (and in the case of modern Libertarians, misquote) the founding fathers of America, I offer up the words of Thomas Jefferson; “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants”……

Keep reading “The Case for Violence”

A lot has been said about the current USMC scandal where four Marines were videotaped urinating on dead Taliban fighters. Here’s Chuck Z’s two cents on the subject:

1. Not since weinergate has the wikiLEAKS been so appropriate a website for sharing video.
2. We’ve all had to review the CG’s policy on Laws of Warfare, etc. Pretty sure it didn’t change from the last time I read it, it’s always been not okay to piss on the dead.
3. Not sure if the DADT repeal had anything to do with it, but back in the old days, when we pulled out our dicks for any reason, whoever grabbed a camera was stuffed in a paint locker and thrown down stairs, 4. So, is it okay (in keeping the faith with our muslim brothers) to drag the bodies of the dead through the street, hang them, and then burn them?
5. Aside from law of warfare, I think these marines could use a few lessons in proper aim.
6. The marines can claim PTSD from having watched R-Kelly videos.
7. I really want the prosecuting attorney to ask “Did you know that urinating on the dead would be highly offensive to the Muslims?” So the Marine can respond “Do you know trying to kill me is highly offensive to me?”
8. These guys all need to demand trial by jury–because urine is pretty damned far from desecration, in my book.

Maybe people would be far less apt to get froggy with us if, instead of taking the “high road” and holding ourselves to a higher standard, we made a point of holding ourselves to a far, far more grim standard.

Sure, the high road is where we want to be, and when fighting a civilized country, we should take that road. But when you fight 13th century barbarians, who believe that terror is the best way to fight, then you fight them with terror.

We should pay no heed to their moral or religious beliefs, we should always desecrate their bodies after death in every way possible, and we should do everything we possibly can to insult the religious beliefs of the insurgents before death, because they are NOT good muslims, they are NOT true believers, and they are on a false path.

By treating them and their carcasses with dignity and respect for the way they believe, we actually acknowledge their faith and beliefs as valid–the same faith and beliefs that drive them to attack us.

If instead we said “you have perverted your faith and the teachings of muhammed (Piss Be Upon Him, too), and we will not honor and respect perversion in any way, so welcome to hell, you bastards, our bombs and bullets all contain pig fat and we’ll be burying you all wrapped in chitterlings.” We might have one guy decide that he doesn’t want to risk his eternal soul fighting us. And that’s one less guy we’d have to piss on.

Check out Chuck’s website here

During Marine Corps Recruit Training, there’s one week that young recruits look forward to with great anticipation: Mess & Maintenance week. For a few blissful days, the entire Company is farmed out to various places around the Recruit Depot – mess halls, Base Maintenance, the rifle range “target factory” – to slave at various menial tasks so that real Marines don’t have to. Any day where you deal with Drill Instructors stressing you out for less than two or three hours seems like a vacation, and since it’s already 6 or 8 weeks into the training schedule – mid-December, in our case – you can almost allow yourself to think about returning to the outside world again someday. The prospect of 14-hour days of mowing lawns, painting rocks, and washing dishes seems like a barrel of fun compared to the alternative, and there’s a glimmer of hope beginning to grow in your mind.

Such was the case for my Platoon, 2081. After worship services one Sunday, we packed all our gear and moved topside to the squad bay we’d live in for Mess & Maintenance week. We were shoehorned in with Platoon 2087, but their schedule of maintenance work meant we’d hardly see them while we worked at the chow hall that week. After an hour or so of settling in and meeting their DI, it seemed like this wouldn’t be a bad deal after all. What little free time we had each night wouldn’t be taken up by classes or merciless hazing military instruction, so I would be able to crank off a few Christmas cards to the folks back home and work on spit-shining my boots some more. So many activities!

That’s exactly what my Platoon was doing on the night that 2087’s Drill Instructor went totally, completely mental on all of his recruits. ‘81 had been back at The House for most of an hour when we heard ‘87 march up out front, dismiss, and then come stampeding up the ladderwell to the 3rd deck. The entire time, their DI stormed behind them, screaming at full-on Drillmaster Command Voice volume, berating them for doing whatever stupid thing it was that had pissed him off. Yeah, we were wondering what the hell had happened – mainly so we wouldn’t do the same thing and catch hell from our DIs – but my Platoon to a man knew better than to look up or even acknowledge the presence of 87 once they stormed in and stood online at attention in front of their footlockers.

By the time their DI strode in, it was deathly quiet in the squad bay, save for the sounds of 2081’s recruits buffing boots and writing letters as we sat Indian-style on the floor. He walked back & forth in front of 2087, whispering just loud enough for 87 to hear him… but whatever he was saying was having great effect. I think I caught a glimpse on one of his recruits pissing his pants a little bit as the DI continued hissing at them. In the midst of this muted tirade of horrific threats and well-earned mockery, the DI suddenly stopped midstride, as if he’d been hit by a sniper – or, in this case, an epiphany.

“OKAY, ’87. YOU KIDS WANNA FUCK UP MY WHOLE DAY, HUH? WHEN I GIVE THE COMMAND, YOU WILL GET UNDRESSED AND GET BACK ON LINE… DOITNOWMOVE!!!”

At this point, the recruits of 2087 collectively hesitated a bit. I could understand why – I was beginning to wonder if I’d heard him right myself.

“I DIDN’T FUCKING STUTTER, YOU IDIOTS! GET NAKED, LIKE THE DAY YOU WERE BORN, RIGHT GODDAMN NOW!!!”

Which was all 87 needed in the way of clarification, I guess. Boots, cammies, skivvies, and body parts went flying all over the place on 87’s end of the squad bay. They were totally disrobed in about 20 seconds, which was about average recruit speed for dressing or undressing (seriously). After that, things got a little weird.

“ALRIGHT, BITCHES, LISTEN UP: WHEN I GIVE THE COMMAND, YOU WILL DIVE INTO YOUR FOOTLOCKERS, AND WHEN YOU COME BACK UP YOU WILL BE ON LINE WITH FOOT POWDER IN YOUR LEFT HAND AND YOUR PONCHO IN YOUR RIGHT HAND. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME?

“YES, SIR!”

“DOITNOWMOVE!”

It was a flurry of naked bodies moving with crazed urgency, scattering everything they owned on the deck until they came up with the two items they needed and returned to the position of attention, most with some serious concerns about whatever the hell was going to happen next.

“ALRIGHT, 87 – GET INTO MY RAIN ROOM NOW!!!”

We continued to sit, studiously ignoring 2087 and their DI, as they scurried like cockroaches into the shower side of the head. The DI, still in his still-immaculate Service “C” uniform, followed them, screaming like a maniac the entire time.

Once again it got eerily quiet. After about a minute, I recalled Auschwitz and began to think he might have gassed them all to start over with fresh recruits that weren’t total fuckups. But no… what happened next was actually a bit more frightening to a bunch of Third Phase recruits.

The DI stepped out of the head and strolled over to the middle of 2081’s area. He then asked, in a normal, friendly, conversational tone “Hey, 81 – you guys wanna see something funny?”

I froze, mid-buff, holding my boot brush, and was stunned enough to venture a gaze upwards at the Drill Instructor. As a rule, DIs don’t have “conversations” with recruits, much less friendly ones. Yet there he was, grinning, hands on his hips, as he asked again: “No, seriously, guys – could you use a good laugh?”

We were flabbergasted, but at least a few recruits had the presence of mind to answer “YES, SIR!”

He walked back over to the entrance of the head, pointing at the deck and said “Give me a single file line right here.”

We all dropped our writing gear and boot brushes and ran over to the spot where he was pointing, standing at attention in a perfect single file line, eyes forward.

“Relax, guys,” he said. “This will be fun, I promise.”

He then peered around the corner towards the showers and screamed “HIT IT, BITCHES!!!”

As we were led into the changing area between the showers and shitters, we were greeted by the sight of seventy-three very broken and dejected looking young men dancing in the showers wearing nothing but field ponchos, squeezing and puffing gigantic bottles of foot powder into the air as they sang “Jingle Bells” at full volume. A few of us laughed openly, falling over almost in tears, but that wasn’t quite good enough.

“No, LAUGH, 81!!! LAUGH AT MY STUPID BITCHES! SING, BITCHES! SING!!! MERRY FUCKING CHRISTMAS, 87, YOU GODDAMN MORONS!”

Of all the moments I wish I’d been able to capture in a photograph during boot camp, this one was right up there. It truly would have made one hell of a Christmas card for the folks back home.

This whole shit storm was incited by one little email from Professor Avery in response to a school wide email requesting donations for holiday care packages to be sent to our brothers and sisters who just happen to be deployed in war zones around the world. For those of you with high blood pressure, you may want to take a little extra dose of medication before you read this so your head doesn’t explode. Avery states in his email “I think it is shameful that it is perceived as legitimate to solicit in an academic institution for support for men and women who have gone overseas to kill other human beings. I understand that there is a residual sympathy for service members, perhaps engendered by support for troops in World War II, or perhaps from when there was a draft and people with few resources to resist were involuntarily sent to battle.”

Really?!? I understand that you are getting up there in age Mikey, but with those years of experience comes knowledge, right? Comparing WWII and Vietnam references to today’s military state is just asinine, especially for a presumed educated man such as you. These brave men and women volunteered to place their life in danger so that you sir have the constitutional right and opportunity to be a shithead.

But it doesn’t stop there, Avery then continues with a tirade on our flag with “We need to be more mindful of what message we are sending as a school. Since Sept. 11 we have had perhaps the largest flag in New England hanging in our atrium. This is not a politically neutral act. Excessive patriotic zeal is a hallmark of national security states. It permits, indeed encourages, excesses in the name of national security, as we saw during the Bush administration, and which continue during the Obama administration.”

So now, not only are you blasphemed for supporting our troops by donating to the cause, the school is also a full-fledged member of the “machine” because it proudly displays a large American flag. Dude, get a fucking clue.

There is a little more to Professor (and I use the term loosely) Avery than what is being reported in the main stream media. McQ at Blackfive dug up a little bit of “The Ave’s” history which includes: the fact that “He’s a Harvard grad who also studied at Moscow University from ‘68 to ‘69 (and that tells you volumes).” He once gave a talk in Cuba (with Fidel Castro in attendance) entitled “The Hypocrisy of US Policy Towards Terrorism.”

So to sum it all up, we have a douchebag who likes to spew his hatred for our service members, ridicule an academic institution for their display of the American flag, and has a history of communism. Hmmm, I may be stepping out of bounds here but…if it looks like a commie, sounds like a commie, acts like a commie, we just may have a fucking commie amongst us!

Hey dicksmack – why don’t you head on over to Starbucks and get a hot, fresh, cup of WAKE THE FUCK UP! This is America, we love our service-members and appreciate that they, not you, have the gumption to Ranger the Fuck Up and go where you are too scared to go. Be a good little boy and do what your mommy said, “if you haven’t anything nice to say, don’t say it at all.” But I guess this advice is just a little too late.
Michael Avery, I hereby sentence you Douchebagistan – as you wait in line for moldy bread, you can spew your silly little views on life and have the company of many, many politically-retarded, like minded individuals.

“Did we win?” That’s what my Twitter feed wanted to know in the wake of President Obama’s announcement that our troops will leave Iraq by the end of the year. I couldn’t be more conflicted about the news.

It’s all dust in the mind now, but I called the desert in Iraq home only three years ago. As a scout platoon leader in the 25th Infantry Division, I’d deployed to a remote outpost north of Baghdad, a last-chance gambit for a country on the brink of civil war. We went as volunteers, and went with a messy, if coherent, mission statement – buy the Iraqi government and security forces time to stabilize. We did the best we could, pouring blood, sweat and tears into a strange land. We left 15 months later, some of us swearing never to go back, others champing at the bit for just such an opportunity to do so. For better and for worse, it remains the preeminent experience of my life.

While there’s no clear answer to the question of whether America “won” or not, some things are irrecoverably clear.

In the aftermath of 9/11, with two wars raging, less than one half of one percent of Americans served in uniform. And yet, despite our collective reluctance to fight, more than 4,400 American military personnel died during Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation New Dawn. More than 32,000 more were wounded in action. At least 100,000 Iraqis have died, with another 1.3 million displaced.

Those numbers, as damning as they are, don’t linger with me the way memories do. Upon hearing the President’s speech yesterday, I thought about the many people I met in Iraq who changed my life, like my platoon’s interpreter, Suge, a loyal man who risked his life every day simply by being seen with American soldiers; and a rural sheik named Haydar who taught me the subtleties of Arabic culture; and the teenage bomber with American blood on his hands, captured but subsequently released because the jails were full; and the bleary-eyed Iraqi widow who felt she had no other means of income than to pimp out her eldest daughter.

Read the rest of the story here.

Gallagher is an Iraq veteran and senior writing manager at Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. He is the author of the war memoir “Kaboom: Embracing the Suck in a Savage Little War.” Check out Matt’s book here.

William Swenson. It’s probably not a name many recognize, something that could change in the next few months. Earlier this month, as the military prepped for Sergeant Dakota Meyer’s Medal of Honor ceremony, the Military Times published an article about the unrecognized valor of former Army Captain Swenson, who fought at the Battle of Ganjgal alongside Meyer. For whatever reason, Swenson’s heroics have gone unrecognized up to this point, and it took Marine General John Allen to take a personal interest in Swenson’s story to compile and submit the Medal of Honor recommendation. I’m sure I wasn’t the only reader that was left wondering why the Army hadn’t taken care of one of their own; as a former Army cavalry officer I’m a bit embarrassed by it, myself.

Captain William Swenson in Afghanistan

Moreover, Swenson didn’t hold back about his superiors’ decision to not support their request for artillery or air support, for fear of civilian casualties. In the interview that followed the battle, Swenson told investigators “When I’m being second-guessed by higher or somebody that’s sitting in an air-conditioned TOC, why [the] hell am I even out there in the first place? Let’s sit back and play Nintendo. I am the ground commander. I want that f—er, and I am willing to accept the consequences of that f—er.”

Frankly, most company-level leaders that have served on the ground in Iraq or Afghanistan will immediately identify with Swenson’s anger and frustration. (Not to mention possibly envy his wrath and resoluteness.) These are small wars that require small unit command and control. Decentralization and delegation of authority, however, have not been a trademark of the American military for a very long time.

Read the full story here

11:45a
Register for hot yoga class. Infinite wisdom tells me to commit to 5 class package and purchase a yoga mat. I pay $89.74. Money well spent, I smugly confirm to myself.

11:55a
Open door to yoga room. A gush of hot dry air rushes through and past me. It smells of breath, sweat and hot. Take spot on floor in back of room next to cute blonde. We will date.

11:57a
I feel the need to be as near to naked as possible. This is a problem because of the hot blonde to my left and our pending courtship. She will not be pleased to learn that I need to lose 30 pounds before I propose to her.

11:58a
The shirt and sweats have to come off. I throw caution to the wind and decide to rely on my wit and conditioning to overcome any weight issues my fiancée may take issue with. This will take a lot of wit and conditioning.

11:59a
Begin small talk with my bride to be. She pretends to ignore me but I know how she can be. I allow her to concentrate and stare straight ahead and continue to pretend that I don’t exist. As we finish sharing our special moment, I am suddenly aware of a sweat moustache that has formed below my nose. This must be from the all the whispering between us.

Seems easy, huh? So does a vasectomy

12:02p
Since I do have experience with Hot Yoga (4 sessions just 5 short years ago) I fully consider that I may be so outstanding and skilled that my instructor may call me out and ask me to guide the class. My wife will look on with a sparkle in her eye. We will make love after class.

12:10p
It is now up to 95 degrees in the room. We have been practicing deep breathing exercises for the last 8 minutes. This would not be a problem if we were all breathing actual, you know, oxygen. Instead, we are breathing each other’s body odor, expelled carbon dioxide and other unmentionables. (Don’t worry, I’ll mention them later.)

12:26p
It is now 100 degrees and I take notice of the humidity, which is hovering at about 90%. I feel the familiar adorning stare of my bride and decide to look back at her. She appears to be nauseated. I then realize that I forgot to brush my teeth prior to attending this class. We bond.

12:33p
It is now 110 degrees and 95% humidity. I am now balancing on one leg with the other leg crossed over the other. My arms are intertwined and I am squatting. The last time I was in this position was 44 years ago in the womb, but I’m in this for the long haul. My wife looks slightly weathered dripping sweat and her eyeliner is streaming down her face. Well, “for better or worse” is what we committed to so we press on.

12:40p
The overweight Hispanic man two spots over has sweat running down his legs. At least I think its sweat. He is holding every position and has not had a sip of water since we walked in. He is making me look bad and I hate him.

12:44p
I consider that if anyone in this room farted that we would all certainly perish.

12:52p
It is now 140 degrees and 100% humidity. I am covered from head to toe in sweat. There is not a square millimeter on my body that is not slippery and sweaty. I am so slimy that I feel like a sea lion or a maybe sea eel. Not even a bear trap could hold me. The sweat is stinging my eyeballs and I can no longer see.

12:55p
This room stinks of asparagus, cloves, tuna and tacos. There is no food in the room. I realize that this is an amalgamation of the body odors of 30 people in a 140 degree room for the last 55 minutes. Seriously, enough with the asparagus, ok?

1:01p
140 degrees and 130% humidity. Look, bitch, I need my space here so don’t get all pissy with me if I accidentally sprayed you with sweat as I flipped over. Seriously, is that where this relationship is going? Get over yourself. We need counseling and she needs to be medicated. Stat!

Read the rest at Chuck’s blog here

When I was on patrols in Iraq, I liked to pretend Osama bin Laden was in the hut next door.

It seems ridiculous now, and it was just as ridiculous then. Bin Laden found in a backwater village north of Baghdad, circa 2008? Not ever a possibility, even for the most obtuse soldier. But sometimes, when the sun was getting to me and the mission seemed most nebulous and futile and I needed a reason to care, I’d mentally place Bin Laden within our area of operations, all likelihood of such be damned.

Why was I fantasizing about killing Osama bin Laden in Iraq, when I should have been focused on other things?

It’s the late afternoon and I’m drinking chai indoors with a local. It’s hot.

I spot him through a window, tipped off by his lanky jihadist frame and hardened gaze. I recognize his hate, and then his silhouette ducks away. The local disappears, either in fear or shame, and I give my scout platoon the order to prepare for a raid. Alpha Section stacks first, followed by Bravo Section, with my radiomen and me sandwiched in between. Staff Sergeant Caldwell kicks open the door for his guys, and in they roll. One, two, three, four, slow is smooth, smooth is fast, sweep and clear, sweep and clear, rifle lasers dancing along the inner mud walls.

We find him in a dark corner of the last room, alone. He’s holding an AK-47 and it’s pointed in our direction. Sometimes he yells “Allah Akbar,” sometimes he doesn’t. I raise my rifle to my shoulder pocket, but before I set my cheek against the top of the stock and stare down the sights, I hear two shots fired in rapid succession. The infamous Osama bin Laden, architect of 9/11 and villain to everything America and the Free World encompasses, double tapped, two golden rounds of kill shot straight through his forehead. Even in my own fantasy, I know I’m not as fast as Sergeant Ford or Private First Class Smith.

We all come home, living heroes in the flesh, with women and glory and gold for the rest of our lives — and a war story worth telling, totally free of the chains of ambiguity.

It seems ridiculous now, and it was just as ridiculous then.

Read the rest of Matt’s New York Times story here

Matt Gallagher is the senior writing manager of the nonprofit organization Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA). He spent 15 months in Iraq with the U.S. Army as an armored cavalry officer. His memoir “Kaboom: Embracing the Suck in a Savage Little War” was published in April 2010 by Da Capo Press.