Blood Thirsty Psychopath's blog: "Letters home"

Today, I am writting you a letter with my heart torn out. My best friend Ben died today. He was shot through the neck just behind the trachia. I saw him go down after he got hit. I froze. What do I do? Is this real? Then my training kicked in. I returned fire on the shooter. My fireteam hit the shooter 8 times before I ordered a ceasefire. After the Iraqi died, I ran to Ben, who was still alive. I looked at his wound, and knew instantly, he wouldn't survive. I knelt down and picked him up and held him. I looked right at him and drew my Ka-Bar and put it in the sand. I asked him if he wanted to die slow, or if he wanted me to end it quick for him. I knew he couldn't talk, and told him to blink once for no, twice for yes. He blinked once. I closed my eyes and knew he was going to go out painfully. I held him until i saw the life leave his eyes. When he died, I felt nothing. I was completely numb. Like it was just a nightmare, and I would wake up any second to see Ben fucking around with his bolt, or with the football he never left behind. It's been 7 hours since he died, and I still can't really accept that he's gone. I'm feeling the pain now. Right now, I could really use a warm hug and kiss. I wish I was home to get those, but I can't be. I have a duty to our country, no matter the cost. I want you to know, I love you very much, and if I don't come home, be proud I died for our country. I have to go see after Ben's memorial.

- Captain Jason Vine

Note: This will be the last post I make in this blog. Reliving all the events that brought me to and from war have taken a massive toll on my mentally. I can't remember anymore for my own sake. Thanks for reading if you have been, but the memories just hurt too much. This is the weeks leading to, and upon my arrival home. Again, thanks for reading.

2006/8/20

Good news! I'm coming home soon! My 3 year tour is finally up! I can finally see you again! I can't wait to hold you in my arms again! God, to just feel the warmth of another person, that will be amazing to me. I come home 2006/10/19, so we can do something for our anniversarry instead of have a 5 minute conversation over the video phone. Oh, I forgot, happy birthday! Hard to imagine I've missed 3 of yours. Anyway, I have to report to command for something trivial. I love you!

2006/9/03

They weren't kidding when they say short-timers are prone to injury and death. I just cut the shit out of myself with my Ka-bar. Nothing major, just nearly cut my left index finger off. Just another day in the sandbox other than that. Only a couple more weeks to go, then I get to have you back. I can't wait. I love you.

2006/10/10

One week, and i board the C-130 home. About fucking time! I can't take this place anymore! The heat, the firefights, the deaths of my friends, enough is enough! I have given enough to the people of the United States and Iraq. I need to rest. I need to go home and just rest. Have some time to think for myself. Time to just do nothing. Time to spend with you. I need to finish packing up my bags and stuff. I love you.

This letter never happened, since the evens here took place the day i came home.

2006/10/19

I walked in the door of the house, and heard some noise upstairs. I saw a car i didn't recognize outside the house on the way in. I brought a few of my marine friends with me, so we could relax, have some beers or whatever. We drew out weapons, and went up the stairs to our bedroom. When we got to the door, I heard you. I heard you say a name, not my name. I wasn't in the mental state to know what you were doing until we opened the door, and there you were, with our neighbor Chad. I froze. What are you doing? I thought at first he was trying to rape you, and I put a bead on him, when you saw me and screamed no. I looked at you, why would you defend him if he was hurting you? Then it dawned on me. He wasn't hurting you. You wanted him to do what he was doing. My heart died right then. The gun shots I suffered, the deaths of my friends, none of it hurt as bad as what you had just done to me. My enemy had never wounded me as badly as you just had. As i absorbed what you had done, I knew why you hadn't written me a letter in 3 years. I knew why I never got any sort of response from you other than on the video phone. Our vows to eachother meant nothing to you. Nothing at all. Now, I am becoming enraged. I look right at you, then at Chad. I tell Chad he has 3 seconds to get his shit, and get the fuck out of my house, or he leaves in a bodybag. The marines I brought with me "assist" Chad out of the house, and give him the thurough beating that he deserved. Then look right into your eyes, and I see fear. Genuine fear for what I might do to you for your betrayal. I look at you, and tell you that you have 15 minutes to get you, and your kids' shit out of my house. I holster my gun and go outside to where the marines had beatten the shit out of Chad. I looked at Chad on the ground and bleeding and say to him that he is lucky that is all he got. I then tell the marines to stay at my house and make sure that you get out. I am so angry right now, I can't think straight. I want to kill the both of you for what you have done, but neither of you pieces of shit are worth going to prison for. You and your kids come out of the house, you are crying, but your tears do not move me. I hate you now. You have betrayed all the trust I ever put into you, you broke your promise to me. A promise you made before a God I lost faith in before this, but I will never have faith in again. I look away from you, and tell you to go before I change my mind about shooting you. I don't care where you go now. I never want to see you again. You are dead to me. Once you are gone, the marines walk up to me, and give me that look. The look to a brother who has just lost everything that ever meant anything to him. You destroyed me. You broke my heart, the one part of me I thought would never break. You've shattered me Jenifer. Nothing will ever be the same. I loved you.

- Captain Jason Vine

Thanks to all of you who read these. It was incredibly painful to relive those memories, and I know I should have written more before I jumped to the end, but you can't imagine how much it hurts to remember things like that. To my most avid reader, you now have a glimpse into what I am, and who I am.

Today, after what I just saw, I have lost any faith I had left there was a God. I saw things that I can't quite articulate. What I can describe is, a kid got shot because a marine thought the kid had a gun. We all thought the weapon was real when the order to engage was issued. The ROE have been lowered to the point that, if anyone looks hostile, engage. The marine obviously felt this kid was hostile, so he fired. Most of Iraq is now a free-fire zone. We've turned the population from people into moving targets. I need to have a talk with command, and see about re-instating a useful set of ROE. I love you.

- Captain Jason Vine

My platoon was ordered on point through Nazarriha, an obviously hostile town. We were strong pointing the city, while AMTRACS, LAVs, and Abrams tanks rolled by. Obviously, someone thought the armor was more likely to be destroyed than the humvees. Beyond the obvious ignorance of command, this was incredibly irritating for a number of reasons. Our humvees have no armor. The tanks do. Out humvees only have a .50 cal machine gun. The LAVs and Abrams have HUGE cannons. My soldiers only have M4A1's and maybe an M203 if the qualified with it. 1 tank has more firepower than my entire platoon, and here we are, strong pointing a city. Like the saying goes though, another day, another dollar. I love you.

- Captain Jason Vine

I recovered from the bout of illness I had the other day. That wasn't the best experience I've ever had. The medical guys think it was just a bad MRE. Took my ass out of the fight for almost a week. I'm better now though. There's a private or something running towards me looking scared, I better find  out what the problem is. I love you.

- Captain Jason Vine

(this letter, along with the rest i have posted so far would never have happened if it wasn't for the swift action of the corpsmen and medics who treated me. thank god for them.)

Today, after a long stalk, we found out target. He was taking a rest on the otherside of the berm, and under a tree about a klik out. I put the SRAS .50 down, and chambered a round. My spotter, Scott, started making adjustments on the wind value, humidity, curvature of the Earth, everything that effects a shot. Just as i start dialing in the adjustments, I hear a loud pop, and feel the most horrible pain I've ever felt in my life pierce through my back. A second pop, and another shot of the horrific pain through my back. I know I've just been shot twice. The pain was so intense, that I think for a moment, I passed out. When I could think again, I told Scott to return fire. After he eliminated the target, he got on the radio and called up a corpsman and called in for a cas-evac for me, which was declined due to a shamal storm rolling in later. Once the medics arrived, they had grim looks on their faces. I was confused by what was going on. I couldn't figure out why I was bleeding, and why I was in so much pain. The medics gave me an a-line of morphine, which further confused me. I remember being drug for some distance to a waiting hoopty. I remember being picked up and put in the back, and having an IV put in my arm. I was taken from the A-O to the RCT medical tent, where they attempted stablize me, having no luck. They called an emergency cas-evac. They loaded me onto a blackhawk and flew me to the main hospital to have another go at stabilizing me. My heart stopped once on the flight. After failing to stabilize me, my last hope was the Army Hospital in Rammstein, Germany. I was put on a flight out. On the flight my heart stopped 2 more times. I died 3 times for my country, when the average "hero" dies only once. I'm not sure if I'll survive these injuries. I'm told the only thing that saved my life was the anterior side of my Interceptor kevlar vest. The bullets entered my back at L2 and L3 hitting my latisimuss dorsi and thorico-lumbar aponerosis, passing through my abdomen, and passes though my abdominous rectus, stopping in the kevlar vest. I hope you pray for me. I love you, and if I never see you again, know in your heart, i died protecting you.

- Captain Jason Vine

Today, I woke up, and I got my rifle, then went to a bush, and did my business. I came back, grabbed an MRE, and had some breakfast. Since the teams are on 25% watch, my driver, PVT Patterson, and myself slept last night. Nothing happened. It was just quiet last night. I could hear to crickets chirrping. There was a little scare with one of those huge spiders that lives here. Those things can kill a camel. I spent the next hour inspecting my humvee, making sure my team had water, food, sufficient ammunition, M203 rounds, properly secured body armor, weapons were brass checked, things like that. Then, we got a call. Because we are so far ahead of the next friendly unit, we are to remain static for the next 24 hours, or until advised further. So the boredom begins. There are 2 things in this world that are more dangerour that anything else. 1. A horny soldier. 2. A bored soldier. Since we have no women in this platoon, the horny soldier is a given, but a bored, horny soldier That's a disaster waiting to happen. I went to talk to Lueitenant Nathan about the performance of his team the other day, when everyone heard an explosion. We all readied our weapons, and went to where we heard the explosion, to find my team laughing like school girls. They had taken a bottle of water, drank half of it, filled it with dry ice from H&S, sealed the cap, and thrown it. The pressure from the melting carbon from the dry ice, caused the bottle to explode violently. I admit, if I had seen it, I would have laughed as well. Something, anything to break the monotony. Like Bill Mahre said, "War is like catholic school. Long periods of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror." This is indeed the hardest part of being a soldier. There's nothing to do, no targets to engage, everything is going great, and it's very uncomfortable to me. Something will go wrong. I can feel it.

- Captain Jason Vine

My unit got engaged in a fire fight today. I lost a brother in it. I made the decision to flank the enemy, knowing one of my soldiers might be wounded, or killed. By the book, I did the right thing. We destroyed our opposition, and protected the RCT, and the civilians in the city. I don't have a lot to say today. I'm struggeling with the death of my soldier. He did his job. His family shold be proud. I better get to writting the letter to his mother. I love you.

- Captain Jason Vine

It was another hot day in Iraq today. We took shelter under some trees while the engenires fixed to hoopty. Apparently, the hoses rotted out. How do they expect us to fight a war with ghetto ass victors like this? When the sun reached it's peak, I thought of you. Wondering what you're doing, how things are at home. I wonder if you miss me. I wonder if you are ok. I wonder if you can handle being alone for 18 months. I wonder if, when I get home, will I be able to see your smiling face, or if another will have taken my place. I haven't gotten a letter back from you yet, probably just got short stopped at battalion. I know you're thinking of me. I know your mother must be extatic knowing I'm not around to tell her to go fuck herself when she tells you that you shouldn't be married to an Army guy. I'm sure you're doing a great job on your own with that. Anyway, someone just negligantly discharged an M203. Better make sure no one is dead. I love you.

- Captain Jason Vine

Today, we went out on patrol, and came across a group of kids. They were just like kids in the states. Playing, laughing, and having fun. We continued our patrol, and about half a klik away, we hear an explosion. We ran back to the place where the kids were playing. Someone had fired an M203 at the kids. They were all dead. They got good effect on target, but now 6 kids are FUBAR. I'll always remember the faces.

- Captain Jason Vine