Moondust

What can really be said about OIF? Hindsight’s 20/20? A lot of us can remember being in bootcamp when Delta Force captured Saddam and his sons met their end. We thought then it was all over and wouldn’t even get to deploy. But little did we know on February 5th, 2003, when Colin Powell addressed the UN about Iraq, he set in motion a sequence of events that would plague an entire planet for the foreseeable future.

While it’s easy to delve into a series tone-deaf platitudes and tropes about the Iraq war and the toll it’s taken on troops long after coming home, all of us who wore and/or continue to wear the uniform need to come to grips with something; the rest of the world is sick of hearing about how killing people made our troops sad when the world told us not to go in the first place.

It's easy to talk about the triple D (death, destruction, destabilization) we triggered across the region and ultimately the world, but by this point there’s nothing that can be said that hasn’t been said already about the undue pain and suffering we caused. Countless people died doing exactly what we would have done had someone invaded our country. Even more people died that did nothing at all.

A lot of vets are looking back on Iraq today filled with countless existential questions. No one can answer those unfortunately as there is no logical answer. A lot of people have regrets about the things they did or allowed themselves to be peer pressured into doing for sake of a definitive victory that never came and rightfully so. Quite frankly, what’s done is done and it’s too late to take anything you wish you hadn’t done back. All any OIF vet can do is pass their lessons learned onto the generation that holds the torch now lest they make the same mistakes we did.

The duality of this all is kind of mind blowing though if you take a step back and think about it. The lessons learned, technology developed and blood shed during the Global War on Terror has turned the US military into finest on the planet without question. But it has also guaranteed that we will need to be the best in the wars to come. And make no mistake, as sure as you’re reading these words, those wars are going to come.

But for now, if you’re an OIF vet, reflect on surviving a war that never should have happened. Don’t forget the whale’s hump, the shark’s fin, the horizons littered with pillars of black smoke. The piss tubes, the palm trees, the cigarettes on rooftops and the salt stains in your flak. And come what may, no matter what, don’t ever forget the moondust.

Written by E.C. Browne

March 20, 2023