"Kill 'em all"

After the fantasy of shoot-em-up video games the young man found reality a little hard to take.

He might have seemed to be ideal military material.

He was “hard”. Violence came easily to him.

In February last year he enlisted in his country’s armed forces.

He enjoyed the life of the basic training camp – it’s friendships, a regular wage, a sense of common purpose. He claimed that he was proud to serve.

He looked forward to some “action.”

On hearing that he was to be posted to Iraq he bragged that he was going to “…go over there and kill �em all.”

But like so many before him he found the reality of war too much to bear. He suffered the loss of friends in battle. He turned out not to be the natural born killer we are told we all really are underneath.

“I thought it’d be cool to kill people, but I saw my buddy get shot in the face. It’s not pretty.”

His behaviour led his comrades in arms to believe that he was trying to get out of his commitment.

It was not long before the army realised they had a misfit on their hands.

He was honourably discharged for what the arm termed a “personality disorder.” Seven weeks later he was arrested and charged with the rape of and subsequent murder of an Iraqi girl, and with the murder of her family.

Under pressure to recruit more young men to fight in a war that was not supposed to go on as long as it has army recruitment standards have been lowered. Prior to the invasion of Iraq one in five new soldiers were “weeded out” within six months of joining. Currently less than half that number is. This man slipped through the net and subsequently brought dishonour upon the army in which he served.

Any number of points could be made from the retelling of this sad tale.

This young man was possibly psychologically disturbed before he entered the army. His experiences while in the army may have brutalised him further.

He was fighting on behalf of interests that were not his. He owned no share of the spoils over which the fighting is taking place. A young girl and her family – strangers to the perpetrator – are now dead.

And the army has another publicity disaster on its hands because while authorised killing is expected and allowed, unauthorised killing is bad public relations.