A SOLDIER'S STORY

Too Young

By
Franke Gracia

They’re young. So young. Too young. It shouldn’t be this way. Why does it have to be this way?

Specialist Gless, your face belongs in a high school sophomore English class. You shouldn’t be here. What are you doing with a Combat Infantry Badge on your uniform? That means you’ve already put your life in harm’s way for your country. You’re too young Specialist Gless. Too young to be giving a class on convoy operations. But here you are telling me about your convoy missions in Iraq and how our weapons need to always be pointed out of the Humvee so you can return fire quickly; how somebody better tell the poor driver about the route, mission and radio freqs so that just in case your leaders get taken out, your driver knows what the hell to do and where the hell to go.

I can’t pay attention to your class Specialist Gless. Because while you’re going over procedures about what a convoy should do when a vehicle breaks down, all I can do is look at your face and wonder why wars can’t be fought by old men instead of kids like you. It ought to be a rule – minimum age to fight in a war: 50.

Specialist Gless, you should go home. You’ve already served a tour in Iraq and now here you are on your way to Afghanistan. You told me they gave you a choice between Kosovo and this mission and that you’re not a “peacekeeping-kind-of-a-guy.”

This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. Specialist Gless, go home. You’ve done enough. Go home and cruise around town with your buddies like I did when I was your age. Pull some pranks. Go to school and cut class. You’re too young to be here Specialist Gless. When we pass each other during the day you have to salute me. Why? I should salute you Specialist Gless.

Specialist Gless, your young face haunts me at night. Just like the Tijerina brothers in Bravo Company – the twins. They’re so young. Their faces are so innocent. Shouldn’t it be mandatory that anyone who goes to war for his country should have shaved at least once in his life?

Of course that would mean many a soldier in this task force would get sent home and that would be just fine with me. Then maybe I could get some sleep at night. I’m not sleeping too well these days. I keep seeing Specialist Gless and the Tijerina brothers in my dreams. Those faces. So young. So innocent. So trusting.

Private Estrada, I see you pause and say a short prayer in the chow hall before you eat your meals. Your parents obviously tried to raise you right. Private Estrada, what are you parents thinking right now? Are they thinking of you? I’ll bet they are. They’re thinking of your young face. Private Estrada, you don’t belong here. You and Specialist Gless and the Tijerina brothers should go home. Go hang out at the mall together and giggle and blush and rib each other when a pretty girl walks by. Watch a silly movie together and laugh until your sides hurt.

Your faces don’t belong here in full battle rattle, marching eight miles before breakfast. You shouldn’t have to take a marker and record the mechanical zero of your weapon on the inside of your helmet band. That stuff is for men – hard men. Your faces are not hard. They’re soft and kind and pleasant and nice . . . and young. So young. You should be struggling with college algebra or English lit – not learning how to maintain and M249 Squad Automatic Weapon or studying a nine line medevac report.

Lord, can you please tell me why these soldiers have to be so young? Old men start wars. Shouldn’t old men fight them? When salty old sergeants walk by me, I don’t give them a second thought. Why is it that when young soldiers walk by, their faces are immediately seared into my psyche? Why is it that their faces haunt me at night?

Lord, I’d really like to get some restful sleep sometime soon. But these young soldiers aren’t going anywhere – and I don’t think I’ll ever get used to seeing that Combat Infantry Badge on Specialist Gless’ uniform. I don’t think I’m ever going to stop looking at the Tijerina brothers or Private Estrada and asking . . . why?

Lord, this is going to be a long mission.

Franke Gracia lives in Temple, Texas and was deployed in Afghanistan with the National Guard from May 2005 to April 2006. He is a math professor at Temple College and is very close to his family that includes two brothers and two sisters. He earned a bronze star while he was deployed, which he gave to his mother. As to why he decided to write this series of articles he says, "I hope folks who read my scribbling will gain a greater appreciation of what a citizen-soldier goes through during a deployment."