We Made Him a Killer, Now We Owe Him

Nice looking fellow, yes? Handsome, all-American boy. No doubt about it. There's definitely some intensity in those eyes. His family is proud of him. Of that, we can be sure.

So, we, American society, lure him into the armed services with all kinds of inducements. The litany is long, illustrious and distinguished.

We train him to be a heartless killer. We forge his consciousness into the amygdala, a part of the lower brain sitting on top of the brain stem with superfast synapse chains for lighting-quick recognition and action. This guy can now see the world in Technicolor, Panavision, Super Slo-Mo. Get it? Wow! There are no second thoughts here. Simply recognition and action. Oh! Did I mention we trained him and equipped him to kill quickly and efficiently rather than flee the apparent danger? Never mind. Next, we put him in a war zone, not some live-fire exercise. Let's say an urban setting where the guys shooting at him look like everybody else, except they have automatic weapons and lots of ammunition and don't mind dying because of the seventy virgins waiting for them in heaven. And, oh yes, they were trained by the best tacticians in America! Finally, before we drop him off, we have some dirtbag lawyer in a uniform explain the incomprehensible and conflicting rules of engagement that specify when he can kill and when he's not supposed to. So now he's very well trained and very confused.

This is a story straight from the archives of In the Valley of Elah. That's where David took on Goliath, by the way. It's a story of madness created from ignorance in the minds of otherwise intelligent people who have never been to war and experienced the ultimate political tool. We have no meaningful or achievable agenda in Afghanistan. Whom are we kidding?

This young American cannot be held to the same standard as a senior officer, a physician in relative safety who walks in on a group of young men in their boxer shorts and opens fire. Each is in need of a different kind of help. One was in a position to help himself and chose a different path.

Sargeant Gibbs should never see the inside of a prison cell. The blood is on our hands and we cannot wash it away. Gibbs should be brought home and offered the kind of deprogramming and reprogramming he now desperately needs. We can do this for this young man. He didn't learn atrocity in America. He learned American atrocity in Afghanistan. No reason he should not live a productive life. How many men died and how many have suffered so that we can offer Calvin Gibbs the understanding and compassion he has earned and so richly deserves?

We need to bring the rest of them home, too.