Quotations from veterans were gathered by the authors through personal interviews and e-mail correspondence unless otherwise noted with a citation to the source. All quotations not cited are published here with permission.
1. Rita Brock’s talk “The Humanity of Soldiers” was given at the Rothko Chapel in Houston on April 12, 2011. For stories of Hunt’s suicide, see Kristine Galvan, “Marine Loses Battle with PTSD,” MyFox Houston, April 9, 2011, http://www.myfoxhouston.com; Kimberly Hefling, “Veteran Advocate Kills Self After War Tours,” April 15, 2011, Associated Press, http://abcnews.go.com; James Dao, “Veteran Loses Battle With Depression After Helping Others With Their Own,” April 15, 2011, New York Times, http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com.
2. K. H. Seal et al., “Bringing the War Back Home: Mental Health Disorders among 103,788 US Veterans Returning from Iraq and Afghanistan Seen at Department of Veterans Affairs Facilities,” Archives of Internal Medicine 167 (2007): 476–82.
3. Lisa M. Shin, Scott L. Rauch, and Roger K. Pitman, “Amygdala, Medial Prefrontal Cortex, and Hippocampal Function in PTSD,” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1071 (July 2006): 67–79; Katie Drummond, “Blasts to the Head ‘Primed’ Brains for PTSD, Study Says,” Danger Room, February 22, 2012, http://m.wired.com; Judith Herman, Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence—from Domestic Abuse to Political Terror (New York: Basic Books, 1992).
4. Tyler E. Boudreau, Packing Inferno: The Unmaking of a Marine (Port Townsend, WA: Feral House, 2008), 212.
5. Ibid., 220–21.
6. Jess Goodell and John Hearn, Shade It Black: Death and After in Iraq (Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2011); Brett T. Litz et al., “Moral Injury and Moral Repair in War Veterans: A Preliminary Model and Intervention Strategy,” Clinical Psychology Review 29, no. 8 (2009): 695–706. See also Kent Drescher et al., “An Exploration of the Viability and Usefulness of the Construct of Moral Injury in War Veterans,” Traumatology 17, no. 1 (March 2011): 8–13, http://tmt.sagepub.com.
7. Maureen Trudelle, Navajo Lifeways: Contemporary Issues, Ancient Knowledge (Oklahoma City: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001), 226. The U.S. National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, MD, describes the VA support and Navajo uses of the Enemy Way at their website in “Native Heritage: Traditions Preserved and Renewed,” http://www.nlm.nih.gov. Bernard J. Verkamp, The Moral Treatment of Returning Warriors in Early and Modern Times (Chicago: University of Scranton Press, 2006), 1-8.
8. Video of veteran testimonies, a history, and the commission’s report can be found at Truth Commission on Conscience in War, http://conscienceinwar.org.
1. Chuck Leddy, “A Critical Look at the GI Bill’s Impact,” Boston Globe, September 12, 2009, http://articles.boston.com; Sarah Turner and John Bound, “Closing the Gap or Widening the Divide: The Effects of the G.I. Bill and World War II on the Educational Outcomes of Black Americans,” Journal of Economic History 63, no. 1 (March 2003): 145–77.
2. See “Small Towns Absorb the Toll of War,” National Public Radio, February 20, 2007, http://www.npr.org; “Military Recruitment 2008: A Look at Age, Race, Income and Education of New Soldiers,” National Priorities Project, February 18, 2009, http://nationalpriorities.org; “US Military Sees Surge in Asian-American Recruits: Education Opportunities, Increased Visibility Lure New Generation,” Voice of America, July 14, 2010, http://www.voanews.com; “Soldiers of Misfortune: U.S. Violations of the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict,” American Civil Liberties Union, http://www.aclu.org.
3. Sgt. Kevin Benderman, with Monica Benderman, Letters from Fort Lewis Brig: A Matter of Conscience (Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2007): xvii.
4. Boudreau, Packing Inferno, 12, 128.
1. Samuel Lyman Atwood Marshall, Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command (New York: William Morrow, 1947), 79.
2. Material for this section is drawn from personal writing by Camillo “Mac” Bica sent to the authors in e-mails, as well as his testimony for the Truth Commission on Conscience in War (TCCW), http://conscienceinwar.org.
3. Gary Weimberg and Catherine Ryan, Soldiers of Conscience, USA, 2007.
4. Camilo Mejía, Road from Ar Ramadi: The Private Rebellion of Staff Sergeant Camilo Mejía (Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2008), 138–39.
5. Ibid., 140.
6. Joshua Casteel, Letters from Abu Ghraib (New York: Essay Press, 2008), 4.
7. “Former Abu Ghraib Interrogator, Joshua Casteel, Interviewed,” LiveLeak, August 8, 2007, http://www.liveleak.com.
8. Russ Bynum, “Images Behind Soldier’s Iraq Refusal,” Associated Press, January 17, 2004, http://www.commondreams.org.
9. David Zucchino, “Breaking Ranks to Shun War,” Los Angeles Times, February 7, 2005, http://articles.latimes.com; Kevin Benderman, “A Matter of Conscience,” AntiWar.com, January 18, 2005.
10. Boudreau, Packing Inferno, 175.
11. Colonel Westhusing’s suicide note is found in Robert Bryce, “I am Sullied—No More: Faced with the Iraq War’s Corruption, Col. Ted Westhusing Chose Death Before Dishonor,” Texas Observer, March 8, 2007, http://www.texasobserver.org/.
1. Chris Hedges and Laila Al-Arian, Collateral Damage: America’s War Against Iraqi Civilians (New York: Nation Books, 2008), 112–13.
2. “Godspeed Clay Hunt,” Blackfive, April 4, 2011, http://www.blackfive.net.
3. Lindsay Wise, “Marine Who Pushed Suicide Prevention Took Own Life: War Casualty on the Home Front,” Houston Chronicle, April 9, 2011, http://www.chron.com.
4. Chris Hedges, War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning (New York: Anchor Books, 2003), 38–39.
5. Chris Hedges, “War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning,” Amnesty International NOW, Winter 2002, http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com.
6. Stanley Milgram, Obedience to Authority: An Experimental View (New York: Harper Collins, 1974).
7. Peter A. French, War and Moral Dissonance (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 157.
8. C. C. Bica, postwar journals, 1970, provided to the authors.
9. Mejía, Road from Ar Ramadi, 203.
10. Ibid., 205.
11. Ibid., 207.
12. Ibid., 213.
13. Ibid., 223.
14. Weimberg, Soldiers of Conscience.
15. Ibid.
16. Sgt. Kevin Benderman, “Truth Be Told,” January 01, 2006, http://jackdalton.blogspot.com; unpublished material from a personal interview with the authors, March 28, 2012.
17. Boudreau, Packing Inferno, 148.
18. Ibid., 207.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
1. “Evan Thomas and Sebastian Junger: Author One-on-One,” Amazon.com, May 2010, http://www.amazon.com.
2. Boudreau, Packing Inferno, 79–80, 83; Tyler Boudreau, “Digging In,” Psychatrix, May 3, 2010, http://www.tylerboudreau.com/.
3. Boudreau, “Digging In.”
4. Benderman, Letters from Fort Lewis Brig, 40.
5. Ibid., 45.
6. Quotations from his speeches at the Exploring Moral Injury Conference, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, CA, March 18–19, 2011, and published in Camilo E. Mejía, “Healing Moral Injury: A Lifelong Journey,” Fellowship of Reconciliation, http://forusa.org/.
7. Christopher Clair, “Joshua Casteel,” Be Remarkable series, University of Iowa website, October 19, 2009, http://www.uiowa.edu.
1. George W. Casey Jr., “Comprehensive Soldier Fitness: A Vision for Psychological Resilience in the U.S. Army,” American Psychologist 66, no. 1 (January 2011): 1–3.
2. Kenneth I. Pargament and Patrick J. Sweeney, “Building Spiritual Fitness in the Army,” American Psychologist 66, no. 1 (January 2011): 59–60.
3. Department of the Army, “The Army Health Promotion Program,” Spiritual Fitness, September 1, 1987, http://www.militaryatheists.org/regs/ArmyPam600–63–12v1987.pdf.
4. Suicide rates in the active duty military and veterans are discussed in Margaret C. Harrell and Nancy Berglass, “Losing the Battle: The Challenge of Military Suicide,” Policy Brief of the Center for a New American Security, http://www.cnas.org; citation from “Why Does the Army Need Comprehensive Soldier Fitness?” Comprehensive Soldier Fitness, Frequently Asked Questions, http://csf.army.mil.
5. ABC news interview, August 21, 2011, http://abcnews.go.com.
6. Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg, “You May Be Asked to Do Things Against Your Beliefs,” in 10 Excellent Reasons Not to Join the Military, Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg, ed. (New York: The New Press, 2006), 119. A number of versions of “Sniper Wonderland” can be found online at YouTube, and the lyrics of two versions are posted at Army Study Guide, http://www.armystudyguide.com.
7. Jim Rendon, “Post-Traumatic Stress’s Surprisingly Positive Flip Side,” New York Times Magazine, March 22, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com.
8. Renato Rosaldo, Culture and Truth: The Remaking of Social Analysis (Boston: Beacon Press, 1989), 69–70.
9. Linda Hutcheon, “Irony, Nostalgia, and the Postmodern,” University of Toronto English Library, January 19, 1998, http://www.library.utoronto.ca.
10. Edward Tick, “Healing the Wounds of War: Atonement Practices for Veterans,” in Beyond Forgiveness: Reflections on Atonement, Phil Cousineau, ed. (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2011), 123.
11. Ibid., 124.
12. Camillo “Mac” Bica, “Remembering the Context of War Crimes: The Crime of War Itself,” Truthout, February 25, 2012, http://www.truth-out.org.
13. Norman Solomon, “In Praise of Kevin Benderman,” Antiwar.com, July 30, 2005.
14. Camilo Mejía, “Concluding Remarks by Camilo Mejía,” in Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan, Eyewitness Accounts of the Occupations, Iraq Veterans Against the War and Aaron Glantz, eds. (Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2008), 214–15.
15. Tyler Boudreau, “The Morally Injured,” Massachusetts Review (Fall-Winter 2011–2012): 751, 753–54 .
16. Primo Levi, The Drowned and the Saved (New York: Vintage Books, 1989), 48–49.