despite knowing all the horrors of war...

I shared those exact thoughts in my teens, so much so I joined the British Army in the late 80's. Turns out I dint have long to wait until I saw some action, in 1990 I was part of a Armored Engineer spearhead unit in the first Gulf War. We were in old Centurion tanks that were developed soon after world war two so they were poorly armed and ran on petrol so highly flammable. Our job was pretty much to clear the defensive anti tank ditches and mines fields so War was a let down after spending 9 months in the desert as my job was affectively over after a mad 120 minute adrenaline run by being the first unit to cross the belt. There were a few scary moments but the adrenaline kept us switched on to fight in those skirmishes.

All in all that was a let down really and did not satisfy my ego. 91 was to be a wake up call, we just returned after a month off after the Gulf and we found ourselves in Sarajevo, Bosnia as part of the UN. The first months was kind of cool, we walked around and drank coffee in the cool cafe's around the city and had a good craic with the locals. A few weeks later I witnessed a small girl and her mother take a direct hit from a heavy mortar round as the fighting erupted around us. It was one of the first attacks of the city and from that moment changed my attitude to war. Gone from that moment was any gun ho attitude, I had weapons but I was powerless to help that poor family. I went into what they call battle shock, in World War 1 & 2 they called it shell shock. Unfortunately I do not have vocabulary to describe how I felt completely but all rational thought disappears, I lost control of most of my body and went into hysterics. Lucky for me I had good section commander who calmed me down gave me a brew and a smoke so within 20 minutes I was functioning soldier again.

Many more incidents happened during my first 6 month tour of Bosnia, I was shot at on a almost daily basis, taking cover during an artillery or mortar strike became a joke and I remember on more than one occasion laughing with a bunch of other lads at embarrassing moments we had when taking cover. Mine was mid piss after drinking at least 2 liters of water so diving for cover I managed to piss on me, my section commander and the troop commander as I could not stem the flow. By this point I had witnessed the the real losers of war and that is innocent families and the minorities.

Many more tours of Bosnia followed and even a trip to Rwanda but all followed the same pattern. The suffering of the innocent! From Bosnia 91 I have not had a real buzz from being under fire, in fact I functioned normally all be it with a bit more adrenalin flowing. Others didn't fare so well in that there were suicides, some people left the British Army and joined the Bosnian militia to try and help further. Those are are even more messed up than the rest of us! PTSD is common place, is it not a nice thing to have. I dream of incidents I was involved in, I can play back in my head in perfect slow motion the blast that killed the mother and child in front of me. I can also play back over a dozen further incidents including the blast of a land mine that ended my career.

War is hell, be careful what you wish for! My wishes came true and all I want is to turn back time.