A Holiday for Heroes

                It’s November, and already lights are going up and Christmas decorations are coming to life in every store. The warm feeling of family and love washes over the world around this time of year.  Christmas is just around the corner, and everyone knows it is a time for family and making memories with our loved ones, but what about the soldiers fighting for our freedom overseas? They are oceans away from their families and the traditions they grew up with. How do they survive the holidays so far away, and do they still even celebrate?

                Even though troops are thousands of miles from home, Christmas still finds its way to them.  KTVN reports that troops in Iraq are getting into the Christmas spirit despite being away from home.  Their article “Troops Celebrate Christmas Early Overseas” explains, “American soldiers at a military outpost in Iraq sang Christmas carols, lit up the tree, even met with family members over a video teleconference.” The soldiers are not with their families, but they do find comfort in the company that they have, which are the men and women fighting alongside them. Benjamin Harmon, and infantryman with Company A,

 1st Battalion, 38th Infantry Regiment, discusses this in the article, “Soldiers Celebrate Christmas in Afghanistan” Harmon states , “You have your whole platoon which is basically all your best friends. You don’t do much, you just work and sleep, but you’ve got your best friends to the right and left of you the whole time during the holidays, so that makes it pretty easy.”  The article also describes some of the small things soldiers do to celebrate the holiday, like decorating their rooms, putting up paper trees, and getting to eat a Christmas Eve dinner. Christmas Eve dinner is very special for the troops. Samuel Bell, a cook for the 702nd Brigade Support Battalion, points out, “Most of these things can be described as comfort foods, or they’re things that (the soldiers have) grown up with, so they bring back feelings of nostalgia, (They are) things that make them feel like they’re at home … and hopefully take them away out of current circumstances for a few minutes.” Forgetting their current predicament and remembering the season helps lift the spirits of the troops.

     Soldiers do as much as they can to celebrate and have a holly jolly Christmas while away. They decorate, sing Christmas carols, and put up paper trees, but sometimes there are limits to how much they can do; however, there is something more we can do Between writing letters or sending stockings filled with goodies, there are hundreds of locally or community sponsored fundraisers and food drives for overseas soldiers. A few local organizations in Alabama are Treat the Troops and Soldiers' Angels of Alabama. If you are having trouble finding somewhere to donate your local news will usually advertise close by drop offs around this time of year. The American Red Cross, a reliable and well known charitable organization, expresses, "Once a year, we get the joy of delivering holiday greetings to veterans, military families and active-duty service members at hospitals and installations around the world." They encourage people to sign cards and send them in so they can be delivered to soldiers. They also accept donations to help military families. 

A Flare for the Fallen

Everyone knows their are casualties in war but are soldiers every really prepared for death on the battle field?  These men and women fight side by side and become like family to each other, so how do they adjust to losing them and how do they mourn for their lost friends in such a short amount of time?

Everyone has seen war movies and seen soldiers fall on a fake screen with actors but is that what really happens? In the documentary  Restrepo we get to see the raw feelings of the soldiers seeing and dealing with death.  The article Restrepo: Is this the greatest war film ever?  reports the movie as being, “No script. No acting. No props. Real blood, real bodies.” The movie shows a soldier break down over a lost friend but, because his group is in the middle of a battle, he is not given time to register or accept his death. When asked how the film maker, Tim Hetherington, managed to film the emotionally evoking scene, he said, "Yes, it was upsetting, and it's difficult. The American lines had been overrun by insurgents, people were being killed at close range, and we were in a state of shock. But you have to go on to autopilot. I was just doing my job."  In the end soldiers have to do just that: their job.  They do not have time to mourn the fallen. They have to get through and continue to fight or risk getting killed themselves.  The article, Soldiers Try to Cope with Battlefield Losses , by Corey Flintoff describes an example of this. The article tells the stories a group of soldiers in Iraq as they deal with loss during battle. Flintoff points out, “[They] had no time to mourn or even consider its losses. There were wounded to treat, houses to search and acres of orange groves where insurgents were known to camp and stash weapons.” The soldiers have to forget and ignore death in order to get the mission done.

So how do soldier deal with death after battle? The web site army medical gives steps to helping soldiers cope with loss. These steps include going through the five basic steps of mourning, which include denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.  The web site stresses that soldiers need to have reasonable time to grieve the death of friends or other soldiers. It reports that, “Many of the mental health professionals now treating combat veterans with post-traumatic stress disorders feel that too often the soldiers didn't allow themselves to grieve for their buddies at the time (or soon after), and so are still haunted by them today.” But sometimes this is just not possible because all people grieve in their own way and take different amounts of time. War does not always allow them this time. We also see this in Restrepo as one of the leaders of the group speaks to the soldiers about having to get over the large loss within another group of soldiers. He tells them they need to mourn and then get over it and do their jobs.  They get a moment of silence to remember and pray and are then sent to go along their business as usual.

Soldiers have to learn how to deal with death because sooner or later in war it’s going to happen. When it does happen in battle they have to try and continue to fight and do their job.  Afterwards they are often not given enough time to cope with the losses, which could sometimes lead to PTSD. However, soldiers do find ways to remember those who died. In Restrepo the soldiers set off flares to remember the anniversary of a lost friend and named their outpost after him.  There are also web sites such as Military Times that are dedicated to honoring the fallen.  Even though they may not get to mourn the traditional way; they can always find ways to show their respect  for those who died fighting alongside them.