The Way It Is

by Keith Nightingale

October 7, 2016

Killing is a natural extension of being a Grunt. It is both expected and necessary. Failure fails the unit, and that is bad. Everyone in the business knows that and honors the event. Organizational comfort is in knowing that everyone can and will kill.

Killing is easy at the instant moment. It is only later that it is hard. As Shakespeare said: “That’s the rub.”

Killing usually falls into three categories; at a distance, close, and without emotion. Of the three, the first is the most common; and the last most effective. In all cases, remorse may or not be an outcome. 

For those whom remorse never visits, we later identify as sociopaths. At the moment, they are heroes. For those that experience remorse, we call them Grunts and they live with it always. In truth, it takes a bit of both to survive on the battlefield. Surviving the afterlife is another issue. Unfortunately, the afterlife is experienced as an individual, not as a team where both the impetus and motivation ruled response and was the basic foundation for survival and success.

Killing at a distance is easy. It is detached from the human aspects other than fear. It is a participation event with the score not recorded until later if at all. Simply being part of the unit engaged is sufficient honor for each member and engagement. The truth and result of each participant’s actions are not recorded other than the end state which is devoid of personal association. It’s just another day. Later, it may be all day, all the time.

Killing close is a highly individualistic event played within the context of the unit. It is kill him or be killed. It is a clear highly focused moment where training and natural primordial senses take charge within ranges that would be familiar to Caesar’s legions. Each specific incident comes with great clarity and great relief—for a moment. It is remembered always in the depth of the mind to be resurrected by a stray sound, color or image. The imprint of the encounter never departs.

Killing without emotion during or after is the best—for the unit. And the worst for the participant-an action totally unemotional without the slightest hint of rationality or remorse. The trigger for such a condition is usually assigned to a preceding horrific event that challenges sanity and converts the unit and its members to pure automaton killing machines. Or a moment of supreme desperation where being a non-human is the only potential survival option. Without regard to the normal human survival skills and cautions, this condition insulates the members with a shield of ignoral and a fanatic’s focus on the necessity of the moment—killing absolutely every living thing, man or beast, that is perceived as the enemy. Only when no more targets exist and mental exhaustion overcomes the physical, does the Grunt return to being a “normal” human being.

Killing is easy. Living with it later is far harder.

COL Nightingale is a retired Army Colonel who served two tours in Vietnam with Airborne and Ranger (American and Vietnamese) units. He commanded airborne battalions in both the 509th Parachute Infantry Regiment and the 82nd Airborne Division. He later commanded both the 1/75th Rangers and the 1st Ranger Training Brigade.