Surviving War a Blessing or a Curse

Three corpsmen move into position in a remote area in Afghanistan . They take refuge behind a concrete blockade. One person takes his binocu...

Three corpsmen move into position in a remote area in Afghanistan. They take refuge behind a concrete blockade. One person takes his binoculars out and spots a militant position approximately 2 klicks to the North East. He gives the coordinates to his Platoon and ensures that they are accurate. 30 sec after the mortar is placed into the ground the loader yells fox3 and loads the shell, 10 sec after he yells fire in the hole, every one of the three member platoon shift their heads to their sides and cover their ears. A shell is fired; 6 sec into flight a huge bang sounds and the rising smoke can be seen from a far area. The platoon commander yells in the radio “Command Bravo 1 is cleared awaiting further instructions”. It seems that the mission is successful but the other side tells a completely different reality.

The Other Side......

In the courtyard of a house, three children aged 4,6 and 7 years are playing with a plastic horse manikin. Their faces are all dusty and their hair are pretty messed up but these children are very high spirited and make the best of things from what they have. It is lunch time and they call out their mother to bring some food. They jump off from the horse and run across the conked out courtyard barefooted. Their feet are full of cuts and bruises but they still have sturdy footsteps to walk across such harsh terrain. The children quickly occupy their spaces on a Chaarpai. 2 minutes later the mother who is wailed due to a strict local custom comes out with a steel plate in her hand with half rice and half lentils in it. The children savor on the sight. Suddenly enough a familiar but unclear sound through the air strikes their eardrums and in jolt of inquisitiveness they abruptly jump off the chaarpai and run to the courtyard to see what is creating such a noise. The mother yells out loud “wadrega! Wadrega! Wadrega!” in the midst of yell the mother knew what was going to come, she dropped the steel plate and ran to save her children from the impact of the projectile that was coming to strike at their house. The mortar shell struck the house and destroyed its one and only standing room as well as half of its courtyard. Souls of two of the three children departed immediately from their bodies. The third child who was the eldest of them all ran in a state of shock to save his only surviving family member, his mother. He climbed across the debris and the adrenaline in his body made him invincible to the sensation of fire that he was passing through. There along with the plate of rice and lentils that was on fire was the body of his mother who suffered a severe head injury. The child yelled in a state of despair and did not know what to do. He quietly sat down in a dark corner of the slightly standing wall. Tears rolled down his cheeks and for the first time the dust covered cheeks had streaks of fair complexioned skin being unraveled form underneath.

The Realism!

1 minute after the mortar was fired the platoon received the commands transmission stating that the target was a miss and they poorly coordinated the attack due to which loss of life was reported. In reality the success rate was every 4 of 10 mortar attacks in Afghanistan. Surviving war can be a blessing and a curse depending on the situation that the victims are after the war. There are always two sides of a story, to judge a story you have to analyze both sides, only then your decision can be satisfying.