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“I Am Sorry That It Has Come to This”: A Soldier's Last Words
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By Daniel Somers
Gawker
Monday, Jul 8, 2013
Daniel Somers was a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He was part of Task Force Lightning, an intelligence unit. In 2004-2005, he was mainly assigned to a Tactical Human-Intelligence Team (THT) in Baghdad, Iraq, where he ran more than 400 combat missions as a machine gunner in the turret of a Humvee, interviewed countless Iraqis ranging from concerned citizens to community leaders and and government officials, and interrogated dozens of insurgents and terrorist suspects. In 2006-2007, Daniel worked with Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) through his former unit in Mosul where he ran the Northern Iraq Intelligence Center. His official role was as a senior analyst for the Levant (Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, and part of Turkey). Daniel suffered greatly from PTSD and had been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury and several other war-related conditions. On June 10, 2013, Daniel wrote the following letter to his family before taking his life. Daniel was 30 years old. His wife and family have given permission to publish it.
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I am sorry that it has come to this.
The
fact is, for as long as I can remember my motivation for getting up
every day has been so that you would not have to bury me. As things have
continued to get worse, it has become clear that this alone is not a
sufficient reason to carry on. The fact is, I am not getting better, I
am not going to get better, and I will most certainly deteriorate
further as time goes on. From a logical standpoint, it is better to
simply end things quickly and let any repercussions from that play out
in the short term than to drag things out into the long term.
You
will perhaps be sad for a time, but over time you will forget and begin
to carry on. Far better that than to inflict my growing misery upon you
for years and decades to come, dragging you down with me. It is because
I love you that I can not do this to you. You will come to see that it
is a far better thing as one day after another passes during which you
do not have to worry about me or even give me a second thought. You will
find that your world is better without me in it.
I really have
been trying to hang on, for more than a decade now. Each day has been a
testament to the extent to which I cared, suffering unspeakable horror
as quietly as possible so that you could feel as though I was still here
for you. In truth, I was nothing more than a prop, filling space so
that my absence would not be noted. In truth, I have already been absent
for a long, long time.
My body has become nothing but a cage, a
source of pain and constant problems. The illness I have has caused me
pain that not even the strongest medicines could dull, and there is no
cure. All day, every day a screaming agony in every nerve ending in my
body. It is nothing short of torture. My mind is a wasteland, filled
with visions of incredible horror, unceasing depression, and crippling
anxiety, even with all of the medications the doctors dare give. Simple
things that everyone else takes for granted are nearly impossible for
me. I can not laugh or cry. I can barely leave the house. I derive no
pleasure from any activity. Everything simply comes down to passing time
until I can sleep again. Now, to sleep forever seems to be the most
merciful thing.
You must not blame yourself. The simple truth is
this: During my first deployment, I was made to participate in things,
the enormity of which is hard to describe. War crimes, crimes against
humanity. Though I did not participate willingly, and made what I
thought was my best effort to stop these events, there are some things
that a person simply can not come back from. I take some pride in that,
actually, as to move on in life after being part of such a thing would
be the mark of a sociopath in my mind. These things go far beyond what
most are even aware of.
To force me to do these things and then
participate in the ensuing coverup is more than any government has the
right to demand. Then, the same government has turned around and
abandoned me. They offer no help, and actively block the pursuit of
gaining outside help via their corrupt agents at the DEA. Any blame
rests with them.
Beyond that, there are the host of physical
illnesses that have struck me down again and again, for which they also
offer no help. There might be some progress by now if they had not spent
nearly twenty years denying the illness that I and so many others were
exposed to. Further complicating matters is the repeated and severe
brain injuries to which I was subjected, which they also seem to be
expending no effort into understanding. What is known is that each of
these should have been cause enough for immediate medical attention,
which was not rendered.
Lastly, the DEA enters the picture again
as they have now managed to create such a culture of fear in the medical
community that doctors are too scared to even take the necessary steps
to control the symptoms. All under the guise of a completely
manufactured “overprescribing epidemic,” which stands in stark relief to
all of the legitimate research, which shows the opposite to be true.
Perhaps, with the right medication at the right doses, I could have
bought a couple of decent years, but even that is too much to ask from a
regime built upon the idea that suffering is noble and relief is just
for the weak.
However, when the challenges facing a person are
already so great that all but the weakest would give up, these extra
factors are enough to push a person over the edge.
Is it any
wonder then that the latest figures show 22 veterans killing themselves
each day? That is more veterans than children killed at Sandy Hook,
every single day. Where are the huge policy initiatives? Why isn’t the
president standing with those families at the state of the union?
Perhaps because we were not killed by a single lunatic, but rather by
his own system of dehumanization, neglect, and indifference.
It
leaves us to where all we have to look forward to is constant pain,
misery, poverty, and dishonor. I assure you that, when the numbers do
finally drop, it will merely be because those who were pushed the
farthest are all already dead.
And for what? Bush’s religious
lunacy? Cheney’s ever growing fortune and that of his corporate friends?
Is this what we destroy lives for?
Since then, I have tried
everything to fill the void. I tried to move into a position of greater
power and influence to try and right some of the wrongs. I deployed
again, where I put a huge emphasis on saving lives. The fact of the
matter, though, is that any new lives saved do not replace those who
were murdered. It is an exercise in futility.
Then, I pursued
replacing destruction with creation. For a time this provided a
distraction, but it could not last. The fact is that any kind of
ordinary life is an insult to those who died at my hand. How can I
possibly go around like everyone else while the widows and orphans I
created continue to struggle? If they could see me sitting here in
suburbia, in my comfortable home working on some music project they
would be outraged, and rightfully so.
I thought perhaps I could
make some headway with this film project, maybe even directly appealing
to those I had wronged and exposing a greater truth, but that is also
now being taken away from me. I fear that, just as with everything else
that requires the involvement of people who can not understand by virtue
of never having been there, it is going to fall apart as careers get in
the way.
The last thought that has occurred to me is one of some
kind of final mission. It is true that I have found that I am capable
of finding some kind of reprieve by doing things that are worthwhile on
the scale of life and death. While it is a nice thought to consider
doing some good with my skills, experience, and killer instinct, the
truth is that it isn’t realistic. First, there are the logistics of
financing and equipping my own operation, then there is the near
certainty of a grisly death, international incidents, and being branded a
terrorist in the media that would follow. What is really stopping me,
though, is that I simply am too sick to be effective in the field
anymore. That, too, has been taken from me.
Thus, I am left with
basically nothing. Too trapped in a war to be at peace, too damaged to
be at war. Abandoned by those who would take the easy route, and a
liability to those who stick it out—and thus deserve better. So you see,
not only am I better off dead, but the world is better without me in
it.
This is what brought me to my actual final mission. Not
suicide, but a mercy killing. I know how to kill, and I know how to do
it so that there is no pain whatsoever. It was quick, and I did not
suffer. And above all, now I am free. I feel no more pain. I have no
more nightmares or flashbacks or hallucinations. I am no longer
constantly depressed or afraid or worried
I am free.
I ask
that you be happy for me for that. It is perhaps the best break I could
have hoped for. Please accept this and be glad for me. |
Source: Gawker
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