On Combat

Why are civilians attracted to the fight in Iraq and what keeps them there? Motivations are more complex than simply the appeal of money. The Washington Post’s Steve Fainaru’s narrative of four security guards abducted in Iraq provides a small glimpse into the motivation of some of the thousands of armed civilians at war.

Many contractors are former military—all four featured in “For Abducted Guards, Iraq Wasn’t Just About Money” were vets, arguably they knew what they were getting into, but all wanted back some appeals of life in war.

Initial Motivation—what brought them back into the war—appears to have been the enduring appeal of battle catalyzed by the need for change their civilian lives.

Timeless and enduring appeals of battle include intense camaraderie, the intensity of life in a combat zone, and connection to great events beyond a normal life.

Camaraderie: “I’d take a bullet for them” Munns said of [comrades] Cote and Skora. “The rest of these people, I probably wouldn’t.”

Intensity: “I can’t handle monotony,” said Munns, the young former Marine who is also missing. “I gotta have something that shocks my system so I know I’m still alive.”

“Basically I was looking for a feeling that I didn’t have, and this job provided that”

Connection to great events: “There’s only a certain percentage of people who are doing this. It’s like a hidden, secret part of the war, and if I could be part of that hidden, secret thing, it would be cool, you know? It’s kind of like being part of history. People are gonna be like, ‘Oh, man, remember the war? Where were you?’ I was here. I was here.”

These appeals of battle, however, seem to have been catalyzed by a dramatic need for change in ordinary civilian lives, either an urgent need for money and/or the need to change direction after a major setback. Two of the contractors applied for security jobs after DUIs, both with pressing financial needs: one (Cote) to pay for college, one (Reuben) to pay the bills of a family of teenagers after losing a police job.

“It basically gave me an opportunity to run away from my problems,” he said. “So I just left.”

Sustaining Motivation—what kept these men in the fight—differed from the initial motivation as the imagined war proved to be different from the real one they encountered:

The work was harder and more dangerous than expected: “Reuben said he was exhausted from having worked ‘72 or 73 days straight’ and jittery from fending off constant attacks….‘The RPG attacks were the scariest thing I’ve ever seen’”

Pain and death of war was intimately close: “he was increasingly repulsed by what he saw on Iraq’s dangerous roads. The coffin [of an Iraqi co-worker being returned to a family] had a drip valve that was positioned directly over the windshield. Water and blood trickled over the glass…the screams from his family. It rips your heart out.”

The men wrestled with their situation, whether to continue on or go.

“Reuben went back and forth about whether to stay on. He weighed the risk and time away from his family against the cash, which never seemed to be enough, and the appeal of the warrior lifestyle.”

Although the possibility of being killed and mutilated (as had the Blackwater employees who were killed and burned precipitating the battle of Fallujah in 2004) was not far from consideration:

“It’s not the getting hit part that bothers me,” he said. “It’s the getting lost and getting hung from a bridge part.”

There is a sense that there was little time and opportunity to consider the personal risk vs reward of combat, and close calls were apparently not enough of a catalyst for some:

“Young had decided to keep returning to Iraq, even after a bullet took a chunk out of the collar of his armored vest and threw him into the steering wheel as he escorted a convoy through Baghdad one afternoon.”

“There’s no time to think about yourself. Sometimes you should take a step back and take it all in and be like, ‘What am I really here for? Why am I really doing this? Is it really worth it?’ You go out, you get hit and come back, you go out and get hit and come back. You just become numb, and you just do it.”

And seemingly, the money was never quite enough to return home:

“I’m getting caught up on some bills and stuff like that. And I heard they’re coming out with that new Dodge Challenger in 2008. I want that.”

“All you’re thinking about is the money….You have $50,000 in the bank, and all you’re thinking about is, ‘Another month and I’ll have $57,000, another month and I’ll have $64,000….I hate to say it, but I am so thankful for this war,” he said. “I only came over here for the money, and I didn’t even know I could do this job until two years ago. I didn’t know it was available to me.” From: “Private War : Convoy to Darkness Cutting Costs, Bending Rules, And a Trail of Broken Lives”

Interestingly, the cause and ideology behind the war goes unmentioned in the words of the contractors or in the telling by Steve Fainaru.

Regardless of their individual motivations, these men responded to the needs of our government and our military. They risk their lives to fulfill a mission we do not have enough uniformed forces to accomplish.

Our hearts must go out to them, we must keep them in our prayers and we must keep their families in our prayers as they cope with the impossible uncertainty and fear. At the same time, the MNF-I must do everything in its power to reclaim the freedom of these individuals who put themselves in harms way at our request.