Pause

Ya'know. It's so funny. It's not the death that ever threatens to dissuade me from military service. It's the little shit, like this.

Silent Posting: With His Blog Kaboom, a Young Soldier Told of His War. Last Month the Army Made Him Shut It Down

"There was a boy who went to war, like many other boys before him. Maybe it made him a man, maybe it didn't. Maybe he already was a man, maybe he wasn't. Maybe it doesn't matter, maybe none of it does, maybe it all does. Maybe.

-- Lt. G, March 4

He was an unlikely warrior, this scrawny boy from Reno, Nev., the son of two lawyers, raised in the suburbs.

He had a way with words, this boy. When his Stryker unit deployed to Iraq last winter, he was a rookie platoon leader who had never seen combat. And like many other soldiers before him, he decided he'd chronicle the war on a blog. Intending to keep family and friends abreast of the follies and pitfalls of soldiering in a five-year-old war that now relies less on gunfire and more on diplomacy, this boy, under the pen name Lt. G, launched 'Kaboom: A Soldier's War Journal.'

An indictment of the war it was not. Lt. G's dispatches -- at turns hilarious, maddening and terrifying -- provided raw and insightful snapshots of a conflict many Americans have lost interest in.

Word got around, and more and more readers closely followed the postings of 25-year-old Lt. Matthew Gallagher, with the site drawing tens of thousands of page views. By the time Kaboom went kaput last month -- Lt. G was ordered to take down his blog -- it had a following that would be the envy of many a small-town paper.

The blog's downfall was a May 28 posting that, in violation of military blogging rules, Gallagher failed to have vetted by a supervisor. (That the posting depicted an officer in the unit unflatteringly might have played a role. Gallagher declined a request to comment...)

'This is a disgusting decision on the part of the Army command,' one reader fumed, while another wrote: 'A free society would not shut down your blog.' Still another drafted a template letter and urged others to contact their lawmakers to demand that Lt. G's cyber gag order be lifted...

Lt. Col. Steve Stover, a military spokesman, said in an e-mail that Kaboom was 'deemed by the commander to be counter to good order and discipline of his unit.' He added that the blog had not been registered with the military, an assertion Dennis Gallagher disputes.

Lt. G wrote in his last dispatch that all postings, except for the one about the promotion talk, had been vetted by a supervisor. On June 27, he wrote one last entry, titled "A Tactical Pause":

I'm a soldier first, and orders are orders. So it is.

If you think, please think of us. If you pray, please pray for us. The second half of our deployment will be just as challenging and dangerous as the first half.

Thank you for caring. Agree or disagree with the war, if you're reading this, you are engaged and aware. As long as that is still occurring in a free society, there is something worth the fighting for."

Here's the link to the archived blog:

Kaboom: A Soldier's War Journal at http://kaboomwarjournalarchive.blogspot.com/

And here's the post that got him in trouble, with the music that plays on the site.


The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide is Press Coverage

That post in toto:

"I’d brushed aside the informal inquiries for months now. No, not me. Not interested. Keep me on the line. I want nothing to do with a lateral promotion to XO (Executive Officer) that involves becoming a logistical whipping boy and terminal scapegoat for all things NOTGOODENOUGH. I’ve been out here in the wilds too long, dealing with matters of life and death, to go back to Little America for PowerPoint pissing matches. Not me. I’m that too skinny, crazy-eyed mustang who drives a hippie van with a McGovern bumper sticker and keeps his hair long and actually read the counterinsurgency manual rather than pretending he did, even quoting it during meetings and out in sector in this era of recentralized warfare, remember? You aren't gonna break me, no matter how enticing the fires of the FOB are.

Semper Gumby.

I guess they forgot, and instead focused on matters of competency. Cue outright offer.

Cue LT G 'thanks but no thanks' response.

Cue illogical backlash from higher, acting like a spurned teenage blonde whose dreamboat crush tells her point-blank that he prefers brunettes.

Q finding myself on the literal and metaphorical carpet of multiple field-grades, sometimes explaining, sometimes listening.

Mostly listening.

Yes, Sir. I’m getting out. No, I’m sure. Definitely sure. Surer than sure. What am I going to do? Don’t tell him Option A, he’ll scoff at Option A. He believes dreams are only for children. Option B will suffice. Well Sir, I’m going to go back to school, somewhere on the East Coast. Haven’t decided if I’ll focus on the Spanish Civil War or Irish History yet, though. I think I’d be a pretty good wacky professor. I already like to ramble and I look good in banana yellow clip-on ties. Sir.

No, Sir. I’m not saying that at all. I would absolutely bust my ass as an XO, and perform the job to the best of my ability. I’m just saying I’d be screwing a peer of mine, who is staying in, and could use this professional development, benefiting both him and the big Army in the long run. Uncle Sam agrees with me.

No Sir, I don’t think I’m selling myself short. Recognizing one’s own weaknesses isn’t a weakness in and of itself. Crushing balls is only my thing with people who aren’t wearing an American uniform.

If I throw enough clutter in the way, something will stick.

This is the Army, son. Your opinion doesn't matter.

Roger. Acknowledged. I'd figure I'd proffer it, just in case.

You need to start thinking big picture, Lieutenant. That’s what officers do.

I roll out of the wire everyday to bask in a third-world cesspool craving my attention for nothing more than the most basic human need - hope. Is there a bigger picture than that, or just different vantage points from safer distances?

Yes Sir, I will remember to think things out more rationally next time. (Pause long enough to make the point that this was already a well-thought out decision.) Of course. Sir.

No Sir, this isn’t just because I want to stay with my platoon. (Maintain eye contact so he doesn’t think you’re lying, for the love of God, maintain eye contact!) I won’t lie though, Sir – it was a factor. Just not my motivation.

Nice work, liar.

Another reason? Well, Sir, two of my best friends in the world are LT Virginia Slim and LT Demolition. If I were to become their XO, I would be extremely uncomfortable with possibly having to order them and their men to their deaths. As their peer, I should be right there next to them. Hell, I probably would insist on it.

Yes, I know that was a good point. Don’t say that out loud. Don’t say that out loud. Phew. That was a close one. I almost out-louded rather than in-loaded.

Yes Sir, I have full confidence in my platoon to be able to succeed without me. SFC Big Country would be more than capable of performing the job of a platoon leader. But he’s an NCO. He shouldn’t have to deal with lieutenant bullshit. That’s my bullshit to deal with. I’m the soldier’s buffer. (Cough. From you. Cough.) If a butterbar were here, I’d understand. That’s the natural order of things. But since an opening occurred without a backlog, I really strongly really definitely really definitively believe that it should go to a LT who wants it. Hell, there are some of them out there who NEED it. Aren’t I being a team player here?

The ballad of a thin man walking a thin rope. Moonwalking a thinly-veiled rejection of his superiors’ life decisions. Wondering why they are taking it personally. People are different. They want different things out of existence. Let’s not act like I’m a ring of Saturn stating the case that Pluto’s planethood should be reconfirmed.

Don’t fall on your sword, Lieutenant. No one likes a martyr.

Can’t help it, I’m Irish. And. Yes. They do.

Fine, I’m not going to make you do it. (Even though I spent three days trying to do so.) But you are now on my shit-list, and I want to fuck you over for daring to defy and defying to dare. A bullshit tasking will eventually come down the pipeline, and I got a rubber stamp with your name on it. And yes, I know your performance has been outstanding, and we have consistently rated you above your peers, at the top echelon. Doesn’t matter now.

You’re right. It doesn’t. Doesn’t matter at all. Even if I’ve only haggled a few more months with the Gravediggers, it was worth it; I came here to fight a war, not to build a resume. My men need me. And. I need them. It would have been worth it for a few more days.

Victory.

Mustangs don’t blink.

You know where we learned how not to?

It wasn’t behind a desk.

Every day of free-roaming makes it worth it."

I don't know about you, but I like this guy more after reading this post, not less. Fuck 'em, Lt. G.

It's one of the more serious deterrents to me signing up. Not being able to speak and think freely and, as a function of those, to blog reasonably freely. Not being able to say what's on my mind. Not having a place to vent. Especially when your mental health as much as your physical safety is taking such a beating as it inevitably does in war.

Still. Job's gotta get done.

And I respect soldiers like Lt. G who fight because it's the right thing and not because it's a path to promotion. That's all I want out of the experience, at least. Do right. Let the rest of the chips fall where they may.

As Poppa G, Matthew's father, put it after he was ordered to take down the blog:

"I find it incredibly ironic that the day after the US Supreme Court issues a landmark decision concerning the second amendment of the Constitution, some midmanagement bureaucrat decides he can piss on the first amendment. Incredible!"

Apparently, Matthew's superior officer misses the irony, here, that while Lt. G is fighting for someone else's freedom and right to self-determination, in a war of self-sacrafice, rather than a war of self-defense, that he signed up for out of his own free will, his own freedoms get abrogated in the name of that fight.

I'm with Poppa G. I think this commanding officer got his feelings hurt, pussed out, and took the lame option of shutting the Lieutenant down rather than accepting his decision not to opt for promotion.

Pretty weak, if you ask me. Not sure I trust that kind of weak-ass shit to lead us in war. Maybe this C.O. ought to rethink his idea of good order and discipline.

Definitely has me rethinking it, that's for sure.

Good on ya for stickin' to your guns, Lt. G. Better officers know to respect the consciences and judgments of the men and women under their command.

If there's one lesson I've been trying to learn more than any other when it comes to my students, my friends, my family, everyone, this is the one. Just because I choose a path that serves others or which I think is a noble one or which I think is a better one, doesn't mean that everyone else should too. And, like Lieutenant Gallagher, here, just because they give you service doesn't mean they owe it to you into perpetuity.

If there is one lesson that Americans and the world needs to learn when it comes to how they relate to one another, this is it. We need to learn to respect the consciences and judgments of those around us.

It's a hard lesson to learn. And it's especially hard while the whole world rallies to disrespect that conscience and judgment in the name of forcing good intentions on the one another.

But we will never, ever, ever have peace with one another until we learn this lesson. Meaning we will fight and fight and fight and fight endlessly with one another, until we learn this lesson. And there is no assertion of authority or power or capacity to force each other otherwise which will resolve this fight in any other direction. The only real resolution we will ever really accept is one which respects the consciences and judgments of people involved.

And not having my conscience and judgment respected is the single biggest fact to give me pause for signing up. It's the single biggest fact to give most people pause to sign up for most public service, including military service, I think. And yet we keep barreling down that path like it doesn't mean a thing.

And folks like Lt. G take it on the chin for our hubris. A lot of people taking it on the chin for our hubris, these days.

Trying to decide if I'm willing or not. Whether the mission is more important than the bullshit.

I think it is. But that doesn't make the bullshit any less bullshit. FUBAR, as the boys in Saving Private Ryan refer to it. And fuck 'em for that.

If I thought we were too foolish and stubborn to ever get over it, I'd give it all up, today. The teaching. The writing. Considerations of the service. Even the theater and film work. I'd just go straight money. Nothing wrong with money. And it's awfully handy to have around.

But I know we're better than that. We don't always act like it. We fuck it up plenty along the way. Always have.

But I know we're better than that. And I'd rather keep working on behalf of me and others getting better than that than leaving it the mess that it is, today.

And I like the idea that there's other folks out there, like Matthew, who would too. Thanks for your service, Lieutenant. Truth is, we need more thoughtful, decent upstarts like you, Matthew. And we're not going to get more of them by bullying them. We will only get that kind of commitment in the ranks by treating them decent and respecting their conscience.

And, if not, I'm with you, Matthew. They can fuck off and try to win those wars on their own.

Something tells me that wiser heads will prevail on this one, eventually, Matthew. Thanks for your service, in the meantime.