Is a question I often get about my time in Iraq. Let me tell you this, this is not an appropriate question for someone who has just gotten back, or really at all for that matter. Some will want to tell you about it, and if they do, listen. Most, in my experience, will not want to talk about it. It is an intimate experience and everyone experiences it differently and relates to it differently too. There’s different kinds of getting shot at too, at least in my opinion, and I think that makes a difference. There’s getting shot at when you are pinned down in an impending ambush, there’s getting shot at while you’re on guard, there’s getting shot at in a firefight on the street, inside a building, etc. The list goes on. Getting shot at period isn’t good, but I believe the first two are the worst. You are not mobile, (at the time), and you don’t know where the fire is coming from. Thus, you have all these invisible projectiles whipping and crackling over your head, you keep your head down but turn to look up, you hear it, and know it’s only a foot or two away, but you can’t see them. Sometimes when they are really close you can feel the kinetic energy coming off of them, I can’t describe it really, as it is surreal, but I experienced it on guard one night while I was eating my chow in the tower. No thank you.

The worst part when you are hunkered down and taking fire, is that you don’t know where it’s coming from, so you don’t know where to return fire and where to move. This comes down to the four basic rules of an Infantryman: Shoot, Move, Communicate, Kill– in that order. But, when the first two are taken away it is demoralizing. Those are the only times I’ve been truly terrified when getting shot at. When I knew where it was coming from, and that we were moving and shooting tactically, I was going through the motions and wasn’t really ever scared. Executing battle drills, bounding, making the weapons “talk,” was all that was on my mind, and everyone else’s. That’s what made us so effective, from Bravo 6 down to the lowly PV2 Rifleman, we were a well oiled machine, that executed near perfection. We had two-thirds of the company get wounded, but didn’t lose a single man dead.

Getting shot at is horrible, but what’s worse is when you can’t shoot back.

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