In 2004 in Fallujah, we were involved in so many direct fire engagements. We made eye contact with the enemy. And we lost guys. That was a totally di… - David Bellavia

The gunman on the roof was a teenaged boy, maybe sixteen years old. I could see him scanning for targets, his back to me. He held an AK-47 without a stock. Was he just a stupid kid trying to protect his family? Was he one of Muqtada al-Sadr's Shiite fanatics? I kept my eyes on him and prayed he'd put the AK down and just get back inside his own house. I didn't want to shoot him. He turned and saw me, and I could see the terror on his sweat-streaked face. I put him in my sights just as he adjusted the AK against his shoulder. I had beaten him on the draw. My own rifle was snug on my shoulder, the sight resting on him. The kid stood no chance. My weapon just needed a flick of the safety and a butterfly's kiss of pressure on the trigger.
Please don't do this. You don't need to die.
The AK went to full ready-up. Was he aiming at me? I couldn't be sure, but the barrel was trained at my level. Do I shoot? Do I risk not shooting? Was he silently trying to save me from some unseen threat? I didn't know. I had to make a decision.
Please forgive me for this.
I pulled my trigger. The kid's chin fell to his chest, and a guttural moan escaped his lips. I fired again, missed, then pulled the trigger one more time. The bullet tore his jaw and ear off. Sergeant Hall came up alongside me, saw the AK and the boy, and finished him with four shots to his chest. He slumped against the low rooftop wall. "Thanks, dude. I lost my zero," I said to Hall, explaining that my rifle sights were off-line, though that was the last thing going through my mind.

My greatest regret has always been leaving the service I so dearly loved. I tried to make it work at home, but but the pull of the battlefield was too strong. Out there, I had meaning and purpose. You live on the raged edge of danger that forces you to confront your own mortality. Every breath becomes euphoric. You exist in a different emotional framework. In rural western New York, life's color was drained away by a million little nicks. You stress over bills and taxes, a car that's become unreliable. The house needs siding, the floors in the kitchen need to be redone. All the logistical headaches of modern life take center stage and start to define your life.
Out there, on the battlefield, none of that shit matters. None of it. The complexities vanish, and everything boils down to this: can you measure up? When you do, you feel like a rock star. Nothing- no drug in the world- can compare to that moment of self-discovery. For me, self-discovery in combat convinced me the essence of life distills down to one thing: proving to yourself why you are needed in the fight.

It's important to have different perspectives, and journalism supports that. Today, everyone has an opinion about everything. COVID-19 happens, and suddenly we're all research specialists posting our findings on Facebook or wherever. What we don't do is properly consider the sources of our material, our "facts." Everyone responds emotionally to everything. We paint millennials in a bad light: the iGeneration is awful; but the truth is that my parents' generation thought the same things about us. We were couch potatoes; we lived in our parents' basements until we were twenty-five. Then the Twin Towers fell.
Every generation is going to be tested. And some people are going to answer the call. Fortunately, I believe that many liberals shoot as straight as conservatives. I served with a lot of guys who hated George W. Bush and his reasons for taking us to war. Now they didn't vote for President Trump. But under fire, they saved my life and they made sure I came home. Those guys are my family. I love them to death. We argue about politics every single day, but we also see beyond that.