I remember that day as if it was yesterday. I can still smell the gas burning and hear the young men screaming on the beach, suffering from a variety of wounds. I was a infantryman on the runner bulldog. As we approached the shores I heard the man on the intercom yell out my number “six”, I was to be in the first wave out of the runner, the most dangerous one. The ride was horrifying to say the least, in the distance you hear bombs dropping, machine guns sounding off, and the occasional bullet slam against the draw door. My unit, the tenth mountain, were the usual grunts right out of the marine basic training, we were the expendables.
Back home in ohio, I was a football star and the usual all American boy from the normal family. I had no understanding of the outside world beyond my county’s lines. Even my basic training unit was based out of a town twenty minutes away. I went through the training course like no problem, but after graduation we were told rumors of a mass deployment to re-take Europe from hitler and all of us were going. Sure enough two weeks later I got my deployment letter from the president complete with a copy printer signature…pssh some respect they give us troops.
The day before we left silence was the band as we lay in our bunks setting sail to our fates. Nobody really thought much of what we were going to do, but then again nobody for sure knew what we were going to do, so morale was high as we heard voices of troop pep gals over the radio. We had an immediate briefing on our assignment later that day. We were to be deployed tomorrow on the beaches of Normandy and the only detailed subject covered was to kill as many enemy as we could and we were wished good luck, the final words said to us by our general was “ Last rights will be read at nineteen hundred sharp.” Jee what a way to make us feel good about what we were doing, but it was too late it was lights out and we were invading in the morning. The only sound that night was the sound of planes dispatching down the runways to drop off the hundred and first boys behind the lines, man those mac’s had moxy, you would never catch me behind the lines at night, or even in a plane! Every soldier from seventeen to twenty nine lay in there bunks stone quiet wondering what awaits them on that beach.
It was a cold morning as we entered the runners, “match boxes” we called them, made of pure cold steel which made it even colder. We were told not to wear jackets because they would weigh us down on the exit. Everything was splittingly loud and violent, I remember stepping foot off the matchbox then blackness. I woke up to my sgt yelling at me “Wake up boy! Theres work to do!” I later found out that I was hit by the precussion wave of an enemy mortar. I sluggishly and lathargicly ran up the dunes, occasionally ducking down for cover from the incoming fire. Then suddenly I was hit from behind by the butt of a rifle, I turned around only to see it was a german soldier with his bayonet drawn. I reckon he meant to slit my throat and not give it a second thought, but he chose the wrong soldier and the fight was on. Using all my might I fought him off through the agony as the little advantage of strength he had over me allowed him to lasserate my forearm, and as I saw my life before my eyes a sudden inner strength, a fight to survive exploded in me and as I turn him over and sink the knife into this man’s chest I was plagued with the sight of watching the light leave his eyes, he was the first person I ever killed. Chatter of rounds being fired and bombs exploding seiced only leaving the screams of both friend and foe to be heard, we had won, the forst stage of the mission was a complete success, at least in the eyes of the pentagon. As I sit on the roof of an enemy’s bunker going through hysterics over what I had done, the only thing my sgt had to say to me was “Get up! Get on you’re feet boy! There is more work to do!”
I returned home later that year, forever change by the war. I was emotionless and cold, I did not feel joy to see my family or girlfriend again, what I felt was a sort of fakeness and emptiness in the smile on my face. We had won, the whole mission was a complete success and Europe was taken back from Hitler. Inside I could not feel anything, but I understood that what I did was right and that what I did was apart of the ending of this horrible war. As I will forever be changed by this war and the things I did wrong, I will also remember what great things I did for this country and for others, and no one can take that from me, even with a bayonet.
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