During the long, dusty convoy from my base in the mountains of Paktya province, Afghanistan, to Bagram Airfield, it never occurred to me that I’d be returning to the emotional moments of my first deployment here.  This is what I am thinking about this Memorial Day here in Afghanistan.

Our cargo trucks and gun trucks crept along battered roads through breathtaking mountain passes, lush, green valleys of farmland and mud-brick qalats, and busy roadside bazaars of fruits and vegetables, hanging meat carcasses, and even a few vendors selling plastic carts filled with ice cream.  Afghan National Army soldiers rolled along with us in their own vehicles as a combined convoy, where we work together to run our logistical missions as a truly combined effort.  We arrived at Bagram in the evening, and I invited two Afghan officers to walk with me along the bustling main drive.  They asked to bring along one of their drivers, who was having trouble with an eye infection.  So our first stop was the hospital to have this soldier seen by a doctor.

I knew the hospital well from my first tour, where my task force worked to move everything from the old plywood hospital into a newly constructed permanent facility.  When we left in early 2007, there was much discussion of establishing a memorial wall in the hospital lobby to honor the service and sacrifice of the medics killed in action during our tour.  I didn't know what the end result was—until last week, when I walked into the hospital with these Afghan soldiers.

At first I led the Afghans past the memorial wall, not stopping to look at the series of plaques with the names, photos, and stories of the fallen, along with a sign in large block letters: “WE WILL NEVER FORGET.”  I knew many of the names and stories already.  We took the Afghan soldier to an examination room and left the interpreter with him, while the two officers and I waited in the lobby.  As we waited, I thought back to 2006, to the Fallen Comrades ceremonies, when we would stand along Bagram’s main drive, saluting the flag-draped caskets passing by in Humvees.  I thought back to the loss of Sergeant Roger P. Pena, Jr., whom I knew personally as a comrade in my unit, and whose name I wear on a black metal wristband.

I talked with these two Afghan officers using what words and phrases they knew in English and what few words I knew in Dari, even drawing pictures.  I learned that the senior of these two officers was a captain, who had begun his career in the Afghan army under the Soviet occupation, even being awarded a medal for valor by then-President Najibullah.  He described this in his formal, military tone, rubbing his fingers along his trim black beard as he reminisced.  Surely these men have seen such great loss throughout their military careers and personal lives in Afghanistan.  I wanted to tell them about the memorial wall, but it was too complex to communicate without our interpreter.  We watched as a U.S. general passed through to award a Purple Heart medal to a wounded soldier.  I tried to be present with my Afghan colleagues, but felt alone with the memories surrounding me and the seriousness of the conflict still raging around us.

After their soldier was cared for by the doctors, I touched my interpreter on the arm and stopped my Afghan colleagues in front of the memorial wall.  I pointed to the plaques, explaining that these men and women had fallen during my tour, that these were people whose stories I knew and will always remember.  I pointed to the photo of Sergeant Pena, explaining that he was killed by the Taliban on a convoy in Helmand province.  I pointed to his name on my wristband.  As the interpreter translated this into Dari, both officers nodded gravely.  “He was a very good man,” I told them, which they understood without translation.  The captain pointed gently at the plaque and read aloud: “Pena.”  I was floored to hear his name spoken, in the hospital my unit had helped to establish, and by this distinguished Afghan.

I realized then what an honor it is to speak the names of the fallen, what a relief it is to bring others into this important remembrance.  The memory of Sergeant Pena has been a personal driving reason for continuing my military career and choosing to deploy to Afghanistan a second time.  Upon his death, and ever since, I have asked myself: am I doing everything I can to help my fellow soldiers?  Ultimately, war is forged by human relationships, at least for those of us on the ground.  We work for each other, we work to help each other accomplish the mission—and here in Afghanistan we also work to empower our Afghan colleagues to continue the mission themselves when they are ready.  Coming here again is, to me, how I can best honor the men and women who have sacrificed everything in service of a stable, democratic Afghanistan.

A couple of weeks back I saw my friend Rich when we convoyed to southern Paktya, and he told me about an Afghan National Army medic he works with who, after being shot in the leg, still continued to work diligently to help his fellow soldiers during an attack.  Determined to stay in the fight, he placed a tourniquet above the place where much of his lower leg had been torn away by gunfire, then pulled out a medical knife and cut away what was left.  He was wounded again, but as he was evacuated after the Afghan soldiers successfully repelled the attack, he lay wide awake on the stretcher asking how his comrades were.  “That guy is a patriot,” Rich told me.  “That makes me want to win even more.”
The successes of past conflicts, the better world that has come about from the tremendous sacrifices of U.S. servicemen and servicewomen over the course of our nation’s history, has depended on our interconnectedness not only with each other, but also with the populace of the places we’ve made safer and better.  Our relationships are where the rebuilding and renewal begin, where the seeds of peace and reconciliation can begin to take root.

Before we got back in the trucks to head back to Paktya province, the Afghan captain turned and said to me, “Thank you for coming to help my country.”  I believe he meant that for all of us who have worked here to honor the dead by making good on their sacrifices.  May a better world be the result.