Fallen Angels and Restrepo

Pre writing 

Restrepo and Fallen angels are both very similar.  The men when they reach their post say I will die here.  That feeling of being doomed and not having a chance is always present.  Another similarity is that even the hardest men when a friend dies or gets hit lose it and freak out.  When writing home it was much easier to tell their families that they were doing fine and that everyone was okay when in reality some friends had died and they were not okay.  Perry tells his little brother this and Pemble from Restrepo also says this.  The people in the towns were very involved with the Taliban/congs and were afraid that if they would help the Americans to find the Taliban/congs then they would be killed.  They use fear to control the town’s people and unfortunately it usually works.  Hoarse play between the troops is a way to relieve the tension and to not think of what was happening to them.  It rely shocked me to see the soldiers in Restrepo try to convince themselves that their friend would be okay “it’s not that bad, he’ll be fine”.  Seeing that made everything real, up until that point we had not actually seen anything but our US solders shooting at an enemy that we could not even see.  But I guess that’s a part of war.  Unfortunately that makes things even scarier, at any moment a lucky shot could end everything.  At the begging everyone was joking around and having a good time.  The Korengal Valley was named the one of the deadliest places to fight and Vietnam was a very dangerous place.  Lobel would always compare a situation to a movie and he would have fun with that and in Restrepo a solder tells the camera man that a firefight gives him a big high.  I think it’s all just a front for what is rely going on they may act cool on the outside but that doesn’t rely mean anything.          

Writing

I learned a lot from Restrepo and Fallen Angels about the true nature of war.  It is nothing like Hollywood likes to portray it.  The Movies try to glorify the killings and show how fearless our soldiers are in battle.  But in reality there is so much more going on.  The soldiers may not show it but they are very scared as Restrepo and Fallen angels show us.  They are scared for their friends’ lives, for innocent civilians’ lives that often get killed in the crossfire, for their own life and for their families back home if they do not return.  I think that some people use denial to make things better.  Lobel had always tried to compare their situation to the movies, and one thing that I noticed is that after going through firefights and seeing friends die Lobel didn’t make that reference anymore.  I can’t even begin to imagine what goes on in a vets mind, but just seeing/reading a little bit of what they had to go through gives me a greater appreciation of what they did for us as a country.