I'm going to ask and try to answer, in some ways, kind of an uncomfortable question. Both civilians, obviously, and soldiers suffer in war; I don't think any civilian has ever missed the war that they were subjected to. I've been covering wars for almost 20 years, and one of the remarkable things for me is how many soldiers find themselves missing it. How is it someone can go through the worst experience imaginable, and come home, back to their home, and their family, their country, and miss the war? How does that work? What does it mean? We have to answer that question, because if we don't, it'll be impossible to bring soldiers back to a place in society where they belong, and I think it'll also be impossible to stop war, if we don't understand how that mechanism works.
Do te pyese dhe do te mundohem te pergjegjem ne nje fare menyre, nje lloj pyetje e papershtashme. Si civilët, padyshim, edhe ushtarët vuajnë në luftë; Unë nuk mendoj se ndonjë civil ka humbur luften te ciles i ishin nenshtruar. Kam spjeguar lufterat per gati 20 vite, dhe një nga gjërat me te spikatura për mua është fakti se sa shume ushtareve ju mungon ajo. Si është e mundur qe dikush mund të kalojë nëpër përvojen më të keqe të imagjinueshme dhe të kthehen në shtëpi, përsëri në shtëpitë e tyre, ne familjet e tyre, vendin e tyre, dhe ti mungoj lufta? Si funksionon kjo? Cka do te thote? Ne duhet ti pergjigjemi kesaj pyetje, sepse po nuk e beme, do te jete e pamundur ti kthejme ushtaret perseri ne nje vend ne shoqeri ku ata perkasin, gjithashtu mendoj se do te ishte e pamundur te ndalojme luften, nese nuk e kuptojme se si funskion ai mekanizem.
The problem is that war does not have a simple, neat truth, one simple, neat truth.
Problemi eshte se lufta nuk ka nje te vertete te thjeshte e te paster, nje te veretete te thjeshte e te paster.
Any sane person hates war, hates the idea of war, wouldn't want to have anything to do with it, doesn't want to be near it, doesn't want to know about it. That's a sane response to war. But if I asked all of you in this room, who here has paid money to go to a cinema and be entertained by a Hollywood war movie, most of you would probably raise your hands. That's what's so complicated about war. And trust me, if a room full of peace-loving people finds something compelling about war, so do 20-year-old soldiers who have been trained in it, I promise you. That's the thing that has to be understood.
Çdo person i arsyeshëm urren luftën, urren idenë e luftës, nuk do donin që të kishin te benin asgjë me të, nuk do donin të ishin pranë saj, nuk duan të dinë për të. Kjo eshte nje pergjgije e arsyshme per luften. Por nese do te pyesja te gjithe ne kete salle, kush nga ne ka paguar para per te shkuar ne kinema dhe te argetohen nga ndonje film Holivudian lufte, shumica prej jush do te ngrinin doren. Kjo eshte arsyeja pse lufta eshte kaq e komplikuar. Dhe besomeni, në qoftë se ne një dhomë plot njerez paqedashës gjejme diçka bindëse për luftën, keshtu do te benin edhe ushtaret 20 vjecar te cilet jane trajnuar ne te, dhe kete j'ua premtoj. Kjo eshte ajo c'ka duhet te kuptohet.
I've covered war for about 20 years, as I said, but my most intense experiences in combat were with American soldiers in Afghanistan. I've been in Africa, the Middle East, Afghanistan in the '90s, but it was with American soldiers in 2007, 2008, that I was confronted with very intense combat. I was in a small valley called the Korengal Valley in eastern Afghanistan. It was six miles long. There were 150 men of Battle Company in that valley, and for a while, while I was there, almost 20 percent of all the combat in all of Afghanistan was happening in those six miles. A hundred and fifty men were absorbing almost a fifth of the combat for all of NATO forces in the country, for a couple months. It was very intense. I spent most of my time at a small outpost called Restrepo. It was named after the platoon medic that had been killed about two months into the deployment. It was a few plywood B-huts clinging to a side of a ridge, and sandbags, bunkers, gun positions, and there were 20 men up there of Second Platoon, Battle Company. I spent most of my time up there. There was no running water. There was no way to bathe. The guys were up there for a month at a time. They never even got out of their clothes. They fought. The worked. They slept in the same clothes. They never took them off, and at the end of the month, they went back down to the company headquarters, and by then, their clothes were unwearable. They burned them and got a new set. There was no Internet. There was no phone. There was no communication with the outside world up there. There was no cooked food. There was nothing up there that young men typically like: no cars, no girls, no television, nothing except combat. Combat they did learn to like.
Kam mbuluar luften per gati 20 vite, sic thash, por përvojat e mia më të forta në luftime ishin me ushtarët amerikanë në Afganistan. Kam qene ne Afrike, ne Lindjen e Mesme, Afganistan ne te 90-tat, por ishin ushtaret Amerikan ne 2007, 2008, me te cilet u konfrontova ne lufte te rende. Unë kam qenë në një luginë të vogël të quajtur Lugina Korengal në Afganistanin lindor. Lugina ishte gjashtë kilometra e gjatë. Ishin 150 njerëz të Kompanise Beteja në atë luginë, dhe për një kohë, ndërsa unë kam qenë atje, pothuajse 20 perqind e te gjithe luftes ne te gjithe Afganistanin po ndodhte ne ato gjashte milje. Njeqind e pesedhjete burra po mbanin pothuajse një te pesten e luftimit për te tëra forcat e NATO-s ne te gjithe vendin, per dy muaj. Ishte shume e rende. Shumicen e kohes e kam kaluar ne nje post te vogel te quajtur Restrepo. Ishte emeruar sipas nje mjeku te toges i cili ishte vrare para dy muajve ne dislokim. Ishte disa kompensata te kapura ne nje ane te nje kreshte, these me rere, bunkeret, pozicionimi i armeve, dhe ishin 20 burra atje te Toges se Dyte, te ekuipazhit te betejes. Kalova shumicen e kohes time atje. Nuk kishte uje. Nuk kishte mundesi per te bere dush. Djemtë ishin atje për nga nje muaj. Ata kurre nuk i hiqnin rrobat e tyre te trupit. Ata luftuan. Punuan. Ata flinin me te njejtat rroba veshur. Ata kurre nuk i hoqen nga trupi, dhe ne fund te muajit, ata shkonin tek zona qendrore e ekuipazhit, dhe ne kete pike, rrobat e tyre nuk mund te visheshin me. Ata i digjnin ato dhe merrnin komplete te reja. Nuk kishte internet. Nuk kishte telefona. Nuk kishte komunikim me boten e jashtme. Nuk kishte ushqim te zier. Nuk kishte asgje atje qe djemt e ri do te pelqenin: nuk kishte makina, vajza, televzion, asgje pervec luftes. Luften, te cilen ata mesuan ta duan.
I remember one day, it was a very hot day in the spring, and we hadn't been in a fight in a couple of weeks, maybe. Usually, the outpost was attacked, and we hadn't seen any combat in a couple of weeks, and everyone was just stunned with boredom and heat. And I remember the lieutenant walking past me sort of stripped to the waist. It was incredibly hot. Stripped to the waist, walked past me muttering, "Oh God, please someone attack us today." That's how bored they were. That's war too, is a lieutenant saying, "Please make something happen because we're going crazy."
Me kujtohet nje dite, ishte nje dite shume e nxehte ne pranvere, dhe ne nuk kishim qene ne luftim per disa jave, ndoshta. Zakonisht, avanposti ishte me i sulmuari, dhe ne nuk kishim pare asnje luftim per disa jave, dhe te gjithe u shtangen me merzi dhe nxehtesi. Dhe me kujtohet togeri qe kalonte pas meje gati i zhveshur deri ne mes. Ishte shume nxehte. I zhveshur deri ne mes, ecte pas meje duke pershperitur, "O Zot, te lutem te na sulmoj dikush sot." Aq te merzitur ishin. Edhe kjo nje form lufte eshte, nje toger duke thene, "Te lutem le te ndodh dicka sepse po cmendemi."
To understand that, you have to, for a moment, think about combat not morally -- that's an important job to do — but for a moment, don't think about it morally, think about it neurologically. Let's think about what happens in your brain when you're in combat. First of all, the experience is very bizarre, it's a very bizarre one. It's not what I had expected. Usually, you're not scared. I've been very scared in combat, but most of the time when I was out there, I wasn't scared. I was very scared beforehand and incredibly scared afterwards, and that fear that comes afterwards can last years. I haven't been shot at in six years, and I was woken up very abruptly this morning by a nightmare that I was being strafed by aircraft, six years later. I've never even been strafed by aircraft, and I was having nightmares about it. Time slows down. You get this weird tunnel vision. You notice some details very, very, very accurately and other things drop out. It's almost a slightly altered state of mind. What's happening in your brain is you're getting an enormous amount of adrenaline pumped through your system. Young men will go to great lengths to have that experience. It's wired into us. It's hormonally supported. The mortality rate for young men in society is six times what it is for young women from violence and from accidents, just the stupid stuff that young men do: jumping off of things they shouldn't jump off of, lighting things on fire they shouldn't light on fire, I mean, you know what I'm talking about. They die at six times the rate that young women do. Statistically, you are safer as a teenage boy, you would be safer in the fire department or the police department in most American cities than just walking around the streets of your hometown looking for something to do, statistically.
Per te kuptuar ate, ju duhet qe per nje moment, te mendoni per luften jo moralisht-- kjo eshte shume e rendesishme -- por per nje moment, mos mendoni per te moralisht, mendoni per te neurologjikisht. Te mendojme se cka ndodh ne trurin tuaj kur jeni ne lufte. Se pari, pervoja eshte shume e tmershme, eshte me e tmershmja. Nuk eshte absolutish c'ka kisha pritur une. Zakonisht, nuk friksohem. Kam qene shume i frikesuar ne lufte, por shumicen e kohes kur isha atje, nuk kisha frike. Kam qene shume i frikesuar me pare dhe tmersisht i frikesuar me pas, dhe ajo frike qe vjen me pas mund te zgjas me vite. Nuk kam me ka kapur asnje plumb ne gjashte vite, dhe me zgjoi ne menyre te menjehershme kete mengjes nje makth qe po me qellonin nga nje avion gjashte vite me vone. Kur nuk me kane qelluar nga nje avion, dhe kisha makth nga kjo gje. Koha ngadalsohet. Dhe te krijohet ky vizion i pa zakonte tuneli. Je ne gjendje te veresh disa detaje shume, shume, shume me saktesi dhe disa gjera te tjera thjesh nuk i sheh. Eshte pak a shume ndryshim i mendjes. Cka eshte duke ndodhur ne trurin tend eshte se je duke marre nje sasi te madhe te adrenalines qe pompohet nga sitemi jot. Te rinjte do te shkojne shume larg per te pasur ate pervoje. Eshte e rrenjezuar tek ne. Eshte e ndihmuar hormonalisht. Shkalla e vdekshmerise per djemt e rinj ne shoqeri eshte gjashte here me shume se per femrat e reja nga dhuna dhe nga aksidentet, budallalleqet qe djemt e rinj bejne: duke u hedhur nga vende nga ku nuk duhet hedhur, te ndezurit e gjerave te cilat nuk duhet ti ndezin, e dini se per cka e kam fjalen. Ata vdesin gjashte here me shume se sa vajzat e reja. Statistikisht, si nje adoleshent duhet te jesh i sigurt, duhet te jesh me i sigurt ne departamentin e zjarrfikesve ose ne departamentin e policise ne shumicen e qytetve Amerikane thjesht duke ecur neper rruget e qytetit tuaj duke kerkuar te beni dicka, statistikisht.
You can imagine how that plays out in combat. At Restrepo, every guy up there was almost killed, including me, including my good friend Tim Hetherington, who was later killed in Libya. There were guys walking around with bullet holes in their uniforms, rounds that had cut through the fabric and didn't touch their bodies.
Provoni te imagjinoni se si eshte kjo pamje ne luftime. Ne Restrepo,pothuajse c'do djale atje gjeti vdekjen, duke me perfshire edhe mua, duke perfshire edhe shokun tim te mire Tim Hetherington, i cili me vone u vra ne Libi. Kishte djem te cilet ecnin me brima plumbash ne uniformat e tyre, rrathe qe kishin prere copen por nuk kishin prekur trupin e tyre.
I was leaning against some sandbags one morning, not much going on, sort of spacing out, and some sand was kicked into the side of, sort of hit the side of my face. Something hit the side of my face, and I didn't know what it was. You have to understand about bullets that they go a lot faster than sound, so if someone shoots at you from a few hundred meters, the bullet goes by you, or hits you obviously, half a second or so before the sound catches up to it. So I had some sand sprayed in the side of my face. Half a second later, I heard dut-dut-dut-dut-duh. It was machine gun fire. It was the first round, the first burst of an hour-long firefight. What had happened was the bullet hit, a bullet hit three or four inches from the side of my head. Imagine, just think about it, because I certainly did, think about the angle of deviation that saved my life. At 400 meters, it missed me by three inches. Just think about the math on that. Every guy up there had some experience like that, at least once, if not many times.
Isha shtrire ne disa thase rere nje mengjes, nuk kisha cfare te beja, thjesht po hutohesha kur ca rere mu perplas me vrull dhe goditi nje pjese te fytyres time. Dicka goditi nje pjese te fytyres time, dhe une nuk e dija se cfare ishte. Ajo qe duhet te dini per plumbat eshte se ato levizin me shpejt sesa zeri, pra nese dikush ju qellon prej disa qindra metrash, plumbi ju kalon prane, ose ju qellon, perafersisht gjysme sekondi perpara zhurmes. Pra, ca rere ishte sperkatur ne nje pjese te fytyres. Pas gjysme sekondi, degjova dut-dut-dut-duh. Ishte nje arme zjarri. Ishte raundi i pare, shperthimi i pare i nje ore te gjate luftimesh. Ajo qe kishte ndodhur ishte se plumbi qelloi, plumbi qelloi tri ose kater centimetra larg kokes sime. Imagjinoni, vetem mendoni per nje caste, sepse une sigurisht mendova, mendoni per kendin e devijimit qe shpetoi jeten time. Nga 400 metra distance, deshtoi per vetem tre centimetra. Vetem mendoni per matemetiken aty. Secili prej djemve ne ushtri ka pervoja te tilla, se paku nje here, nese jo shume here.
The boys are up there for a year. They got back. Some of them got out of the Army and had tremendous psychological problems when they got home. Some of them stayed in the Army and were more or less okay, psychologically. I was particularly close to a guy named Brendan O'Byrne. I'm still very good friends with him. He came back to the States. He got out of the Army. I had a dinner party one night. I invited him, and he started talking with a woman, one of my friends, and she knew how bad it had been out there, and she said, "Brendan, is there anything at all that you miss about being out in Afghanistan, about the war?" And he thought about it quite a long time, and finally he said, "Ma'am, I miss almost all of it." And he's one of the most traumatized people I've seen from that war. "Ma'am, I miss almost all of it."
Djemte kane nje vit qe jane atje. Ata u kthyen. Disa nga ata u kthyen nga Ushtria dhe paten problme te medha psikologjike kur erdhen ne shtepi. Disa nga ata qendruan ne ushtri dhe ishin pak a shume ne rregull psikologjikisht. Unë kam qenë veçanërisht i afërt me një djalë i quajtur Brendan O'Byrne. Akoma jemi miq shume te mire. Ai u kthye perseri ne SHBA. U largua nga ushtria. Kisha nje darke feste nje nate. E ftova Brendan, dhe ai filloj te fliste me nje grua, nje nga shoqet e mia, ajo e dinte sa keq ka qene atje, dhe ajo e pyeti, " Brendan, a ka ndonje gje qe te mungon nga Afganistani, nga lufta?" Dhe ai u mendua per nje kohe te gjate, dhe me ne fund tha, " Zonje, me mungon pothuajse gjithcka." Dhe ai eshte njeri prej njerezve me te traumatizuar nga lufta qe kam pare ndonjehere. "Zonje, me mungon pothuajse gjithcka."
What is he talking about? He's not a psychopath. He doesn't miss killing people. He's not crazy. He doesn't miss getting shot at and seeing his friends get killed. What is it that he misses? We have to answer that. If we're going to stop war, we have to answer that question.
Cka po flet ai? Ai nuk eshte nje psikopat Atij si mungon vrasja e njerezve. Ai nuk eshte i cmendur. Atij nuk i mungon te qellohet dhe te shoh shoket e tij te vriten. Por cka i mungon atij? Ne duhet ti pergjigjemi. Nese ne duhet te ndalojme luften, ne duhet ti pergjigjemi kesaj pyetje.
I think what he missed is brotherhood. He missed, in some ways, the opposite of killing. What he missed was connection to the other men he was with. Now, brotherhood is different from friendship. Friendship happens in society, obviously. The more you like someone, the more you'd be willing to do for them. Brotherhood has nothing to do with how you feel about the other person. It's a mutual agreement in a group that you will put the welfare of the group, you will put the safety of everyone in the group above your own. In effect, you're saying, "I love these other people more than I love myself."
Mendoj se atij i mungonte vllazeria. Atij i mungonte , ne shume menyra, e kunderta e vrasjes. Cka atij i mungonte ishte lidhshmeria me djem te tjere qe ishin atje. Tani, vllazeria eshte ndryshe nga miqesia. Miqesia ndodh ne shoqeri, padyshim. Sa me shume qe pelqeni dike, aq me shume ke deshire te beni gjera per ta. Vllazeria nuk ka te beje me menyren se si ndihesh per persona te tjere. Eshte nje marreveshje e perbashket ne grup qe ju do te vendosni mireqenien e grupit, ju do te vendosni sigurine e te gjitheve ne grup para te tuajes. Ne fakt, ju jeni duke thene, "Une i dua keta njerez me shume sesa e dua veten time."
Brendan was a team leader in command of three men, and the worst day in Afghanistan — He was almost killed so many times. It didn't bother him. The worst thing that happened to him in Afghanistan was one of his men was hit in the head with a bullet in the helmet, knocked him over. They thought he was dead. It was in the middle of a huge firefight. No one could deal with it, and a minute later, Kyle Steiner sat back up from the dead, as it were, because he'd come back to consciousness. The bullet had just knocked him out. It glanced off the helmet. He remembers people saying, as he was sort of half-conscious, he remembers people saying, "Steiner's been hit in the head. Steiner's dead." And he was thinking, "I'm not dead." And he sat up. And Brendan realized after that that he could not protect his men, and that was the only time he cried in Afghanistan, was realizing that. That's brotherhood.
Brendan ishte nje lider grupi kishte nen komand tri djem, dhe dita me e keqe ne Afganistan-- Ai gati sa nuk u vra shume here. Por kjo nuk e shqetesonte. Gjeja me e keqe qe i ka ndodhur ne Afganistan ishte se nje nga djemt e tij ishte qelluar me plumb ne koke ne helmet, duke e rrezuar pertoke. Ata menduan se ai kishte vdekur. Ishte ne mes te nje shkembim zjarri te madh. Askush nuk mund t'ja dilte, dhe nje minute me vone, Kajl Stajner u mbesht i ulur dhe nga i vdekur, si ishte, iu kthye vetdija. Plumbi vetem sa ja kishte humbur vetdijen. Ai leshoi helmeten. Atij i kujtohen njerezit qe thonin, sepe ai ishte pothuajse gjysem koshient, ai kujton njerezit duke thene, "Stajner eshte qelluar ne koke, Stajner ka vdekur." Dhe ai po mendonte. "Une nuk kam vdekur." Dhe ai u zgjua. Dhe Brendan kuptoi me pas se ai nuk mund ti mbronte djemte e tij, dhe ky ishte momenti i vetem ku ai ka qare ne Afganistan, pikerisht te kuptuarit e kesaj gjeje. Kjo eshte vllazeri.
This wasn't invented recently. Many of you have probably read "The Iliad." Achilles surely would have risked his life or given his life to save his friend Patroclus. In World War II, there were many stories of soldiers who were wounded, were brought to a rear base hospital, who went AWOL, crawled out of windows, slipped out doors, went AWOL, wounded, to make their way back to the front lines to rejoin their brothers out there. So you think about Brendan, you think about all these soldiers having an experience like that, a bond like that, in a small group, where they loved 20 other people in some ways more than they loved themselves, you think about how good that would feel, imagine it, and they are blessed with that experience for a year, and then they come home, and they are just back in society like the rest of us are, not knowing who they can count on, not knowing who loves them, who they can love, not knowing exactly what anyone they know would do for them if it came down to it. That is terrifying. Compared to that, war, psychologically, in some ways, is easy, compared to that kind of alienation. That's why they miss it, and that's what we have to understand and in some ways fix in our society.
Kjo nuk eshte shpikur se fundmi. Shume prej jush ndoshta e ka lexuar 'Iliaden" Akili sigurisht qe do te rrezikonte jeten e tij ose te jepte jeten e tij per te shpetuar shokun e tij Patroclus. Ne Luften e Dyte Bpterore, kishte shume histori te ushtareve te cilet ishin plagosur, u sollen ne nje baze te spitalit, te cilet shkuan ne AWOL, u zvarriten neper dritare, reshkiten nga dera, u plagosen, per te dal ne vijen e frontit per ti ribashkuar vellezrit e tyre atje. Pra mendoni per Brendan, mendoni per te gjithe keta ushtare qe kane nje pervoje te tille, nje lidhje te tille, ne grupe te vogla, ku ata donin 20 njerez te tjere me shume mundesi me shume sesa donin vetveten e tyre, mendoni se sa mire do te ndihej c'do kush, imagjinojeni, dhe ata jane te bekuar me nje pervoje te ketille per nje vit, dhe pastaj ata kthehen ne shtepi, dhe i bashkohen shoqerise sikur te gjithe ne, duke mos ditur se te kush mund te kene besim te plote, duke mos ditur se kush i do, ke mund ta duan, duke mos e ditur saktesisht se dikush qe ata njohin do te bente gjithcka per ta. Kjo eshte tmerruese. Krahasuar me te, lufta, psikologjikisht, ne disa menyra, ishte e lehte, krahasuar me kete lloj tjetersimi. Kjo eshte arsyeja pse atyre u mungon lufta, dhe kjo eshte ajo cka duhet te kuptojme dhe ne nje fare menyre ta rregullojme ne shoqerine tone
Thank you very much.
Faleminderit shume.
(Applause)
(Duartroktije)