My knight in Kabul: war becomes personal (sort of)

I’ll call him “Mike” — for now. He contacted me on a social site, writing “I would love to know you better so if you don’t mind please email me.” I checked his profile: one unclear picture, a few personal details, “searching for an LTR.” That’s it. I respond to all messages, those attempts to connect that make us vulnerable. (Ok, not Foot-Lover’s request to “please send me a pair of your dirty socks.”) Even “thanks, but no thanks” is proof we exist, we matter, even in the shallow realm of social sites.

I wrote to Mike and in several 500-word messages, he described himself as “one of the squad of infantry soldiers dedicated to protecting [his] great nation.” He’s stationed in Kabul, Afghanistan, sent to “shithole countries” to destroy enemies, and “loves his job and comrades as a true American.” He’s also not into hookups and is very shy. Mike lost his partner to cancer, but is now ready to love “in and out of bed and be loved through the sun and the rain.” He seeks a permanent relationship, described what he likes sexually, confessed that I’m “the man [his] heart desires and [his] dream come true,” again pouring out his heart paragraph after paragraph. He attached photos of himself with his comrades and commanding officer, all decked in camouflage and AK-47s (or … I don’t know, just some big-ass guns). I thought Mike incredibly trusting, his ungrammatical sentences endearing, and how this lonely gay soldier, 7200 miles from home is, like all of us, trying to connect, to find love, even in the midst of war.

I responded lengthily with heart, thanking him for his service. I sentimentally thought of him as my knight in Kabul fighting for freedom, for America. We’re the good guys.

Soon after, a bomb explosion in Kabul ignited a visceral worry that expanded in my chest. There were many injuries but no casualties; I was relieved, grateful, and surprised. How could I be so worried about a stranger? I thought how these common announcements must terrify soldiers’ families. I thought of how my first world problems — my mini-blind snapped, my league bowling lane broke down, I have a hangnail — are so stupid in comparison.

Complete strangers enter our life and their effect lingers, fleeting in time but profound in memory. These moments can never happen with lovers, friends, co-workers, or relatives because we share a common history to varying degrees. We’re a clean slate to a stranger, and they to us. And we have no idea who we may touch in brief encounters, no idea of the occurrence as it unfolds, but that person remembers us.

So a lonely, gay soldier, my knight in Kabul, affected me. And then he sent me a link to download more pictures which began loading a virus, nipped by my buddy Norton. Then a friend told me of a “soldier” who asked him for money. I searched my knight in Kabul’s real name, finding an obscure picture and a link to a military blog with hundreds of enlisted women discussing dating scams and two male soldiers searching for “Mike” to expose his romantic scams. Then I read articles on men and women who’ve lost hundreds of thousands of dollars to these scammers who prey on the lonely, the kind-hearted, the generous. My knight in Kabul was a sham. I was angered, disgusted, embarrassed by my warm and fuzzy feelings about connections. What a bunch of gooey hooey!

How could I be so worried about a stranger? I thought how these common announcements must terrify soldiers’ families. I thought of how my first world problems — my mini-blind snapped, my league bowling lane broke down, I have a hangnail — are so stupid in comparison.

I have little experience with the military. The closest I’ve come occurred when I lived in New York in the late seventies through a brief fling with Richie, adorably cute with a sweet personality and killer smile that shone when he was not debilitated by incurable sadness. He was a Vietnam Vet. At night his tight, little body would curl up into a fetal position next to me like a pet dog who couldn’t get close enough to its master. Richie talked of his nightmares in a painful language I was ill-equipped to interpret. I felt helpless. All I could do was hold him. In hindsight, he suffered from PTSD. I wonder if he’s still alive.

Experts quibble about the length of the war that ruined Richie, 17.2 years, almost as long as our Revolutionary War, Civil War, and World Wars I and II combined. American shooting in Afghanistan began Oct. 7, 2001, less than a month after 9/11, and it’s on track to become our longest as President Obama announced troops will remain there until 2017, undoubtedly longer. Congress just sent him a $612 billion dollar defense budget, the exception to the caps imposed on domestic programs, with Republicans warning him to avoid vetoing it as it’s crucial for national security. But if Alexander the Great and the British Empire couldn’t conquer Afghanistan, what makes America think it can? These sobering facts don’t include the almost nine years spent in Iraq (which is not over) and the looming claw that will drag us into Syria. Again, experts quibble about the costs of the Afghan and Iraq wars, but the most common range is between 4 and 6 trillion dollars! In the eighties, the Afghan War bankrupted the USSR; look where that led: rootin’ tootin’ cowboy Putin. We learned nothing from Vietnam.

Does the Highlands Ranch soccer mom or the Wall Street broker care about any of this? As long as they can fill up their SUV with relatively cheap gas, probably not. Are Americans more concerned with posting a picture of their lunch on Facebook, than with war and death and poverty and international political disasters? What’s on your Facebook account?

Spared the ravages of war, disconnecting from its realities creates a complacent citizenry. We’re numbed by the unceasing barrage of media, information, and advertisements, this cacophony of crap distracting and assaulting us 24/7 through modern gadgetry. Airports, restaurants, bus stops, walking the dog, going to work, panting on a treadmill, everyone’s “connecting” on their mobile phone when friends, relatives, sunsets, fall colors, strangers — our world — exist in real time only inches away. This same gadgetry allowed the connection to my knight in Kabul who could be in Cardiff, Cameroon, or Castle Rock. It’s confusing.

I called him Mike. I could call him many nasty names, but I gave my phony soldier a phony name because in the unlikely event Mike is a real soldier, I don’t want to compromise his identity. Because of this brief connection with a stranger, for a moment I had the minutest of glimpses into the real worry and concern for real soldiers felt by real loved ones, maybe even a soccer mom or a stockbroker. For a moment, my worry and concern for the safety of my knight was not phony and war became personal.

Wars often are for nothing, except of course, for the trillions of dollars in the coffers of the military industry, the power plays of politicians and generals, and the illusory and temporary control and influence of peoples and countries. I guess that’s something, but of what value? I pray my country’s legitimate knights — and damsels — in Kabul and around the globe are safe and soon return to the country they so passionately serve and love. I hope their faith and potentially their lives are not given for naught. We are connected, and they matter to me.