"Freedom don't come free"

"And I will always do my duty, no matter what the price,
I've counted up the cost, I know the sacrifice,
Oh, and I don't want to die for you,
But if dying's asked of me,
I'll bear that cross with honor,
'Cause freedom don't come free.

I'm an American soldier, an American,
Beside my brothers and my sisters I will proudly take a stand,
When liberty's in jeopardy I will always do what's right,
I'm out here on the front lines, sleep in peace tonight."

-Toby Keith, "American Soldier"

Last night I chose to attend a ceremony which I hope never to attend again. It's called a "Fallen Comrade Ceremony", and it takes place on Bagram whenever a US or allied troop is killed in Afghanistan. Most of the deceased are transported by ground to Bagram then flown to the US, and therefore a Fallen Comrade Ceremony occurs here for every soldier killed anywhere in Afghanistan.

The first notice we get of the ceremony is electronic: there is generally an email sent to our Afghan email account announcing the timeline of the ceremony. Before the ceremony begins, the "giant voice" on the loudspeakers across base direct all available personnel to line up, in ACU uniform, on Disney Drive (the main drag through Bagram). Hundreds - perhaps thousands - of soldiers from a variety of countries line the several-mile route and stand silently at parade rest awaiting the commencement of the ceremony.

I was at the very end of the parade route, so I waited about 30-45 minutes for the procession to arrive in my area. There were several large police vehicles at the head of the procession, followed by two pick-up-style humvees carrying two caskets draped in American flags. Each casket had 8 pallbearer escorts at its side. We snapped to attention and rendered a deliberate salute as the caskets passed, then performed an about-face (a formal 180-degree turn) in order to return to our duty locations. It was a solemn and respectful tribute to two US servicemembers who gave their lives so that we may all experience and enjoy freedom.

It also reminded me that this is a war zone, and that people die in war zones. Almost every day, I see severely injured US and allied troops in the hospital, but I have yet to see a soldier die within our walls. (We do everything humanly possible to transport the patient back to Germany where their families are able to see them before they die.) There is certainly a considerable amount of morbidity associated with the injuries suffered by these servicemembers, but the mortality of this 21st-century war is diminutive relative to the injuries sustained; the percent of soldiers who die from their wounds is also far smaller in OIF/OEF in comparison to prior wars like Vietnam and WWII. Since essentially no US or allied soldiers die within our facility, it's easy to assume that the pall of death is absent from this war. However, the more and more frequent Fallen Comrade Ceremonies lately prove that soldiers DO die on the battlefields of Afghanistan before tertiary medical care can be rendered. The ceremonies thereby serve as a reminder to all soldiers that our line of work - no matter how safe or mundane it might seem - is quite dangerous and requires constant vigilence. Clearly, freedom is not free.