We talked for a while about where he"d served, how he"d been hit, and where he was from. I asked him, "What do you want to do when you recover?"
"I want to go back to my unit, sir."
I nodded. "I know that your guys"ll be glad to know that."
In Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape school we were taught the "Stockdale paradox," named after Admiral James Stockdale, a POW in Vietnam for seven and a half years who received the Congressional Medal of Honor for his leadership while in captivity. Stockdale taught that as a leader, you must embrace reality and be brutally honest about the harsh facts of your situation. At the same time, you must maintain hope.
The reality and the brutal fact was that this Marine was not going to be back on the battlefield with his unit any time soon. So how could he maintain hope? In Croatia, Rwanda, Bolivia, India, and a dozen other places overseas, I"d seen people rebuild their lives by renewing their sense of purpose.
I said to the Marine, "If you can"t go back to your unit right away, what would you like to do?"
He said, "I thought about that a little bit. You know, I had a rough childhood growing up. The Marines was the best thing that happened to me. Those men steered me in the right direction. I"ve thought that maybe I"d like to go home and maybe be a coach. Maybe I could go home and be some kind of coach or mentor for young kids."
In another room, I talked with a Marine who had lost both his legs. His head was shaved in the Marine Corps high and tight, and his upper body was still powerful.
I asked him, "What do you want to do when you recover?"
"Go back to my Marines, sir."
After we talked a bit longer, I asked him, "And if you can"t go back right away, what would you like to do?"
"I think that maybe I"d like to stay here at Bethesda. I want to find a way to help these other Marines to recover, let them know there"s hope for them. I was pretty down when I first learned that I lost my legs, but I"ve had a lot of wonderful people that helped me, and so I"d like to help out other guys that come in."
Later, I talked with a Marine who had been hit by a roadside bomb.
"How"s your hearing?" I asked.
"In one of my ears it"s bad. In the other it"s getting better. The doctors say they think it"ll come back. I hope it"ll all come back soon."
The Marine"s father stood leaning against the wall. When I asked him what he would like to do if he couldn"t go back to his unit, he said that he might want to become a teacher. His dad added, "We"ve been talking about him going back to college to get a teaching degree."
As I left the hospital that day, I knew that these men and women had a long stream of visitors who were coming to the hospital to tell them, "Thank you." The visitors-other service members, government officials, celebrities, friends, Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts-were all telling these men and women, "Thank you for your service. Thank you for your sacrifice." And it was clear that our men and women appreciated that. It meant a lot to them when they heard, "Thank you."
I also realized that these men and women had to hear something else. In addition to "Thank you," they also had to hear, "We still need you." They had to know that we viewed them not as problems, but as a.s.sets; that we saw them not as weak, but as strong. They had to know that we were glad they were home, that we needed their strength here at home, that we needed them to continue to serve here at home.
I knew from my experience working with Bosnian refugees and Rwandan survivors that those who found a way to serve others were able to rebuild their own sense of purpose, despite all they had lost. I knew from my time in refugee camps and my time working with children of the street that to build a new life in the face of great challenge, what mattered was not what we gave them, but what they did.
Our wounded and disabled veterans had lost a lot. Some had lost their eyesight. Some their hearing. Some had lost limbs. All of that they could recover from. If they lost their sense of purpose, however, that would be deadly. I also knew that no one was going to be able to give them hope; they were going to have to create create hope through action. hope through action.
I did some research when I left the hospital and found over one hundred organizations that served wounded warriors. There were groups that paid for the education of the children of fallen soldiers, groups that a.s.sisted wounded veterans to build adaptive housing so that they could live independently with disabilities, and groups that served as advocates for veterans.
I found plenty of organizations ready to give to veterans or to advocate for them, but no organizations that were ready to ask of of wounded veterans that they continue their service. wounded veterans that they continue their service.
I wanted to welcome returning wounded and disabled veterans not just with charity, but with a challenge.
So I donated my combat pay to begin a different kind of veterans" organization, and two friends contributed money from their disability checks. My plan with The Mission Continues was to offer fellowships for wounded and disabled veterans to serve at nonprofit, charitable, and public benefit organizations. We would provide wounded and disabled veterans with a stipend to offset cost-of-living expenses and with mentors to help them build plans for their post-fellowship life. Most importantly, we would provide them with the challenge and the opportunity to rebuild a meaningful life by serving again in communities here at home.
When I committed to work as a volunteer CEO, a good friend asked me to rethink my plans. "How are you going to make money? How are you going to support yourself?"
I thought of Jason and Caroline, who had left everything to work with the street children of Bolivia. I thought of the nuns I had seen in the home for the dest.i.tute and dying in Varanasi, India, of the aid workers who had flown to Rwanda. I thought of Earl Blair, who dedicated his life to teaching young men to box. I had learned that there came a point in their lives when they simply had to listen to their hearts and trust that if they did the right thing, all would work out in the end.
If we were going to build a culture of service, I would set the example. I knew that there were a number of fellowships that existed to support leaders of innovative organizations. If I led well, I might obtain a fellowship to support myself. It would be a challenge, but if I was going to challenge others, I had to challenge myself.
Tom and Janet Manion inspired me. They had set up the Travis Manion Foundation, its motto being the famous saying, "If not me, then who?" I thought about that for myself. I had been in some of the world"s worst situations, and I had learned from people who had turned pain into wisdom and suffering into strength. I had studied public service organizations for years, and because of my military service I understood these men and women; we had worn the same boots, carried the same rifles. If not me, then who? If not me, then who?
I also thought about the guys in the hospital at Bethesda. I thought about the challenge that they faced. They had served overseas, been wounded, and now I was going to ask them to build new lives here at home. If I was going to ask that of them, then certainly I could ask it of myself.
My most difficult moment in h.e.l.l Week had come in the tent-when I let myself focus on my own pain and fear. Then I became weaker. The same thing was happening here. When I asked, "How am I going to support myself? What if I fail? What if this is an embarra.s.sment?" then I grew weaker. When I thought about Joel, when I thought about Travis, when I thought about all of the wounded and disabled veterans fighting to rebuild their lives, then I grew stronger.
I focused on changing one life at a time.
Chris Marvin was driving home from a physical therapy session when a radio commentary by my friend Ken caught his ear. Ken was talking about the war stories his grandfather had told him as a child. When Chris pulled into his driveway, he cut off his engine, but kept the radio on: "Bullets today aren"t any friendlier than they were back then. I"ve seen what they do. And now there are IEDs and suicide truck bombs and all manner of horrors my grandfather never faced. War stories will never sound the same to me as they did when I was little. I see past the punch lines now. Yeah, I still laugh along with the double amputee who jokes about losing $300 worth of tattoos. But I know how real the pain is when he tells me his only regret is that he didn"t stop enough shrapnel with his own body to save his squad mate from getting hit."1 A tear rolled down Chris"s cheek. Three years before, Chris"s Black Hawk helicopter had crashed during operations over Afghanistan. He broke his legs, his foot, and his right arm; shattered the bones in the right side of his face; and severely damaged both knees, his hips, and both shoulders. He was barely conscious when a man ran up to the wreck.
"Is the aircraft on fire?" Chris gasped.
"No," said the man.
"Am I the worst one?" Chris asked, thinking, If I"m the worst injured, everybody else will be OK. If I"m the worst injured, everybody else will be OK.
What Ken described-a man who failed because he couldn"t save the life of his fellow soldier-was what Chris felt after the helicopter crash. Before hearing the commentary, no one had put into words that feeling of sacrifice and camaraderie forged through service.
After the radio piece finished, the host announced: "Commentator Ken Harbaugh is a former Navy pilot," and explained that he worked with a nonprofit that aimed to help wounded and disabled veterans volunteer in their communities.
Chris thought, I"m a wounded veteran. I should contact that guy. I"m a wounded veteran. I should contact that guy. Chris Marvin became our first fellow. Chris Marvin became our first fellow.
As a fellow, Chris served with other wounded warriors. He led service projects, counseled his wounded friends, and worked with us to create a model for helping wounded veterans begin to serve again here at home. Dozens of wounded veterans owe their first steps in service to Chris. Today, Chris is an MBA student at Wharton and still an active member of our team.
Even with the success of Chris"s fellowship, our work remained a struggle. I lived on an air mattress in an empty apartment, and after we"d made a commitment to fund our second fellowship, I was planning to fund it using my credit card.
A few dozen people came to our opening in St. Louis on February 28, 2008. Among them was Mathew Trotter, our second fellow.
Mathew was an eleven-year veteran of the United States Navy. In late 2004, in a shipboard accident, he tore the Achilles tendons in both his legs. In addition to the torn Achilles, small bits of bone splintered and planted themselves in the muscles along the bottom of his feet. Every time Mathew moved, bone splinters cut his tendons. He underwent reconstructive surgeries to repair the damage, but with both legs in casts during his recovery, he could not stretch, and scar tissue damaged the nerves in his legs.
When the doctors cut his casts, Mathew tried to walk, and "every step felt like I was walking on nails." Excruciating pain shot from his heels, up his legs, and into the small of his back. No longer able to do physical training, he gained 150 pounds. He fought to rejoin his men on the ship, but after his fourth surgery, the Navy handed him his transfer papers. At the bottom of the first page, in the box labeled "Reason for Discharge" it said, "Service member is unserviceable for shipboard use, therefore unable to proceed in the Navy." Mathew had served ten years in Navy aviation, and he had sometimes filled out paperwork that designated certain equipment as "unserviceable." Now he felt like he"d been stamped "unserviceable."
When he returned home to Texas, he moved into a trailer and lived off his disability pay. No one would hire him. "It was the hardest time of my life. I used to be in charge of 160 people. Now here I was, absolute bottom of the barrel. My wife left me then and I sunk even further." In late 2007 Mathew heard about The Mission Continues. When we talked with Mathew we asked him the same question we"ve asked every wounded and disabled veteran since then: we need you; how are you going to continue to serve?
Mathew told us that he wasn"t sure, but that he"d always liked working with horses, had always liked working with kids. So we contacted a Texas nonprofit called Horses Helping the Handicapped, which specializes in horse riding as a form of therapy to help children with physical and mental disabilities.
For six months, we paid for Mathew to serve as a mentor and role model for children with physical disabilities. Mathew did incredible work with children, and then on his own initiative he visited the burn unit at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. Standing in the physical therapy room in front of some of the country"s most severely wounded veterans, he talked about his experience.
"Equitherapy is physical therapy, except with a horse. Any physical therapy done on the ground can be done on a horse. When I started physical therapy, I was only able to walk a hundred yards. With equitherapy, I could ride a horse for six miles. You work your upper and lower body, strengthen your core, legs, and arms. Before therapy, I had to use a cane to walk. After therapy, I haven"t touched my cane in months."
At the end of his presentation Mathew asked the veterans, "Now, how many of you want to do some of your therapy with horses at the Equitherapy Center?"
Everyone in the room raised his hand.
"Well," Mathew said, "I"m not going to take any of you."
The veterans traded confused looks.
"I"m not going to take any of you," he paused, "unless after your therapy is done, you come back to the Triple H Ranch and volunteer to be mentors to the kids who come to the ranch for their therapy." Mathew explained that his life had changed when we challenged him to begin to serve again. Now he was going to challenge these wounded veterans to begin to serve again.
When Mathew"s six-month fellowship finished, he was hired full-time at the Triple H Equitherapy Center. He continues to serve as a role model and mentor for children with physical disabilities, and he continues to oversee a group of veterans who do therapy and then return to mentor children. Today, Mathew is going back to school part-time to become a licensed physical therapist while continuing his employment at Horses Helping the Handicapped.
When Mathew became a fellow, I named his fellowship in honor of Travis Manion and invited Janet Manion to come to our launch in St. Louis. There she met Mathew, who told her, "This fellowship changed my life. I am trying to live Travis"s values every day, so that what he stood for will live on."
He continued, "I measure my goals in "This guy"s able to walk" and "This guy"s able to move his hands." And it"s just so much more rewarding. It allows me to help other guys who are in the same situation or worse than I am. I bring the veterans in, so that once they go through the therapy, they get back out there helping the community by helping the kids in the program. We use the military guys as role models for the kids, and they inspire the kids to get better."
Later, when I spoke, I saw my mom sitting next to Janet Manion, both of them crying, and I knew that it well could have been Travis here talking and my mom showing a video. Since that day, I"ve talked hundreds of times about our work. That speech was my hardest, but as I watched my mom and Janet side by side, I knew that I had made the right decision.
From our very humble beginnings, The Mission Continues has awarded over one hundred fellowships to wounded and disabled veterans like Chris and Mathew, and in October 2008 the President of the United States stopped in St. Louis to recognize our work. In our Tribute Service Projects, men and women come together to "continue the mission" of fallen service members by serving in their communities. We believe that the greatest way to honor those who have fallen is to live their values. With our wounded veterans as examples of courage, we have built a movement of service, and we have had over twelve thousand volunteers who have performed over seventy-five thousand hours of service in communities across the country.
Viktor Frankl, a Holocaust survivor and author of Man"s Search for Meaning, Man"s Search for Meaning, wrote that human beings create meaning in three ways: through their work, through their relationships, and by how they choose to meet unavoidable suffering. Every life brings hardship and trial, and every life also offers deep possibilities for meaningful work and love. wrote that human beings create meaning in three ways: through their work, through their relationships, and by how they choose to meet unavoidable suffering. Every life brings hardship and trial, and every life also offers deep possibilities for meaningful work and love.
I"ve learned that courage and compa.s.sion are two sides of the same coin, and that every warrior, every humanitarian, every citizen is built to live with both. In fact, to win a war, to create peace, to save a life, or just to live a good life requires of us-of every one of us-that we be both good and and strong. strong.
Recently I was at Special Operations Command in Tampa, Florida, to do my reserve duty. Toward the end of a long run, another SEAL and I caught sight of a statue of a lone armed soldier looking out-eyes forward. Was he resting a moment? Midstride? Standing guard? Behind him the names of fallen warriors were engraved in a wall. We walked to the wall and searched for the names of our friends. I looked at name after name, but...
"Here they are."
I walked over. We both touched the names of our cla.s.smates, our fallen friends. We stood awhile.
"You ready?"
"Yeah. Let"s go."
We ran in quiet for a while, both of us humbled by our good fortune to have known worthy people and to have loved them. Both of us humbled by the incredible gift of continued life.
I write these lines sitting at peace in a cabin in mid-Missouri, where a single quotation hangs on the wall: "I shall pa.s.s through this world but once. Any good, therefore, that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pa.s.s this way again."2 Life is short. Life is uncertain. But we know that we have today. And we have each other. I believe that for each of us, there is a place on the frontlines.
Author"s Note and Acknowledgments This book relates my experiences on the frontlines of humanitarian service overseas, military training and war, and public leadership in the United States. It is not a full account of my service or, more importantly, the incredible service of those I have worked with. I have included here only a few critical moments from a few key endeavors; other parts of the journey-Albania, Chiapas, a White House Fellowship-I have left out completely.
In sharing this ma.n.u.script with friends, the most frequent comment I heard was some version of, How could you leave out the time we...
were almost attacked by hippos?
lost twenty pounds and looked like walking ghosts?
were compromised on that reconnaissance mission?
fed that starving girl?
To those not finding their stories here, I am sorry. They may not be on these pages, but I still carry them with me.
This book is not the story of my life. If it were, my family and others close to me would feature more prominently. I have worked with some incredible people-Mother Teresa"s Missionaries of Charity, who wake every day to work among the poorest of the poor, and members of America"s most elite commando units, who have given their lives defending their friends and our country. They are real heroes, and I hope that this account has shone some light on their incredible lives.
I hope that this book will be of use to those seeking to find their own place on the frontlines, as well as those concerned about loved ones who are serving or thinking of serving there. On a regular basis, I am asked things like, "I want to be a Navy SEAL, what should I do?"; "Who makes it through SEAL training?"; "My daughter wants to serve in an orphanage overseas; should I let her go?"; "Is there any way I can be of service here at home?"; or "What can I do to help veterans?" Most people, I have found, are trying to figure out how to live their lives well. I hope that this account of my experience-complete with low points and high points, mistakes and successes-will prove valuable to those who are finding their own way.
It"s always tough to piece together the past, but I"ve been fortunate to have a number of good friends who accompanied me on this journey and have been able to sh.o.r.e up my memory and correct the record where necessary. I"ve also been fortunate to have access to the thousands of photographs I took during my travels, and the notebooks in which I recorded my observations. In addition to letters, I also have e-mails, memos, papers, and reports to look back on. My colleague Tim Ly further helped me by conducting interviews and researching key events. Still, errors undoubtedly remain. There was a boy who died when I was working in a home for children of the street in Bolivia. His story is recounted here. I was confident enough in my memory that in my earlier book, Strength and Compa.s.sion, Strength and Compa.s.sion, I wrote that a broken leg had led to his admission to the hospital. After digging through bins in my bas.e.m.e.nt, however, I found a notebook from my time in Bolivia where I"d written that the initial injury had been a broken collarbone. It"s a minor detail, perhaps, but details matter, and I"ve tried to get them as right as possible. I take full responsibility for any errors of fact that remain. I wrote that a broken leg had led to his admission to the hospital. After digging through bins in my bas.e.m.e.nt, however, I found a notebook from my time in Bolivia where I"d written that the initial injury had been a broken collarbone. It"s a minor detail, perhaps, but details matter, and I"ve tried to get them as right as possible. I take full responsibility for any errors of fact that remain.
It might go without saying that some of the conversations included here are not verbatim. I"m thinking specifically of the scene in Chapter 4 in which my grandfather lectures me on the virtues of Chicago pizza. I remember this lecture well, and my aunt and brother both agree that the speech sounds like him. But the incident took place twenty years ago. I"ve tried my best to present conversations accurately, but for some of the casual conversations recounted here, the best I could do was capture the spirit of the dialogue.
I"ve used pseudonyms for all living Navy SEALs and Special Warfare personnel mentioned in the book, except for those who are public figures. I have used the real names of those who died in combat. There are also two names that I a.s.signed: "Karen" was a woman I worked with in Rwanda, and "Denis" was a Bosnian boy I knew in the refugee camps. Though I remember these individuals vividly, I was unable to confirm their names, and it was awkward to keep referring to them as "the blond volunteer from Texas" and "the pensive Bosnian boy."
I did not use composite characters or scenes in the book, and the sequence of events is largely chronological, except where indicated otherwise in the text.
I owe a huge debt of grat.i.tude to the many people who helped with this project. My literary agent, E. J. McCarthy, encouraged me in this endeavor and has offered counsel and friendship every step of the way. Bruce Nichols, publisher at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, believed in this project from the beginning, and his insightful editing strengthened the final product. Tim Ly did excellent research and conducted hours of quality interviews. He is a wise and hardworking friend, and his sense of humor made him a valued a.s.sistant on this project.
My best editors are people who know me well, and my thanks go out to Audrey L. Jacobs, Rob Greitens, Marc Greitens, Barb Osburg, Sheena Chestnut, Silvette Bullard, and Jimmy Soni. Melissa Dobson served as an exceptional copyeditor. At Houghton Mifflin Harcourt I had a great set of friends and allies. Thank you to Lori Glazer, Larry Cooper, Megan Wilson, and Carla Gray. Jacques Chazaud created excellent maps, and Richard Schoenberg graciously allowed me to use his exceptional photographs from BUD/S training. My thanks also to Bob Holden, who loaned me his cabin for several days of focused writing.
I served with hundreds of incredible people-too many to thank by name, for fear that I might leave someone out. Thank you. My final acknowledgments go to the children, their families and communities, and the many relief workers and volunteers who welcomed me into their lives. Many of them told their stories to someone who could do little for them. This work is too weak a gesture to serve as a thank-you, but I hope, at least, that it reflects some of their strength.
Notes.
1. IRAQ IRAQ.
1. "Hall of Valor: Travis L. Manion," Military Times, Military Times, (last accessed May 26, 2010). (last accessed May 26, 2010).
2. CHINA CHINA.
1. Nova Online, "Shackleton"s Voyage of Endurance: Meet Shackleton"s Team," www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/shackleton/1914/team.html (last accessed May 26, 2010). (last accessed May 26, 2010).
4. BOSNIA BOSNIA.
1. John Kifner, "In North Bosnia, a Rising Tide of Serbian Violence," New York Times, New York Times, March 27, 1994, March 27, 1994, www.nytimes.com/1994/03/27/world/in-north-bosnia-a-rising-tide-of-serbian-violence.html (last accessed March 30, 2010). (last accessed March 30, 2010).
2. Brett Dakin, "The Islamic Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina v. The Republika Srpska: Human Rights in a Multi-Ethnic Bosnia," Harvard Human Rights Journal Harvard Human Rights Journal 15 (Spring 2002), 15 (Spring 2002), www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/hrj/iss15/dakin.shtml (last accessed March 30, 2010). (last accessed March 30, 2010).
3. Roy Gutman, "Death Camp Lists: In Town After Town, Bosnia"s "Elite" Disappeared," Newsday, Newsday, November 8, 1992. November 8, 1992.
4. Samantha Power, A Problem from h.e.l.l: America and the Age of Genocide A Problem from h.e.l.l: America and the Age of Genocide (New York: Harper Perennial, 2003), 256. (New York: Harper Perennial, 2003), 256.