Captain Johansen Quotes in If I Die in a Combat Zone
We stood straight up, in a row, as if it were a contest. I confronted the profile of a human being through my sight. It did not occur to me that a man would die when I pulled the trigger of that rifle.
I neither hated the man nor wanted him dead, but I did fear him.
I was not at My Lai when the massacre occurred. I was in the paddies and sleeping in the clay, with Johansen and Arizona and Alpha Company, a year and more later. But if a man can squirm in the meadow, he can shoot children. Neither are examples of courage.
Courage is nothing to laugh at, not if it is proper courage and exercised by men who know what they do is proper. Proper courage is wise courage. It's acting wisely, acting wisely when fear would have a man act otherwise. It is the endurance of the soul in spite of fear—wisely.
Captain Johansen helped to mitigate and melt the silliness [of the war], showing the grace and poise a man can have under the worst of circumstances, a wrong war.
Captain Johansen Quotes in If I Die in a Combat Zone
We stood straight up, in a row, as if it were a contest. I confronted the profile of a human being through my sight. It did not occur to me that a man would die when I pulled the trigger of that rifle.
I neither hated the man nor wanted him dead, but I did fear him.
I was not at My Lai when the massacre occurred. I was in the paddies and sleeping in the clay, with Johansen and Arizona and Alpha Company, a year and more later. But if a man can squirm in the meadow, he can shoot children. Neither are examples of courage.
Courage is nothing to laugh at, not if it is proper courage and exercised by men who know what they do is proper. Proper courage is wise courage. It's acting wisely, acting wisely when fear would have a man act otherwise. It is the endurance of the soul in spite of fear—wisely.
Captain Johansen helped to mitigate and melt the silliness [of the war], showing the grace and poise a man can have under the worst of circumstances, a wrong war.
