Private First Class Tim Low - Medic, 101st Airborne, Age 20

                             It wasn't “combat, combat..” it was more like,

Am I allowed to defend myself?

No.

Well then.

BOOM!

Two months ago, Tim Low, an infantry medic in the U.S. Army 101^st Airborne, made the same sacrifice that nearly 7,000 others have made since September, 2001: He was injured on active duty. CBS News reported June, 2010, as the deadliest month of the invasion on Afghanistan that began in October, 2001. Sixty U.S. Troops were killed and 517 injured in 30 days.

While supporting the Afghan National Police (ANP) on a joint, NATO-led (IASF) mission in Lar Sholtan Village, Kunar, Tim said he saw an Afghan woman walking down the mountain road into the village.

“I knew,” he said. Tim looked right into my eyes and I knew there had never been doubt.

Grasping his index finger to count the reasons; he said he'd never seen a woman in Afghanistan walking alone and holding his middle finger, he said he'd never see a woman wearing brightly-colored clothing. She was wearing orange. Rumor was she was middle-school aged. Her name was Bibi Alimi, the Taliban told reporters and claimed she was one of theirs.

“Yeah, I saw her on the bridge told (Spc. Andrew) Looney, “That bitch is going to blow the fuck up.” I asked to shoot her. He said, “no PID (positive-identification), no shot.”

Rules of engagement, Tim explained. “And, unfortunately, I was right.”

When the female suicide bomber detonated her IED, the blast killed two from the 2nd Battalion, 327th Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne.

Spc. Andrew R Looney, 22, was killed. 

Pfc. David R Miller, 19, was the other. Media reports vary, some said there were more than 12; others said up to 18 others injured. Three Afghan National Policemen were reported dead. Tim remembers seeing three dead children

“It broke my knee and both of my feet, and I was bleeding like crazy from my head,” Tim said about the explosion. He estimates he was 25-30 meters from the female suicide bomber when her IED exploded. He was flown to Asadabad Airforce Base, to Bagram Airforce Base, then out of Afghanistan to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany (the largest American hospital outside the United States) before he arrived at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland on June 25. Bethesda has facilities for treating Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).

*****

What I remember most about meeting Tim that afternoon on the surgery ward at Bethesda Naval Hospital, was how eagerly he shared his story with me. And he was smiling. What the heck did this guy have to smile about I remember thinking.

His father, Mike, had introduced himself to me in the hallway, and Tim wheeled himself out of his room to join us. Tim's legs and feet were obviously injured. He'd definitely already had surgery, and there was a giant metal contraption attached to his right foot. It wasn't until he looked down at the floor once when smiling that I noticed the scar on his head.

“Shrapnel,” he told me.

“IED, right?” I asked cautiously.

“Female suicide bomber,” he said, looking right in my eyes.

I remember pausing to let that sink in. Did he say what I think he said? I had only heard about that stuff in the news, and there I was looking into the happy eyes of a young man I guessed to be about 19. I fumbled around in my bag for my pen.

“How did you know?” I continued, “You didn't see her before it happened....someone must have told you?”

“Oh, I'll tell you the whole story,” he said.

This young veteran was different. His spiritual glass seemed half full. When I asked about the surgery to remove shrapnel from his brain, he shrugged and told me they were still doing tests. He smiled and said he figured since he was there talking to us and understanding what was going on around him he was doing pretty good.

Pretty good for a kid with a large, obvious, unmistakeable scar above his right ear. Pretty good for a strong, handsome, young man now confined to a wheelchair. Pretty good for kid who made it home from this war at the peak of combat and violence. Pretty good for a kid who took a piece of shrapnel to the right cheek—it formed a scar of the cutest dimple.

Another soldier walked past using two canes, maybe learning how to walk for the second time in his two decades on the planet. One more soldier passed with a giant open wound on his left leg—like nothing I'd ever seen. We don't read about those soldiers. The Department of Defense has a system of announcing casualties, but doesn't announce servicemen and women who are injured in combat or supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.

In an instant message conversation just the other night, I could feel Tim's direct and pointed frustration. He stated the facts in a direct manner, without using too many words.

“There are 7000 guys like me, some worse off, some not. No one talks about that. That toll of the war. It’s just death toll. Makes it look less deadly. Less suffering, because dead aren't human vegetables with a wife and a baby who have to take care of them now.”

Today Tim's at Fort Campbell's Warrior Transition Unit. On September 23^rd he'll have exactly two years of service left. He'll go to med school—maybe even back home in Kansas City.

Thanks, Tim, for your service. I know you'll be walking the next time I see you.