Tuesday, November 02, 2004
A Soldier Speaks: Denver Jones
The 35-year-old Army reservist suffered a spine-shattering injury that left him permanently disabled. But he reserves his compassion for those who need it most: Iraqi children.
... Disaster struck when a Humvee accident ruptured three disks and fractured two of the vertebrae in his spine. As he described it to Now with Bill Moyers, "My head came up, hit the ceiling, jammed my neck down, I came down and hit on my tail in the seat, and it broke some seat brackets out from under the seat, and I pretty much was, you know, pretty hurt after that."
...It's hard for Denver to perform the simplest tasks: walk, sit, sleep. As he puts it, "I feel like a 90-year-old man trapped in a 35-year-old body."
...One of the things I think about a lot and can't get out of my head is the living conditions of the majority of the children in Iraq. Some of them have no home whatsoever. Some of them had mud huts, but there was no windows, no roof, or no doors. If it would rain and they would get some water, they would let their camels and sheep drink out of it before they did. And when the water dried, they would scrape the salt up and put it in bags.
I've spoken to several people over here – about how many children are starving over there – and they come back and say, "Well, there's people starving over here too." [laughs] They have no idea of the size of the problem I'm trying to describe. ...
My hopes are that the world can communicate as people – not governments communicating for us. If we communicated as people, there wouldn't be disputes and problems and war.
The governments of countries go and speak as though they represent the people of the country. But they don't represent what the people are actually saying. I've spoken to Iraqi soldiers who at one point wanted to kill me. And once we talked, there was no reason for fighting. Their leader tells them one thing while our leader tells us another. And we go on that.
More stories in this series: http://alternet.org/asoldierspeaks/
The 35-year-old Army reservist suffered a spine-shattering injury that left him permanently disabled. But he reserves his compassion for those who need it most: Iraqi children.
... Disaster struck when a Humvee accident ruptured three disks and fractured two of the vertebrae in his spine. As he described it to Now with Bill Moyers, "My head came up, hit the ceiling, jammed my neck down, I came down and hit on my tail in the seat, and it broke some seat brackets out from under the seat, and I pretty much was, you know, pretty hurt after that."
...It's hard for Denver to perform the simplest tasks: walk, sit, sleep. As he puts it, "I feel like a 90-year-old man trapped in a 35-year-old body."
...One of the things I think about a lot and can't get out of my head is the living conditions of the majority of the children in Iraq. Some of them have no home whatsoever. Some of them had mud huts, but there was no windows, no roof, or no doors. If it would rain and they would get some water, they would let their camels and sheep drink out of it before they did. And when the water dried, they would scrape the salt up and put it in bags.
I've spoken to several people over here – about how many children are starving over there – and they come back and say, "Well, there's people starving over here too." [laughs] They have no idea of the size of the problem I'm trying to describe. ...
My hopes are that the world can communicate as people – not governments communicating for us. If we communicated as people, there wouldn't be disputes and problems and war.
The governments of countries go and speak as though they represent the people of the country. But they don't represent what the people are actually saying. I've spoken to Iraqi soldiers who at one point wanted to kill me. And once we talked, there was no reason for fighting. Their leader tells them one thing while our leader tells us another. And we go on that.
More stories in this series: http://alternet.org/asoldierspeaks/
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