THE BUCK STOPS HERE
photo of Buck Sargent by Buck Sargent
Mosul, Iraq - September 2005
Once we have a war there is only one thing to do. It must be won. For defeat brings worse things than any that can ever happen in war.
-Ernest Hemingway
Due to technical difficulties at my current undisclosed location in Baghdad, I will for the time being be unable to continue to post either regularly or at length. I am no longer able to upload my own material to the available public computers, thus I am limited to updates or commentary of a necessarily brief duration.
Obviously, recent events have also rendered moot the planned September release date of Give War a Chance, which is fortunate for me considering I have not yet begun the work of editing even a single minute of the nearly 100 GB of raw footage I have acculmulated over the past year. But ultimately, a finished project will emerge. Our story simply isn't finished unfolding yet.
Our Stryker Brigade is currently in the preparation stage for the upcoming operations planned throughout the capital city. It remains to be seen exactly what form they will take, but it's likely they will be decisive one way or the other in the months to come. I will continue to write and document the journey regardless of my ability to post, even if only in the interests of historical accuracy. I would like to think that our unit's additional time spent in Iraq was worth the cost when all is said and done. With time, we'll both know the answer to that question. I only hope that it is a satisfactory one.
I'll bid thee farewell (though not yet to arms) with more from Hemingway:
If a writer goes to war for a year, he will have enough to write about for the rest of his lifetime.
How much do you figure I can milk out of a year and a half?
I'd like to thank everyone who has contributed to the support of this blog over the past twelve months and counting, the men who lived the words and deeds I've described within it, and especially all those who continue to wait patiently for their soldiers to return home to them.
We'll try not to miss Christmas. Again.
