Where Men Win Glory Part 5

PART TWO

War is always about betrayal, betrayal of the young by the old, of idealists by cynics and of troops by politicians.- CHRIS H HEDGES, "A C CULTURE OF A ATROCITY"

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

Tillman and the Cardinals played their final game of the NFL season in Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C., against the Redskins, on January 6, 2002-the makeup for what was supposed to have been their first game of the season, which had been canceled in the aftermath of 9/11. At halftime Arizona led 176, and by the end of the game Pat had recorded a team-leading eighteen tackles, but his brilliant performance was for naught: Arizona lost, 2017, leaving them with a disappointing 79 record. n.o.body suspected that it was the last football game Pat would ever play.

Throughout the autumn of 2001 many NFL players expressed outrage over the attacks on New York and Was.h.i.+ngton, declared their support for the war in Afghanistan, and made a lot of noise about wanting to kill bin Laden with their bare hands. But none of them took any meaningful action. They continued playing football and leading comfortable lives, with no discernible sacrifice. This didn't sit well with Pat. Given the enormity of what happened on 9/11, he felt he should do more than issue empty p.r.o.nouncements.

Near the end of the football season Kevin Tillman had come to Phoenix for one of Pat's home games, and afterward, Marie recalls, "Pat started talking to Kevin about joining the Army. They were hanging out in the backyard after the game. All the talk at that point was strictly hypothetical. But that night Pat came in to bed and just mentioned out of nowhere, 'What if I joined the Army?' He said it in a sort of nonserious way, but there was a part of me that knew he was serious. I understood him well enough to know why he would feel he needed to do something like that. It wasn't really a surprise."

In the weeks that followed, says Marie, Pat continued to "just run the idea through his head. Then, as he got more and more serious about enlisting, Pat and I started having conversations about it. But it was a long process."

Jeff Hechtle's parents had a friend who'd enlisted in the Marines and joined one of the Force Recon units, a Special Operations detachment roughly a.n.a.logous to the Army's Green Berets. In February 2002, Pat and Marie drove up to Provo, Utah, where the ex-Marine lived, to ask him what being in the military was really like. Over the next couple of days Pat and the ex-Marine went climbing on frozen waterfalls that hung from the walls of Provo Canyon like ghostly blue curtains, and on the belay ledges they did a lot of talking. "Pat was trying to figure things out," Marie says: "'Should I go in as an enlisted man? Or should I go in as an officer?' I wasn't really part of those conversations. But we of course talked about it all the way home in the car. He needed to work through everything in his head.

"It wasn't like 9/11 happened and Pat immediately said, 'I'm joining the Army.' He did a lot of research first. He weighed all the pros and cons. What was it going to be like for him? What was it going to be like for me? He considered things from every possible angle. He didn't even bring Kevin into it until he'd already made his decision. First he wanted to figure it out on his own, to be sure it was the right thing."

Pat and Marie continued to discuss the matter intently. "I was definitely concerned," she explains. "How could I not be? But mostly I was concerned for his safety. He was always trying to rea.s.sure me that nothing was going to happen to him. 'Statistically, I'm more likely to die in a car wreck,' he would say."

Exactly five years after the September 11 attacks, staring out a window at throngs of New Yorkers scurrying through lower Manhattan, Marie muses, "I never explicitly asked him, 'Why are you doing this?' Because I understood Pat well enough to already know.... If it was the right thing for people to go off and fight a war, he believed he should be part of it.

"He saw his life in a much bigger way than simply, 'I am a professional football player, and if I walk away from this, my life is over.' Football was part of who he was, but it wasn't the be-all/end-all. He was looking in other directions even prior to 9/11. I always knew he would stop playing football before they had to kick him off the field. It was just a matter of time.... I mean, Pat could have played for years, retired, then golfed for the rest of his life. But I knew he was never going to do that."

After carefully weighing all the factors, Pat sat down at his computer and typed a doc.u.ment t.i.tled "Decision," dated April 8, 2002: Many decisions are made in our lifetime, most relatively insignificant while others life altering. Tonight's topic...the latter. It must be said that my mind, for the most part, is made up. More to the point, I know what decision I must make. It seems that more often than not we know the right decision long before it's actually made. Somewhere inside, we hear a voice voice, and intuitively know the answer to any problem or situation we encounter. Our voice leads us in the direction of the person we wish to become, but it is up to us whether or not to follow. More times than not we are pointed in a predictable, straightforward, and seemingly positive direction. However, occasionally we are directed down a different path entirely. Not necessarily a bad path, but a more difficult one. In my case, a path that many will disagree with, and more significantly, one that may cause a great deal of inconvenience to those I love.My life at this point is relatively easy. It is my belief that I could continue to play football for the next seven or eight years and create a very comfortable lifestyle for not only Marie and myself, but be afforded the luxury of helping out family and friends should a need ever arise. The coaches and players I work with treat me well and the environment has become familiar and pleasing. My job is challenging, enjoyable, and strokes my vanity enough to fool me into thinking it's important. This all aside from the fact that I only work six months a year, the rest of the time is mine. For more reasons than I care to list, my job is remarkable.On a personal note, Marie and I are getting married a month from today. We have friends and family we care a great deal about and the time and means to see them regularly. In the last couple of months we've been skiing in Tahoe, ice climbing in Utah, perusing through Santa Fe, visiting in California, and will be sipping Mai Tais in Bora Bora in a little over a month. We are both able to pursue any interests that strike our fancy and down the road, any vocation or calling. We even have two cats that make our house feel like a home. In short, we have a great life with nothing to look forward to but more of the same.However, it is not enough. For much of my life I've tried to follow a path I believed important. Sports embodied many of the qualities I deem meaningful: courage, toughness, strength, etc., while at the same time, the attention I received reinforced its seeming importance. In the pursuit of athletics I have picked up a college degree, learned invaluable lessons, met incredible people, and made my journey much more valuable than any destination. However, these last few years, and especially after recent events, I've come to appreciate just how shallow and insignificant my role is. I'm no longer satisfied with the path I've been following...it's no longer important.I'm not sure where this new direction will take my life though I am positive it will include its share of sacrifice and difficulty, most of which falling squarely on Marie's shoulders. Despite this, however, I am equally positive that this new direction will, in the end, make our lives fuller, richer, and more meaningful. My voice is calling me in a different direction. It is up to me whether or not to listen.

"Pat decided that going into the military was what he needed to do," Marie explains. "After he made his decision, he called Kevin and said, 'This is what I'm doing.' He never said, 'Come with me'-but he didn't have to.... I remember talking to Pat about it and saying, 'It's not fair to Kevin in some ways. Because you know he's going to come with you.'"

On his own, Kevin had actually been toying with the idea of joining some branch of the Special Operations Forces for years, since well before 9/11, although nothing had ever come of it. Upon graduating from college in June 2001 with a bachelor's degree in philosophy, Kevin signed a contract to play professional baseball for the Cleveland Indians, and in early 2002 was employed as an infielder on one of the Indians' minor-league teams. While playing baseball in college, however, he'd suffered a nagging rotator cuff injury from which he'd never fully recovered, and increasingly he'd been entertaining thoughts of leaving baseball and going down a different road. When Pat told Kevin that he was thinking about enlisting in the military, Kevin decided to enlist along with him, as Marie had predicted.

"When they were growing up in New Almaden," Marie explains, "Pat and Kevin were always together. There was never any compet.i.tion or resentment. Even though they were so close in age, Kevin wasn't bothered by all the attention Pat got. Kevin and Richard were each very talented in their own right, and their parents were careful never to single out Pat, but there's no getting around the fact that Pat was the one who was usually in the limelight-which for a lot of people would be tough to take. But not for Kevin and Richard. All three brothers just loved each other to death."

Pat and Marie announced to their families and friends that they would be getting married in San Jose on May 4, 2002. Kevin was then living in North Carolina, playing second base for the Burlington Indians, and he asked his team manager for time off to attend the wedding. When the manager refused, citing club policy, Kevin asked to be released from his contract, the Indians granted his request, and he showed up at Pat and Marie's home in Chandler in mid-April, free from professional obligations.

By now both Pat and Kevin were certain they were going to join the military, but they decided not to break the news to anyone until after the wedding, so as not to distract from the festivities. They were leaning toward joining one of the branches of the Special Operations Forces. Shortly after arriving in Arizona, Kevin visited an Army recruiting office in a strip mall off Chandler Boulevard, a few miles east of Pat and Marie's home, to gather some basic information. Soon after this initial visit, Kevin, Pat, and Marie visited the same recruiting office together.

"Kevin and I pretended that we were a married couple," Marie says, "and we sat down at a table across from this recruiter to ask him detailed questions. Pat just kind of stayed in the background with his hat pulled down over his eyes, because he didn't want anyone to know who he was." One of the things Pat and Kevin had been undecided about was whether to become officers or go in as enlisted men-ordinary grunts. This meeting with the recruiter convinced them to forgo the officer track. They didn't want to remain back at headquarters sending other soldiers into harm's way. If they were going to join the military, they wanted to be part of an elite combat force-to be in the thick of the action, share the risk and hards.h.i.+p, and have a direct impact.

The recruiter explained to them that the minimum commitment for Rangers was three years. "Before going in there," says Marie, "they thought they were going to have to join for four years. When we heard they could be Rangers and only have to be in for three years, I was like, 'Okay! That's much much better than four years.' So I was pretty happy about that. I was also happy that we could have some control over where we lived. If they had gone into the regular Army, they could have stationed us who knows where. With the Rangers, there were three possible places we could have been stationed: Fort Lewis, near Seattle; or one of two bases in Georgia-Fort Benning and Fort Stewart. At that time you could actually pick where you wanted to be." better than four years.' So I was pretty happy about that. I was also happy that we could have some control over where we lived. If they had gone into the regular Army, they could have stationed us who knows where. With the Rangers, there were three possible places we could have been stationed: Fort Lewis, near Seattle; or one of two bases in Georgia-Fort Benning and Fort Stewart. At that time you could actually pick where you wanted to be."

When they left the recruiting office after about an hour, Marie remembers, "I was thinking, 'We can live near Seattle! We'll be done in three years instead of four!' Also, we learned that Rangers deploy overseas for relatively short periods; they're usually gone for only three months at a time, compared to troops in the regular Army, who would go overseas for twelve months at a time. And by becoming Rangers, they would be with elite soldiers who knew what they were doing, so I a.s.sumed that would make things safer for Pat and Kevin. I came out of there feeling that it didn't sound that bad, all things considered-if I could put out of my mind the fact that they would be in combat situations."

Pat, Marie, and Kevin traveled to San Jose at the beginning of May for the wedding and then returned briefly to Arizona before Pat and Marie departed for their honeymoon in Bora-Bora on May 10. In the interim, Pat and Kevin returned to the Army recruiting office, where they signed contracts committing them to three years of military service, beginning in July. Because he'd been such a big football star for both the Sun Devils and the Cardinals, Pat was a celebrity throughout Arizona, and he and Kevin were recognized while they were signing doc.u.ments, prompting fears that their enlistment would be leaked to the news media. Although they had intended to tell their family of their plans in person after Pat returned from Bora-Bora, Pat and Kevin decided they should notify them right away over the phone instead, lest Richard or their parents learn of their impending enlistment from the evening news.

When the Tillman brothers made these calls on May 8 and 9, the announcement was not well received by their loved ones. Knowing Pat and Kevin as well as they did, n.o.body doubted that once they were in the Army, they would insist on being sent to the front lines. This prospect was especially upsetting to Dannie and Richard.

While Pat and Marie were honeymooning in the South Pacific, Uncle Mike Spalding-Dannie's brother-flew out to Arizona and tried to convince Kevin that joining the Army was a terrible idea and they should call the whole thing off, but to no avail. Marie's parents called Pat's agent, Frank Bauer, and asked him to talk Pat out of it as well, but Bauer had no more success than Uncle Mike did. So Pat and Kevin's parents, in conjunction with Marie's parents, decided to attempt an intervention.

It took place at the Tillmans' cottage in New Almaden, soon after the newlyweds returned from Bora-Bora. In attendance were Pat, Kevin, and the Tillman parents; Marie and her parents; Marie's sister, Christine Garwood; and her husband, Alex Garwood. "It wasn't a real intervention," says Marie, "because Pat and Kevin knew what was coming. But Pat believed that everybody had a right to tell him what they thought, and to try and talk him out of it. By that point, though, there was no talking him out of it. It was a done deal. So the intervention turned into a disaster. It was very upsetting."

"I think Pat opened the discussion," recalls Christine. "He was like, 'Okay! Tell me whatever you want to tell me! Throw it out there, and I'll respond as best I can. Bring it on!' It started out with orderly give-and-take, but Dannie was very emotional. Her big concern was that they could be hurt or killed. Pat kept insisting, 'That's not gonna happen.' And that's exactly how we all felt-that it wasn't even a possibility. But Dannie wasn't convinced."

Pretty soon it became clear that no argument or entreaty would be sufficient to convince Pat and Kevin to abandon their plans. So in desperation the pet.i.tioners directed their pleas to Marie. "They thought that it was my job to stop it," she says. "I felt like a lot of people were pointing fingers at me, saying, 'You're the only one who can do anything; why don't you put your foot down and tell Pat not to go?' But I didn't feel like I needed to answer to anyone, not even our families. It was between Pat and me. I understood why he was doing it, and I supported him. Our conversations about how this decision came about were really n.o.body's business. So I was a little upset by that. By all of it.

"Pat cared a lot about the people around him," Marie continues. "He didn't hurt people on purpose. It killed him that it hurt his mom or hurt me. That was very, very difficult for him to handle. But he had to do what he thought was right."

Marie and Christine's father, Paul Ugenti, tried to sway Pat with an economic rationale. "Obviously, my dad loved Marie and he loved Pat," says Christine. "And knowing the way Pat's mind worked, he tried to appeal to his logic. He pointed out that Pat would be leaving football at the peak of his career, and the peak of his market value as a player, and might not be able to return to the NFL." Pat countered that he would be away from football for only three years, and would probably have no trouble playing again. Mr. Ugenti then responded by reiterating how much money Pat was giving up-that joining the Army would potentially cost him and Marie many millions of dollars in the long run.

The emphasis on the financial downside pushed Pat's mother over the edge. "Why are you talking about money?!" money?!" she exclaimed. "This isn't about money! Pat and Kevin could get killed!" She began to sob, imploring her two eldest sons, "Life hands out plenty of trouble without even asking. Why do you want to go out looking for it?" She reminded them that the current commander in chief of the nation's Armed Forces was not a man who inspired trust or confidence. Then, as her emotions got the better of her, she asked everyone to leave. she exclaimed. "This isn't about money! Pat and Kevin could get killed!" She began to sob, imploring her two eldest sons, "Life hands out plenty of trouble without even asking. Why do you want to go out looking for it?" She reminded them that the current commander in chief of the nation's Armed Forces was not a man who inspired trust or confidence. Then, as her emotions got the better of her, she asked everyone to leave.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

In April, the Cardinals had offered Pat a three- year contract that would pay him $3.6 million to keep playing football for Arizona. Upon returning to Chandler after the intervention in May, Pat informed the Cardinals' head coach, Dave McGinnis,* that he was declining the offer in order to join the Army. McGinnis was taken aback, but he said he understood Pat's reasons for enlisting. When he tried to discuss strategies for announcing Pat's decision, and asked how Pat was going to handle the overwhelming interest from the news media that would inevitably follow, Pat simply replied, "I'm not." He explained that his decision to enlist spoke for itself, and he would be doing no media interviews of any kind. And from that day forward he did none. that he was declining the offer in order to join the Army. McGinnis was taken aback, but he said he understood Pat's reasons for enlisting. When he tried to discuss strategies for announcing Pat's decision, and asked how Pat was going to handle the overwhelming interest from the news media that would inevitably follow, Pat simply replied, "I'm not." He explained that his decision to enlist spoke for itself, and he would be doing no media interviews of any kind. And from that day forward he did none.

In early June 2002, Pat and Kevin appeared at the Military Entrance Processing Station in downtown Phoenix, across the street from the arena where the Phoenix Suns, the professional basketball team, play their home games. The Department of Defense operates sixty- five such offices across the nation; each MEPS screens new recruits for all four branches of the miliary-Army Navy, Air Force, and Marines-to determine if they are qualified. The daylong process includes an apt.i.tude test, medical exam, and background check, and concludes with the recruits swearing an oath of enlistment.

The first indication that it might prove difficult for Pat to adapt to the Army's hidebound ways occurred when Pat, Kevin, and several other recruits lined up before an especially abrasive master sergeant who began shouting contradictory orders at them before they'd signed any doc.u.ments committing them to enlist. Pat felt compelled to point out to the master sergeant, "Hey, you're confusing everybody. Besides, you're treating us like a.s.sholes, and we haven't even signed up to be treated like a.s.sholes yet."

As soon as the sergeant recovered from his shock that a recruit would dare to address him in this fas.h.i.+on, he jumped down Pat's throat. Unintimidated, Pat yelled right back at him, and the two men came close to exchanging blows before some other recruits interceded. Despite this inauspicious episode, at the end of the day Pat and Kevin signed away their freedom, recited the oath of enlistment, and received orders to appear at Fort Benning, Georgia, on July 8, 2002. For three years thereafter, their lives would be under the nearly absolute control of the U.S. Army. Pat was twenty-five years old, and Kevin was twenty-four. Each would be starting at a base salary of $1,290 per month.

As Pat and Kevin departed Phoenix on the appointed day, Pat pulled a journal bound in brown leather from his backpack and began doc.u.menting his impressions of the long stint stretching ahead of him. The first entry, dated July 8, begins, "It will be interesting to see how this little adventure pans out. At the moment I care little about the 'moral stance' that got this fiasco started.... As I taxi down the runway on my way to Georgia, all I can think about is how nice it was to sit with Marie, sipping hot chocolate and watching Gosford Park Gosford Park last night. Or how comfy my big bed is with Marie's naked body pressed against me. I hope Marie is happy at home.... I hope Ma's OK.... I hope Pooh's OK.... I hope Kevin doesn't get hurt.... I know what I'm doing is right, but at times it is very difficult to see it that way." last night. Or how comfy my big bed is with Marie's naked body pressed against me. I hope Marie is happy at home.... I hope Ma's OK.... I hope Pooh's OK.... I hope Kevin doesn't get hurt.... I know what I'm doing is right, but at times it is very difficult to see it that way."

After landing in Atlanta, the Tillmans boarded a bus for the two-hour ride to the Thirtieth Adjutant General Reception Station at Fort Benning, known as Thirtieth AG, where they arrived shortly after midnight on July 9. They would spend the next nine days "in-processing" here, bunking in a fifty-foot-by-fifty-foot concrete "bay" with 110 other new recruits in a nightmarish state of purgatory before moving on to the bona fide h.e.l.l of basic training.

Both Pat and Kevin were astonished, and appalled, by the immaturity of many of the eighteen- and nineteen-year-olds among whom they found themselves at Thirtieth AG. These were not the kinds of men they'd envisioned themselves fighting alongside and entrusting their lives to. To be sure, not all of their fellow recruits were suspect. Some were intelligent and motivated, and would go on to become excellent noncommissioned officers of the sort who have formed the crucial backbone of the world's armies since Alexander the Great battled the forebears of today's Afghan insurgents in 330 B.C B.C. But a disturbing number of the recruits in their bay struck the Tillman brothers as indolent whiners and losers who had enlisted not out of any sense of duty, or even adventure, but rather because their parents had booted them out of the nest and they lacked the qualifications to land a minimum-wage job.

Twenty-four hours after the Tillmans arrived at Thirtieth AG, a fresh recruit named Tulio Tourinho showed up in the middle of the night and immediately crawled into his bunk. He was a Brazilian national whose family came to the United States when he was five years old in order for his father to get a doctorate degree, and then five years later returned to Brazil, where Tulio dreamed of one day making a life for himself in the States. He eventually achieved this goal by winning a scholars.h.i.+p to attend his final year of high school in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, after which he remained in the United States on a student visa and obtained a bachelor's degree from More-head State University in eastern Kentucky.

On September 11, 2001, Tulio was happily employed as a high-school teacher in Winchester, Kentucky. The attacks on New York and Was.h.i.+ngton affected him so profoundly, however, that at the end of that academic year he enlisted in the Army, even though he wasn't a U.S. citizen. His American-born wife, pregnant with their first child, "wasn't very pleased," Tulio admits, "but she supported me."

When he arrived at Thirtieth AG after midnight, he says, "I was dead tired. I'd just received a whole bunch of shots that were making me completely ill. I was trying to overcome this roller-coaster ride of emotions that was tearing my insides out. And all around me were these immature kids who were talking and yelling and making silly, obnoxious noises throughout the night." He felt as if he were at a sleepover with a hundred fourteen-year-old boys who had attention deficit disorder. After he tried in vain to get some rest, the racket finally became so intolerable that Tulio yelled at the top of his lungs, in a voice well practiced in the art of disciplining unruly students, "Shut the f.u.c.k up! I am thirty years old, I quit my job to serve my country, left a wife pregnant with our first child at home, whom I love and miss dearly, and I will be G.o.dd.a.m.ned if I'm gonna let some f.u.c.king immature juvenile punks prevent me from getting a good night's sleep! Now, shut the f.u.c.k up right now or I'm going to beat you back to your f.u.c.king mommies!

"All of a sudden the entire bay got quiet," Tulio remembers. And it stayed that way for the remainder of the night, which made an impression on another older recruit who had been trying to sleep nearby. In the morning this guy approached Tulio, introduced himself as Pat Tillman, and thanked him for bringing order to the bay.

"We were wondering when somebody was going to speak up," Pat said to the Brazilian, "because these kids are just relentless. They don't let anybody rest."

A conversation between the two men followed, during which, Tulio recalls, "Pat told me briefly what was going on and what I needed to do to get into the game. He offered to help me out. Immediately I noticed his appearance. He was quite a large-size man. But it was his vocabulary I noticed most, and his demeanor, and his poise." It was the start of an enduring friends.h.i.+p among Tulio, Pat, and Kevin.

"I had no idea who Pat was at the time," Tulio says. "Neither he nor Kevin ever mentioned that he was a professional football player. I found out later from the chatter that he was famous. We ended up going through all of basic training together, and I depended on Pat and Kevin for intelligent conversation. I guess they did the same with me. We counted on each other for support. We had college degrees, which set us apart from almost all the other recruits in our cycle. And Pat and I were both married. We just hit it off."

Six days after the Tillmans arrived at Thirtieth AG, some high-ranking officers showed up at their bay for an inspection, and Pat wrote that encountering them was "awkward. Getting used to the idea of saluting to officers constantly...is odd. Of course I understand and appreciate the point of showing respect to superiors but the caste separation between officers and enlisted men is foreign." This, alas, was only the first of many aspects of military culture that struck Pat as archaic, bizarre, and counterproductive.

On July 17, Pat happily noted in his journal: We are leaving this place tomorrow and going down to start bootcamp.... It's about time.... I've written a few letters to Marie.... I miss her more and more and hope she is well. One thing that I found horrible in college was that I got used to her not being around. I never again want to get used to that. It's much better to be sad than calloused. I look forward to the time when both of us have the lifestyle we used to enjoy.... Not only will these next 3 years make me a stronger person, mentally and physically, I know it will also free up my conscience to enjoy what I have. My hope is that I will feel satisfied with my accomplishment...enough to relax for a while and just be. Be, with Marie.

Three days later Pat wrote, "Well, we are now in Basic and I'm starting to get more comfortable. Yesterday was a complete disaster." Things started to go badly when he forgot to lock his locker, prompting one of the drill sergeants to hurl its contents across the floor. And "to add insult," Pat mused, "if that wasn't enough, I was written up for it. I f.u.c.ked up my cadence calls, lost s.h.i.+t, got yelled and screamed at.... I was a mess. Oh well, just keep working and we'll see what happens.... Our drill sergeants are tough but quality people and I believe they will teach us a lot. Still missing my love."

A day after this-thirteen days after arriving at Fort Benning-Pat wrote: As always, Marie is on my mind. I have been unable to speak with her... since we've been here, and I miss the sound of her voice.... Often it bothers me that I am not by her side. Sometimes I feel like I've left her all by her lonesome to fend against the world. I suppose there is a reason for my feeling that way: My actions could be interpreted as such. I just hope to h.e.l.l she doesn't feel that way. I love her to death and know that eventually this will be good for us both. Hopefully, she will one day see it that way. In the meantime I struggle with the guilt of what I've done. Naturally I'm a confident person and know all will be well and in a few years we'll be right back in the driver's seat kicking life's a.s.s. But I'm also aware that there is the possibility I'm wrong. If Marie's, Ma's, Kevin's and Pooh's, and Dad's life was somehow hurt on account of me, I couldn't forgive myself.

I console myself in the knowledge that I did this with n.o.ble intention. Sometimes one must purposefully convince himself that he is right as doubt creeps in. Fortunately the doubt is a small voice and I can control it.

My wife and family mean the world to me, as do my friends; I cannot allow this to bring pain to them.

Pat's entry for July 25 begins: Yesterday was a combination of bittersweet for me. The bitter taste came from the fact that Nub & I did awful in our land navigation.... The sweet of the day was the fact we went on two long marches with our stuff on. It was nice to move on out of here for a while and meander about. It will probably take me a while to get used to lugging around a sack all day but I only have to look around me to stop feeling sorry for myself....

One thing I find myself despising is the sight of all these guns in the hands of children. Of course we all understand the necessity of defense.... It doesn't dismiss the fact that a young man I would not trust with my canteen is walking about armed....

My moods at this point, with the exception of the constant loneliness & guilt a.s.sociated with my separation from Marie, vary depending on how I'm doing at my tasks. Blow the land navigation, feel bad for a few hours; do something to help someone or get my marching calls correctly, feel good for a few hours....

On the whole, in spite of any worries or fluctuating moods, Nub and I are standing fast and moving right along. How important it has been to have Nub around has been covered but must be reiterated.

When Pat left home for the Army, he carried with him a laminated photograph of Marie taken on their wedding day. Unabashedly sentimental, he wrote that this "picture of Marie, outside of my ring, is my most prized possession. It's amazing how beautiful she is in her wedding dress.... What a fantastic day that was." Gazing at the little photo in the barracks, he contemplated his marriage and other major milestones. "It is amazing the turns one's life can take," he reflected, then listed a few: Spending time in jail for a.s.saulting Darin Rosas, he wrote, "was huge, drastically changing my mindset and priorities. That experience aged me about ten years and I credit it for my success with academics and football in college."

On the next page of his journal he pondered what impact his enlistment would have on his life. Having completed just 3 weeks of his military commitment, with 153 weeks remaining, he wrote: Everything about my life has completely s.h.i.+fted. Everything. I planned on having kids, continuing my football, and enjoying life as always. Now I'm sitting in a f.u.c.king barracks with 53 kids. This path needs to hurry itself up and brighten.... I do my best to control it, but sometimes I get so incredibly frustrated around here my f.u.c.king jaw muscles want to collapse my teeth on themselves. Today Marie's letters came and I needed so badly to be with her, hold her, make love to her.... I can see her writing. Picture her next to the cats, searching for the words to put on paper. I flatter myself and imagine a tear rolling down her cheek, her giant eyes glowing and full of feeling.... How the h.e.l.l I have been able to keep her after all these years is a G.o.dd.a.m.n miracle. Why does she put up with it? Who does this? Who takes a perfectly perfect life and ruins it? A perfectly happy wife and marriage and jeopardizes it? AHHH! If I do not strangle someone while I'm here I was touched by an angel.

A day later, on July 29, he was able to speak with Marie on the phone for the first time in more than two weeks. "It wasn't for long," he wrote, "but how nice it was.... I was a mess. Just like in the clink: fine when I'm there but give me a person I love and I can hardly pull the lump out of my throat. She had to talk the whole d.a.m.n time while I got a hold of myself.... Her voice was so soothing, I'll be able to survive off that for weeks to come."

For the next two months of basic training, Pat struggled to keep his emotions on an even keel. His celebrity didn't make things any easier for him. Although he'd declined all of the numerous requests for media interviews and tried to keep a low profile, his fame followed him to boot camp. Even without Pat's cooperation, the Bush administration turned his enlistment into a marketing bonanza for the so-called Global War on Terror. On June 25, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld sent a memo to Secretary of the Army (and former Enron executive) Tom White, with a newspaper article about Tillman attached; the memo said, "Here is an article on a fellow who is apparently joining the Rangers. He sounds like he is world-cla.s.s. We might want to keep an eye on him."* On June 28, Rumsfeld wrote a personal note directly to Pat declaring, "It is a proud and patriotic thing you are doing." A month later, Pat received a flattering letter from Major General John Vines, the commander of the Army's Eighty-second Airborne Division, urging Kevin and him to forgo their plans to become Rangers and join the Eighty-second Airborne instead. The Army, the Department of Defense, and the White House were paying close attention to everything Pat did. On June 28, Rumsfeld wrote a personal note directly to Pat declaring, "It is a proud and patriotic thing you are doing." A month later, Pat received a flattering letter from Major General John Vines, the commander of the Army's Eighty-second Airborne Division, urging Kevin and him to forgo their plans to become Rangers and join the Eighty-second Airborne instead. The Army, the Department of Defense, and the White House were paying close attention to everything Pat did.

"It definitely made things more difficult for him," recalls Tulio Tourinho: The drill sergeants bent over backwards not to show favoritism toward him. Through it all, Pat just tried to be the best soldier he could. Whenever he was told to do something, he executed it. When there was a job to be done, he always did more than his share.... If there is one thing certain about stress, and about despair, it's that it will inevitably show who you really are. And the amazing thing about Pat is that the despair and stress never revealed anything ugly about him. That astounded me, because when things got hard and the kids were being utterly disrespectful, I would become an ugly individual at times. I would lose it and tell them they were being spoiled brats. But Pat was restrained. He had fort.i.tude.

Pat's enlistment made waves throughout the Army, from four-star generals at the Pentagon to buck privates at boot camp. "Officers and other soldiers didn't really know how to react or what to do with him," says Marie.

They weren't quite sure who he was-they were like, "Why is he here? He's not so great just because he played professional football." Pat antic.i.p.ated that reaction to a certain extent. But it was definitely hard for him. I think it was maybe a little easier for Kevin because he wasn't so much under the magnifying gla.s.s. Pat felt more pressure. He was being looked at more closely. And he was feeling responsible for how everything might affect all the rest of us. His parents are worried. Richard is worried. He's worried about me. He's wondering, "Did I ruin Marie's life and Kevin's life by doing this?" With his family, he always a.s.sumed that type of responsibility, for as long as I've known him.

Pat had been introspective since childhood, but the Army seemed to make him even more so. "What kind of man will I become?" he wondered in his journal on August 7. "Will people see me as an honest man, hard working man, family man, a good man? Can I become the man I envision? Is vision and follow-through enough? How important is talent & blind luck?...There are no true answers, just shades of grey, coincidence, and circ.u.mstance."

* McGinnis had succeeded Vince Tobin as head coach after Tobin was fired in the middle of the 2000 NFL season. McGinnis had succeeded Vince Tobin as head coach after Tobin was fired in the middle of the 2000 NFL season.* According to Rumsfeld's senior military a.s.sistant at the time, Lieutenant General Bantz Craddock, this was the only time he could remember Rumsfeld ever writing a personal note commending the enlistment of an individual soldier. According to Rumsfeld's senior military a.s.sistant at the time, Lieutenant General Bantz Craddock, this was the only time he could remember Rumsfeld ever writing a personal note commending the enlistment of an individual soldier.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

During the first week of September, Pat, Kevin, and their fellow recruits were taught how to shoot several types of machine gun. "Of course this is fun," Pat noted on September 5, "but I do not get too fired up about guns no matter what they are." The first weapon they shot was the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon, commonly referred to as the SAW, which Pat would later be a.s.signed to carry in Iraq and Afghanistan. Just before it was Kevin's turn to fire it, a recruit opened the weapon's feed tray while a round was still in the chamber, inadvertently released the bolt, and the cartridge exploded. The blast peppered his face, neck, and chest with bra.s.s shrapnel, and burned him badly. He could easily have been killed. Chastened by the accident, Pat observed, "You forget, or don't think about, just how incredibly dangerous these weapons are until something like this takes place."

A day later the platoon went into the field for an overnight bivouac, during which they engaged in simulated combat with laser-tag gear. After Pat was selected to be one of the team leaders for these exercises, his team of five was ambushed by two snipers as he led them down a hill. During the mock firefight, he wrote, "We were coordinated and the communication was clear," enabling his team to repel the attackers and survive the faux ambush. During a second exercise, however, communication between members of his team broke down, they acted as panicked individuals rather than as a unified team, and in the resulting chaos all the men under his command were "killed" by the snipers. Sobered, Pat remarked that it was a "great learning experience."

The worst part of the day, however, had nothing to do with the simulated ma.s.sacre during the ambush. That evening after returning to the barracks, he confessed to his diary, "Sometimes I'm overwhelmed with an injection of intense sorrow that is difficult to control. An intense need to be close to Marie, surrounded by her touch, smell, sound, beauty, and ease. It's as though one week of pain is condensed into 57 minutes....

What have I done?"

A day later Pat revisited his roiling feelings: Just when I think my emotions have flat-lined they rear their ugly head. Yesterday, from out of nowhere, I got so f.u.c.king mad/upset/sad that I was having trouble maintaining my cool. It only lasted a short while but it was strong and surprised me. All I wanted was to squeeze Marie, tell her how much I care, give her back all that I've taken.... In a way it is refres.h.i.+ng in that this place has yet to callous or numb me. Somehow I enjoyed letting myself long for my wife and the life I left behind. It makes me feel feel and and appreciate appreciate and and love love. It makes me feel very alive, and aware of my struggle. I do not intend to get dramatic, but life is about feeling and emotion.... Love, laughter, and joy, as well as pain, longing and sorrow, are all part of the ride. Without the latter you cannot truly appreciate the former, cannot come to understand just how much you truly care.... I'm experiencing and growing, and with this comes some suffering, but it's part of the deal. I feel I'm headed in the right direction....Pa.s.sion is what makes life interesting, what ignites our soul, drives our curiosity, fuels our love and carries our friends.h.i.+ps, stimulates our intellect, and pushes our limits.... A pa.s.sion for life is contagious and uplifting. Pa.s.sion cuts both ways.... Those that make you feel on top of the world are equally able to turn it upside down.... In my life I want to create pa.s.sion in my own life and with those I care for. I want to feel, experience, and live every emotion. I will suffer through the bad for the heights of the good.

On September 11, Pat wrote a letter to Marie that began, "Who would have guessed that a year ago today would do such a number on our life in Eden.... Well, you take life as it comes. This separation craziness will end soon enough, and when it does we will once again be back in our Eden." As agonizing as it was for him to be apart from Marie, it reminded him how intensely he loved her, and how much she enriched his life.

"These last few weeks," he continued, have given me such an appreciation for everything we have in our life that were I to get hurt tomorrow and all my plans were dashed, it would all have been worth it.... These next few weeks and most of the next three years we will be pushed and tried as a couple just as hard as Nub & I will be individually. When we come out of this intact, spirits unbroken, we'll be stronger, closer, and happier than we could ever have been otherwise. Anything else will seem trivial to what we've weathered.I'm already pleased at the strides we've made despite our distance. Even after all that's taken place and the miles between us, I still feel as close, if not closer, than we've ever been. The tighter we get, the more incredible a person I see, and the more proud I am to know I'll be sharing the rest of my life with you. Of course I do not expect these feelings to be reciprocated, especially not while I've left you all alone; for now it's enough that I feel it.A year ago completely changed our life. It taught me what truly matters.... It clarified the direction I need to head and it reinforced that you're the best thing that has happened, or ever will happen, to me.... I love you.

On Friday, September 20, Pat and Kevin completed basic training. When they learned that the Tillman brothers would be getting a thirty-hour pa.s.s to mark their graduation, Marie and Jeff Hechtle, Pat's high-school amigo, booked a flight to Georgia in order to spend the brief holiday with them. "In the days leading up to it everybody was walking on eggsh.e.l.ls," Tulio remembers. "The Army hung the idea of the midcycle pa.s.s over our heads like a guillotine. If you do anything wrong, so much as breathe incorrectly or stand with an improper posture, they threaten to take it away from you."

At 1:00 p.m. on Sat.u.r.day, when the pa.s.s was due to commence, Pat, Kevin, and Tulio gathered with the rest of the recruits in the main a.s.sembly area for inspection, attired in their new Cla.s.s-A dress uniforms and spit-s.h.i.+ned boots. Because they would be required to report back at the base at 7:00 p.m. on Sunday, they were desperate not to waste a single minute of freedom. "We had a plan of action how to get out of there as quickly as possible," says Tulio. "As soon as we were dismissed, Kevin ran upstairs to grab our stuff, and I ran to a phone booth to call a cab for the three of us." Kevin, Pat, and Marie had booked rooms at a Days Inn near the gate to the base, and Tulio had reserved a room to meet his wife at a motel right across the street.

When the cab pulled up to the Days Inn, Marie was standing in front of the motel waiting for them. "As soon as the cab stops," Tulio remembers, "Pat leaps out the door. Marie runs up and jumps on him, knocking him off balance, and they both fall to the ground. They just lay there, kissing each other and staring at each other-him caressing her face, caressing her hair, telling her how much he missed her, how much he loves her. They stayed there on the ground like that for what seemed like ten minutes, although I'm sure it couldn't have been that long. It was an amazing moment. A demonstration of absolute love. It affected me very strongly."

Shortly after returning to his barracks after the visit was over, Pat wrote, What a glorious weekend.... What an absolutely glorious weekend. All the build-up and expectation, all the yearning and planning, for a mere 30 hours. For just one night of freedom...Seeing Marie and spending time with the woman I love was incredible. We said things we longed to say for months, held one another the way we've longed to for months, and enjoyed the company we've been missing for so long.... The hours the four of us spent were not in a whirlwind of action, drinking, or traveling. We simply drank loads of coffee, ate numerous coffeehouse treats, had a marvelous dinner, and talked for hours on end. Three hours at one coffee shop, three at another, three in the hotel or car-all we did was yak & yak & yak. Every subject was fair game: home, Arizona, Pooh, friends, future, business, our present situations, etc., etc., etc. We just ran for hours without a break, or a dip in its quality....The fact that Hechtle took the time and expense to come out...Acts like that are never forgotten and sure to be reciprocated. He is an amazing friend and my whole family is fortunate to have him in our life. What a gesture....

Jeff Hechtle's willingness to fly all the way across the country just to spend a few hours with him was especially meaningful to Pat because he felt like some of his most valuable friends.h.i.+ps had suffered since his enlistment, and he confided in his journal at length about this sense of abandonment. In one entry he wrote, "Because of the lengths I've gone to, and the importance on which I place my relations.h.i.+ps, I'm somewhat put off by the lack of letters from my friends at home.... No question I am overly sensitive, but...It's funny, these last 67 years I've noticed some of my close friends putting governors on our relations.h.i.+p. In most cases it is I who calls, I who sets up dinner, I who makes the effort. Why this is the case is not exactly clear.... I care about my friends openly and unselfishly and-though realizing I sound like a woman-am bothered by their apparent lack of interest."

"I think most of his friends didn't necessarily understand how difficult the Army was for him and Kevin," Marie says. "While they were going through all this c.r.a.p at boot camp, it seemed to Pat that everyone else was just going about their lives, and had kind of forgotten about them. That's why when Hechtle flew out to Georgia, Pat appreciated it so much."

Pat, of course, appreciated Marie's visit even more. She was his crucial source of emotional comfort-a calm, steady force that anch.o.r.ed his life and brought him tremendous joy. "It was so nice to see Marie," Pat wrote, "so incredibly nice.... Simply put, the visit allowed me to express to Marie those things that have been burning in my gut. I'm sure she still hates me for everything, but at least she will know how her hate holds nothing to my own self-loathing. This comes across as down, but I a.s.sure you the visit was nothing but positive. Around here one is allowed a little self-loathing."

By 7:00 on Sunday evening Pat and Kevin had said their good-byes to Marie and Hechtle, and were back in their barracks. When Pat sat down to write in his journal twenty-four hours later, he was still soaring from the visit. "It's funny how quickly things can be put into perspective," he reflected. "A few hours with Marie & Hechtle, coffee & m.u.f.fins, and of course Nub has reminded me just how petty all the annoyances and frustrations that I experience are. As we sat around discussing our tribulations we, and our visitors, could not help but laugh at ourselves for ever letting any of this place under our skin. Once again (and we'll see for how long) I feel centered and focused on what's important."

As it happened, it didn't take long for Pat's reveries to be brought to a screeching halt by the routine insults of Army life. Although he and Kevin had completed basic training, they remained in Georgia to begin five weeks of what the Army calls advanced individual training, or AIT, which is scarcely distinguishable from basic. On September 24, just two days after Marie's departure, Pat wrote, "My mind is everywhere but here: Marie, home, future, past, Pooh, Ma, friends, etc.-but not Fort Benning; left, right, left, right; or 'Front lean & rest position! Move!' Especially now that we will spend the next two and a half weeks rehas.h.i.+ng old stuff, my interest will fall further. We are bored to tears and fed up with this place. We need to move on."

Later that week, with even less cheer, he wrote, "You know what we did today? We f.u.c.king sat in our platoon area all day. For four hours we cleaned weapons, for another three or so we sat with our rucksacks taking inventory and collecting our linens. It may have been the most unproductive day of my life. This place is f.u.c.king tired.... For whatever reason, I'm hesitant to write too negatively about how I feel or what I'm going through. I feel obligated to take the high road in my journal. I feel that I should express my consummate belief that ultimately people are good and all will be well, yet this is not how I always feel."

Referring to his barracks as "this house of gnats," Pat vented, Often I am so disgusted with the people I'm surrounded with that my heart fills with hate. I've been exposed to an element of people that can be worse than any I've encountered, including in Juvenile Hall. They're resentful, ungrateful, lazy, weak, and unvirtuous, as often as not. They bicker, complain, lie, tell tall tales, mope, and grumble incessantly....Perhaps I keep this out of my journal because I'm disappointed in myself. When Nub and I embarked on this journey I just kind of a.s.sumed these kids would fall in line.... Many times I struggle to maintain my cool through their chaos. Kevin and I are forced to yell and swear as opposed to recommend and suggest.... Perhaps I'm not as good a leader as I think.Ultimately I believe in a general goodwill, and I've not become bitter, however I've not maintained as high a road as I'd hoped. I suppose when you wrestle with pigs, you're going to get dirty.... I continue to learn.

As Marie elucidates, "The thing about Pat that was so great was that he was an idealist who believed in the good in humanity. He always wanted to see the good in people. Unfortunately, that's not the case all the time, and it was upsetting for him when he was confronted with that. He treated people in a certain manner and expected to be treated in kind, but in the Army it didn't always work that way. He was twenty-five, and a much more mature twenty-five than other twenty-five-year-olds. Most of the other guys were eighteen-year-old kids who were immature for eighteen. He had a hard time with that."

On September 29, looking forward to the next phase of their training-airborne school, due to begin at the end of October, which would put them in the company of more elite soldiers, and would teach them how to parachute out of airplanes-Pat wrote, "All I can think of is getting the h.e.l.l out of here. Away from mediocrity, inept.i.tude, whining, and boredom. My hope is that Airborne will expose us to a more motivated group of people and give Nub and me the freedom to be ourselves."

The next day their company practiced "ground fighting"- a variety of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, recently adopted by the Army, that emphasizes submission techniques such as joint locks and choke holds. Near the end of the session, recruits were allowed to challenge anyone to fight in front of the entire 110-man company. A swaggering young recruit who had been a high-school wrestling champion stood up, glowered at Pat, and announced, "I want Tillman!"

Kevin, according to Pat's journal, was "disgusted with the fact they even allowed us to fight these yahoos," and jumped to his feet to accept the guy's challenge so Pat wouldn't have to. Whereupon "this joke of a kid" had the temerity to insult Kevin by saying, "'Not you, your older brother.' Kevin simply embarra.s.sed the kid. He stared him down, called him out, tossed his a.s.s around, choked him out repeatedly.*...After the first choke the guy realized he had made a mistake and was completely intimidated-he could not even look at Kevin." Kevin fought three matches with the recruit in quick succession, effortlessly defeating him on each occasion in front of the drill sergeants and all the other recruits. "This young man was trying to make a name for himself and use us as a vehicle for it," Pat noted. "I'm very proud and honored at the way Kevin jumped to defend what he believed was an insult. He carried himself like a man and spoke with action not words."

They completed the final trial of boot camp on October 17, a seven-day ordeal known as the field training exercise, or FTX. "Ahh," Pat wrote, "to be back from our week of rain, muck, & marching.... Were it not for the drizzle I doubt very much the experience would have been a difficult one. However, that curveball was no joke. Normal tasks...become a b.i.t.c.h and marches that are otherwise simple turn rough.... We slept outside in the cold with nothing but our clothes and a poncho. All I could do to keep warm was spoon with old Nub." A thirty-two-mile march carrying heavy rucksacks, Pat confessed in his journal, "broke our a.s.ses off. Feet still f.u.c.king killing me...Despite what I expected from this basic training, Nub and I were pushed a little. No kidding, it was not an easy deal.... Tougher than expected at the end, a worthy task. Solid way to finish up...These kids have reason to be proud. They weathered the storm.... I'll give it to this place, it was a good finale, now get me the f.u.c.k out."

On October 21, the Fort Benning Public Affairs Office leaned on Pat and Kevin to do a media interview. Although they met with the officer sent to talk them into it, Pat wrote, he and Kevin simply repeated "what we've said from the beginning: 'We're not talking.' Anyhow, the meeting was uneventful, but our free time afterwards was priceless." For an hour and a half following the meeting the Tillman brothers sat around chatting with each other, drinking coffee, and listening to National Public Radio, which led off that afternoon with a report about President Bush's efforts to inveigle the UN Security Council to authorize the use of force in Iraq. When a drill sergeant came around to escort them back to the barracks and found his famous recruits "a.s.sed out" listening to liberal commentary on NPR, he laughed at them but let it slide.

A "Turning Blue" ceremony-wherein the recruits would receive light blue cords to wear on their Cla.s.s-A dress uniforms, designating them as infantrymen-was scheduled for October 25. Marie, Richard, and both Tillman parents would be flying to Georgia to attend. Pat was very excited about seeing everyone. "I'm tired of our surroundings," he wrote, and need the positive chi chi of those I love to recharge my batteries.... It's been almost a month since I've spoken with Marie. If she hasn't run off with anyone, she surely hates my guts. Once again those strong feelings of guilt and pain for all I'm putting her through surface. My hope is that during the weekend she visits, I can pull off some miracle and express just how much I miss her and give her something to sustain another six weeks of our separation. The poor girl is such a superhero-actually at this point a Greek tragedy heroine. I need to hurry and put an American (happy) ending to this story.... of those I love to recharge my batteries.... It's been almost a month since I've spoken with Marie. If she hasn't run off with anyone, she surely hates my guts. Once again those strong feelings of guilt and pain for all I'm putting her through surface. My hope is that during the weekend she visits, I can pull off some miracle and express just how much I miss her and give her something to sustain another six weeks of our separation. The poor girl is such a superhero-actually at this point a Greek tragedy heroine. I need to hurry and put an American (happy) ending to this story....I cannot speak for Kevin, but I feel no sense of accomplishment from finis.h.i.+ng this place. I've learned no ultimate lessons and improved my character in no way. The only positive things this place has presented are a cast of solid characters, namely our drill sergeants, Tulio Tourinho, and a few others.... It will probably take a while for me to get perspective on everything that's happened and, who knows, maybe eventually I'll feel it was a positive. Right now, it was not. Kevin and I have gained only a pessimistic view of human nature. All our altruistic goals coming into this place have been ignored and trampled on. Fortunately we believe that this awful environment will not follow us. As we move along we expect to meet more people who are here [to accomplish] good, as opposed to, "because they have to be here."... I am not a negative man, I do not want to report bad, I want to rise above and bring everyone along with me. However, this place f.u.c.king blows...period.* In Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, "choking someone out" is a common, safe, and officially sanctioned maneuver, the equivalent of pinning an opponent during a wrestling match. In Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, "choking someone out" is a common, safe, and officially sanctioned maneuver, the equivalent of pinning an opponent during a wrestling match.