FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. — The wounded soldier holds a homemade poster ringed with Christmas lights.
The widow stands in the back, hoping not to be seen.
The wife squeezes her three-year-old son’s hand and leans forward in anticipation.
The newlywed wipes away tears.
All wait in the bleachers of an airplane hangar for soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division. They are coming home from the unit’s deadliest year of combat since Vietnam.
After nearly a decade of war, the welcome-home ceremony has become a moment ingrained in American popular culture. The cheering, hugs and tears are staples of television newscasts. American beer and car companies use the return of the soldier in ads designed to evoke patriotism and a sepia-toned sentimentality.
These events are far more complicated than such portrayals suggest. To see why, it helps to step into the lives of the wounded soldier, the widow, the wife, the newlywed.
It is 3 p.m. on a Friday in early May at Fort Campbell. In a few seconds a brass band will start playing, the crowd will start screaming and the soldiers will burst through the hangar doors.
‘You feel helpless’
The wounded soldier is Staff Sgt. Dan Kelly. Twenty-three years old, he is handsome with short blond hair. He is a little bit heavier than he was in Afghanistan. But what defines him most is the guilt he feels over having come home before his soldiers. “Back here, you feel helpless,” is how he puts it. “Back here, I’m drinking beer and eating steak. It’s not a good feeling.”
He shifts his weight off his right leg, which bears two red railroad-track incisions made by the doctors to relieve the pressure and swelling from his wounds. The injuries, caused by an enemy bullet and shrapnel from a rocket-propelled grenade, have effectively ended his career as an infantryman.
He is waiting for a flight that includes about 30 soldiers from Combat Outpost Monti, a tiny base near Afghanistan’s mountainous border with Pakistan where Kelly spent most of his tour.
During his first two months at the outpost, nine of the base’s 140 soldiers were killed and about three dozen were wounded. Kelly was tapped to take over his nine-man squad in late July after his squad leader and platoon sergeant quit, citing mental strain. Kelly held the job for five months before his own wounds forced him home.
In Afghanistan, he was a steady and aggressive sergeant, one of the platoon’s best soldiers.
“He wanted to succeed so badly,” his platoon leader said.
At Fort Campbell, Kelly has bristled at taking orders from superiors who have not seen combat. His fiancee has pressed him to seek treatment for his anger.
“She laid down the law,” he says. “I know she is not going to be understanding forever.”
He has started to worry that he needs the rush of battle to keep his sanity.
In the hangar, Kelly holds a bright orange poster bearing the message “Kelly Loves Ham,” a reference to Spec. Brian Ham, one of the soldiers dumping their gear on the other side of the hangar doors as they prepare to make their entrance.
“He’s one of my best friends, and I wanted to embarrass him and maybe get a laugh,” Kelly says.
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