Baghdad passed by as usual, a collection of misery and semi-destroyed infrastructure that people were pulling back to life with a vibrancy I still found amazing.

In 2006, our patrol in Iraq was in the northern parts of Saydiah, an increasingly Shia neighborhood and therefore a more dangerous one. We maneuvered south through the market district, crowded with fish from the Tigris flapping and gasping for air and small spice shops.

Heaps of umber, orange, and red spices spilled haphazardly in a wild array of colors. Discordant vines of electrical wires hung like a forest above the whole enterprise. The bakers had their delicious biscuits on display, twisted and hanging.

Likely, our Humvees would soon smell of them.

Out front, our Bradley vehicle, which we named Sledgehammer, slewed its 25-mm cannon to the right and stopped traffic.

“We’re good to move onto Route Irish,” the Bradley commander said over the radio, signaling we were ready to go to the main highway, a road referred to as a highway of death due to the prevalence of roadside bombs.

We had completed the first phase of our Saydiah market survey, asking vendors if they would allow us to photograph them and record their names and products.

The idea behind the survey was to build a comprehensive understanding of the economy and discover, if possible, any unusual deviations that indicated IED manufacturing or distribution. It was exhausting, and for the infantry unit, not rewarding.

Our patrol readied to depart with one final economic exchange.

Security established, with massive firepower that could easily destroy anything around us, a few of my men proceeded to jump out with our interpreter, Ali, to buy some bread.

The palm-thick bread, almost football-shaped due to its twisted ends, was very tasty. But I always had reservations about buying it and made sure we never frequented the same seller more than once since patterns equaled death.

As the men negotiated their purchases, a voice sounded over the radio: “Rock 11, potential SBIED. Grid coordinates to follow.”

SBIED—suicide bomber improvised explosive device.

Outside, heads swiveled, and the platoon understood. Dinars changed hands quickly (and probably to our disadvantage). Clutching a few plastic bags of bread—soldiers will be soldiers—the troops quickly returned to our vehicles.

The Bradley fired up, and its tracks tore into the pavement as our trucks followed. The turret rotated from left to right using its thermal imagery to identify any roadside bombs.

After a catastrophic attack the previous month on another patrol in our company, our nerves were frayed and the reality of counterinsurgency sucker punched naive idealists like me and haunted the returning veterans.

“Ali, you ready to go?” I yelled back to the rear of our vehicle.

He sweated, his helmet and glasses poorly adjusted, but he desperately worked to keep his notebook and pen in hand, our Terp.

“Yes, sir!” Although he didn’t wear a uniform with his name neatly printed on it, Ali risked his life to help us. I don’t think Ali was even his real name.

Traffic was intense, and we just wanted to get back, remove our body armor, and be done with it. Sledgehammer crested around the lanes of traffic and circled in on our suspected suicide bomber.

“Ali, tell him to come now with his hands up,” I said.

Ali yelled in Arabic through our loudspeaker. I didn’t know what Ali was saying, only that it was angry and very specifically directive. Yet the man remained hidden between the ubiquitous concrete blast barriers surrounding Forward Operating Base Falcon.

“Fuck, Ali, is he not listening or what?” I demanded.

“Sir, I don’t know, he might be a bad man.”

The Sledgehammer’s 25-mm cannon slewed over and dipped down, aiming near our own base. That main gun was primarily used to identify roadside bombs and explosives, but its second most common use was intimidation. “I’m getting him out of there myself. You come with me.”

“What?”

“GET OUT.”  The door was already opening and my rifle was at the low ready.

My perspective began to collapse into a distant moment. I recalled the heat and stench of Baghdad, the burning fires of people making do in a collapsed society engulfed in civil war.

Striding out, I didn’t know what my soldiers thought, or if they cared. It was stupid, but I was sick of half measures. They maneuvered into security positions with their vehicles.

“ALI, TELL HIM: GET OUT NOW.”  The concrete barriers were staggered, offering spaces to hide between, and our man was in the shadows between two of them.

Somewhere behind me I heard yelling in Arabic and my men’s guns moving in to support me.

“GET OUT, YOU FUCK!” I screamed. I edged around the barrier with my rifle at full ready, dividing the space into killing zones as I found the man. “GET OUT!”

He was clutching a satchel, and I immediately aimed to kill as his hand moved across it. He stopped, and it probably saved his life. He was crying, stumbled forward, then fell to his knees.

I pointed my weapon, its smooth barrel well-oiled, at his head. His satchel swung to the side and I could see he had notebooks and books, not bombs.

My finger was firmly placed on the trigger of my rifle. Tears of anguish streamed from his face washing away some of the soil and soot of his beloved city.

A darkness opened in me and my finger quivered on that trigger. What was the balance of my desire for vengeance with his misery?  A drip of sweat rolled down my eye.

“Sir, stop!” someone yelled, or was it in my head?  I lowered the rifle, shot unfired.

Ali and the man exchanged rapid-fire talk in Arabic, gesticulating, while my men moved out of position.

Later, I learned he was one of ours, another interpreter working with another company on Forward Operating Base Falcon, hiding from the same militias we fought. He’d stayed in the shadows, waiting for a friend to extract him after work and away from the open street, not knowing his hidden presence might get him killed.

Nearly two decades have gone by, and although no guns were fired, that encounter still haunts me more than some firefights.

I sometimes recall that dark energy and recoil. Feeling the pull of that hate and frustration is a struggle that never existed before the war.

That day in Baghdad, I held immense power, and I nearly used it, not out of duty, but out of frustration, vengeance, and fatigue. Restraint, in that moment, was harder than pulling the trigger.

In the grand celebrations following redeployment home, it was easy to shelve the memory, one of many. But over time, that moment has emerged as a defining one for me.

In Saydiah, we ground out a long slog of patrols where the constant threat of roadside bombs could randomly end a life, with the maddening thought that an unlucky moment could wipe out all training and preparation.

Yet I had unwittingly become an agent of that same fickle prospect of death for another person.

That unbound dark energy is a burning ember I now carry. Ignited by the spark of combat, it craved unfettered violence. Now, tempered by the years, it remains an unwelcome companion.

But it taught me a lasting lesson: I’ve come to believe that in war, control is just as vital as courage.

This War Horse Reflection was edited by Kim Vo, fact-checked by Jess Rohan, and copy-edited by Mollie Turnbull. Hrisanthi Pickett wrote the headlines.