If I Die in a Combat Zone by Tim O’Brien Read Free Book Online Page B

lingers all the day long.
    The soldier who finds himself in AIT is a marked man, and he knows it and thinks about it. War, a real war. The drill sergeant said it when we formed up for our first inspection: Every swinging dick in the company was now a foot soldier, a grunt in the United States Army, the infantry, Queen of Battle. Not a cook in the lot, not a clerk or mechanic among us. And in eight weeks, he said, we were all getting on a plane bound for Nam.
    “I don’t want you to mope around thinkin’ about Germany or London,” he told us. “Don’t even think about it, ’cause there just ain’t no way. You’re leg men now, and we don’t need no infantry in Piccadilly or Southampton. Besides, Vietnam ain’t all that bad. I been over there twice now, and I’m alive and still screwin’ everything in sight. You troops pay attention to the trainin’ you get here, and you’ll come back in one piece, believe me. Just pay attention, try to learn something. The Nam, it ain’t so bad, not if you got your shit together.”
    One of the trainees asked him about rumors that we’d be shipped to Frankfort.
    “Christ, you’ll hear that crap till it makes you puke. Forget it. You dudes are Nam-bound. Warsville, understand? Death City. Every last fat swingin’ dick.”
    Someone raised a hand and asked when we’d get our first pass.
    “Get your gear into the barracks, sweep the place down, and you’ll be out of here in an hour.”
    I went to the library in Tacoma. I found the Reader’s Guide and looked up the section on the United States Army. Under the heading “AWOL and Desertion” I found the stuff I was looking for.
    The librarian fetched out old copies of Newsweek and Time , and I went into a corner and made notes.
    Most of the articles were nothing more than interviews with deserters, stories of their lives in Stockholm, where they lived openly, or in Paris, where they hid and used assumed names and grew beards. That was interesting reading—I was concerned with their psychology and with what compelled them to pack up and leave—but I needed something more concrete. I was after details, how-to-do-it stuff. I wanted to know the laws of the various nations, which countries would take deserters, and under what conditions. In one of the Time pieces I found a list of certain organizations in Sweden and Denmark and Holland that had been set up to give aid to American deserters. I wrote down the names and addresses.
    Another article outlined the best routes into Canada, places where deserting GIs crossed. None of the NATO nations would accept U.S. military deserters; some sort of a mutual extradition pact was in force. I knew Canada harbored draft dodgers, but I couldn’t find anything on their policy toward deserters, and I doubted our northern neighbors went that far. Sweden, despite all the problems of adjustment and employment, seemed the best bet.
    I smiled at the librarian when I returned the magazines; then I went into the library’s lobby and called the bus depot. To be sure, I disguised my voice—perhaps they had some sort of tape-recording system—and asked about rates and time schedules for Vancouver. From Seattle, Vancouver was only a two-hour drive, the fellow said, and the rates were low and buses ran frequently, even during the night.
    Then I called the Seattle airport and checked on fares to Dublin, Ireland. Playing it carefully, professionally, I inquired first with one of the large American firms, telling them I was a student and wanted to do research overseas. Then I called Air Canada, gave them the same story, and mentioned that I might want to leave from Vancouver. Soon I had a list of airfares to more than a half-dozen European cities.
    Having done all this, I went back to my corner in the library and, for the first time, persuaded myself that it was truly possible. No one would stop me at the Canadian border, not in a bus. A flight to Ireland would raise no suspicions. From Ireland it was