The Heart of Darkness.

Apocalypse Now always felt a little farfetched to me. I remember watching and thinking that something like Col Kurtz would never happen. It didn’t seem reasonable for someone to fall that far from the norm. Now, I’m not so sure. Don’t worry, my beard is nowhere long enough, my Urdu is non-existent and hummus still isn’t my favorite. But there is this guy we work with, who I will refer to as Cook. Cook has been here for the last 2 years. Yes, 2 years. And he’s not living in the capital city; he’s living in the heart of darkness, literally on the Taliban’s doorstep. The US doesn’t actively engage combatants here, but the guys we train do.

The story on Cook is very interesting. He’s a Silver Star winner from some operations he headed in Afghanistan. A real no kidding war hero. They could easily make a movie over what he did in Afghanistan. If you’ve seen the pictures of special ops guys running around on horseback, killing Taliban, he was leading those guys. But for whatever reason, Cook hasn’t promoted. And in the Army, everyone promotes. My guess is that he knows if he makes Lieutenant Colonel, he won’t be able to kill people anymore, but it’s just a guess.

I’ve been here for a week and I’ve heard countless ‘Cook’ stories. Some about him telling of General officers during video telecoms, others about him sending five-thousand word emails explaining the importance of what he’s doing and others about the promises he’s made to the people he is responsible for training.

When I met him, we were pulling up in a vehicle while he and a few of his guys were standing outside. The guy I was with said, ‘that’s Cook’. He looked like somebody delivering something to the house. His hair is easily past his shoulders and his beard touches the middle of his chest. Dressed in the local pajamas, he easily blended in even with a complexion lighter than mine.

Apocalypse Now made Col Kurtz seem like he had gone mad but The Heart of Darkness left that decision up to the reader. Marlow, the guy looking for Kurtz, asks repeatedly why Kurtz would leave his home for a place like this, but the reasoning is left for you to decide. Cook hasn’t reached that level yet, but I find something unreasonable about turning off your life for two years. I don’t think we’ll send someone up the river for him, but at some point, l would think lines would begin to blur so much that he couldn’t possibly go and do something else.