"your arms are too short to box with god" comes to mind.

i wouldn't assume that this cat enlisted for any gung ho reason, but the kids who get sent off to fight without any sense of the obvious events involved in making war - i.e. human beings deciding who will live and who will die - seem to wind up the most damaged.

a lot of cats come back with problems, but some of 'em actually understood the stakes before they were thrust into the situation. imo modest experience talking with those folks, seems that they cope a little better with what's happened to them.

great post, j. would like to see this archived myself.