This will be my final piece in this series because quite honestly, ground combat, despite having a lot of intricacies is relatively straightforward and simple. Don't die, don't let the dude next to you die and don't fall asleep on patrol. Stupid, simple, easy right. Train the right way, harden the hell up and do your damn job and it's pretty easy. Kill the other guy.Look, I'm not Carlos Hathcock super duper Operator DELTA Ranger SEAL Sniper, but I can still shoot pretty damn well after being out for ten years and as far as I could tell, most insurgents can't shoot for shit. There is one piece of ground combat though, that I haven't addressed, and it only sort of applies, but hopefully, you'll see the bridge I'm trying to make.Coming the f*** home.You need to learn how to do it. Nobody is going to do it for you. That task, unfortunately, is not the mission of the Marine Corps or any other branch. While they've gotten better at it, teaching dudes to go from wholesale stacking bodies like they were filling up a Costco to being totally cool on the streets of America is not exactly an easy task or their main focus. Some dudes (dude is a unisex term, by the way, he's a dude, she's a dude, everyone is a dude) still have issues with it today. Others have found a way to deal with it.I can tell you for certain the wrong way to deal with it is blaming civilians. I'm guilty of it as are a shit ton of us. Talking shit about civilians because they didn't do what we did. But then I'm reminded that, hey I made a choice. I didn't have to go do what I did and I shouldn't treat people like "less than" because they didn't. I know, I know, I know it's not popular to say that, but the truth is that there are a lot of civilians I'm glad didn't go do what we did. Not because they couldn't hack, but because hell man, I figured I was fighting for someone to have a decent life where they didn't have to see the death and destruction that we did.And truth be told, I've been a civilian and will be a civilian a lot longer than I was on active duty. What ground combat entails is being a damn adult about this shit. Yes, we are "badasses, gunslingers and warriors, sheepdogs" and whatever other buzzwords you'd like to use, but you know what? Ten years after you're out, the truth of the matter is very few people give a shit.And the more you ride the coattails of what you did ten plus years ago, the more you're going to sound like the high school quarterback that won state but is now 45 years old and that's all he talks about.Get a hobby. Part of ground combat means being a damn adult and finding a way forward and being successful in the here and now. You can be proud of your accomplishments, but don't let what you did between 18-22 years old or whatever your period of service was, be the only good thing you do in this life. You're capable of more. Enduring ground combat is proof of that.

WHAT GROUND COMBAT ENTAILS PART ONE

WHAT GROUND COMBAT ENTAILS PART TWO

WHAT GROUND COMBAT ENTAILS PART THREE

WHAT GROUND COMBAT ENTAILS PART FOUR

WHAT GROUND COMBAT ENTAILS PART FIVE

WHAT GROUND COMBAT ENTAILS PART SIX