We are posed, at Fort Bragg, ready to leave; certified fit for combat.
I don’t know any of these people now, not that I knew them much back then, our summer of blood.
I never kept in touch. Never felt that touched. Never felt connected to war, to warriors, to that band of others.
What I have is an old color photograph, made by the base photographer. One group picture of thousands made, stored. Some may be displayed in a case alongside a folded flag, maybe a box with a medal. Mine has traveled and nagged me for too many years. Of all the things I’ve lost. All the things I’ve tossed out or left behind, I don’t know why, what weak part of me, keeps this fading picture, still in its rubber stamped folder.
Evidence, of what, for whom…. maybe me, maybe not.

The general is buying more rockets. Rockets to defend his emplacements, war batteries. You have just asked him about the cost of those rockets. His response is the question: ” what value do you place on human life.” You, being a reporter with NPR, don’t answer, not even with a follow up question. You have treated his question as rhetorical.
Why didn’t you respond, tell him that he places the value of human life at zero. That is how he treats the lives of his enemy. He treats them as having no value.