"I was the new guy, so I just stayed quiet and took it," he writes. "The combat action ribbon seemed less important Less than an hour later we knelt at the edge of a cornfield as the ANA told us to use their compound for 24 hours" A single shot rang out Followed by Sergeant Decker coming at me in a run. That's when the reality of Sang and Hit me became clear: We could kill people here It was a notion that would soon become prosaic, but in the moment it was striking.