You can answer one or multiple questions as you reflect on Chapters 9-12:

In Chapter 14 LC McDonough makes a difficult personnel decision after returning from a patrol.  Do you think he made the right one? Why? Are the risks of his decision worth the potential benefits?

In Chapter 15 LT McDonough’s platoon is granted three days of R&R. What do you think about their activities? In Iraq and Afghanistan American service members are not authorized to consume alcohol while deployed. What do you think about the prohibition of alcohol enforced on current Soldiers versus how LT McDonough and his Soldiers are treated?

Do you agree or disagree with LT McDonough’s tactics as he describes them in Chapter 16? He seems to identify his own potential discomfort with his actions and how to reconcile them stating, “War is not a series of case studies that can be scrutinized with objectivity. It is a series of stark confrontations that must be faced under the most emotion-wrenching conditions. War is the suffering and death of people you know, set against a background of the suffering and death of people you do not. That reality tends to prejudice the already tough choices between morality and pragmatism.” What do you think of his actions and his statement above?

Did something else stick out to you during these Chapters? Feel free to ask your classmates some questions or reflect on what caught your attention.