I wrote this letter to my commanding officer the day I decided to leave the Army as a conscientious objector, I was about twenty years old.

March 21, 2005

My moral and religious beliefs have become incompatible with military service. I can no longer continue to train as a combat soldier, nor can I remain in the service of an organization that exists for the sole purpose of destroying human life. I know myself to be a conscientious objector and therefore must request separation from the United States Army.
I joined the military in May of 2003, eager to fight in the Iraq War which had so recently begun. In October of that year I was deployed to Iraq where I participated in countless mounted and dismounted combat operations until our return to Germany in July of 2004. While in Iraq I was involved in a number of minor combat incidents and on one occasion did fire my weapon with the intent to kill. At that moment my conscious was profoundly altered by the devastating realities of human mortality. I’ve seen people and animals lying dead in the streets and experienced first hand the horrifying toll that war inflicts on living things; I was in a constant state of mental and emotional decay while deployed to Iraq. At the time I felt I could pull through and ride out the time left on my military contract, even though I was beginning to doubt my abilities as a combat soldier.
During this past gunnery of January and February 2005 I drove for two tank crews, one of which fired distinguished, I engaged in MOUT training, marksmanship training with both M16 and M9, and other types of weapons familiarization. Through all of this I found myself feeling disgusted and extremely uncomfortable with what we were training to do, how could God ever be expected to condone such cruelty, such vile inhumanity? I knew then that I would never kill another human being and could never be expected to return to combat and perform in any manner which would be beneficial to the military.
I can no longer allow myself to hide these feelings from my chain of command; I have a responsibility to both the military and my country to let the truth be known. I have always lived my life by the laws and principles that were so boldly forged by our forefathers centuries ago, and it is my deep admiration for the democratic traditions of the United States of America, and my dedication to the ideal of human decency that demand that I speak out. I have become a conscientious objector, I am opposed to war of any kind, and I will never again attempt to take human life or aid others in doing the same.
I am not simply seeking a ‘quick way out’ of military service, I am well aware that this is a long process, one in which deceivers will find little opportunity for success. I assure you that I am sincere. The Army teaches its soldiers to always “take the hard right over the easy wrong”, which is exactly what I am doing.
There are those who remain skeptical of my claims; I am thought of by some of my superiors as a liar, an idiot, and a coward. They and those who think alike are entitled to their beliefs, just as I am entitled to mine. If only they knew how much honesty, intelligence and
courage it takes to pursue such beliefs, thus enduring the persecution and hatred of such a multitude of nay sayers. My actions in the past and at present have well proven that I am not a coward, for a coward will never do what he believes to be right when those around him say that he is wrong, he will simply be bullied into submission. I expect that none of us would have found ourselves in disagreement with Abraham Lincoln when he said, “To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.”
I will not be a slave to the laws of man, while the laws of God are held to no account. I intend to live my own life in a way which will affirm the lives of others, not destroy them. I will rejoice in life; never again will I revel in the so called “glory and honor” of war.