Huffington Magazine Issue 92-93 | Page 57

THE GRUNTS 30 years later, than that of bereaved a spouse whose partner had died in the previous six months. ‘A WAR OF MORAL INJURY’ In Afghanistan, some ugly aspects of the local culture and the brutality of the Taliban rubbed American sensibilities raw, setting the stage for deeper moral injury among Marines like Nick Rudolph. He remembered one time where Marines helped local Afghans build a school, near Combat Outpost San Diego, outside Marjah. “And all the kids went to that school, and the Taliban came over and splashed acid in their faces and, like, horribly deformed them,” he said. “And it was because they went to a school that we built and they didn’t like it. They didn’t view it as we were trying to help them be educated. They just d