Carried the guilt to the end

Well I am glad at least one solider felt guilt. Unlike others...

On March 16, 1968, Calley led around 100 soldiers of Charlie company into the village of My Lai. Although they faced no resistance, they entered the village shooting. They murdered hundreds of civilians consisting mostly of South Vietnamese elderly men, women, children, and infants using automatic weapons, grenades and bayonets. Infants and children were killed with bayonets, and females were raped and shot.

The official American estimate of those murdered was 347, but a Vietnamese memorial at the site lists 504 names, with ages ranging from 1 to 82. In the My Lai museum in Vietnam, a marble plaque lists the names and ages of the victims. 504 people from 247 families were killed. Of these, 24 families lost everyone – three generations, no survivors. Included in the 504 were 60 elderly men, and 282 women (17 of whom were pregnant). A total of 173 children were killed; 53 were infants.

On direct examination during his court martial, Calley stated:

Well, I was ordered to go in there and destroy the enemy. That was my job on that day. That was the mission I was given. I did not sit down and think in terms of men, women, and children. They were all classified the same, and that was the classification that we dealt with, just as enemy soldiers ... I felt then and I still do that I acted as I was directed, and I carried out the orders that I was given, and I do not feel wrong in doing so, sir

His guilty sentence of life imprisonment with hard labor was commuted to three years of house arrest by President Richard Nixon.

America perpetuated true evil upon Vietnam.

For more info read Kill Anything That Moves by Nick Turse
Boy that was a blood boiling read. Fuck him, raping women and shanking infants surely wasn't part of the order, surely.
Also fuck Nixon.

While America definitely is brutal, all militaries are a terrorist force. The whole point of the military is to kill, maim, and slaughter whoever they're told to for a paycheck. They're told that they're allowed to refuse illegal orders, but if they refuse, they're just digging themselves a grave.
- Not really. For example, Vietnam's military has served defensive purposes, repelling colonizers and stopping genocidaires like Pol Pot. Yes, there's a command structure and all that, but I don't think it's really fair to call them a "terrorist force" or to say that the point of their military is to go around slaughtering whoever they're told.
  The US military, absolutely. But that's like comparing a pack of ravenous wolves to a sheepdog because they both have teeth. Some countries don't have militaries for the purpose of travelling halfway around the globe to massacre anyone who defies their imperial hegemony, they have militaries for the purpose of defending themselves against such militaries.
- It's not always for a paycheck. Sometimes indoctrination can run so deep that money isn't even needed. Sometimes living in fear of an autocratic regime is plenty motivating. Sometimes, the promises of better living conditions is enough to draw people to the military.

She was closer to death than most (still a horror), and he got the rest of his life ruined for doing it.

Looks like she got him better than he got her, without lifting a finger, with every physical disadvantage.

Major props to the older version of the guy choosing that for his own grave.

Some things will be with you until your dying day.

good