INDIANAPOLIS — The newest images and headlines from Afghanistan are more than just words and pictures for Army Staff Sgt. Brian Alvey.
For this Army veteran from Franklin, it’s personal.
“I ate, slept and breathed with these folks...and we just bolted on them,” he said.
Alvey's first tour of duty began in 2004. He’s been back again since then, and kept in touch with local residents who worked alongside U.S. forces to change life for the better.
“I’m messaging back and forth with those I can get ahold of,” he said. “I don’t have the answers. I struggle with it. But I just know how we left wasn’t the right answer.”
Alvey is now fearful for those civilian helpers’ lives after the Afghan government fell to Taliban forces in the days and weeks following the withdrawal of U.S. troops.
He’s also wrestling with his own emotions about what to think and feel.
“You don’t want to be a whiner about it, but it’s like, ‘What did we do all that for ... just to walk like that?’” he said. “I know that when we were there, what we did … we were doing the right thing at the time. But to look back at it all and say, 'So you're supposed to tell me now that it was worth that?' How do you reconcile that in your head?”
He's far from alone.
“It’s disturbing, it's aggravating,” said Brian Romans, a Marine Staff Sergeant from Bloomfield who also served in Afghanistan.
“It hits home a lot harder than I’d like to admit,” said Romans, who runs Romans Warriors Foundation, a nonprofit organization that provide support to veterans, first responders and their families.
“I've fielded calls over the last 48 hours from veterans I served with 15 or 20 years ago and just trying to help each other understand, myself included,” Romans said.
They say reaching out to talk with each other has never been more important.
“Try to just stay tight and process it together,” said Alvey, who co-founded a 110-mile annual walk in 2019 to raise awareness of PTSD issues among veterans.
“We need to stick together. Nobody's going to take care of us better than us,” Romans said. “For those having a hard time swallowing and thinking ‘everything I did overseas is in vain’ .. without saying an expletive … I’ll just say that’s crap. I assure you each and every service member that has served in Afghanistan that made the ultimate sacrifice will never be forgotten.”