As we're running out there, we feel the machine gun around skipping through like the side of our legs, like over our heads, like it's nuts.

Ernie Jimenez joined the military because he saw it as the career opportunity of a lifetime.

He joined the Marines because he wanted to fight.

As an infantry assaultman, he got plenty of opportunities to test his metal.

And right from the first, he got a good hard look at what it is like to have no choice but to face down your fears.

I was super scared and I was like, my 19th birthday is literally four days away from now and I'm like, I don't even know if I'm going to make it.

What is true bravery? What makes a hero a hero?

Tested by the worries of what's happening at home, thousands of miles away, and the reality of what you're facing here and now.

When your life is in danger every second and it's either kill or be killed, an original podcast from In-Congruity Media.

This is Anthony Russo and this is War.

Although his father, Luis, was enthralled about the prospect of his son joining the Marines just as a war was getting underway,

him and his convinced him of the benefits, service, discipline, money for college, all the things the US military is known for.

But as a 17 year old, him and his only impression of military service came from Call of Duty.

Even with the discipline and education of bootcap, he really just wanted to blow things up and as loud away as he could.

I really wanted to play with machine guns and explosives and stuff like that so I joined the infantry.

If you're going to join the Marines, you might as well join for what Marines are like known for and that's going and fighting.

But I chose to be an infantry assaultman because I wanted to handle C4 and stuff like that.

And then we got the train in the small, which is a shoulder fired, multi-purpose assault weapon, explosives and the javelin missile, the anti helicopter anti tank missile.

As he trained in the weaponry, him and his developed a steady hand and an accuracy with both blowing open doors for breaching and shooting rockets that would serve him well in Iraq.

Although he still had no sense that that really was in his future.

In 2003, training wasn't as pointed as it would become.

So although he knew how to use the weapons in urban combat, technically he wouldn't have a deep understanding of the ins and outs until he hit the ground, which was something that still was an abstraction.

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