My name is Zachary Findlay-Maddox, I am a former marine, I was stationed at Marine Barracks 8th & I in Washington D.C. on 9/11. As I am writing this as I am listening to Metallica's "ONE"....god how this song rings true today....

I was born and grew up in Santa Cruz, CA. There is probably nobody here that can relate to with what I experienced, I am sorry to say. I am twenty-six years old, I am married now and I am blessed with a beautiful baby girl.

I joined the Marines when I was eighteen, it was 2000, and I was ready to become a man, and I wanted to learn how to take care of myself, and of course go to college, which was a pretty good reason too. My grandfather on my dad's side was in World War 2 as a dauntless dive-bomber tail gunner. He only was fifteen when he enlisted, he got out when he was eighteen. I have kind of hippy parents, and my grandfather on my mom's side is from Cape Town, South Africa. I guess I've always had a worldly view of life. I knew from when I was a teenager that I wanted to be in the military. I originally planned on going Navy, but decided marines because I wanted to be one of the few, proud. I always saw marines as kind of sacred. I when I graduated from boot camp, had to be one of my proudest moments. I volunteered to go to Washington D.C. when I was still in boot camp. They had all the infantry bound marines go to this building at Camp Pendleton, where we were finishing our last month of boot, and this tall striking marine first sergeant came out and in a Jamaican accent told us about this opportunity to go to Washington D.C. he made it sound really cool, and I had already been their once before, with my mom when I was fourteen. So I volunteered to go. After boot I went to School of Infantry, and after that I went to Marine Barracks 8th & I.

I am from a Bay, its called Monterrey Bay. I grew up in Santa Cruz county, in California. I don't think anything can prepare you for the level of poverty I witnessed in D.C. It seemed almost third world in some places. I figured this out quick when I first got there. I've been told that D.C. has a murder rate of three a week, I can't confirm this but it seems right. I trained and became an honor guardsman for the Marine Corps. My secondary mission was to provide support and protection for the Washington D.C. area. Discipline there was extreme. We would spend hours practicing rifle drill, because I did full honor funerals at Arlington National Cemetery, Tomb of the Unknown, Pentagon ceremonies, and many other ceremonies, including Marching in the first inaugural ceremony for President Bush and Donald Rumsfield.

I was pro bush after the Clinton Scandal, and believed in him until the invasion of Iraq. Even then I hoped that everything would turn out okay, never in a million years would I expect what ended up happening over there. I have read Thomas E. Ricks's book "Fiasco", and would recommend anyone to read it. After reading that book, I couldn't believe what was really going on. I shouldn't be to surprised though, after living in D.C. for over a year, I can believe what length's people will go to hide the ugly truth.

I am proud of my accomplishments in the Marines, I am proud, and always be proud of what I accomplished. I was a good marine, I did what I was told, and "sucked it the f**k up" all the time. That what I was trained to do.

When 9/11 happened, I was in the middle of moving out of the Barracks, with all the other first year'ers, and making room for the next group of marines coming to D.C. We all had to move out into the city, so I moved with two other marines into an apartment in Crofton, Maryland. One of my roommates, Paul Bushnell, and myself were driving to Maryland when we started hearing about the plane hitting one of the twin towers in New York. My first thought was "oh it had to be a Cessna", but right after that news came that a plane had hit the other tower, and the pentagon had been hit too, I knew at that point we were at war. We continued to drive to Crofton, and when we got there we turned on the TV. In our apartment, and started watching the attacks play over the news. I called my mom and dad, and let them know I was okay, especially because of the fact I went to the Pentagon a lot for ceremonies. We drove back a few minutes later, going ninety down the I95 freeway. When we left everything was at threat con Alpha, when we got back an hour later it ws at threat con Delta. We found our platoon, and went down stairs to draw out our M-16's and bayonets, and other gear. My platoon assembled on our platoon floor, which was on the fourth floor of Alpha company side of the living quarters for the Marines. I could see the Pentagon that day, only because of all the black smoke that was pouring out of it. It turned the sky partially black in that area, it was pretty horrific. I watched on T.V. President Bush coming back to D.C. in marine one with two gunships, and they flew right over us at roof top level. We stayed at the Barracks until that evening, when finally we were allowed to go home. T think I was running on pure adrenaline at that time. I don't think I even allowed it all to sink in; it was just so much to process.

One of the ironic things was I was allowed to go home on leave, on the fourteenth of September, because my grandmother had died in August, I couldn't even leave the D.C. area for another two days, because my flight got canceled twice, so I missed the funeral. I felt so glad to be home when I finally got there, it was really surreal to be back home after all of that. Everything was kind of calm back home; it didn't affect people as much. That has always been a weird thing for me to grasp, because being a marine, in D.C., you feel like Pearl Harbor just happened again, which it was in a sick sense. Even today, it's hard for me to relate to most people, people who have no idea what is at stake in the world right now.

After I got back to D.C., is when I started coming apart. I was put on guard duty in the month of October, and during that month I guarded the Alpha company side glass doors that lead right into the barracks it's self. Let me explain a little about these guard posts. I was completely by myself at night, and I was unarmed. That's right, our nations capitol gets attacked for the first time since the British invaded back in the eighteen hundreds, and I was completely unarmed. Oh, I'm sorry, I was armed, but with a twelve inch METAL POLE. The marine I had enitially relieved had given it to me with a smirk, when I asked him what we would be protecting our selves with. The normal marine security forces had pistols and shotguns, and I was an infantryman, so I was trained on how to use an m-16A2 service rifle, and among other weapons. So I was kind of shocked by it. Anybody by the way could walk up and through the post, the side walk for I street south east was right outside the glass doors. I also had at this time very "Osama Bin Laden" looking guys coming through my post, to deliver pizza. I seriously thought one of thoughs times one of those guy's would just gun me down, and waste me. I felt completely naked. One interesting note on this was, I heard this from someone else who I releaved one night, that someone's father who was a marine who's son was doing the same thing I was doing, got pissed and demanded that his son be armed. So, instead of arming us so we could protect our selves, they just switched his son out with another marine instead. I thought that was bullshit.

Since I lived in the city now, I had to have a car. I ended up getting my driver license while I was on leave for my grandmother's funeral, knowing that I would need to have a car when I got back. I ended up buying a car from a certified used Mazda dealership in Fairfax, Virginia. I really struck a cord with the sales staff there. I made friends with everybody, even the Manager. I even started hanging out with the Manager, and going to his place to hang out with him and his wife. I started drinking, and smoking marijuana with him too, because I wanted to escape and it calmed me to the point I felt normal again.

I had had a really crazy roommate by the name of Marin before 9/11, and lets say we didn't agree on a lot of stuff. He was normal enough when I met him originally at School of Infantry at Camp Pendleton, but by the time we roomed up, he had become a sadist, or maybe it was always there, I don't know. He disgusted me with his racism, and he threatened me with harm a lot. He had been on the wrestling team in school, and he was much bigger than me, and worked out all the time. He was one rank above me, so he got away with it. I don't completely blame him; I think it was the environment we were in. Anyways, he actually had kept a loaded pistol in the room with us, I only found this out when we were moving out of the barracks, and he showed it to me. I was pretty shocked, I should have told someone, he probably would have gone to the brig, but I seriously felt he would have probably taken me out if I did. The strange thing was I actually agreed to room with him and that other marine Paul Bushnell originally. It was only after 9/11 and coming back from home that I decided I had enough, and moved in with my friend Greg Abdullah and his wife and son. The last straw had been two things, one was when Marin told me I could use his pistol to shoot anyone who came to the door and tried to get in, which sounded insane to me cause Crofton was a nice area, and second when I watched Marin practically torture Bushnell right in front of me, they had just started wrestling for fun, and then Marin just lost it and started stabbing his fingers into Bushnell's eyes, Bushnell was screaming for me to help him, but I was too afraid of Marin to help. You might wonder why I didn't tell anyone, I did, but my corporal just told me to "suck it up marine, when I lived in the barracks, me and my roommate would get into fist fights everyday after work." I thought that was bullshit, but it just made things worse for me.

When I finally moved in with Greg and his family, is when I finally started coming apart. It was probably because I felt like I could relax for once, and I started smoking pot every night before I went to sleep. I had gotten the pot from one of the sales rep. at the Mazda car lot. He was from Africa, and borrowed a two-seater sports car and took me on a joy ride when we bought the pot. It helped a lot, it actually made me feel like I could turn off my emotional pain I was going thru, and feel normal.

One day after the Thanksgiving four-day holiday was over, I got pissed tested. I knew I was screwed. We just started going to the rifle range that week, and that weekend I went clubbing and met a girl, and hung out with her the whole weekend. I stayed with her in Manassas, Virginia, and ended up missing rifle qualifications that following Monday morning. I thought to myself, fuck it; I just wanted to lay there in bed with this girl. I knew I would just get fucked with, and made to clean everything while everybody else was at Quantico. I ended up staying with her for a few more days, and then ended up driving across the entire U.S. to go home. I don't know what I was thinking, I just wanted my emotional pain to go away, I think I felt like I couldn't go back, something bad would happen. It took me four days to drive back to California, and I drove to my uncle's house in Fresno. My parents found me a day later, and had already talked to my unit back in D.C. I also talked to my Platoon Commander on the phone, who asked me if I was okay, I told him that I was sorry, and he said that was okay. I flew back two days later. After I got back, everyone was real nice to me. I think most of everyone had felt sorry for me, and were blown away that I had driven home like that. Marin ended up going to the fleet, so having him gone was good. The funny thing was too that a lot of random people started telling me their drug stories, on how this guy took ecstasy, or this guy did meth, etc. There were a lot of people that had these stories; it kind of blew me away. I started drinking heavily at this point, started even drinking in the middle of the day.

I went back to doing my regular job again, including funeral detail at Arlington. I don't know why I didn't receive any kind of counseling, it doesn't make any sense now that I look back at it. A few months later I went to my special court martial, and received a bad conduct discharge, and was sent to the brig at Quantico for three weeks. The ironic thing was, I finally got some counseling at the brig, and I thanked the counselor for just for asking me "how are you doing today?" It seemed like I hadn't heard that in a really long time.

After I got out of the brig, I went back to my unit, and spent my last week there filling out paper work and getting different people to sign off on my paper work. One of the marines I had to have sign off on my paper work was the counselor for the Barracks! He was really pissed off that nobody had sent me to him, and apologized to me. I left D.C. on April 1st, 2002. I then went on apellate leave, and I offically got out on August 11th, 2003.

When I first got back home, I was really happy. But my friends that I grew up with tried to beat me up, said all kinds of things to me, and laughed in my face. I ended up getting into a fight with one of them, and after that they all left me alone. I felt VERY suicidal at this point. I don't know how I made it, if it wasn't for my Marine Corps training, I probably would have just given up.

Well, it is now 2008. I have been happily married for over two years, and have a beautiful baby girl. Thru my mom talking to the American Legion, I went to the VA one day back before Christmas, because even though I was married and had a baby, I was emotionally falling apart. The stress of having my daughter brought back a lot of bad dreams, and I started becoming mean to the people I loved. I went to the VA, and itially the counselor I went to said I could only get three sessions, then it turned into me getting a psychological evaluation, now I am lucky and happy to say to say that I am still seeing my counselor at the VA!!! My counselor said that she asked her supervisor about continuing to see me and she got it!!! I guess this means that I must have a really good chance of upgrading my discharge to a medical, because I have been told I have PTSD after I got out, now hopefully this counselor will write that down too, so I can get this taken care of.

I am finally done with my background story. I don't blame the Marine Corps for what happened, I BLAME the poor leadership at my duty station, and not giving a young twenty-year old marine the help he needed to combat PTSD before self-destructing. When I orignally read about this site the one thing that struck me was about getting the help veterans need. I totally agree with this. It took me almost six years and a marriage and a baby later to finally build up the courage to seek help. I have felt guilty about what happened for so long, I just want to feel alive again.

Thank you again for taking the time to read this, I felt like writing this would make me a real person, and not just a number.

I want this war to end more than anything; I am sick and disgusted that there hasn't been a "Nuremberg Trial" for Bush and Co. yet. I can even get my head around the elections; it just doesn't make any sense to me. I have enjoyed listening to former Marine Sergeant Madden talk about this war being a war crime, because it is. It makes me sigh with relief to hear someone call it for what it is. We got to stop Bushie and Tricky dick before they get away with this, as a victim of 9/11, I think its complete bull for them to use this as an excuse to terrorize the world, I believe in Karma, so I believe they'll get their's no matter what. Be sure to go on youtube and check out tricky dick talking to a reporter about why they didn't go into Iraq back in 91, use the words "Dick Cheney 94" and watch Tricky Dick become Nastrodamus.....

Semper Fi,

Zachary Findlay-Maddox