In Battle, Hunches Prove to Be Valuable Assets

“One afternoon I remember turning down a road in Baghdad we were very familiar with, and there’s no one out — very creepy for that time of day.” Sgt. Dan Gomez, speaking about when he and others sensed something was amiss and ended up avoiding a roadside bomb. Michael Appleton for The New York Times

From The New York Times:

The sight was not that unusual, at least not for Mosul, Iraq, on a summer morning: a car parked on the sidewalk, facing opposite traffic, its windows rolled up tight. Two young boys stared out the back window, kindergarten age maybe, their faces leaning together as if to share a whisper.

The soldier patrolling closest to the car stopped. It had to be hot in there; it was 120 degrees outside. “Permission to approach, sir, to give them some water,” the soldier said to Sgt. First Class Edward Tierney, who led the nine-man patrol that morning.

“I said no — no,” Sergeant Tierney said in a telephone interview from Afghanistan. He said he had an urge to move back before he knew why: “My body suddenly got cooler; you know, that danger feeling.”

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My Comment: My father said the same thing about his experience while serving with the Soviet Army in the Second World War. After 6 months he just knew where there was danger and where it was not, and he saw the same thing in other soldiers if they could survive that long.

Call it a 6th sense, instincts .... there is some truth to it if you are a soldier on the battlefield.