The Tender Soldier: A True Story of War and Sacrifice (36 page)

He credited Tracy and her team with reducing:
This was a bit of rhetorical sophistry. To make the statement accurate, Schweitzer would have had to serve two tours in Khost that were identical in every way except for the presence of the Human Terrain Team. A million factors, from weather to political unrest, economic conditions, and the timing of religious holidays, can affect the level of violence, making it all but impossible to attribute such a large reduction in combat operations to a single factor. Tracy agreed that the drop in fighting during her team’s tenure in Khost proved only “correlation,” not “causality.” Tracy, interview by author, December 15, 2012. For Schweitzer’s comments, see “Statement of Colonel Martin P. Schweitzer, Commander, 4/82 Airborne Brigade Combat Team, United States Army, Before the House Armed Services Committee, Terrorism & Unconventional Threats Sub-Committee and the Research & Education Sub-Committee of the Science & Technology Committee,” 110th Congress, 2nd Session, Hearings on the Role of the Social and Behavioral Sciences in National Security, April 24, 2008.

By the fall of 2007, the Defense Department:
Rohde, “Army Enlists Anthropology in War Zones.” McFate says the request to expand came earlier, in the spring of 2007, just as Fondacaro returned from escorting AF1 to Khost. Although Schweitzer’s praise for the team clearly could not have impressed the military in February 2007, since he was just beginning to work with them then, his remains one of the clearest and strongest military endorsements the project has received.

Chapter 3: The Tender Soldier

In September 2008, Paula Loyd boarded a Chinook:
Loyd and her Human Terrain teammates arrived in Afghanistan on September 20, 2008, and flew out to Maiwand about a week later. Don Ayala, interview by author, August 19, 2009. The description of the landscape is drawn from my notes and photographs during flights from Kandahar to Maiwand in early 2009 and late 2010.

She had spent her early childhood in Alamo Heights:
Gretchen Wiker, interview by author, January 7, 2013; Susanna Barton, interview by author, January 17, 2013; Patty Ward, interviews by author, February 15, 2009, and December 14, 2012. For more on her childhood in Alamo Heights here and below, “Paula Loyd: A Worthwhile Life,” self-published memorial book, 2009.

Loyd was an only child:
Her full name was Paula Gene Loyd. She was named after her father and her maternal uncle, Eugene. Patty Ward, interview by author, December 14, 2012. That she became known as a peacemaker, and for the story of her giving toys to her half brother’s kids, Paul Loyd, Jr., interview by author, February
15, 2009. “They always fought over toys like starving dogs would over table scraps,” Paul Loyd told me of his children. “Paula’s first efforts at conflict resolution were with them.” For Loyd’s father’s World War II service, see “Paul Loyd, Sr.: Obituary,”
San Antonio Express-News,
http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/sanantonio/obituary.aspx?page=lifestory&pid=142309053
. Accessed October 5, 2012.

Loyd’s mother sent her to a Montessori school:
“She liked structure: ‘This is your job, get it done.’ She worked very well under those circumstances,” Patty Ward told me. “She had a hard time with Montessori when she was little because this room was real open, and you just had to go pick out and do what you wanted to do.” Ward, interviews by author, February 15, 2009, and December 14, 2012.

Later, she would struggle with math:
Stefanie Johnson, one of Loyd’s friends from college, noted: “It’s no wonder that the woman who could see numbers as people and pluses and minuses as the relationship between them would choose a major that is all about different people in the world. Anthropology was her love.” Funeral of Paula Loyd, San Antonio, 2009.

She was quirky and bright, a ravenous reader:
Ward, interview by author, December 14, 2012, and Barton, interview by author, January 17, 2013.

Loyd was different from Barton:
Barton, interview by author, January 17, 2013.

At eight or nine, Loyd and Barton started an animal rescue group:
Ward, interview by author, December 14, 2012.

Loyd’s childhood home in Alamo Heights had a broad winding staircase:
Information about Loyd’s childhood here and below is from Ward, interview by author, December 14, 2012; Barton, interview by author, January 17, 2013; and Wiker, interview by author, January 7, 2013.

Gretchen Wiker was a recent transplant:
Wiker, interview by author, January 7, 2013.

In some ways, Loyd was a typical preteen girl:
For Loyd’s earrings and high ’80s style, edgy haircuts, and mall crushes, “Paula Loyd: A Worthwhile Life.”

When Loyd was about thirteen, her parents divorced:
“We moved to St. Thomas because she said, ‘I want to live somewhere where you’re a different color, and see how people treat you.’ St. Thomas is 90 percent black.” Ward, interview by author, February 15, 2009. That Ward told her, “You’re a minority already,” Ward, interview by author, December 14, 2012.

“She’s basically always been an anthropologist”:
Ward, interview by author, February 15, 2009.

It was Ward who made her get out:
Ward, interviews by author, February 15, 2009, and December 14, 2012, and Ward, “Dear Darlin’ Daughter,” in “Paula Loyd: A Worthwhile Life.”

But after two years, Loyd began to worry that the island school:
Ward, interviews by author, February 15, 2009, and December 14, 2012, and “Choate Grad Paula Loyd ’90 Passes Away,”
The News
(student newspaper of Choate Rosemary Hall),
February 20, 2009,
http://thenews.choate.edu/archives/2009/02/20/News/Choate_Grad_Paula_Loyd_90_.php
, accessed October 5, 2012. See also Farah Stockman, “Anthropologist’s War Death Reverberates,”
The Boston Globe,
February 12, 2009.

She spent her junior and senior years at Choate Rosemary Hall:
This description of Loyd is from Rafe Sagarin, interview by author, January 7, 2013, and Johnson, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009.

Her teachers noted her hunger for ideas and her gentleness:
“Choate Grad Paula Loyd ’90 Passes Away,”
The News,
February 20, 2009. The picture of Loyd with the stone lion captures “everything I remember about Paula,” Sagarin wrote. “Her wry humor is there, but also her desire to get right down on the same level with everything she interacted with—to be wholly a part of it—which I’m sure is what drove her work in Afghanistan. Most importantly, what comes through in this picture is her fierce inner strength. Paula is a lion.”

At Wellesley, Loyd ran along the Charles River:
Johnson, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009, and Johnson, interview by author, June 23, 2010.

At Wellesley, they rowed crew together:
For the crew team waking at 4:30 a.m. to practice, “Varsity Crew,”
Legenda: The Wellesley College Yearbook
(1995), 68.

She and Johnson worked together at a student-run coffee shop:
Johnson, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009, and Amanda Beals, “Café Hoop Celebrates 100th Anniversary,”
The Wellesley News,
November 24, 1992.

For one of her classes, she was assigned to conduct an ethnography:
Sally Engle Merry, interviews by author, June 7 and 11, 2010.

At Wellesley, Loyd championed human rights:
Johnson, interview by author, June 23, 2010, and Merry, interview by author, June 7, 2010. “Her own politics were quite left,” Merry told me. “I followed her activism. She liked to get things stirred up.”

Her much older half brother, Paul Loyd, Jr.:
Although Paul Loyd, Jr., described his half-sister as “almost Don Quixote–like,” he explained that
dreamer
was not the right word to describe someone as grounded as Loyd. “I don’t think she’s just Don Quixote tilting at windmills,” he told me. “I was what I would call a pragmatist, what are the pros and cons of this thing, and literally calculate my odds of success. That’s not what she was about. If the cause is worthy, she’s going to take it on, even if the odds are five percent. I don’t think that way but she does.” Paul Loyd, Jr., interviews by author, February 12 and 15, 2009. For more on Paul Loyd, Jr., see:
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/person.asp?personId=222660&privcapId=3051396&previousCapId=4436226&previous
Title=On-TargetSupplies&LogisticsLtd.

He and others were shocked when, upon graduating from Wellesley, she joined the Army:
“I didn’t believe her,” Paul Loyd told me. “I was blown away. I said, ‘You’re doing what?’ ” Paul Loyd, Jr., interview by author, February 15, 2009.

Loyd’s decision also surprised Johnson:
Johnson, interview by author, June 23, 2010.

before leaving Wellesley, where she had been:
Loyd’s thesis adviser, Sally Engle Merry, recalled that only a few students, perhaps three at most, were selected each year to write an honors thesis in anthropology at Wellesley when she taught there. Merry, interview by author, June 11, 2010.

Her paper clocked in at 181 pages:
Including an extensive bibliography.

Drawing on Marxist and feminist theory, Loyd wrote:
Paula Loyd, “Lesbian Resistance in the Bars of San Antonio, Texas” (bachelor’s thesis, Wellesley College, Spring 1995), 10.

“I have found that subordinate groups”:
Ibid., 28.

Loyd wrote that she was interested in “the numerous gray areas”:
Ibid., 31.

Instead, she enlisted:
Patty Ward, interview by author, December 14, 2012; Paul Loyd, Jr., interview by author, February 15, 2009; and Colonel Steve Walker, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009.

Loyd thrived as an outsider:
“People tried to push her in the Army to go into officer’s training, and no doing with her,” Ward told me. “She didn’t want to be in an office, she wanted to be with the people.” Ward, interview by author, February 15, 2009. Said Paul Loyd: “She didn’t want to be an officer. She wanted to get down and learn how people work and what made people tick. She’s always sort of been for the common guy.” Paul Loyd, Jr., interview by author, February 15, 2009.

Soldiers with this job description fix trucks weighing more than five tons:
Loyd’s initial classification in the Army was 63S Heavy, according to an Army officer who served with her. The job specifications mentioned here are available online at
http://usarmybasic.com/mos/63s-heavy-wheel-vehicle-mechanic
and
http://www.apd.army.mil/Home/Links/PDFFiles/MOSBook.pdf
, accessed October 6, 2012.

Loyd stood five foot six and weighed 120 pounds at most:
Ward, interview by author, February 15, 2009; Barton, interview by author, January 17, 2013; and Walker, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009. “I recall when we took the Army physical fitness test. . . . And Paula gave the men a run for [their] money. . . . There’s a men’s standard and a women’s standard, and I think pretty much she was on the men’s standard,” Walker said.

Her commanders marveled at the contrast between her flaxen delicacy and her physical toughness:
One officer recalled: “Although she was a petite woman probably not more than a hundred pounds, I marveled when I witnessed Paula, although carrying about thirty-five pounds in her rucksack, was among the top finishers among men and women in a ten-kilometer rucksack march. In sum, I saw Paula as an example of how you cannot judge people by their appearance, and that the boundaries are endless if you’re willing to explore them with zest.” Walker, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009.

She was sent to Korea, where she lived for a time on a remote outpost ringed with barbed wire:
Paul Loyd, Jr., interview by author, February 15, 2009, and Paul Loyd, Jr., funeral address, San Antonio, 2009. Loyd’s letter to her half brother read: “My unit is not
the greatest place for a mechanic. Since it’s a Patriot Missile unit, anything related to a missile takes priority. It looks like I’m going to spend a lot of my time over here pulling guard duty. . . . I’ll keep you all posted on life here. I live in a two-block area with all the U.S. soldiers, surrounded by barbed wire. People call it a prison camp. . . . After this, I don’t need any more character-building life experiences. I’m going to relax and enjoy life when I get out of the Army.” The message ended with a smiley face.

After four years, she switched to the reserves:
Ward, interviews by author, February 15, 2009, and December 14, 2012.

In the rarefied atmosphere that nurtures America’s policy-making elite:
For her study of Bosnia, Chester Crocker, James R. Schlesinger Professor of Strategic Studies, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, interview by author, June 22, 2010.

Then came the attacks of September 11, 2001, and her reserve unit was called up:
Loyd’s unit was called up in August 2002. Ward, interviews by author, February 15, 2009, and December 14, 2012, and Walker, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009.

By now, she had given up fixing trucks in favor of civil affairs:
Loyd received her airborne certification before deploying to Afghanistan. Ward, interview by author, December 14, 2012, and Walker, funeral address, San Antonio, 2009. For more on civil affairs, see “Careers and Jobs: Civil Affairs Specialist (38B),”
http://www.goarmy.com/careers-and-jobs/browse-career-and-job-categories/intelligence-and-combat-support/civil-affairs-specialist.html
, and “United States Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command (Airborne),”
http://www.usar.army.mil/ourstory/commands/USACAPOC/Pages/Overview.aspx
, accessed October 6, 2012.