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Eighth installment

Over the next two weeks everybody just waited to the governments final decision as to the future of our brigade, nothing came of the plan that I had submitted as there was no money and no need for it or that's what they said but I would not give up the hope of one day having my own unit. It was now July, the sun was shining and it was a good time to be alive, the trees were full of colour, the river was warm and all our free time sun bathing and swimming in the river. One of these fine days I decided with Paula's help to check on weather or not my citizenship had been allowed, we went to the local police headquarters to see a woman that we knew, she told us that she would check and that we were to come back the following day. When we went back she handed me a piece of paper, it was my citizenship and I was overjoyed, I had got the one thing that meant so much to me and to make matters even better Ernies application had not yet been accepted, I was now a Croatian citizen and there was no way that they could demobilise me from the army, this piece of paper was the only thing that could have replaced what I had lost during the war and I considered it a sort of thank you from the government. The only others to get it were Kevin, Mark and the Hungarians, I was the only one who had collected it and the only one that had really wanted it. Over the last few weeks I had learned that Kevin had left my ex unit and had gone to Bosnia, Mark had gone back to the Spanish army to serve with the anti-terrorist unit, James was spending a lot of time in Zagreb with his girlfriend and was planning on going back to America to get married, Ernie was still here but only for a short time as he wanted to be demobilised (probably to spend some of his ill earned money), the only ones that were to remain in the army were myself, Alan, a couple of Hungarians and some of the Croatians. The unit had eventually fallen apart with everybody going their own ways, all of my friends were being spread all over Osijek and I couldn't help but wonder whether or not I would be able to keep in contact with them. The life and friends that I had built up over the last ten months was falling apart, the main was that I still had Paula, she was the only person that mattered now. While waiting for the end of 160 brigade I kept trying to write my book and whilst doing so I was reliving the good and the bad times, remembering the people that were alive and those who had died. These last few months had taken it's toll on me both mentally and physically but I was still here and most of all alive, was the war over for me, was I to become a civilian or was I to remain in the army and fulfill my ideals that I had set myself so many months ago? My parents kept on trying to get me to leave the army but no matter how much I told them of my feelings for the Croatians they could not understand, my wife had started divorce proceedings against me and the newspapers were calling me rotten, it was ironic to think that here I was fighting for another country, getting paid miserable wages and still the media insisted that I was a mercenary and a dog of war. How long was it going to take before the media and the people of the world realized who the aggressor was, perhaps the war in BiH would change all that but somehow I doubted it. There was only one thing to do and that was to get on with my life, to survive and live happily whatever and wherever I was to go, I had made the break from the UK and I had to make the most of it, Croatia was now my home.
The end of 160brigade heralded a new phase in my exploits in the Croatian army, I was now about to be dragged somewhat reluctantly into the conflict in BiH, reluctantly I may add because I came to fight for Croatia and had seen so much death and destruction that I now knew that this fight had been my last, I had to concentrate on building my life around this country. My idealistic fight for freedom had been very costly, with the freedom of Croatia came loss of contact with my family back in Wales, divorce, accusation by the press of being a murderer, branded a war criminal by the Serbian government in Belgrade, had my ideals about a free world really been worthwhile? 

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