Edited for date specifics, as it seems to have got a couple of people excited.

Around 2000, I joined a regiment. I deployed to Bosnia about a year after.

My friend was called on to do a tour as an individual augmentee. This would have been around 2002, so first tour couldn't have been Iraq, and was possibly Kosovo.

A fax went out saying he couldn't go as he wasn't a volunteer and had a girlfriend. I saw this fax with my own eyes.

He was then told he was going on tour to Iraq 6 months later.

He claimed to be a conscientious objector, then became a Jehovah Witness, then went to his civilian doctor and got signed off for stress.

He eventually got kicked out.

20 years on, he's on Facebook, still plastered on with being ex army, despite never doing a tour and back when there was an expectation that you would do a tour. I was in for 5 or 6 years and did Iraq and Bosnia.

I still feel bitter about this.

I mean he hasn't exactly done well for himself, but it's the fact that he was happy taking the money, wearing the uniform until it was time to do his bit. And then some other poor bastard had to cover for him.

He contacted me 2 years ago, to go to Ukraine with him. I can't just give up my job, as I have responsibilities and financial security for my children. He hasn't got a job, called me a bottler. Then refused to go by himself without me holding has hand. I haven't even physically been near him for over 12 years.

Shouldn't I be over this by now?