ABSTRACT
The Shahrur hospital stunk of iodine, fresh blood, and urine. Doctors and nurses hauled patients into surgery rooms and removed shrapnel with a cool professionalism and efficiency that were highly impressive, given the state of the hospital and the fact that there were no anesthetics. I watched as one physician scraped a disinfected Q-tip along a half-inch crease traversing the top of a young man's head, cleaning out the filth that follows hot lead. He was going to have a scar, but he was a fortunate lad: another half-inch lower, and the bullet would have torn his cranium apart.
