Everyone reacts differently in their own way, and you might not be able to tell how a guy feels by the way he acts unless you're trainined to do so. I met a fellow over there who was depressed that he was the only troop in his team who didn't get a kill during the combat phase. I heard some of his guys ribbing him about it and laughing about how "the fat guy moved his head so you missed HA HA" or something like that. How any of them really feel is something only they know.
As for the remf part, normally this would throw a few BS points into his story, but in Iraq it's entirely possible. The war didn't really begin until it was over (as predicted), and there aren't any front lines for the remfs to be behind. Everyone gets shot at sooner or later, so yeah, it coulda happened they way he says it did.
