A group of US Marines made a terrible mistake and took on a bunch of Norwegian kids, which turned out to be a really, really bad idea.

In the U.S. Marines, doing amock war in the Norwegian city of Trondheim with the Dutch, Germans, and otherallies, training in urban combat. My infantry unit was positioned in a largesoccer field next to an elementary school. Keep in mind that there was noactual combat, even simulated; it was primarily just practicing maneuvers andtactics. However, we still looked out of place with weapons and gear, etc. It isFebruary. In Norway. Cold as hell. Snow up to our knees. Norway obviously hasno snow days, so the kids were all in school.

Anyway, Norway has this mostdelicious and amazing delicacy, which I have no idea what it’s called, but it’sbasically a bacon-wrapped hot dog; we just assumed it was called the Candy ofthe Lord. As Americans, we were naturally and instantly addicted. You find themat gas stations, and there just happened to be one on the other side of theschool where we were camped. A few of my fellow Marines and I requestedpermission to go to the gas station, and we set out on our way.

We arrived at the right spot,just about where the main entrance of the school was, and the doors opened; theschool was out. There were only a few kids, probably 6 or 7 years old.Lots of talking and laughing, gawking at us as we walked by, with our guns and giantridiculous snow suits. One precocious little guy made shooting noises at us. Wemade shooting noises back.

And then someone in my group. I do not know who. God help me, I do not know who…

Someone threw a snowball andhit a little girl in the leg.

Furthermore, those littleNorwegian children unleashed hell.

There was a shrill cry inunintelligible gibberish, and the doors to the school burst open. Schoolchildren flooded out like a never-ending flood of something that never ends.Screeching, smiling, sprinting – how the hell were they sprinting? – littlebastards were slinging snowballs faster than the laws of physics should allow.It was like that movie Elf. Suppose you can imagine riding in a fast car in asnowstorm and sticking your head out the window. Now imagine the snowflakesthat are hitting your face are the size of snowballs. We could not see a damnthing. We could not run. We could barely breathe. Holy hell….

We tried to return fire andthrew one, maybe two half-packed, crappy snowballs that fell apart in the air,arms flailing like limp-wristed fairies. I am from Texas. We were a unitstationed in North Carolina. We were so outmatched and out of our element itonly made them laugh harder. We were cut off from our main forces. We attemptedto execute a flanking maneuver, but they were too fast. I think some of themwere throwing rocks!

As for my comrades, I could seethem speed-waddling in their giant suits back to camp like a messed up pair ofwhite Teletubbies under withering fire. Screw tactics, screw me, screw theCandy of the Lord; this was survival! I was the slow one in the group. My snowboots were too big, but they were the smallest size they had at the Store,goddammit! My Marines had left me behind.

I tried pulling my hood over myhead and keeping my head down. No longer content to pelt my defenseless bodywith ballistic snow, the enemy swarmed me and dragged me down, cackling like apack of hyenas descending on a wildebeest. I tried to sling them off byspinning. I came out of one of my boots and fell. I began to scream and pleadfor them to stop, but they neither understood nor gave a single Nordic damn. They ally pinned me down with about five kids on each limb. It was then that I actually thought – oh sh*t. I am really in trouble. My snow-mittens wereripped off and flung into trees. They started shoving snow down my suit. Haveyou ever had anyone drop an ice cube down your shirt?

Well, now imagine someoneshoveling handfuls of ice cubes down your shirt. It literally shocked thebreath out of my body.

They left me lying like aFamily Guy accident victim, moaning and screaming in the cold. Rifle packedwith snow and dirt. The boot is buried somewhere. They ran away laughing, babblingin their crazy language. I lay there trying to figure out just what in thegreat American hell had happened.

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