Perspective: Soldiers' choice -- fight or flight

Before he decided to desert, Justin Colby had served a year in Iraq as a medic, earning the Army Commendation Medal for exceedingly meritorious service for his work while under fire.

Toronto - Just before midnight July 4, 2006, as his fellow soldiers slept in the barracks, Justin Colby began to pack.

Fort Carson was quiet that time of night. Colby, two weeks shy of his 23rd birthday, felt his heart race as he stuffed clothes, a DVD player and his computer into a duffel bag. He left behind the fatigues, the bulletproof vest, the helmet, the trappings of a war he had signed up for but no longer believed in.

Colby's 2nd Infantry Division unit was heading west the next day for final training in California before being sent back to Iraq. But Colby went the opposite direction, driving 30 hours straight to his parents' house in rural Massachusetts, where he hid for two months before fleeing north to Canada.

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