My sister Jonna has lived a sheltered life.  I’ve typically been more of a risk-taking older brother, though we share the same values.  But that changed this week in Haiti.

She was working with a non-governmental organization dedicated to social uplift among Haitians when the deadly earthquake struck. Jonna and her partner Landon are both recent graduates of William and Mary University in Virginia.  When I myself joined the Army in 2003, I felt sure that I would be helping the people of Iraq.  As a teenager, Iraqis seemed to me to be poor and frightened people.  I remember arguing with Jonna, already a cultural relativist, that her pansy liberal approach to helping people was inferior to my military approach.  People don’t need solidarity, I argued, they need order.  Though I aspired as a big brother to be an example of courage and compassion to her, my experience in the Army taught me that soldiers and marines have less of these qualities than the average college girl.

When the earthquake struck, Jonna and Landon were staying in a local shanty in a poor section of town.  Contrast this to my experience in Iraq, where I stayed on a base surrounded by armed guards and fast food.  When I met the natives, it was either in full armor with my automatic weapon, or sitting behind a desk as they sat blindfolded and barefoot waiting to be questioned.  Compare her group, Haiti 2015, to the 99 percent of the U.S. military which doesn’t even speak the native language of Iraq. Compared to my peers in the U.S.

Army, the students in her group are experts on native history, politics and religion.

Consider that the entire yearly budget of Haiti 2015 is less than the cost of one of the thousands of up-armored vehicles being used in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Jonna and Landon were thrown to the ground, and watched buildings topple onto people all around them.  The home in which they were staying was destroyed instantly in the quake; all of their possessions were lost.  Nevertheless, within moments they began digging through rubble and helping the victims.  They set up a casualty collection, and used their clothing for bandages, helping hundreds of people.

The courage they demonstrated is unparalleled by anything I witnessed in the military. My little sister, the cultural relativist, and her boyfriend showed more courage and compassion in one night than my entire unit did in Iraq.  And as Jonna and Landon comforted the dying through darkness and aftershocks, the most powerful military in the world was nowhere to be seen.

For all the money that we pour into expensive weaponry, we have very little to show for it.  My little sister had neither equipment, nor training, nor protection; if she could teach a recalcitrant war-monger like me the real meaning of courage, doesn’t that make the military seem pretty worthless?

Jonna and Landon planned to spend their lives helping Haitians.  When I abandoned Iraq, I remember soldiers spitting on the Iraqi soil as if to say “good riddance.”  I want to tell

Jonna that she is a hero; that yellow ribbons and bumper magnets are meaningless next to her bravery. She has taught me that the greatest acts of good are those of compassion, respect and non-violence, and that you cannot help people if your hands are clutching a gun.

Evan Knappenberger is an Iraq war veteran with PTSD and depression living in Bellingham, Wash. His sister, Jonna Knappenberger is a college student and journalist living in central Virginia.