Cross's other character defect is his personal and emotional inability to lead Alpha Company. He jealously guards a photograph of Martha, a girl who is not his girlfriend, to maintain a strong link to love and his life at home. He fails to recognize, however, how love and war are connected, relying instead on his love for Martha as an escape from war. He cannot be both in love and in war; just as his relationship with Martha is a fiction, so is his ability to perform his soldierly duties. By loving, therefore, he actively resists his duty as a leader — he withdraws from leadership and Vietnam.
Cross is a foil to "O'Brien" because Timmy and Linda share a true love story and Cross and Martha do not. Martha is the object of Cross's sexual desire, Linda is not the subject of O'Brien's; Martha prevents Cross from being a soldier, Linda teaches Timmy about death. O'Brien's story is a true love story; Cross's is a war story; the primary function Cross serves in the novel is to demonstrate how sometimes stories are not cathartic, but sources of denial.
