Not even after 20 years

Today I read an article talking about Colombian soldiers retiring after 20 years of service. Their greatest illusion: to be able to afford a home for their family. Can you imagine how ungrateful, poor, and miserable does a nation have to be to not be able to pay its own soldiers enough for a home after having given over half their life to the military? I think it is shameful, even more so by the fact that people there don't think of this as surprising or unusual; the country is is such bad shape that it is 'normal' to put your life on the line for 20 years and still get paid a subsistence salary. It makes me sick.