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MANHATTAN — “I have plans, and I have backup plans,” explained retired Staff Sgt. Joe Pascanic, a former recruiter for the U.S. Army. “That’s one thing I learned in the military. Always have your Plan B, and your Plan C.”

“Plan D is called Unconditional Surrender, a.k.a. filing for Unemployment Insurance. We’re not gonna need to go there.”

Pascanic, 36, of Rahway, New Jersey, was looking for a new job in the civilian sector. The Times spent a day with him as he took the train from this blue-collar town into New York City to pound the fresh post-war pavement.

Pascanic is a medium-tall man, with blonde short hair and brown eyes, trim and nattily dressed in a professional, well-pressed, blue pinstriped suit. He thanked me for my compliments on his “civvies,” and said, “I’m very happy to be wearing them.”

He appeared lost in thought for a moment, and then shook off the reverie with a gruff statement.

“I have to say, however I felt about the war, I’m glad I don’t have that job anymore,” Pascanic admitted as we waited on the New Jersey Transit platform. “That was serious pressure.”

Indeed, while many antiwar activists denounced military recruiters as liars during the war, this time Pascanic was telling the truth. The Army’s strict and harsh quota system for recruiters made it one of the highest-stress jobs in America. As the war grew more bloody and news of “stop-loss” and other involuntary extensions of soldiers’ combat tours made it harder to get new recruits, rates of suicide, drug and alcohol abuse, divorce, and stress-related illnesses such as ulcers skyrocketed amongst Army recruiters.

“I used to say, the only more stressful positions are the ones they put you in at Abu Ghraib, those and the only more stressful occupation was the U.S. in Iraq.” Pascanic laughs a little, gives me a self-conscious glance, and says, “That was an after-work, at-the-bar kind of line, of course.

“I did get a lot of skills from it, though. Besides the working under pressure, I learned so much about marketing. It’s hard to fill your quota when that means getting kids to sign up to go fight in a shooting war. Trust me.”

“I mean right after September 11th, it was no problem, the product sold itself, so to speak. To go fight in Afghanistan, where the bad guys were, the ones who attacked us. I didn’t have to do any pitching, the kids came right to me in droves to sign up. The product made its own sauce. Just add water.”

As we got off the train and made our way on foot into the city, Pascanic warmed to the subject of his skills. He repeated some of his key advantages a few times, apparently rehearsing out loud the lines for his first job interview, at a medium-sized advertising firm in midtown Manhattan not far from Penn Station.

“Now obviously I had to develop massive marketing skills in my old job. Sometimes it was just in terms of what to focus on. So I want them to sign up to fight in Afghanistan? Now I happen to know from Military History class that the British and the Russians both lost in Afghanistan. Empires get bled to death in that place. Now that’s very interesting information, but is it helpful on the job? No, actually it’s counterproductive. So that doesn’t go in the patter. See? It’s not just what you say. It’s what you don’t say.”

And how did he feel about his chances at this job interview? As we entered the sleek lobby, he adjusted his cuffs and said “Hey, maybe my military service got me here to the target. But now I have to deliver the payload.” He spun on his heels and marched to the elevator.

Coming out forty-five minutes later, Pascanic seemed shaken. “They heard my pitch, but they’re really looking for guys with M.B.A.s from Ivy League colleges. They said they’d keep my resume on file. I think they were impressed with my recruitment rate, but I don’t know. I don’t think I should wait around for that phone call.”

We took a taxi down to Chelsea for our next stop, a real-estate firm where Pascanic was hoping to use his work experience to sell co-op apartments. He recovered his confidence and talked himself up as we rode. “I’ve sold people trips to Iraq! We’re talking about desert and urban guerrilla warfare. And they signed! Of course you have to promise them competitive job training, money for education, maybe insinuate they probably won’t ever go to a combat zone, or that they’ll all get assigned to be military journalists or photographers or whatever they’re interested in that sounds safer. But you’re also selling an adventure, a chance to be all you can be, be an army of one, be army strong. It’s a complicated mix of practical bread-and-butter promises and an appeal to the beautiful spirit in all of these kids, their desire to help, to protect, to be a real part of America. It’s tough, but you know what? You’re selling the American Dream. And that’s what I’d like to do as a real estate agent. Sell the American Dream of home ownership.”

And how did he feel about the fates of the people he’d convinced to sign up with misleading promises? Pascanic did not argue the facts — that veterans’ training yields them a lower rate of employment than their civilian peers, not higher; that only a small percentage of veterans ever qualify for the education funding due to hidden restrictions and costs; that military contracts include a catch-all disclaimer to nullify obligations the recruiter has promised.

“Let’s talk about this when I get out from this next interview. I’m not debating! I’m not denying! But I gotta make sure I’m at that front desk on time.” He grinned and jumped out of the taxi, jogging into the company’s front office.

Twenty-five minutes later, Pascanic came back out on the street, frowning. “They gave me a good listen, but they seemed a little offended. I wasn’t trying to compare selling open-ended trips to a war to selling studios to wealthy N.Y.U. students. But I might have come across that way. They didn’t think we’d be a good match.”

Former recruiter, Staff Sgt. Joe Pascanic, pages through job listings before an interview at a used car lot in Elizabeth, New Jersey.

Pascanic slowed his pace, then stopped, and asked if I’d mind if we went into the church we were passing. As we sat in the pews of the huge, solemn hall, he said, “About your question . . . yeah, sometimes I do think about my job and what I promised the kids, and what ended up happening to them.” He pointed at the ceiling and said, “And I wonder what He would think.”

“But I don’t know, you know, this is America, we’re all selling something, right? The President sold the country a war, wholesale; I just did the same thing at the retail level. But what am I gonna do now?” He looked around him at the relative sanctuary of the church. “Maybe I’ll get a job here. Maybe I’m not meant for the private sector. Maybe I can sell salvation. You know, I’d much rather sell Heaven and Hell than Iraq and Afghanistan. Because these products have stood the test of time. People still believe in them. And you know what? They’re for after you die, you don’t actually die in them. I can feel better selling that. How do you apply to be a priest?”

At that moment, Pascanic’s cell phone rang, piercing the silence. His ringtone, Bon Jovi’s In and Out of Love, played for several maximum-volume bars before he patted down his pockets, found, and answered the phone. At that moment, he snapped to attention and darted out of the church.

It was Chris Sorrentino calling. Sorrentino, 24, was one of Pascanic’s first recruits to go to Iraq, instead of Afghanistan as he’d expected, in 2003. He lost his right arm in an I.E.D. explosion five months into his deployment. Pascanic and Sorrentino had kept in touch.

Sorrentino was calling to offer Pascanic a sales job at his family’s used-car lot in Elizabeth, New Jersey.

This reporter, who felt solidarity with Pascanic because The Times, too, had helped to sell the war to the nation, paid for a car service to drive him to the lot. After a few minutes of friendly Jersey-boy small talk, vulgar ribbing and tasteless jokes, Pascanic had nailed the job. Since he was already wearing a dapper suit, Sorrentino’s father, Bill, put the former recruiter out on the lot immediately. Pascanic thanked me for the ride and said goodbye, studying the specs of the car inventory and rehearsing a new pitch under his breath as he marched off to the sales floor.

I asked Sorrentino if he bore any grudges against Pascanic for misrepresenting the reality of the war that had cost him his arm. Sorrentino hesitated, he frowned, shook his head, and answered “Well, I mean… yeah, I wish… but — hey, hey, hey … the war’s over.”