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thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:50 AM
Memorial Held For 31 Troops
Associated Press
February 3, 2005

CAMP KOREAN VILLAGE, Iraq - U.S. Marines held a memorial Wednesday for 31 service members killed in the crash of a transport helicopter during a swirling sandstorm in Iraq's vast western desert - the U.S. military's single biggest lost of life here since the March 2003 invasion.

Filing past their fallen comrades' combat boots, rifles and helmets, Marines took turns kneeling in front of the display. One wept, burying his face into one of his hands. Others hugged each other.

One marine played "Taps" on a bright gold trumpet as hundreds of others stood in stiff salutes and two helicopter gunships flew overhead through a bright blue sky.

The CH53E Super Stallion transport helicopter crashed shortly after midnight on Jan. 26 during a fierce sandstorm near the Syrian border, killing 30 Marines and one Navy sailor.




The hulking aircraft was transporting Marines to this base near the Iraqi town of Rutbah for security operations in preparation of last weekend's elections. The cause of the crash is still under investigation, but officials have said it does not appear the helicopter was downed by hostile fire.

During Wednesday's memorial, a Marine strummed on a guitar before placing the instrument beside the row of upright rifles.

Most of the victims of the crash - 26 Marines and the sailor - were from Hawaii's Kaneohe Bay base. All had arrived in Iraq in September to support the U.S. military's siege on the former insurgent-base of Fallujah in November.

Ellie

http://images.military.com/pics/FL_marines_020305.jpg

thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:50 AM
Yale Can Block Military Recruiters
Associated Press
February 3, 2005

NEW HAVEN, Conn. - A federal judge has ruled that Yale Law School can block military recruiters from campus without fear of losing federal funding.

U.S. District Judge Janet C. Hall ruled Monday that a federal law requiring universities to let recruiters on campus violates the school's constitutional right to free speech.

School policy requires all recruiters to sign a nondiscrimination pledge, which the Pentagon has not done in light of the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy banning open homosexuality. Defense officials argued that federal law requires Yale to allow recruiters on campus even without signing the pledge.

With the government threatening to withhold hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding, Yale faculty members sued the Department of Defense last year.





Hall's decision echoes a ruling in November by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia in a case filed by other law schools. The Pentagon has said it will take that case to the Supreme Court.

In the Yale case, military officials said they were reviewing Hall's decision Wednesday and had no comment.

Immediately following the ruling, Yale's law school returned to its decades-old policy of banning military recruiters. The school temporarily halted that policy in 2002 to avoid losing federal funding.

"The military is free to make its own contact plans and recruiting efforts, but the Yale Law School cannot and will not give the military the assistance that it gives to employers that agree not to discriminate," said David N. Rosen, an attorney representing the school's faculty.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:50 AM
Women Provide Emotion At State Of Union
Associated Press
February 3, 2005

WASHINGTON - The mother of a soldier killed in Iraq and the daughter of a man killed by Saddam Hussein's regime found some comfort in each other's arms in a private moment that electrified President Bush's State of the Union address.

The two women, both touched by death in Iraq, reached out for each other as lawmakers, military leaders, the president and the nation watched. Their locked embrace inspired the longest applause of the evening.

Safia Taleb al-Suhail 's father was killed 11 years ago by the Iraqi intelligence service. Now the leader of the Iraqi Women's Political Council, she watched the annual presidential address Wednesday night at the Capitol as a guest of first lady Laura Bush.

She sat in front of Janet Norwood, who sent her son into battle wishing she could "protect him like I had since he was born."

In a letter to the president, Norwood said Marine Corps Sgt. Byron Norwood was proud to fight, loved his job and wanted to protect the nation.

"We have said farewell to some very good men and women who died for our freedom and whose memory this nation will honor forever," Bush said.




Pain etched lines in Norwood's forehead as she held a woman who won the freedom to vote in Iraq's election on Sunday. Norwood finally let go, took her husband's arm and rested her head on his shoulder.

The Iraqi woman had been applauded earlier when she stood and waved an purple-ink-stained finger and V-for-victory sign after being introduced by the president as a symbol for millions of Iraqis who voted in a free election for the first time last Sunday.

Lawmakers honored those elections with a show of purple, the color that marked the index fingers of Iraqis who voted.

A wave of purple fingers went up at each mention of the Iraqi vote, a gesture organized by Rep. Bobby Jindal, R-La., to demonstrate solidarity with Iraqi voters. In a letter to fellow lawmakers, Jindal said he wanted to display support for "people throughout the world who seek freedom."

Some women traded traditional red and blue garb for suits that spanned a spectrum of purple, from lavender to violet. A few men sported purple ties.

"In any nation, casting your vote is an act of civic responsibility," Bush said of the election. "For millions of Iraqis, it was also an act of personal courage, and they have earned the respect of us all."

Democrats also praised the election, but pushed the Bush administration to improve security and transfer governing authority to the Iraqis.

"We have never heard a clear plan from this administration for ending our presence in Iraq," said House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:51 AM
12 Iraqi Soldiers Killed In Ambush
Associated Press
February 3, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq's interim prime minister declared on Wednesday that the success of the national elections had dealt a major blow to the insurgents. But in a clear sign militants plan to continue their attacks, 12 Iraqi soldiers were killed in an ambush in northern Iraq.

The Iraqi troops were returning to the northern city of Kirkuk, where they guard oil facilities, when armed men ambushed them Wednesday near the village of Zab, Maj. Gen. Anwar Mohammed Amin said Thursday.

The ambush was the deadliest attack since Sunday's general elections. A U.S. Marine and two Iraqis who work on a U.S. military base were also killed in separate attacks.

In another sign of potential trouble, a major Sunni clerical group declared that Sunday's elections "lack legitimacy" because many Sunni Arabs did not participate, saying the new government would have no mandate to guide the nation's future.

That suggested problems remain in reconciling with the Sunni Arabs, who comprise about 20 percent of Iraq's 26 million people but form the core of the insurgency.




Nevertheless, both Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and his major Shiite Muslim rivals reached out to the Sunnis, promising them a major role in drafting the new constitution even though many shunned the ballot - either out of fear of rebel attack or opposition to the electoral process.

"Definitely the Sunni Muslims will take part in the government and will have a role in the drafting of constitution," Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, head of the main Shiite political faction, told The Associated Press.

Allawi, a secular Shiite backed by the Americans, told Iraqi television that the elections, which drew large turnouts except in Sunni insurgent strongholds, constituted a "major blow to all forces of terrorism."

He noted that attacks by Sunni insurgents had fallen dramatically since the elections but it was unclear whether the drop was the start of a trend. Insurgent activity also slowed after the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqis in June but picked up weeks later. Allawi spoke before the 12 Iraqi security forces were killed.

"They might be reorganizing themselves and changing their plans," Allawi said of the insurgents. "The coming days and weeks will show whether this trend will continue ... But the final outcome will be failure. They will continue for months but this (insurgency) will end."

Following the election, U.S. military planners hope to shift from offensive operations against the insurgents to training Iraqi forces to do the job. Still, U.S. troops are continuing offensive operations, arresting four suspected rebels in northern Iraq and killing a suspected member of an al-Qaida-linked group northwest of Baghdad, the U.S. command said Wednesday.

Three days after the balloting, the Iraqi election commission has still not released any results or turnout figures, promising them with a week. Political sources say the ticket endorsed by the Shiite clergy was expected to win the largest share of the 275 National Assembly seats. Tickets led by Kurdish politicians and by Allawi also were running strong.

Al-Hakim, the head of the Shiite ticket, suggested Wednesday that his group would insist on the prime minister's post, saying his faction had several qualified candidates. That could mean Allawi might lose his job in the new administration if the Shiite ticket ends up with more than half the Assembly seats.

Still, the new government's ability to reconcile with disaffected elements in the Sunni community is considered the key to stability and to enabling the 170,000 mostly American foreign troops to leave.

The U.S. military on Thursday said a member of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force was killed in combat in the western Anbar province on Wednesday. At least 1,436 American service members have been killed in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion.

Also Thursday, gunmen opened fire on a car carrying Iraqis who work on a U.S. military base in Baqouba, north of Baghdad, killing two passengers, police and hospital officials said.

In its first official statement since the ballot, the Sunni clerical Association of Muslim Scholars, which had called for an election boycott, said the new government would lack legitimacy because many Sunnis stayed home on election day.

The association said the new government would lack the mandate to draft a new constitution - one of the major duties of the new National Assembly.

"We cannot participate in the drafting of a constitution written under military occupation," said association spokesman, Mohammed Bashar al-Feidhi.

Despite statements by Sunni hard-liners, Allawi met with leaders of the 16 major political factions to discuss plans for the new government. The group included two of the leading Sunni politicians - President Ghazi al-Yawer and elder statesman Adnan Pachachi - and Finance Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, a Shiite mentioned as a possible prime minister.

Allawi said he would meet Thursday with representatives of groups that did not take part in the elections but names of the participants were not released.

Iraqi politicians were relieved that the elections went off without major violence, despite rebel threats to "wash the streets in blood." More than 40 people were killed in eight suicide bombings and about 100 attacks on polling stations, but the level of violence was not extraordinary for a people hardened by years of war, repression and terrorism.

U.S. and Iraqi officials attributed the success to a massive security operation, which included tens of thousands of soldiers and police on the streets, a ban on most private vehicles, closing the borders and extended curfew hours. Those measures have since been relaxed.

Encouraged by the election success, the police chief in the city of Mosul, Gen. Mohammed Ahmed al-Jubouri, gave insurgents two weeks to hand in their weapons or he would "wipe out any village" that gave them shelter.

Mosul has been tense since insurgents rose up in November in support of militants under siege in Fallujah, west of Baghdad. The entire 5,000-member police force deserted before U.S. and Iraqi troops regained control.

Despite the lull in major attacks, insurgents blew up an oil pipeline Wednesday near the central city of Samarra, police said. The pipeline serves domestic power stations in Baghdad and Beiji and does not affect exports.

Four civilians were killed Wednesday in a drive-by shooting in Iskandariyah south of Baghdad, police said. The motive was unclear.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:51 AM
Soldier Says Abu Ghraib 'Deplorable'
Associated Press
February 3, 2005

FORT HOOD, Texas - Conditions at the Abu Ghraib prison were so "deplorable" that rats and wild dogs were a common sight and edible food and water were scarce, a witness testified Wednesday in the penalty phase for a soldier who has pleaded guilty to abusing detainees.

Army Maj. David Dinenna, a leader of Sgt. Javal Davis's military police battalion, testified that Abu Ghraib was a bleak and volatile place for the thousands of detainees and their vastly outnumbered guards.

"It was filthy, with rodents, rats, wild dogs and trash and an overpopulation of prisoners," said Dinenna. There were frequent mortar attacks and prisoner flare-ups.

Davis, 27, a reservist from Roselle, N.J., pleaded guilty Tuesday to battery, dereliction of duty and lying to Army investigators as part of a deal with prosecutors on the eve of his scheduled trial.

The former guard faces a maximum 6 1/2 years in prison for his crimes, but defense lawyer Paul Bergrin has said that the plea deal caps Davis's sentence at 18 months.





Capt. Chuck Neill, a prosecution spokesman, said the jury's sentence recommendation will be compared to the deal offered to Davis, and the lesser sentence will be served.

Earlier in the hearing, prosecutors played a tape for the nine-man Army jury in which Davis responded to questions from the judge on Tuesday about what he did to seven handcuffed and hooded prisoners in November 2003.

In the tape, Davis admitted he stepped on the hands and feet of detainees and that he later fell with his full weight on them.

Davis said he knew his actions were wrong and that the abuse was not carried out as part of an approved regimen prior to interrogation, as other accused Abu Ghraib guards have claimed.

He said he saw prisoners being physically mistreated and sexually humiliated, but that he failed to help them or report the abuse, as required under military law. He also admitted lying to an Army investigator by denying his misdeeds.

Davis also spoke of dangers faced by guards at Abu Ghraib, including prisoners armed with homemade knives. He blamed a high level of stress for his wrongful acts.

However, under cross-examination, Dinenna agreed that guards at other U.S.-run detention facilities in Iraq faced similar conditions but didn't abuse prisoners as a result.

The recording was the only evidence offered by prosecutors during the sentencing phase, which is scheduled to take at least two days.

Bergrin has said he will likely call Davis to testify, and he will present videotaped testimony from three Iraqi detainees who say Davis treated them well.

Five other soldiers have already pleaded guilty in the case and been sentenced. Two others - Spc. Sabrina Harman and Pfc. Lynndie England - still face trial.

The only case to reach trial was that of Pvt. Charles Graner, described as the abuse ringleader. Graner was convicted in January and sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:52 AM
Dod Plans To Link Pay And Performance
Federal Computer Week
February 3, 2005

Defense Department officials will change their civilian personnel system during the next few years, affecting how hundreds of thousands of civilian workers are hired and paid.

Pentagon officials are preparing to use a new land of pay and job classification system for 600,000 civilian employees.

The first phase of the National security Personnel System (NSPS) is called Spiral One, which will affect 300,000 U.S.-based Army, Navy, Air Force and DOD agency civilian employees and managers. It is scheduled to start next summer as one of Defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld's initiatives to transform the military to better meet 21st-century needs.

The system will be a "simplified personnel management system that will improve the way we hire and assign, as well as compensate and reward, our employees," said Mary Lacey, program executive officer for NSPS.

It also will provide DOD with a "modern, flexible and agile human resources system that can be more responsive to the national security environment while enhancing employee involvement, protections and benefits," Lacey said in a Dec. 14, 2004, letter to workers.





Lacey and other officials say the current system needs to be improved because it is more than 50 years old. It sets pay scales based on specific skills and gives raises based on seniority rather than merit. DOD officials intend to begin giving merit raises later this year.

NSPS would give Rumsfeld more flexibility in hiring, classifying, paying, promoting and firing employees. It would bypass aging employee management policies and make it easier to hire technical employees and scientists, often some of the most difficult people to find and retain.

Rules for the new system will be published first in the Federal Register. There will be a public comment period before final rules are implemented.

Aspects of the system already have drawn union protests. Pentagon officials have indicated that they want to limit appeals and reduce collective bargaining powers.

A coalition of more than 30 national unions representing DOD employees is keeping an eye on activities in the coming months to make sure workers do not lose benefits. They have held rallies nationwide.

"If the government is truly interested in changing some of the antiquated or burdensome procedures that reduce DOD's global effectiveness and its ability to accomplish critical mission requirements, working with unions that represent DOD workers is the best way to succeed with such a monumental undertaking," said Jim Hoffa, general president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

Banding together

Defense Department officials are proposing a major overhaul of the personnel system for their civilian employees. Under an approach known as pay banding, they would abandon the General Schedule pay grade system that covers most federal employees in favor of assigning DOD's civilian positions to broad occupational groups and pay levels.

Officials would also establish minimum qualifications for positions. They argue that the approach would simplify the process of classifying and filling jobs.

In addition, pay raises would reward performance rather than seniority.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:52 AM
News From Iraq…Military Style <br />
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February 2, 2005 <br />
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by Thomas D. Segel ...

thedrifter
02-03-05, 09:06 AM
February 02, 2005

Marine recruiters come up short in January

By Gordon Lubold
Times staff writer


Marine Corps recruiters fell short of a critical recruiting goal in January, breaking a winning streak of nearly a decade and setting the stage for the possibility of bigger problems in the months ahead.
Recruiting officials acknowledged Feb. 1 that they did not meet their contracting quota for January, the first time recruiters missed that goal in 114 consecutive months.

Marine Corps Recruiting Command officials fell 87 applicants short of their goal of signing up 3,270 enlistees, according to Maj. Dave Griesmer, a spokesman for the command at Quantico, Va.

The command’s monthly contracting goal is a “self-imposed, adjustable planning target,” Griesmer noted, used to gauge mission accomplishment.

The contracting goal differs from the Corps’ more critical “shipping” goal, the number of Marine applicants who actually are shipped to the service’s recruit depots to begin basic training each month.

The Corps is exceeding that goal, shipping 102 percent of its year-to-date goal of 10,038 enlistees, Griesmer said.

In a wide-ranging interview with Marine Corps Times reporters and editors Feb. 2, Commandant Gen. Mike Hagee addressed the shortfall, saying he isn’t worried about one month’s missed goal. He thinks the Corps will make its overall fiscal 2005 recruiting goal, he said.

“I’m not concerned about January,” Hagee said. “Am I concerned about going ahead? Yeah. It is becoming much more difficult.”

Hagee said that while the Corps missed its contracting goal for January, it had exceeded the contracting goal in the previous month. Overall, Corps recruiters are reaching their goals, Hagee said.

“In December, we shot a birdie,” said Hagee, a golfer. “In January, we shot a bogie. The way I add it up, we’re still at par.”

Still, it’s the first time recruiters have missed any goal since the early 1990s, and if recruiters continue to miss contracting goals in the months ahead, it could affect their ability to “bank” applicants in the so-called “start pool” that they tap into to help meet recruiting goals during leaner months.

While other services occasionally have struggled to make recruiting quotas over the years, the Corps has consistently met or exceeded its recruiting goals, publicly lauding an effective marketing and recruiting approach that emphasizes self-improvement and “intangible” qualities such as honor, courage and commitment over material benefits such as money for college.

While it’s not hard to convince a young man or woman to join the Corps, it’s becoming much more difficult to get their parents on board, Hagee said. Applicants younger than age 18 must obtain parental consent to join the military. But parents of applicants who don’t require consent can discourage their children from joining, too.

Recruiters in the 1st Marine Corps District are feeling that pinch. The recruiting district, based in Garden City, N.Y., missed its own January contracting goal, contributing to the overall missed target. The district contracted only 554 out of the required 722 enlistees, or 77 percent of the goal, according to Capt. John Caldwell, a district spokesman.

The district, which in the past has been one of Marine Corps Recruiting Command’s powerhouses, covers the New England states, New York and Pennsylvania.

While the missed January goal is a challenge, Caldwell said recruiters are confident they will meet their goals by the end of the year despite the temporary setback.

“Recruiting is a marathon, not a sprint,” Caldwell said.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 09:47 AM
February 07, 2005

Numerous causes reported in Iraqi crashes



Here is a listing of the fatal helicopter crashes in the Iraq war:

Jan. 26, 2005: A CH-53E Super Stallion transport helicopter crashed in bad weather in western Iraq, killing 30 Marines and one sailor.


Dec. 10, 2004: An AH-64 Apache attack helicopter collided with a UH-60 Black Hawk that was on the ground at an air base in Mosul, killing two soldiers and injuring four.


Oct. 16, 2004: Two OH-58 Kiowa helicopters crashed in southwest Baghdad, killing two and wounding two. It was unclear whether hostile fire brought the aircraft down.


Aug. 11, 2004: A Super Stallion crashed during a night combat logistics run in Iraq, killing two Marines.


April 11, 2004: Gunmen shot down an Apache attack helicopter in western Baghdad, killing its two crew members.


Feb. 25, 2004: A Kiowa crashed in a river west of Baghdad, killing the two crew members on board. A witness saw a missile hit one of two helicopters in the area.


Jan. 23, 2004: A Kiowa crashed near the northern town of Qayyarah, killing the two pilots. The cause of the crash was unclear.


Jan. 8, 2004: A Black Hawk medevac helicopter crashed near Fallujah, killing all nine soldiers on board. A witness said a rocket hit the craft’s tail.


Jan. 2, 2004: A Kiowa was shot down near Fallujah, killing its pilot and wounding another soldier.


Nov. 15, 2003: Two Black Hawks crashed in Mosul, killing 17 soldiers and injuring five. The military said the helicopters collided during a likely rocket-propelled grenade attack.


Nov. 7, 2003: A Black Hawk was downed near Tikrit, apparently by a rocket-propelled grenade, killing all six on board.


Nov. 2, 2003: A Chinook transport helicopter was shot down near Fallujah, killing 16 and injuring 26. The military believed an SA-7 shoulder-fired missile struck an engine.


May 19, 2003: A CH-46 Sea Knight transport helicopter crashed shortly after takeoff in the Shat al-Hillah Canal in Hillah, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, killing four Marines. Another Marine drowned trying to rescue them. The crash appeared to be accidental.


May 9, 2003: A Black Hawk crashed near Samarra, killing three soldiers, in an apparent accident.


March 20, 2003: A Sea Knight crashed in Kuwait, about nine miles from the Iraq border, killing eight British troops and four Marines. No hostile fire was reported in the area.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 10:11 AM
Eleventh-hour liver donation saves OIF veteran from certain death
Submitted by: MCAGCC
Story Identification #: 200522171042
Story by Sgt. Jennie Haskamp



MARINE CORPS AIR GROUND COMBAT CENTER, Twentynine Palms, Calif. (Jan. 31, 2005) -- “He needs a liver soon, if this is going to be a happy ending,” Dr. Donald Hillebrand said to television news crews Jan. 28. “He is slowly dying upstairs; we need a liver if we’re going to get him through this.”


Hillebrand, the medical director for liver transplants at Loma Linda University Medical Center, made that plea to the community two days after Marine Lance Cpl. Christopher LeBleu was admitted to LLUMC’s intensive care unit, diagnosed with unexplained acute liver failure.


LeBleu, a 22-year-old Lake Charles, La., native, and member of 3rd Battalion, 7th Marines, returned from Iraq in September, married his hometown sweetheart in October, and fell sick in December.


Preliminary tests indicated LeBleu's liver failure may have been caused by viral hepatitis, but more analysis will be needed before the exact cause is known, said LLUMC staff.


LeBleu was jaundiced and swollen Thursday, but still answered questions with one-word answers. His condition deteiroated and octors placed him on a ventilator shortly before Hillebrand appeared before cameras.


“We’re looking at hours now, days at the most,” said Hillebrand.


Someone out there grieving the loss of a loved one has the chance to save someone else’s life, Hillebrand continued.


“Organ donation is the right thing to do—the Christian thing to do,” he said, telling reporters he first registered as an organ donor at 16.


LeBleu’s parents, friends and members of his command held vigil with his wife as precious hours and days passed without a donor.


Doctors said without the liver transplant, LeBleu’s survival rate was as low as 15 percent.


“I know he can hear me, so I tell him I love him every time I visit him,” said his wife, Melany, 21 years old and also from Lake Charles. “I keep telling him how strong he is, and how good he is doing, and that everyone is praying for him.”


Saturday morning, Melany asked for a priest to come and anoint her husband.


Commander Bill Devine, chaplain, 1st Marine Division, came to the hospital at the request of LeBleu’s battalion commander, Lt. Col. Matthew Lopez.


“I knew when Father Divine was made aware of the situation that he would be there right away,” said Lopez. “That's just the kind of man he is--he has always been there when the battalion needed him.”


Devine arrived in a few short hours. After spending time with the family he spoke with the ICU staff and a dozen of LeBleu’s family and friends were allowed into his hospital room, each required to wear a sterile robe and rubber gloves.


Devine leaned over LeBleu’s bed and spoke to him.

“Your family’s here, and all your friends, and we’re all gonna take some time to pray with you,” said Devine, a Boston native. “You just listen to our prayers. We know that you can’t pray, and you can’t talk. That’s OK. We’ll do it for you.”


With his hand on LeBleu’s shoulder, Devine kept speaking to the young man he rememberd from Mass in Iraq.


“Chris, just put yourself in God’s hands,” he said. “We know that God is going to come to you in a special way, and let you know that he’s right here with you. Chris, you just continue to fight.”


“‘Is there anyone sick among you? Then let him call to the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, and anoint him in the name of the Lord,’” said Devine, reading from the Bible.


Before Devine anointed LeBleu with the same oil he’d used in Iraq to anoint Marines and Sailors from LeBleu’s unit, among others, he gave everyone in the room a chance to pray for LeBleu.


“Lord, this man laying here is like a brother and a son to me,” said Capt. Brad Tippett, LeBleu’s former company commander. “I know he is so much more to you.”


Crying, Tippett continued his fervent prayer.


“Father, I pray that you heal this man,” he prayed. “Mortal hands can’t do this, Father. Lay your divine hands upon him.”


After the emotional ceremony, many of the group sobbed openly as they left the ICU ward. Removing their sterile garments, they comforted each other in the hallway and waiting room.


Just hours later, the call came in that a possible donor had been located, and members of the LLUMC staff left to assess the liver that might save LeBleu’s young life.


The liver deemed acceptable, LeBleu was taken into surgery at 6 Sunday morning, and a whole new wait began.


The mood in the waiting room was more cheerful than in recent days.


LeBleu’s stepfather, who raised him from the age of eight, shared a story with friends in the room.


“Blake’s not sure why we’re all worried,” said Eric Lamendola, referring to his 11-year-old son, still at home in Lake Charles. “He told his uncle, ‘He’s been through tougher things than this. Chris has been to war. He’ll be all right.’”


As word of the donor spread, the crowd in the private waiting room grew to more than 30 family members, friends and well-wishers.


Just before 4 p.m. on Sunday, a team of surgeons came to speak to the family. The doctors, who’d operated on LeBleu for more than 10 hours, were greeted with a standing ovation as they entered the waiting room.


“There were no complications, and we’re pleased with the procedure,” said Dr. Okechukwu Ojogho, one of three surgeons who’d operated on LeBleu.


“We must all continue to pray for Christopher,” cautioned Ojogho. “The next few days are very important, and he is still in very critical condition.”


Ojogho told the family they could call him with any questions they had, saying none were too big, too small or too often.


After hugs from LeBleu’s wife and mother, Susan Lamendola, the doctors left the group to celebrate the first victory in LeBleu’s battle for life.


Melany stood to address the room, a broad smile on her face.


“Thank you so much for all of your support,” she said. “Prayers do work.”


After a hug from her mother-in-law, she continued.


“It means so much that because of all of you and God, Chris will still be here with me,” she said, breaking into tears.


LeBleu’s battalion chaplain, Lt. Dave Slater, offered a prayer of thanks.


“God of grace and love and wonder,” he said, with all heads in the room bowed. “For many many days to come, we’ll thank you for your wondrous acts.”


Slater prayed for the family that, in the midst of their grief, made the gift that saved another life.


That sentiment was shared the next day, at the hospital’s press conference.


Though it was an anonymous donor, Melany LeBleu repeatedly offered thanks to the family that gave her husband a second chance at life.


“We don’t know who they are, and that’s fine,” she said to the crowd of reporters in the room. “I want to tell them that my deepest sympathies go out to them, that they had to lose a family member for my husband to live.”


Melany continued, thanking the doctors, the staff, the Marines and all of the well-wishers across the nation.


“I know it’s their job, and they know it’s their job,” she said, looking at the doctors sitting next to her, “but I want to thank them.”


Given the chance to address the nation, Lamendola echoed his daughter-in-law’s thanks.


“We have a lot to be thankful for; for the condition Chris is in now,” he said. “We want to emphasize to other people here about organ donation because if it hadn’t been for the whole system they have set up, Chris wouldn’t be here today. We hope to draw more attention to it. There is someone out there who lost someone, and they’re the people we really need to thank. They have given us Chris back.”


Doctors said given time, LeBleu was expected to make a full recovery.


“He has some recovering to do, but all indications show he will return to a near normal quality of life; he’ll be the Chris his friends and family knew,” said Hillebrand.


Though his Marine received the donation he needed to survive, Lopez vowed to continue to make people aware of the plight for organ donations.


“I have always told my wife to donate whatever is needed when I die,” said Lopez, back at work in Twentynine Palms after spending several days at the hospital with LeBleu’s family. “I had no idea how great the volume of need is for organs. This is a problem that can be solved through education.”


Lopez emphasized that this is everyone’s concern, not just a family immediately in need of a donation.


“Lance Cpl. LeBleu is one of our Marines. We take care of our own—Marines also take care of those on our flanks,” he said. “Now we owe it to all those who helped save his life to do everything we can to help solve this problem. We can start with educating our own Marines and the Marine Corps family. The Marine Corps family runs deep. In my book the transplant community was just added to our extended 3rd Battalion, 7th Marines family.”


Learn more about organ donation at http://www.unos.org or http://www.llu.edu/llumc or call
1-800-338-6112.

http://www.usmc.mil/marinelink/image1.nsf/Lookup/200522173059/$file/LeBleu-compare-for-web.jpg

To show staff and visitors at Loma Linda University Medical Center’s Intensive Care Unit what he looks like healthy, a boot camp portrait lays on Lance Cpl. Chris LeBleu’s bed in the ICU. In less than a month, LeBleu, a Lake Charles, La., native went from healthy to showing signs of fatigue and sickness to being diagnosed with acute liver failure. LLUMC staff changed his survival from four weeks to a matter of days as his conditioned declined. A donor liver was located Jan. 29, and surgeons spent 10 hours removing and replacing his diseased liver Jan. 30.
Photo by: Sgt. Jennie Haskamp


Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 10:32 AM
February 02, 2005

Judge rules Yale can ban military recruiters

Associated Press


BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — A federal judge has ruled in favor of Yale Law School faculty members who sued Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in an effort to block military recruiters from campus.
U.S. District Judge Janet C. Hall, in her ruling Monday, found the government unconstitutionally applied the Solomon Amendment which allows the secretary of defense to deny federal funding to colleges if they prohibit or prevent military recruitment on campus.

The decision means that the law school will be able to turn military recruiters away for the first time in two years to protest the government’s ban against gays serving openly in the armed forces.

“We don’t want to run a law school where outsiders can come in and discriminate against our students based on race, religion, national origin or sexual orientation,” Yale Law School Dean Harold Hongju Koh said Tuesday.

Yale became one of the first law schools in the country to include gays in its non-discrimination policy, in 1978. For two decades, to protest the government’s discrimination against gays, the law school refused to let military recruiters participate in its interview program.

In the months following Sept. 11, 2001, the Pentagon threatened to cut billions in federal aid to Yale and other schools that were refusing to allow recruiters.

Yale had more than $320 million in federal aid in jeopardy and the faculty at Yale Law School agreed to waive the non-discrimination policy for military recruiters.

However, in October 2003, they filed a lawsuit against Rumsfeld, claiming that their free-speech rights were being violated.

Hall’s ruling follows one by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia, which found that universities have a First Amendment right to keep the recruiters away because of their biases. It also said higher educational institutions could do this without fear of losing federal money.



Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 10:32 AM
February 02, 2005

Navy claims immunity in suit over midshipman’s death

Associated Press


PHILADELPHIA — A federal judge has dismissed a wrongful death lawsuit filed against the Navy by the family of a Naval Academy student killed in a fall from his dormitory window.
Midshipman John Paul Ruggiero, 20, of Gouldsboro, Wayne County, tumbled 53 feet from a window at the academy in Annapolis, Md., following a night of off-campus drinking in August 2002 to celebrate the start of a new academic year.

Navy lawyers argued that the suit is barred by a doctrine that protects the military from being sued over injuries to servicemen and servicewomen on active duty.

The rule was generally intended to prevent military commanders from being hauled into court for ordering troops into dangerous situations, and lawyers for the family have argued that it shouldn’t apply to Ruggiero’s death.

In his Jan. 20 ruling that dismissed the family’s lawsuit, U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo wrote that Ruggiero “would not have fallen from his window ... had it not been incident to his status as a midshipman at the United States Naval Academy.”

The family’s Wilkes-Barre attorney, David Tomaszewski, said that he would appeal to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Department of the Navy rejected the family’s initial claim, which tried to hold the military negligent for failing to install safety devices and procedures. The family said that the nearly floor-to-ceiling windows in the dormitory were unsafe, and that the window in their son’s room lacked a screen.

A Navy investigation determined Ruggiero had a blood-alcohol content of 0.11 percent when he died and ruled the death accidental. At the time, the legal blood-alcohol limit for driving was 0.08 percent in Maryland and 0.10 percent in Pennsylvania.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 11:27 AM
Iraqi Army surprises 3/4 with its tactical improvement <br />
Submitted by: 1st Marine Division <br />
Story Identification #: 20052235341 <br />
Story by Lance Cpl. Paul Robbins Jr. <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
FALLUJAH, Iraq (Jan. 25,...

thedrifter
02-03-05, 11:29 AM
One State of the Union Moment
By Gene Harper
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3, 2005 -- Two women provided the most touching moments during President Bush's State of the Union address Feb. 2.

They had so much, yet so little in common. Destiny -- and a bit of planning -- brought them together in a testament to America's fight against global terrorism.

American Janet Norwood and Iraqi Safia Taleb al-Suhail were seated with the president's wife, Laura Bush, in the House chamber perched above the ground- floor level where the president was delivering his speech to Congress. Al- Suhail was next to the first lady; Norwood, with her husband, Bill, was directly behind al-Suhail.

The president followed modern custom by introducing his special guests at opportune moments during his address. First, the spotlight shone on al-Suhail. The president called her "one of Iraq's leading democracy and human rights advocates."

"She says of her country," he said, "'We were occupied for 35 years by Saddam Hussein. That was the real occupation. Thank you to the American people who paid the cost, but most of all to the soldiers.'"

The senators, representatives, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other Cabinet members, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other invited guests heard Bush relate how Saddam's intelligence service assassinated al-Suhail's father 11 years ago. "Three days ago in Baghdad, Safia was finally able to vote for the leaders of her country," Bush noted, "And we are honored that she is with us tonight."

Amidst thunderous applause, al-Suhail stood and alternately waved her index finger and gave the two-fingered Iraqi peace sign, her hand visibly shaking all the while.

Bush continued his speech, laying out successes and challenges facing Iraq, and then talked about the Norwoods.

He said that the Norwoods had traveled from Pflugerville, Texas, to represent their late son, Marine Sgt. Byron Norwood, killed in action on Nov. 13, 2004, in the fierce battle of Fallujah, Iraq, to wrest control of the city from insurgents.

"His mom, Janet, sent me a letter and told me how much Byron loved being a Marine and how proud he was to be on the front line against terror," the president said, "She wrote," he continued, 'When Byron was home the last time, I said that I wanted to protect him, like I had since he was born.'

"He just hugged me and said, 'You've done your job, Mom. Now it is my turn to protect you.'"

Bush then introduced the couple, who were both moved by the extended applause they received. Janet especially could barely contain her emotions, her lip quivering and eyes watering.

Then came the defining moment: Al-Suhail turned around and embraced Janet. People nearby and the millions of television viewers around the word could clearly see Janet clutching her son's military dog tags as she hugged al- Suhail. There they were -- the ultimate symbols of the war against terrorism, liberated citizen and grieving mother, representing the burdens and hopes of democracy.

But there was more: To add to the poignant symbolism of this unfolding drama, as the two women parted, the dog tags became entangled in al-Suhail's clothing. Janet Norwood carefully freed them. All the while, applause continued, with the president and first lady still looking on proudly.

"In these four years, Americans have seen the unfolding of large events," Bush continued after the assembly had just witnessed the symbolic hug. "We have known times of sorrow and hours of uncertainty and days of victory. In all this history, even when we have disagreed, we have seen threads of purpose that unite us."

Janet Norwood and Safia Taleb al-Suhail are the literal embodiment of that purposeful unity.

"The attack on freedom in our world has reaffirmed our confidence in freedom's power to change the world," Bush said. "We are all part of a great venture: to extend the promise of freedom in our country, to renew the values that sustain our liberty, and to spread the peace that freedom brings."


Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 11:51 AM
A Day to Remember
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
The New York Times
Feb. 3, 2005

As someone who believed, hoped, worried, prayed, worried, hoped and prayed some more that Iraqis could one day pull off the election they did, I am unreservedly happy about the outcome - and you should be, too.

Why? Because what threatens America most from the Middle East are the pathologies of a region where there is too little freedom and too many young people who aren't able to achieve their full potential. The only way to cure these pathologies is with a war of ideas within the Arab-Muslim world so those with bad ideas can be defeated by those with progressive ones.

We can't fight that war. Only the Arab progressives can - only they can tell the suicide bombers that what they are doing is shameful to Islam and to Arabs. But we can collaborate with them to create a space in the heart of their world where decent people have a chance to fight this war - and that is what American and British soldiers have been doing in Iraq.

President Bush's basic gut instinct about the need to do this is exactly right. His thinking that this could be done on the cheap, though, with little postwar planning, was exactly wrong. Partly as a result, this great moment has already cost America over $100 billion and 10,000 killed and wounded.

That is not sustainable because the road ahead in Iraq is still long. We have to proceed with more wisdom and more allies. But proceed we must, and now we can at least do so with the certainty that partnering with the Iraqi people to build a decent consensual government is not crazy - it's really difficult, but not crazy.

But wait - not everyone is wearing a smiley face after the Iraqi elections, and that is good, considering who is unhappy. Let's start with the mullahs in Iran. Those who think that a Shiite-led government in Iraq is going to be the puppet of Iran's Shiite ayatollahs are so wrong. It is the ayatollahs in Iran who are terrified today. You see, the Iranian mullahs and their diplomats like to peddle the notion that they have their own form of democracy: "Islamic democracy." But this is a fraud, and the people who know best that it's a fraud are the ayatollahs and the Iranian people.

When any Iranian reform candidate who wants to run can be vetoed by unelected ayatollahs, and any Iranian newspaper can be shut by the same theocrats, that is not democracy. You can call that whatever you want, but not democracy. They don't allow bikinis at nudist colonies and they don't serve steak at vegetarian restaurants, and theocrats don't veto candidates in real democracies. The Iraqi Shiites just gave every Iranian Shiite next door a demonstration of what real "Islamic" democracy is: it's when Muslims vote for anyone they want. I just want to be around for Iran's next election, when the ayatollahs try to veto reform candidates and Iranian Shiites ask, Why can't we vote for anyone, like Iraqi Shiites did? Oh, boy, that's going to be pay-per-view.

Then there is Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. This Charles-Manson-with-a-turban who heads the insurgency in Iraq had a bad hair day on Sunday. I wonder whether anyone told him about the suicide bomber who managed to blow up only himself outside a Baghdad polling station and how Iraqi voters walked around his body, spitting on it as they went by. Zarqawi claims to be the leader of the Iraqi Vietcong - the authentic carrier of Iraqis' national aspirations and desire to liberate their country from "U.S. occupation." In truth, he is the leader of the Iraqi Khmer Rouge - a murderous death cult.

The election has exposed this. Because the Iraqi people have now made it clear that they are the authentic carriers of their national aspirations, and while, yes, they want an end to the U.S. presence, they want that end to happen in an orderly manner and in tandem with an Iraqi constitutional process.

In other words, this election has made it crystal clear that the Iraq war is not between fascist insurgents and America, but between the fascist insurgents and the Iraqi people. One hopes the French and Germans, whose newspapers often sound more like Al Jazeera than Al Jazeera, will wake up to this fact and throw their weight onto the right side of history.

It's about time, because whatever you thought about this war, it's not about Mr. Bush any more. It's about the aspirations of the Iraqi majority to build an alternative to Saddamism. By voting the way they did, in the face of real danger, Iraqis have earned the right to ask everyone now to put aside their squabbles and focus on what is no longer just a pipe dream but a real opportunity to implant decent, consensual government in the heart of the Arab-Muslim world.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 11:53 AM
Rob a Country Club, Go to Baghdad <br />
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- <br />
by Meir Rinde - February 3, 2005 <br />
The Hartford Advocate <br />
<br />
Imagine if the...

thedrifter
02-03-05, 12:06 PM
Service pays tribute to Marine
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February 03, 2005
ERIC STEINKOPFF
DAILY NEWS STAFF

About 250 people packed the Camp Lejeune Protestant Chapel on Wednesday - a brotherhood of military police officers who greeted each other with vigorous slaps on the back and momentary hugs.

Amid the sea of green and desert camouflage uniforms, families with young children and about a dozen special agents from the Naval Criminal Investigative Service gathered to pay their respects to fallen military policeman Sgt. Andrew Farrar Jr., who was electrocuted Friday while on a foot patrol in Iraq. He leaves behind a wife, Melissa, and two sons, Tyler and Liam.

A lone Marine sergeant in full dress blues stood at attention next to a pair of tan desert boots. An M-16 rifle stock pointed into the air, topped with a brown camouflage helmet and desert goggles propped on the forehead. A pair of ID tags hung on a silver chain from the pistol grip, the bayonet buried in a stand on the floor.

At the base was a tan armband reading "military police" in English and Arabic.

"We gather in grief this afternoon to remember a fellow Marine who has fallen," said 2nd Military Police Battalion Navy Chaplain Lt. Cmdr. Larry Jones, 53, a Southern Baptist minister from Swansboro. "God help us to honor the courage and sacrifice of Sgt. Andrew Farrar."

The service was filled with Christian hymns and poignant scriptural readings from the Old and New Testaments. One by one, Farrar's peers and supervisors addressed the crowd, describing him as a professional Marine who shared what he knew with the troops and inspired them with his leadership.

"He taught me everything I know about the field side of MP work," said Staff Sgt. Sonny Medina, 29, a military policeman from Denver, Colo. "He always had a real calm about him. Every single Marine respected Sgt. Farrar and listened to what he had to say."

Cpl. Charles Bigham, 27, a military policeman from Fredericktown, Mo., joined the unit in January 2003 and just 11 days later they deployed to Iraq for Operation Iraqi Freedom I.

"The first person I met was Sgt. Farrar - two years ago to this day," Bigham said. "He was always the first one up and the last one to go to bed, to take care of everyone else."

Second Military Police Battalion commander Lt. Col. Rich Anderson, 44, from Moorhead, Minn., described Farrar as a man of few words, a man of action who stayed calm in the face of an ambush, a man who ran toward the sound of gunfire.

"It has been my honor and privilege to be his battalion commander," Anderson said. "Marines followed him - not for his size or stature, but for the thought of disappointing him."

"He knew no fear, (and) we honor his courage and sacrifice. The success of the Iraqi elections was because of men and women like Sergeant Farrar."

Following the playing of "Taps," those in attendance filed out slowly, expressing their condolences - sometimes though painful sobs - to the Farrar family.

"As his brother, I felt I owed it to the rest of his (Marine) brothers to come down and thank them for being there for him," said 24-year-old Nathan Farrar.

"I appreciate the service and pay tribute to all those who have served," said his dad, Andrew Farrar Sr. "Not only my son, but those who have sacrificed - past and present - are heroes. (My hope) is that their service does not go unnoticed."


Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 01:19 PM
Iraqi woman, Marine's mom share moment


By Joseph Curl
THE WASHINGTON TIMES


None of the 5,056 words President Bush uttered last night in his State of the Union address was as moving as a simple hug between an Iraqi woman who voted for the first time and the mother of a U.S. Marine who died fighting to give her that privilege.
The powerful moment, a snapshot of the sacrifices Americans have made to free Iraq from dictator Saddam Hussein, came near the end of the president's address as he introduced the parents of Sgt. Byron Norwood of Pflugerville, Texas.







Sgt. Norwood was killed Nov. 13 by sniper fire during the assault on the terrorist stronghold of Fallujah, Iraq.
"His mom, Janet, sent me a letter and told me how much Byron loved being a Marine, and how proud he was to be on the front line against terror," Mr. Bush said in the hushed House chamber.
He quoted Mrs. Norwood's letter.
"When Byron was home the last time, I said that I wanted to protect him like I had since he was born. He just hugged me and said: 'You've done your job, mom. Now it's my turn to protect you.' "
Choking back his emotion, Mr. Bush said: "Ladies and gentlemen, with grateful hearts, we honor freedom's defenders, and our military families, represented here this evening by Sergeant Norwood's mom and dad, Janet and Bill Norwood."
The parents stood and acknowledged the thunderous applause.
Just then, Safia Taleb al Suhail, who was seated one row in front of them in the balcony guest box of first lady Laura Bush, turned and reached up to Mrs. Norwood. The two embraced as the applause grew to a crescendo.
The president, visibly moved, looked up from the podium as the seconds stretched to a full minute — the longest applause of the evening.
As the women broke their embrace, they became momentarily tangled. Mrs. Norwood reached down to the cuff of Mrs. al Suhail's sleeve and untwisted her son's dog tags, which she had worn to the address. They had become caught on a button.
The moment followed the president's praise of Mrs. al Suhail, the leader of the Iraqi Women's Political Council, who had flown to the United States after voting Sunday in Iraq.
"She says of her country, 'We were occupied for 35 years by Saddam Hussein. That was the real occupation. Thank you to the American people who paid the cost, but most of all to the soldiers,' " Mr. Bush said.
"Eleven years ago, Safia's father was assassinated by Saddam's intelligence service. Three days ago in Baghdad, Safia was finally able to vote for the leaders of her country — and we are honored that she is with us tonight," the president said.
Mrs. al Suhail stood and held up an ink-stained index finger — voters had their fingers dipped in purple ink to prevent multiple voting. As she waved to the crowd, she held up another finger, making the peace sign.
When Mr. Bush said, "We will succeed because the Iraqi people value their own liberty — as they showed the world last Sunday," more than 100 lawmakers stood and held up their own index fingers, which they had dyed purple in a gesture of solidarity with Iraqi voters.
One of the soldiers who made possible the vote and the purple fingers was Sgt. Norwood, who joined the Marine Corps in 1998 and was killed while fighting during "Operation Phantom Fury," the assault on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah.
Family and friends described Sgt. Norwood as a "rambunctious teenager," who played trumpet in marching band and jazz band at Pflugerville High. He was known for his "hilarious" impression of comic actor Jim Carrey.
From an early age, he had wanted to be a Marine. After enlisting in the Corps, he told his parents he would "place my life in God's hands so that I can concentrate on being the best Marine I can be."
At the time of his death, Sgt. Norwood was serving as part of a combat team operating two armored Humvees with the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, in house-to-house fighting in Fallujah. He was 25 and on his second tour of duty in Iraq when he was killed.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 01:41 PM
Insurgents Ambush 50-Strong Iraqi Police Convoy

By Gideon Long

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi insurgents staged a major ambush on a road near Baghdad Thursday, killing two policemen, wounding 14 and leaving at least 16 missing on the worst day of violence since last Sunday's election.


The attack came a day after guerrillas in the north dragged Iraqi soldiers off a bus and shot 12 of them dead, and suggests the country's 22-month-long insurgency is far from over, despite its failure to stop last weekend's vote.


Police said insurgents attacked a police convoy Thursday between Diwaniya, 180 km (112 miles) south of Baghdad, and the capital. Police initially feared 36 were missing but reduced the number as some began returning to Diwaniya.


U.S. forces sealed off the site of the ambush, near the Abu Ghraib area on Baghdad's western fringes. Police said some of the wounded were treated in hospital in Diwaniya.


At least a dozen civilians were also killed in Thursday's bloodshed, the worst this week.


Iraq (news - web sites)'s policemen and soldiers are increasingly bearing the brunt of insurgent attacks as U.S. troops try to assume a back seat role in preparation for an eventual withdrawal from the country they invaded in March 2003.


National security forces are widely perceived to have done a good job in preventing carnage during Sunday's ballot, when millions of Iraqis braved insurgent threats and voted in their freest election in half a century.


But they have yet to capture one of the insurgency's key figures -- Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of al Qaeda in Iraq and the man behind many of the worst atrocities.


Interior Minister Falah al-Naqib said his forces had come close to catching him two or three times in recent weeks.


"I think we arrived a bit late. Maybe we missed him by one hour ... (but) we will get him -- very soon, hopefully," Naqib told Pentagon (news - web sites) reporters in a videoconference from Baghdad.


In Wednesday's bus attack near the northern oil city of Kirkuk, militants pulled 14 police officers off their bus and killed 12 of them with a bullet to the head. The other two escaped to a nearby village.


Two U.S. Marines were also killed Wednesday in Anbar province west of Baghdad, a hotbed of anti-American militancy.


The deaths took the number of U.S. military and Pentagon personnel killed in action in Iraq since the invasion of March 2003 to 1,103. Including non-combat deaths the toll is 1,439.


PERILS OF VOTING


In a reminder of the perils of voting in Iraq, militants shot dead two civilians Thursday in a car near the town of Balad, north of Baghdad. Local police said the victims had been singled out because they had voted.


At least 10 other civilians were killed in a spate of attacks across the country, the police and army said.


A roadside bomb killed three near the central town of Ishaaq and a Turkish truck driver was killed on a road between the northern cities of Baiji and Mosul.





South of Baghdad, near the largely Shi'ite town of Hilla, gunmen drew up alongside the car of a local government official and shot him dead before escaping.

Hospital sources said U.S. troops killed three Iraqis in the rebellious Sunni city of Ramadi and police said militants killed two men suspected of working at an American base north of Baiji.

Final results of Sunday's poll have yet to be announced and officials say it could be another week before they are.

With around 1.6 million votes counted from Baghdad and five mostly Shi'ite southern provinces, the main Shi'ite block had polled more than three quarters of votes cast.

A list headed by Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi was second on around 20 percent.

Officials cautioned, however, that Shi'ites had been expected to score well in those provinces and the figures should not be seen as representative of the entire country.

"Only God Almighty knows the final figures," electoral commissioner Safwat Rashid told a news conference. "We are still in the process of counting."

Representatives of the Sunni Arabs, only 20 percent of Iraq's population but dominant under Saddam, look certain to have fared badly, raising fears they will not be adequately represented in the new 275-member national assembly.

Many Sunni parties boycotted the vote, saying it was tainted by the U.S.-led occupation. Some said their supporters had been unable to vote as they lived in areas where insurgency is rife.


Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 02:00 PM
Two Marines Killed in Iraq's Anbar Province
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3, 2005 -- Two Marines assigned to 1st Marine Expeditionary Force were killed Feb. 2 while conducting security and stability operations in Iraq's Anbar province.

The names of the deceased are being withheld until next of kin are notified.

Meanwhile, in Mosul, Iraqi Maj. Gen. Ahmad Kalif Mohammed al-Jaburi, chief of police in that northern Iraq city, negotiated the release of 84 individuals from the custody of multinational forces Feb. 2. An investigation had found they were not "active member participants in the terrorists' minority," according to a Multinational Force Iraq statement.

The individuals were turned over to Mosul police at the Task Force Freedom Detention Center in southern Mosul and later released back to their families.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 03:09 PM
DoD Seeks People With Language Skills, Regional Expertise
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3, 2005 — If you speak a foreign language or have the desire and aptitude to learn one, Uncle Sam wants you.

The Defense Department is on the lookout for people with language skills to support not only current operations, but future ones as well, according to Gail McGinn, deputy undersecretary of defense for plans.

And just as important as language skills, she said, is an understanding of other countries' geographies, cultures and people.

The military has the greatest language and cultural expertise in four primary languages: German, French, Spanish and Russian, McGinn said during an interview with the Pentagon Channel. But when the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, thrust the United States into the war on terror, the department simply didn't have enough linguists fluent in Arabic or in Dari and Pashtu, the languages of Afghanistan, she said. Similarly, she said, DoD has come up short on linguists for other areas of the world that have attracted increased U.S. interest during the war on terror.

McGinn said the revelation has been described as a "Sputnik moment." When the Soviets launched Sputnik, the first satellite, in 1957, the United States quickly began promoting math, science and language in its schools so it could play catch-up.

Similarly, after 9/11, the United States recognized its language deficiencies for certain parts of the world. "The global war on terror … made us realize that we need these capabilities, and we need people to have these skills," she said.

Language and cultural skills help servicemembers interact with the local people, McGinn said. Civil affairs specialists and interpreters deployed throughout Iraq are demonstrating the value of those skills daily as they interact with local citizens and their leaders.

But if more servicemembers had language skills, the operational payoff could be tremendous, she pointed out. For example, when coalition troops were headed north toward Baghdad at the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom, what if the local people had information they wanted to share? And what if the U.S. troops wanted to warn them about something, or to diffuse a situation?

"I think you can see, just from that set of activities, how important it is to have the ability to communicate in the language of the country that you're in," McGinn said.

To help boost language skills within the military, McGinn said, DoD has launched or plans to introduce several new initiatives:

-- Increased the Defense Language Institute's budget by more than $50 million to go toward curriculum development and improved foreign language testing, to develop more "crash courses" for developing troops, and to begin training students to higher levels of proficiency.

-- Received legislative authority to increase foreign language proficiency pay for military linguists from the current high of $300 a month to a top rate of $1,000.

-- Pays stipends to college students involved in regional studies and language studies who agree to seek jobs within the U.S. national security establishment, through the National Security Education Program.

-- Established the National Flagship Language Initiative, in which colleges and universities offer advanced language training in Arabic, Korean, Chinese and Russian to students who agree to work for the national security establishment.

-- Initiated a pilot program within the Army encouraging Iraqi Americans to join the Individual Ready Reserve, providing a pool of Arabic linguists, ready when needed. Of more than 200 people recruited through the program, 44 have deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan and another 19 are awaiting deployment.

-- Will survey members of the current force, both military and civilian, to determine who has language skills that could prove useful in current or future operations.

-- Issued a white paper encouraging the United States to promote the emphasis placed on language skills nationwide.

-- Promoted the development of technology with language and translation software.

-- Is considering establishing a database in which American citizens can register their language skills or sign up for a civilian linguist reserve corps that could contribute to national language requirements as needed.

McGinn said these and other initiatives under consideration will help the United States better position itself for future military operations, wherever in the world they occur. "We're working on a lot of those initiatives to try to … anticipate the unanticipated," she said.

She sees the new initiatives as solid first steps in changing the importance DoD places on foreign language skills.

"This is really more than just finding linguists and people with the ability to speak languages," she said. "It's a transformation in the way language is viewed in the Department of Defense — how it is valued, how it is developed and how it is employed."

Integrating foreign language and regional expertise into the military mindset will have far-reaching implications, McGinn said, affecting "the way we conduct operations and the way we conduct ourselves in the world."

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 03:12 PM
Marine General Counseled for Comments

WASHINGTON - The commandant of the Marine Corps said Thursday he has counseled a senior subordinate for saying publicly, "It's fun to shoot some people."


Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis, an infantry officer who has commanded Marines in both Afghanistan (news - web sites) and Iraq (news - web sites), made the comments Tuesday while speaking to a forum in San Diego about strategies for the war on terror. Mattis is the commanding general of the Marine Corps Combat Development Command in Quantico, Va.


According to an audio recording of Mattis' remarks, he said, "Actually, it's a lot of fun to fight. You know, it's a hell of a hoot. ... It's fun to shoot some people. I'll be right upfront with you, I like brawling."


He added, "You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil," Mattis continued. "You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them."


Thursday, Gen. Mike Hagee, commandant of the Marine Corps, issued a statement saying, "I have counseled him concerning his remarks and he agrees he should have chosen his words more carefully."


"While I understand that some people may take issue with the comments made by him, I also know he intended to reflect the unfortunate and harsh realities of war," Hagee said. "Lt. Gen. Mattis often speaks with a great deal of candor."


Hagee also praised Mattis, calling him "one of this country's bravest and most experienced military leaders."


He said the commitment of Marines "helps to provide us the fortitude to take the lives of those who oppress others or threaten this nation's security. This is not something we relish, yet we accept it as a reality in our profession of arms."


He said he was confident Mattis would continue to serve.


According to Mattis' biography, he commanded, as a lieutenant colonel, an assault battalion during the first war with Iraq. During the war in Afghanistan, he commanded the 1st Marine Expeditionary Brigade; in the second war in Iraq, he commanded the 1st Marine Division during the invasion and early period after the war.


Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 03:30 PM
Navy, Marines may see title tout equal billing
Published Tue, Feb 1, 2005

By MICHAEL KERR
The Beaufort Gazette
Marines and Navy sailors have long served side-by-side on ships and battlefields across the globe, and a proposed congressional resolution may soon give the two military branches equal billing in their department's title.
U.S. Rep. Walter B. Jones, R-N.C., has introduced a resolution to rename the Department of the Navy the Department of the Navy and Marine Corps, giving the corps the representation he said it deserves.

"There isn't a subordinate relationship between the Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandant of the Marines Corps," Jones stated in a news release last month. "They are equivalent parts of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and it is time that the Department of the Navy recognizes their equal status."

The Marine Corps is a division of the Department of the Navy, although the National Security Act of 1947 defines the corps, Army, Navy and Air Force as four services given statutory missions and indicates that the corps is a legally distinct service within the department.

The Navy and Marine Corps are both deserving of recognition in the department title, said U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., who represents Beaufort and sits with Jones on the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, where the resolution was introduced.

"This has been an initiative, a long-time initiative, of Congressman Walter Jones of North Carolina, and I have favored this as it came up in the committee," Wilson said. "I believe, first of all, it's respectful to the Navy but also indicates the significance of the Marine Corps. I mean it as a tribute to both."

A similar resolution was attached to the House Defense Authorization Bill last year, but died in conference, Wilson said, adding that he thinks it has a better chance of passing this year.

"It may have just surprised some of the senators (last year)," Wilson said. "This is the type of issue that will grow on you."

Wilson said he has spoken to Secretary of the Navy Gordon England, whose title would also likely change if the resolution is adopted, with England telling the congressman that he had no official stance on the issue.

During a trip last October to Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, the secretary said that he'd be proud to be called the Secretary of the Navy and Marine Corps.

Contact Michael Kerr at 986-5539 or mkerr@beaufortgazette.com.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 03:47 PM
Browns donate Super Bowl tickets to Marines
MARK LONG, AP Sports Writer

Wednesday, February 2, 2005

02-02) 23:51 PST JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) --

As he recovered from a wound in Iraq, Marine Lance Cpl. Michael Berninger figured he would watch the Super Bowl on television and cheer for his New England Patriots.

It turns out that he will have a much better seat for the game.

The Cleveland Browns have donated Super Bowl tickets to 50 U.S. Marines who recently returned from Iraq and Afghanistan or are about to be deployed for active duty in those nations.

"I have never been so surprised and grateful for a gift like this, even on Christmas morning," said Berninger of Martha's Vineyard, Mass. "I am definitely a New Englander and have never been to a college game or an NFL game, let alone the Super Bowl. I can't wait to go root on my team."

The Browns' donation -- Super Bowl tickets are priced at $500 and $600 apiece -- will go to Marines currently serving at Camp Lejeune, N.C.; Parris Island, S.C.; Reserve Command in New Orleans and U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Fla. The donation is an extension of the club's "Hats Off to Our Heroes" program that honors members of the military.

"It was a wonderful act to see an organization that appreciates the contributions these young Marines are making to our country," said Col. Jim Walker, secretary to the commandant of the Marine Corps. "This will truly be a special event for Marines who otherwise never would have thought about attending a Super Bowl."

The Browns have a special connection to the Corps. Late owner Al Lerner was a first lieutenant in the Marines from 1955-57. The club flies the Marine flag outside its team offices in Berea, Ohio, participates in the "Toys for Tots" program and Marine jets do ceremonial fly-overs as part of pregame festivities during the season.

"This is but a small gesture for some of the men and women of our country who have so selflessly devoted themselves to the service of our nation," the club said in a statement.



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^SINGING QBS:@ Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger and Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana, along with other NFL stars, hope to match their football prowess with their singing ability for the Super Bowl.
The current and former players collaborated to sing "Tomorrow" from the Broadway musical "Annie," and the rendition will air as a 60-second commercial during the game.

A similar commercial featuring Cowboys owner Jerry Jones and coach Bill Parcells aired last year.

Others singing this year include: Tampa Bay coach Jon Gruden, Cincinnati coach Marvin Lewis and receiver Chad Johnson, New York Jets running back Curtis Martin, Tennessee quarterback Steve McNair, Dallas safety Roy Williams, Minnesota quarterback Daunte Culpepper, and Jacksonville quarterback Byron Leftwich and offensive lineman Ephraim Salaam.



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^SHIPS ARRIVE:@ The first two mammoth cruise ships chugged into port Wednesday to provide floating hotel rooms for Super Bowl visitors who far outnumber available accommodations in the city.
The city signed contracts with three cruise lines to park five ships as temporary hotels on the St. Johns River for five days beginning Thursday. They range from the Radisson Seven Seas Navigator with a capacity of 490 passengers to the Carnival Miracle with room for 2,680.

The city paid $11.5 million to rent them to help accommodate some of the more than 100,000 people expected to visit. They will mostly house NFL employees and VIPs from top league sponsors.

Super Bowl planners say the more than 3,600 rooms the cruise ships will provide gave the city the minimum 17,500 required by the NFL to host the event. Rooms aboard the ships are $300 to $400 per night.

Three more cruise ships are scheduled to arrive Thursday, planners say. Two more privately chartered cruise ships will round out the Super Bowl fleet.



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^GENEROUS CHUCK:@ Former NFL coach Chuck Knox is donating $1 million to his alma mater, Juniata College, to endow the Dr. Charles R. and Shirley A. Knox Chair in History. The one-time coach of the Rams, Bills and Seahawks graduated from the Huntingdon, Pa., school in 1954 and was on the college's board of trustees from 1978-1999.
Knox was co-captain of Juniata's first undefeated team in 1953 and compiled a 186-147-1 record in 22 seasons as an NFL head coach.



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AP Sports Writer Tom Withers in Cleveland contributed to this report.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 04:56 PM
CASUALTIES



Marine finds solace after losing crew

By Sean D. Hamill
Special to the Tribune
Published February 2, 2005


For the last six months, ever since an anti-tank mine exploded under his vehicle in Iraq killing five of his six crew members, Marine Sgt. Nick Santiago has carried a heavy weight.

Although seriously injured in the July 6 bombing, Santiago was burdened until Jan. 18, when he finally got to meet the families of three of the five Marines under his command.

"I guess it helped me with closure with a lot of things, knowing the families didn't hold anything against me, or [think] that it was my fault,' said Santiago of the meeting at the unit's base at Camp Lejeune, N.C., prior to a memorial service for the 53 members of 2nd Marine Division who have died in Iraq or Afghanistan.

It was important to Santiago, who is still recovering from a left leg fracture and shrapnel wounds, that he got to share stories with their family members.

"I just wish I could take you back there so you could see my boys in action," he said.

Of the seven-man crew, the unit commander, Santiago, 24, from Hinesville, Ga., was the oldest. In the vehicle with him was Lance Cpl. Gabriel Wakonabo, 23, from Bemidji, Minn., who suffered only minor injuries and was able to continue serving in Iraq.

The crew, members of the Delta Company Outlaws, as the unit was known, had already been on more than 200 patrol missions when they left for another one at 3 a.m. July 6.

They were on patrol outside Fallujah when a bomb blew up under the vehicle, instantly killing four of them. A fifth member died from his injuries July 21.

Driving the light-armored vehicle was Lance Cpl. Justin T. Hunt, 22, of Wildomar, Calif., who had fought a battle to get into the Marines.

More than a year after graduating from high school, he decided to join the military, only to find out that at 360 pounds, he was too heavy for his 5 foot 11 inch height.

To get to the required 207 pounds, one of four Marine sergeants from the nearby recruiting station came to his home every morning to run and worked out with him every afternoon.

"I wasn't sure he could do it," said his mother, Debbie. "But I've never seen him this dedicated."

Ten months later, Hunt headed off to boot camp at a svelte 205 pounds. After three months, he graduated at 175 pounds.

Joining the Marines also transformed another scout in the unit, Lance Cpl. Mark E. Engel, 21, of Centennial, Colo., though not physically.

The athletically built Engel, also the unit's mechanic, lacked focus all through school.

"He could be disrespectful and shoot his mouth off," said his father, Bill. "But in the Marines, he really found himself."

The day Engel graduated from boot camp, his father said Engel spent about eight hours talking with his parents. "We spent more hours that one day together than in the previous five years," his father said.

There was no transformation necessary for Lance Cpl. Scott E. Dougherty, 20, of Bradenton, Fla., the gunner on Santiago's vehicle.

Standing 5 feet 4 inches tall, Dougherty was known as "Baby D" by his fellow Marines, an ironic acknowledgment that despite his size, they knew he was as tough as anyone, Santiago said.

After moving to Bradenton his sophomore year in high school, Dougherty joined the Junior ROTC at Bayshore High School.

"If you listen to the code for the Marines, and see their drills, it's like my son was born to be this," said his father, Kevin.

Pfc. Rodricka Antwan "Rah" Youmans, 22, of Allendale, S.C., also in Santiago's vehicle, had a lot on his mind as his fiance was expecting a baby.

The couple were expecting their second child and had started planning their wedding for when he returned from his tour.

Youmans, whose second son, Rodricka Jr., was born two weeks after he died, joined the Marines after tiring of trying to find a job to support his family.

"It wasn't something I wanted him to do," said Stephanie Cuthbertson, his fiance.

Cuthbertson said she'll collect all the memories she can fthrough scrapbooks, videos and stories so his children will "get to know their father."

The team scout leader in Santiago's vehicle was Cpl. Jeffrey D. Lawrence of Tucson, Ariz., who, knowing his wife was due soon, was giddy as the unit got ready to head out on patrol.

"I remember before going out on patrol, he was excited," Santiago said. "He was saying, `As soon as she has the baby, I'm gonna quit smoking."'

Although he came from a long line of military men, Lawrence could have gone in several different directions after graduating in the top 10 percent of his high school class.

He was an actor in school and had already lined up a modeling job in an LL Bean catalog, said his father, Daniel.

"We tried to get him to go to college," said his father, a member of the Air National Guard and a Vietnam veteran.

His wife, Celeste, was due to deliver their daughter, Cadence Freedom on July 4 and was overdue two days when told her husband had died.

Celeste Lawrence is also collecting memories of her husband for her daughter, born July 10.

"When she gets old enough, I'll take her back to North Carolina ...," she said. "I'll tell her that he was a hero and he went over there fighting for his country."


Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 05:26 PM
Hallmark 'America Supports You' Bouquet Honors Troops <br />
Submitted by: American Forces Press Service <br />
Story Identification #: 20052191236 <br />
Story by Ms. Samantha L. Quigley <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
WASHINGTON (Jan. 31,...

thedrifter
02-03-05, 06:57 PM
After Death, a Struggle for Their Digital Memories

By Ariana Eunjung Cha
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 3, 2005; Page A01

Stationed in a remote corner of Iraq, Marine Corps reservist Karl Linn's only means of communicating with the outside world was through a computer. Several times a week, the 20-year-old combat engineer would log on and send out a batch of e-mails and update a Web site with pictures of his adventures.

For his parents in Midlothian, Va., the electronic updates were so precious that when he was killed last week in an enemy ambush, one of the first things they did was to contact the company that hosted their son's account. They wanted to know how to access the data and preserve it.

But who owns the material is a source of intense debate.

Linn's father, Richard, said he believes the information belongs to his son's estate, just like his old high school papers, his sweaters and his soccer ball, and should be transferred to the next of kin. The e-mail and Web hosting company, Mailbank.com Inc., said that while it empathizes with the family's situation, its first priority is to protect the privacy of its customers. It refuses to divulge any information about the accounts.

As computers continue to permeate our lives, what happens to digital bits of information when their owners pass away has become one of the vexing questions of the Internet age. Much of that data are stored in accounts on remote servers and have no physical manifestation that can be neatly transferred. There are no clear laws of inheritance, meaning that Internet providers must often decide for themselves what is right.

Many Internet firms have found themselves facing criticism no matter what they do. If they decline to release the information, they are labeled villains by people supporting the families. If they give it up, they are chastised for violating their own privacy statements.

Complicating such disputes is the very nature of e-mail, which many consider to be more personal and informal than regular letters; some even use it to correspond anonymously, to hide aspects of their lives they may not want revealed to others.

"The difficulty is that there's no clear morally right or wrong," said Michael Froomkin, a professor of Internet law at the University of Miami.

Official policy varies from company to company. Many of the larger e-mail and Web site providers, such as America Online, MSN Hotmail, Google's Gmail and EarthLink, allow for the transfer of accounts upon death with proper documentation, but plenty of others do not. Yahoo, for instance, over the past few weeks has found itself under fire for refusing to allow a Michigan father, John Ellsworth, whose son died in Iraq in November, to access his son's e-mail.

Mary Osako, a spokeswoman for Yahoo Inc. in Sunnyvale, Calif., which manages about 40 million accounts, said that "our hearts go out to the Ellsworths and any family that suffers from a tremendous loss such as this." But, she added, "the commitment we've made to every person who signs up for a Yahoo Mail account is to treat their e-mail as a private communication and to treat the content of their messages as confidential."

After Death, a Struggle for Their Digital Memories


What a company can and cannot do when it comes to the release of digital information often comes down to the language of the "terms of service" agreement it has with customers. Some firms explicitly state that they will not share information while others do not address the issue. The fact that Internet accounts are by their nature contracts raises questions about whether they can be owned.

"We might wish that our Web-based e-mail accounts were like our books and diaries, but they certainly aren't for most legal purposes," said Cindy Cohn, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a think tank in San Francisco.

E-mail accounts can hold an array of personal material, from banking and e-commerce records to notes passed among friends and family, providing a unique window into someone's life. Online journals, known as blogs, and personal Web sites also often offer intimate portraits of their authors, and not all of the material is necessarily viewable to the public.

For some family members of military officers killed in Iraq, retrieving these digital relics has become an important part of mourning their loved ones.

Take Karl Linn's Web page. Linn, who was buried yesterday, was a small guy (when he first went into basic training his commanders were so worried about his 5-foot, 6-inch, 125-pound frame that they put him on double rations) with big ideas (he had a full-tuition scholarship to Virginia Commonwealth University, where he was in his second year as a mechanical engineering major). He was always the tinkerer, and his site, www.karl.linn.net, reflected that.

In a text message on the main page, he apologized for the "improvised" look. "Below you will find what I have to share in the way of news from the front or whatever's on my mind."

Mostly, he used the page to post pictures. One showed the view down the Euphrates River from 10 stories up on the Haditha Dam where his unit was stationed. Another showed him sitting in a Humvee with full battle gear as he prepared to go on patrol.

His father, Richard Linn, 51, who is in software sales, said his son told him he had been working on another Web site at the time of his death, and Richard Linn hopes some of the information is still in the account. He believes his son may have stored some sketches he was making about his designs and inventions related to small arms and robotics.

"I think computer accounts are part of personal effects and I have power of attorney. It wasn't like he didn't trust me to take care of his affairs, and I know what I should or shouldn't be reading," Richard Linn said.

Eric Boustani, legal counsel for Mailbank.com, which is based in Reno, Nev., declined to comment on individual customers but said it is the company's policy to "support absolute privacy of our clients." He said the company is eager to help families download public information on the Web site but believes that by releasing non-public account information like a password or things that have not been published yet, there's "as much potential for harm as there is for good in that situation."

The family of Army Spec. Michael J. Smith had no more luck getting access to his Web page.

The singer from Media, Pa., who dropped out of high school to join a local heavy metal band, had been recording his thoughts in a blog for three years when he arrived in Iraq last fall with the 2nd Infantry Division. He died Jan. 11 when his vehicle was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, and his father has a pending request to get access to both the public and private portions of his son's online journal on LiveJournal.com, where the 24-year-old infantryman wrote poetry about his experiences on Iraq, his love of music and life in general.

In one of his last entries, dated Dec. 31, Smith noted that he had had close calls with three roadside bombs, been in eight firefights and had mortars lobbed in his direction more times than he could count.

As for Iraqis, he said, "the people seem nice, some of the time. i've had lunch with one family, and i've detained another."

When news of his death spread through the blogging community, more than 700 people posted messages thanking Smith, who went by the online alias "wolfmoon98," for sharing his insights and for his service to the country.

Smith's father, James H. Smith, 63, who works for an electronics retailer, hasn't read the blog because he said it would be too painful at this time, but he's hoping to take possession of the postings for later.

"Maybe not right away, but someday I'd like a chance to read what he had to say," he said.

LiveJournal community site supervisor Jesse Proulx said that the company's policy is "to never transfer an account between individuals, regardless of the situation" but that it does offer families of deceased customers other options. The next of kin could request that the account be deleted or preserved to serve as a memorial where people can post their condolences and tributes.

"It's the most ideal solution for all involved -- our liability, the user's privacy and the next of kin's wishes," Proulx said.

Meanwhile, the family of Marine Lance Cpl. Justin M. Ellsworth, 20, who died on Nov. 13 in Iraq in the restive city of Fallujah, is continuing to fight Yahoo over its refusal to give them access to the Mount Pleasant, Mich., man's account. His father said he promised his son he'd make a scrapbook of e-mails sent to him for future generations, a scrapbook that would be incomplete without all the e-mails that Yahoo is holding.

The family hired a lawyer, who is talking to Yahoo about possible alternatives -- but time is running out. According to Yahoo's terms of service, the company deactivates accounts after 120 days if they haven't been used. If the issue isn't resolved by mid-March or sooner, the e-mails could disappear forever.

Staff researchers Julie Tate and Richard S. Drezen contributed to this report.

Ellie

thedrifter
02-03-05, 10:37 PM
February 07, 2005

Grim day for Marines
Corps probes whether brownout brought down CH-53E

By Gordon Lubold
Times staff writer


The Hawaii Marine community is mourning the loss of 30 leathernecks and a Navy corpsman killed when the CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter they were riding in crashed in western Iraq.
Although the cause of the crash is unknown, Corps officials indicated poor weather could be blamed for the Jan. 26 crash, which killed everyone aboard and marked the single deadliest incident for U.S. troops in Iraq since the war began nearly two years ago.

Most of those killed were infantrymen with the Hawaii-based 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines; the aircrew was assigned to Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron 361, Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Calif. The infantry battalion’s tour in Iraq with the Okinawa, Japan-based 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit marked the first combat deployment of a Hawaii infantry unit since the start of the war on terrorism in October 2001.

In a separate incident, four Marine Corps Reserve combat engineers were killed the same day when they were ambushed during a mission in Anbar province. In all, 34 Marines were killed Jan. 26.

The crash is under investigation and officials provided few details except to say there is no indication it was the result of enemy action. Those aboard were being transported to the western border region to help Iraqi government officials provide security at polling sites for the Jan. 30 elections when the aircraft went down.

Although its cause is unclear, the crew may have lost control of their plane in a sandstorm. These “brownouts,” in which blowing sands are caused by a storm or the rotor wash of the helicopter, can make it all but impossible to see. They are common in Iraq, and helicopter pilots have been forced to work around them.

One retired CH-53 pilot who had not flown in Iraq but is familiar with the conditions there said sandstorms can be particularly hard to predict. Flying a Super Stallion in such an environment can be even harder.

“It is very challenging flying out there, and landing and taking off in that type of dust is particularly difficult in a ’53, as it puts out more rotor wash, thus more dust, than any helicopter,” the retired pilot said.

He said he didn’t know if a sandstorm was to blame, however.

“All I know is my heart is broken for the Marines, their families, friends and fellow Marines.”

Another CH-53 pilot, who has flown in Afghanistan, where sandstorms and brownouts are also common, explained how they can be extremely dangerous.

In brownout conditions, the sand can blow so fiercely that pilots can lose their frame of reference and have to rely on instruments completely. While a brownout due to rotor wash is difficult to escape, it’s also not that high. A brownout due to environmental conditions, however, can mean the pilot must climb several hundred feet to escape it.

That poses another danger, because ascending to escape a crash could expose the aircraft as an enemy target.

“You just don’t have any visual cues to know which direction you’re moving in,” the pilot said. Both pilots asked not to be named.

While the possibility still exists that the crash occurred as a result of enemy action, it seems unlikely. Indeed, few helicopters have been seriously hit by enemy fire over the last year.

A number of helicopters were shot down after the major combat phase of the war in spring 2003, forcing pilots to change their tactics, flying low and fast to minimize their exposure to enemy fire. Pilots are also trained to fly in a zigzag pattern as an evasive maneuver to avoid being hit.

Planes darken most of their lights during night operations to avoid detection.

The crash took more lives than any single incident since the war began. Previous to the Super Stallion crash, the deadliest crash was the collision of two Army Black Hawk helicopters in November 2003 that killed 17.

The Super Stallion crashed near Rutbah, a desert town that has served as a resupply base for nearby troops and a refueling point and landing zone for transport helicopters. The CH-53E Super Stallion is a powerful three-engine aircraft. With a crew of three, it typically can seat 37 people, with room for up to 55 personnel if extra seats are installed.

Although Marines from light armored vehicle units have been patrolling the border area, it remains porous and offers ways for terrorists from other countries to come and go with relative ease. The mission was meant to beef up security along the border prior to the Iraqi elections Jan. 30. The Marines were to assist officials with the Interim Iraqi government and Independent Electoral Commission to ensure polling places would be secure, said Col. Walter L. Miller, commanding officer of the 31st MEU, in a written statement released Jan. 28.

Anbar province, where the bulk of the I Marine Expeditionary Force leathernecks are operating, extends west toward the Jordanian and Syrian borders and south to the border with Saudi Arabia. It includes fertile farming villages along the Euphrates River, as well as expanses of desert.

Reinforced infantry battalions with Regimental Combat Team 7 have operated throughout the province since 1st Marine Division returned to Iraq last spring for occupation duty.

The regiment is based at Al-Asad Air Base, a large military complex about two hours north of Ramadi. The province is a crossroads for travelers, delivery companies, businesses and, as many military officials believe, smugglers of weapons, drugs and laundered money, as well as terrorists with their sights set on the more-populated cities of Fallujah, Ramadi, Mosul and Baghdad.

Since last spring, division forces have patrolled the largely unpopulated desert region along the Iraqi border and conducted raids and rebuilding missions in several cities near the borders, including Qaim and Husaybah.

“These are brave men who had served their country with honor and who made lasting contributions to both the Marine Corps and to Iraq,” Miller said of those killed in the crash. “We will hold the memories of these fallen warriors close to our hearts forever; in honor of them, we will continue the mission until its successful completion.”

Gidget Fuentes contributed to this report from Oceanside, Calif. With Associated Press reports.

Ellie