Lejeune Marines return home from deployment in Iraq

[thedrifter]

Lejeune Marines return home from deployment in Iraq
Submitted by: 2nd Marine Division
Story Identification #: 200523155542
Story by Cpl. Adam C. Schnell



MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. (Jan. 30, 2005) -- After seven months battling insurgents in Iraq, approximately 850 Marines with 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment returned to a cheering crowd of family and friends here Jan. 28-30.

The Marines arrived at the elaborately decorated Area One Gymnasium in three waves, beginning Friday night. Music and refreshments were provided by the battalion’s Key Volunteer network for the weary travelers.

“The Key Wives and (family readiness officer) did a great job setting up the homecoming,” said Maj. Mark E. Winn, the battalion’s executive officer. “It goes to show why 1/8’s Key Volunteer program is one of the best in the MEF (Marine Expeditionary Force).”

The newly arrived Marines looked tired after their long journey from the war zones of Iraq. But as they were surrounded by their loved ones, their eyes lit up with happiness at the simple pleasure of seeing their families for the first time in seven months.

“It’s hard for me to explain how I feel right now,” said Lance Cpl. Kendrick Smith, 20, a supply clerk and Ahoskie, N.C. native. “I guess I feel a lot like a little kid at Christmas.”

But with happiness comes a little sadness for their fellow Marines who gave their lives in battles supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

“Even though all the Marines are excited to be home, we’re all sad for the loss of our brothers out there,” Winn said.

Twenty-one brothers lost their lives and approximately 135 were wounded during the many difficult missions they endured in the seven months they spent in the Al Anbar Province of Iraq. These missions included attacks on insurgent strongholds in the cities of Hit, Rawah and Fallujah.

“The Marines had to participate in three or four different scenes,” Winn commented. “They did an outstanding job.”

The battles in Fallujah were the biggest engagement the battalion faced in the deployment. These battles helped to clear the city of insurgents and allowed the capture of large amounts of weapons and ammunition.

“I was in the first Gulf War and that was nothing compared to the battles in Fallujah,” commented Winn.

The attacks the Marines participated in against the insurgents were not the only operations within the city. They also supported the city with humanitarian assistance helping the citizens in the city during the bloody battles.

“We distributed food, water and blankets to the people who were stranded in the city,” Winn added.

These humanitarian operations were also conducted in other cities within their area of operation. They helped distribute school supplies, build multimedia-learning centers and worked to improve agricultural irrigation with projects in the area.

Working to not only fight for the freedom of Iraqi people but to also improve their way of life can be an exhausting task. So the battalion will soon take time off to spend time with loved ones and come back rested and rejuvenated for upcoming training operations to continue the fight in the Global War on Terrorism.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Rumsfeld: No Iraq Timetable
Associated Press
February 7, 2005

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Sunday he does not know when the United States will have trained enough Iraqis so they can adequately secure the country and begin replacing American troops now helping provide protection.

"It's interesting to me that some people think they know that because it's not knowable," Rumsfeld said.

Discussing the two resignation letters he wrote President Bush at the height of the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal last year, Rumsfeld said he believed he still could be an effective Pentagon chief but wanted the president to make that call.

"I told him I really thought he ought to carefully consider it. But he made a conscious decision, and life goes on, and here we are," Rumsfeld told ABC's "This Week."

With speculation heating up about a possible U.S. attack against Iran to derail its nuclear capability, Rumsfeld was asked if there were U.S. military operations going on in the country now. "Not to my knowledge," he replied.

The training of Iraqi security forces is one of the factors influencing the continued presence of American troops, which grew by 15,000 to 150,000 ahead of the Jan. 30 elections in Iraq.




Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has told Congress that only about one-third of Iraq's 136,000 trained security forces are capable of engaging combat with insurgents across the country.

Rumsfeld said Sunday that are too many unknown factors to be able to say when Iraqis will be able to handle internal security.

Citing two of Iraq's neighbors, Iran and Syria, Rumsfeld said, "We don't know the extent to which they're going to be unhelpful or helpful" to enabling Iraq to overcome the insurgency.

Also uncertain, Rumsfeld said, is the extent to which "the political process is going to tip people away from supporting insurgency or being on the fence to supporting the government."

Further necessary to undermining the insurgency is cutting off its financial support, which comes from Saddam Hussein's loyalists and others, the secretary said.

"What you need to do is have the economic progress, the political progress which is going forward in such good style. And that will determine the level of the insurgency," Rumsfeld said. "And the level of the insurgency will determine the speed at which Iraqi security forces will be capable of managing that level of insurgency."

He acknowledged there were are lot of "ifs," but added, "That's life."

On the abuse scandal at the prison near Baghdad, Rumsfeld said that as the Defense Department's leader, he took responsibility.

"My goodness, it happened on my watch," he said. But, he added, "On the other hand, if secretaries of defense resigned every time someone did something they shouldn't do, out of the millions of people involved in the defense establishment - or a mayor or a governor, something happened in their country, you wouldn't have anyone in public office.

"So it's a tough calculation," he said, explaining the offer to resign.

The release of photographs depicting American soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib generated worldwide outrage, particularly in the Arab world. Rumsfeld told lawmakers at the time that he would quit if he felt he could no longer serve effectively, but he also said then that he would not resign simply to please his critics and political opponents.

Rumsfeld said he had no idea whether a limited military strike could lead to the overthrow of Iran's religious leadership. He hoped for change from inside the country.

"I was amazed at how rapidly the shah of Iran fell and the ayatollahs took over that country. It happened just seemingly like that, looking at it from outside. ... So we can't predict these things. We don't have intelligence that good. I just don't know," Rumsfeld said.

During her current trip to Europe and the Middle East, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would not say whether the United States supports a change of government in Iran, although U.S. officials have previously said there is no such goal.

She has used strong language in condemning the religious leadership in Iran for alleged human rights abuses and deceit about its nuclear program. But she said she hopes "diplomacy can work" and that an attack "is simply not on the agenda at this point."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Rumsfeld: Troop Recruiting To Increase
Associated Press
February 7, 2005

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Sunday there is no question the U.S. military is being stretched due to fighting a long, hard war in Iraq, but insisted that a heavy emphasis on recruiting and retention should eventually ease the problem.

"It's clearly stressed, but they're performing brilliantly, they're doing a fabulous job," he said on CNN's "Late Edition" - one of several talk shows he appeared on Sunday.

Concerns over stretching the Army National Guard, Army Reserve and Marine Corps Reserve are being addressed with full force, Rumsfeld said, adding that the military is adjusting the incentives and the number of recruiters.

The issue is that the regular Army isn't organized for the 21st century as well as it should be, he said on CBS' "Face the Nation." The problem is being dealt with swiftly, he said, by increasing the size of the Army, increasing the number of combat brigades from 33 to 43 and rebalancing the active force with the reserve components so that the military has the skill sets it needs on active duty.

Of the 150,000 U.S. troops in Iraq now, between 40 and 50 percent are from the Guard and Reserve. The figure is set to drop to 30 percent for the next rotation, beginning this summer, because combat-ready Guard units have been tapped out.




Rumsfeld said over and over again on the various talk shows, he didn't know when troops would start coming home.

"The president and I, and anyone would dearly love to be smart enough and wise enough to know precisely when our troops could leave," he said on NBC's "Meet the Press." "It would be such a relief for people to know that. It's not knowable."

When U.S. troops can pull out of Iraq is dependent upon the conditions on the ground and whether the Iraqis are capable of managing the security situation. "We're working very hard to see that they can," he said.

When asked why the United States doesn't give Iraqis benchmarks for when it will withdraw, Rumsfeld replied: "Because our country's invested a lot of lives, a lot of heartbreak. The courage of our troops and the sacrifice of those that have fallen and were wounded is important.

"And the idea that you should just arbitrarily say, this is going to happen on that date - think of it. The last administration did that in Bosnia. They said we'd be out by Christmas. Six, eight, 10 years later, not out.

"It is misleading people to think that you know something you don't know. And we know we don't know."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Attacks Kill 3 U.S. Troops, 33 Iraqis <br />
Associated Press <br />
February 7, 2005 <br />
<br />
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Facing the prospect of a Shiite Muslim landslide, Sunni politicians offered on Saturday to participate...

[thedrifter]

Iraq Suicide Bombings Kill 25 People
Associated Press
February 7, 2005

MOSUL, Iraq - A suicide bomber blew himself up inside a hospital compound in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Monday, killing 12 policemen and injuring four others, hospital officials said.

Also Monday, a car bomb exploded outside the gates of a provincial police headquarters in the city of Baqouba, killing 13 people and wounding 18, police Col. Mudhahar al-Jubouri said. Many of the victims were there to seek jobs as policemen, al-Jubouri said.

In the attack at Mosul's Jumhouri Teaching Hospital, a suicide bomber set off explosives outside the hospital building among a group of Iraqi policemen, hospital Director Tahseen Ali Mahmoud al-Obeidi said. Witnesses said the bomber called the police officers over to him and then blew up among the crowd.

"I heard an explosion. When I went to check, I saw bodies everywhere," al-Obeidi said.





Also Monday, insurgents shelled a police station in Mosul with more than a dozen mortar rounds, killing three civilians, a police official said.

The city of Mosul, Iraq's third largest, has seen daily insurgent attacks and rebel clashes with U.S. troops and Iraqi security forces. Violence has surged since a guerrilla uprising in November drove out nearly all of the city's police force.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Reporters Not Told What To Write
Associated Press
February 7, 2005

WASHINGTON - Journalists were not told what to write when they were assigned articles about Europe for Pentagon-run Web sites, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Sunday. The practice is now under review by the military's chief investigator.

"I'm told that in this case, people were just asked to prepare anything," Rumsfeld said on CNN's "Late Edition."

"They weren't told what to write, it had nothing to do with an agenda. They were asked to take a subject, and if they wanted to, write something on it, which people do all the time," Rumsfeld said.

Inspector General Joseph Schmitz is reviewing the military's practice of paying journalists to provide articles and commentary for a Web site aimed at influencing public opinion in the Balkans, Larry Di Rita, Rumsfeld's chief spokesman, said Friday.

The investigation followed a CNN report on the Pentagon's role in two Web sites: Southeast European Times, aimed at audiences in the Balkans; and Magharebia, aimed at the Maghreb region of North Africa that encompasses Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia.





Columnists have come under criticism for writing articles and providing other material to promote Bush administration policies. After the agreements between the columnists and federal departments became known, President Bush said the administration must not pay commentators "to advance our agenda."

In a light moment on ABC's "This Week," moderator George Stephanopoulos told Rumsfeld he was among journalists invited to meet with Bush the day of the State of the Union address.

"You didn't get paid, did you?" Rumsfeld asked, smiling.

"Not for that, no, sir," Stephanopoulos said.

"I just wanted to check," Rumsfeld said and laughed. "I wanted to make sure everything's all right here."


Ellie

[thedrifter]

YMCA throws party for Marines on way to war

By Rick Rogers
STAFF WRITER

February 7, 2005

CAMP PENDLETON – Matt Ingwerson, Niko Thomas and Kolden Daffer know they're probably headed for Iraq, but yesterday they and more than 2,000 fellow Marines from the School of Infantry forgot the war for a few precious hours and were merely very young men watching the Super Bowl.

Over hamburgers and hot dogs, the Marines cheered the Philadelphia Eagles and New England Patriots – and the commercials – in two huge classrooms normally used to teach them how to survive on the battlefield.

"All these Marines here are either going to Iraq, or they are going to go," said Major. Gen. Tim Donovan, Camp Pendleton's commander.

This is the third, and biggest, Super Bowl party thrown for the School of Infantry, said George Brown, executive director of the Armed Services YMCA at Camp Pendleton, which sponsored the event.

About 2,100 Marines shuffled through serving lines, downing 100 pounds of chips, 1,800 hamburgers, 2,100 hot dogs and 2,500 sodas.

Besides of gastronomic delights, Sgt. Verice Bennett, 27, an instructor at the infantry school, said the Super Bowl party serves another purpose.

"Within six months, 80 percent of these guys will be over there," Bennett said. "Here they are allowed to talk on their cell phones and smoke or dip (tobacco) or just relax. They get a break from us. I think this is really important for morale."

"It will be back to work for them tomorrow. It's good to see them relax now," said Sgt. Jason Sperry, 25, from Ankeny, Iowa.

Pfc. Daffer, 19, from Las Vegas, relaxed on the floor eating a hamburger.

"I think that everyone enjoys this," said Daffer, between mouthfuls. "I think they just enjoy the commercials the most."

Commercials proved so popular that one Marine jokingly complained he was missing them while standing in the food line.

Yet not everyone was interested in the game or the commercials.

For Pvt. Ingwerson, 20, from Nampa, Idaho, who arrived here Tuesday from Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego, it was the fellowship he most appreciated.

"You come here and you miss home a little, but you get to watch the Super Bowl with your Marine Corps buddies," said Ingwerson.

Camaraderie was also something Pfc. Thomas, 19, mentioned.

"I think this is great to get a bunch of Marines together," Thomas said. "This is a lot better than I thought. We are all just having a grand old time."

Pfc. William Porter, 19, a reserve Marine from Wylie, Texas, summed up the Super Bowl party this way.

"The best part is the funny commercials and the camaraderie. It's like we are one big family. All these people are my brothers, and nothing is better than watching the Super Bowl with your family."



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Rick Rogers: (760) 476-8212; rick.rogers@uniontrib.com

Ellie

[thedrifter]

MarForRes aviation community tackles mishaps
Submitted by: Marine Forces Reserve
Story Identification #: 200521111626
Story by Cpl. Matthew J. Apprendi



NAVAL AIR STATION, Joint Reserve Base, Fort Worth, Texas (Jan. 29, 2005) -- More than 150 members of the Marine Forces Reserve aviation community gathered here to take part in a program dubbed the 'Global War on Error' Jan. 29.

The program is designed to bring awareness and education to Marine aviators concerning the number one factor in aviation mishaps – individual error. The bulk of the participants were members of 4th Marine Aircraft Wing, Marine Aircraft Group 41.

“Perfectly good aviators go out with good planes and never come back,” said Dr. Tony Kern, the lead instructor for the course and a senior partner with Convergent Knowledge Solutions, LLC, a company designed to improve human performance in high-risk endeavors. “What we’re trying to unravel is why some and not others make it back."

Historically, U.S. forces have lost the bulk of their battle assets to mishap, vice enemy action, according to the Naval Safety Center website at http://www.safetycenter.navy.mil/mishapreduction.

In World War II alone, 56 percent of battle assets were lost due to mishaps between 1942 and 1945. Likewise, Desert Storm continued the pattern in the early nineties with a 75 percent mishap rate.

Currently, the Navy and Marine Corps are engaged in a campaign to decrease mishaps throughout their forces. The Secretary of Defense challenged the Department of Defense to reduce mishaps by 50 percent by the end of the 2005 fiscal year.

4th MAW is considered the pathfinder for this education, according to Col. Mark A. Schulte, the 4th MAW Director of Safety and Standardization. 1st, 2nd and 3rd MAWs will follow suit because of 4th MAWs initiatives.

“Each one of the (Reserve) MAGs has seen the video,” Schulte said to the class. “You guys are lucky to get the live Tony Kern.”

Marine aviators are taking on the challenge set forth by the Secretary of Defense by adopting a personal error prevention program, which was derived from a five-year study completed by Kern. Kern’s study of historical attributes of successful aviators culminated into the books “Redefining Airmanship and “Flight Discipline.”

The first segment is entitled “Flight Discipline: Waging and winning the battle within.”

“It was great and very insightful,” said Maj. Byron Duke, the assistant operations officer for MAG-41 from Granbury, Texas. “I’ll also be able to apply applications learned today to my civilian expertise.”

Duke, a commercial airline pilot in his civilian life, added it would have been very beneficial for pilots to take this type of training years ago – many lives could have been saved.

The Jan. 29 seminar is just the beginning for Marine Corps aviators. The proposed program, which encompasses computer-based programs and professionally facilitated workshops, will be given to aviators in six different segments for the next two years. After the segments are completed, pilots will have reinforcing training throughout their aviation careers.

Ellie

[yellowwing]

Gone from Top Gun to Top Dumb? Well at least our fine Aviators didn't accidently straff a New Jersey school house!

[thedrifter]

Posted on Mon, Feb. 07, 2005





Son's death didn't sway his father's patriotism

Marine died in '83 Beirut bombing

BY RICHARD HYATT

Staff Writer


To his father, Cpl. Mark Prevatt is forever 20, a United States Marine proud of his uniform and proud of his service. He'd be 42 now -- probably a husband and maybe a father -- making kitchen cabinets in the shop his grandfather opened in 1950.

A Sunday morning in Beirut swept away Prevatt's future and the future of 240 other Marines who were sleeping in their barracks on Oct. 23, 1983. The scene is all too familiar in today's world. A truck loaded with explosives brazenly drove into the U.S. compound. The young Americans never woke up.

Sixteen days later, on the tarmac at the Columbus Municipal Airport, Victor Prevatt welcomed home his son. He arrived on a Delta flight in a cardboard carrier. On the side of the box, in large green letters, was a warning: "Handle with extreme care."

Grief squeezed Prevatt like a fist and wouldn't let go. It was he, after all, who signed the enlistment papers for his son, then a student at Shaw High School. He wondered if the torment of losing his son would ever go away.

"It was one year to the day before my mind began to ease. I was OK if I was busy. Otherwise, I couldn't stop thinking of Mark," he says. "This is the only time in life that time is your friend."

Reaching out

Victor Prevatt is 22 years older. His curly hair has gone gray. He still turns out cabinets, though the materials he uses now come from China and Russia. The year his son died is almost a daydream.

Other fathers and mothers grieved with the Prevatts. Bill and Peggy Stelpflug of Auburn, Ala., lost their son, Lance Cpl. Bill Stelpflug, that morning, too.

In a world that is forever changing, one thing is the same: young Americans still are being killed on foreign soil. Prevatt has reached out to some parents that lost a child to an accident or a disease. He hasn't done so in a military situation, but that doesn't keep him from cringing when he hears a news report about a young soldier dying in Iraq.

His message to those grieving fathers and mothers is that their son or daughter died for a very honorable cause.

"I still feel patriotic toward America," Prevatt says. "It was born with the shedding of blood, and it will be sustained by blood."

His son was buried on a hillside in the woods of Talbot County on land where he used to hunt. A Baptist preacher said the young man "stood for America's finest who go and defend our peace on far-flung fronts."

The ritual was both spiritual and military. Taps was played by a bugler. Seven M-1 rifles fired a salute. Reverent Marines, their cadence slow and deliberate, folded the American flag that covered the corporal's coffin and gave it to his mother, Sandra Fay Prevatt. A deer, curious about what was going on, joined the mourners.

A few days after the government notified them of their son's death, the Prevatts got a letter from Mark that was written the day before he died. He talked about being 30 days shy of coming home and he talked about his confusion.

"He didn't know why he was there and the people in Lebanon didn't know why he was there. But he was proud," Prevatt noted in an interview a year after his son's death.

Some of the young people facing death today may also be confused, but Prevatt says the soldiers and the families ought to cling to the pride his son described. "I was proud of Mark being a United States Marine, and he was proud to be one. That was a wonderful thing, though him dying was a terrible thing."

Just about every day, Victor Prevatt walks the peaceful land near Juniper where his son is buried. Railroad tracks wind through the area, tracks that go to and from Fort Benning. Prevatt knows when the Army is deploying. He sees flatbeds loaded with heavy equipment rolling past him on its way to the Georgia coast.

Time has also rolled along. His daughter, Vicki, was 8 years old when she held her father's hand and walked toward the jet that brought her big brother home. She also was there in the rain when he was buried in a grave family and friends had dug.

She recently turned 30. She's married. Her husband is in Afghanistan. He's a Marine.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

2/2 Marines earn combat awards for Iraq duty

By C. Mark Brinkley
Times staff writer


CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. — The son of a Marine lieutenant general was among three leathernecks with 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marines, who received Bronze Stars on Jan. 26 for combat valor in the area of Fallujah, Iraq, during fighting there last spring.
In fact, Capt. James B. Conway was honored for actions that came as his father, Lt. Gen. James T. Conway, was at the helm of I Marine Expeditionary Force in Iraq. And they weren’t the only Conways in the fight.

“My brother was there, too,” the younger Conway said after the ceremony. “More than anything, you’re worried. With all three of us over there at once — well, my mother is the one you should be talking to.”

Marines from his battalion said the younger Conway is no fortunate son riding the coattails of his three-star father, who now serves as operations director for the Joint Staff in Washington. Instead, they describe him as a courageous and dedicated leader of Golf Company.

His award citation echoes the same, commending Conway for “spirited and sustained leadership, personal example of courage, committed professionalism and extraordinary ability to outmaneuver the enemy.” His actions made it possible for Golf Company to achieve superior results and severely disrupt the enemy, according to the citation.

Conway agreed that the Marines performed remarkably, but says it wasn’t because of him.

“This award is all about the Marines,” he said. “I was just lucky to be their commander.”

But Golf Company wasn’t the only success story. The leathernecks of Fox Company were recognized as well, through awards for two of their own leaders.

Staff Sgt. Thomas L. Reynolds, 28, platoon sergeant for 3rd Platoon, and 2nd Lt. Anthony C. Triviso, platoon commander for Weapons Platoon, were awarded the Bronze Star with combat “V” for their heroic actions in the Fallujah area. Both took control in key moments of hostile engagements, coordinating attacks and counterattacks while repeatedly exposing themselves to hostile fire.

In one instance, with most of the company leadership pinned down by enemy fire during a reconnaissance mission near Fallujah and unable to return fire, Reynolds worked with the only officer present to take control of more than two platoons of Marines and direct attacks to defend themselves and suppress enemy fire against the recon group. His actions “ultimately secured the assembly area and enabled the safe return of the company leadership,” according to his citation.

Triviso also stood out during multiple engagements, often exposing himself to enemy fire while coordinating his platoon’s attacks. During one engagement, a wounded Triviso disregarded his own safety and directed a Humvee into a firing position to bring the vehicle’s grenade launcher to bear against enemy troops and force them to cease fire, according to his citation.

A fourth Marine, logistics officer Capt David A. Nasse, 28, was awarded a Bronze Star for outstanding logistical support of operations in and around Fallujah. His distinguishing service “allowed the Task Force to focus on combat operations against the enemy and significantly disrupt the activity of a complex and lethal insurgency,” according to his citation.

“We had an outstanding [Headquarters and Service] Company that [is] unsung,” Nasse said after the ceremony. He credited the efforts of his Marines, saying “They did amazing things over there. I got the glory this particular day, but they do all the hard work.”

Along with the Bronze Star presentations, two junior Marines with Easy Company were awarded Purple Hearts for wounds sustained while fighting in Iraq.

Lance Cpl. Richard W. Cortes, 25, of Kiowa, Colo., suffered burns and shrapnel wounds after his Humvee was struck by an improvised explosive.

Lance Cpl. David L. Brenneman, 20, of Montpelier, Ohio, had shrapnel pierce his helmet and skull during a separate attack.

Brenneman, who lifted his cover to reveal a large scar on the side of his head, said the day was a time to honor a friend who died in the attack, Cpl. Christopher Belchik.

“If I could, I’d change places with my squad leader in a second,” Brenneman said.

C. Mark Brinkley is the Jacksonville, N.C., bureau chief for Marine Corps Times. He can be reached at (910) 455-8354 or cmark@marinecorpstimes.com.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Returning Marines Celebrate Christmas Late

Christmas Celebrations Put on Hold to Begin for Marines Returning Home to Their Families

By SETH HETTENA Associated Press Writer
The Associated Press

CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. Feb 7, 2005 — Even if it is February, it's Christmas time in the home of Marine Lance Cpl. Victor Oseto.

The 21-year-old returned home Sunday, and the celebrations that were put on hold can finally begin. His stocking and the stocking of his twin brother, also a Marine, have been waiting over the fireplace.

Nancy Oseto will be cooking up her traditional, if belated, Christmas prime rib dinner later this month. First, though, she plans to serve her son some Thanksgiving turkey.

Nearly 180 Marines with the 11th Marine Expeditionary Force's battalion landing team returned Sunday from an eight-month deployment to Iraq. Seven Marines with the battalion were killed.

The survivors, marching three abreast in their desert cammies, were quickly engulfed by screaming and cheering loved ones.

Marine Lance Cpl. Gabriel Aponte will be having Christmas on Feb. 20, said his mother, Regina Aponte. The Apontes bought a fake tree for the first time this year so they could celebrate Christmas in their home when the 23-year-old radio operator returned from Iraq.

"You find special ways to make them a part of Christmas," she said.

The tree is still up in the home of Navy Hospital Corpsman Ben Powers, who turned 23 on Christmas Day a double celebration the family will make up.

There was catching-up of another sort to do, as well. Boys were coming home as men.

"I'm anxious to see how he's changed," Nancy Oseto said as she waited for her son in a gymnasium. "I know he's seen a lot since he left. … He's an adult now. I can't call him my baby anymore."

Gary Joslin, who served in the Navy during Vietnam, saw something different in the eyes of his 22-year-old son in a photo taken after a long, fierce battle in Najaf. Navy Hospital Corpsman Garrisson Joslin had spent three days without sleep and lost comrades to battle.

"When I saw it, I knew his whole life had changed," Joslin said.

Garrisson Joslin plans a different celebration with his father. He wants to have a beer, a cigar and talk.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Anti-war generation watches its children go to war
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BY MEG KISSINGER
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

MILWAUKEE - (KRT) - John Treslley shakes his head in awe when he thinks about his 20-year-old son driving a Hummer through the minefields of Iraq.

"I wish I had half the guts he has," Treslley, 47, says in a whisper.

Back in 1977, when Treslley was that age, the notion of military duty never crossed his mind. The draft ended in 1973, and two years later, so did the Vietnam War.

"I was busy in those days playing football, drinking lots of beer and chasing women," says Treslley, a pilot and former game farm operator in Hayward, Wis.

All across America, thousands of parents like Treslley, baby boomers with no military experience of their own, are watching anxiously as their children head off to war. Most are proud. Some are angry, either at their children for taking on such a potentially dangerous mission or at the military for recruiting their sons and daughters. Nearly all say they are scared. For many, frankly, they just don't get it.

"You see a lot of fathers at these ceremonies who look pretty confused," says Terry Bellis, an instructor with the U.S. Marine's Fox Company with headquarters in Milwaukee. "They have this look in their eyes, like, `Wow. My kid is going to do that? Why would he want to do that?'''

When the parents of many of today's soldiers were that age, America was losing or had lost in Vietnam, an unpopular war. Protesters held huge rallies on college campuses, and thousands fled to Canada to avoid the draft. The military was largely scorned, says Lt. Col. Tim Donovan, 53, of the Wisconsin National Guard.

"People would flip us the bird when we'd walk down the street in our uniforms," he says. "You knew that they didn't respect you or what you did."

In Donovan's early years in the National Guard, in the 1960s, the classic generation gap was defined as fathers, many of whom had served in World War II, disgusted at the insolence of youth. Today, military recruiters say, the 18- and 19-year-olds who are signing up are much more trusting of the establishment, much more willing to be part of a team. The gap now, they say, tends to be the parents' lack of understanding of their children's more bellicose leanings.

While their parents may have shunned the status quo and thumbed their noses at the military when they were young, plenty of young men and women today seem eager to join the armed forces. Enlistments soared after the attack on America on Sept. 11, 2001, though the numbers are starting to slow down.

Jeramy Ringwolski, 18, joined the Marines in his senior year in high school, wanting to serve his country and see the world. He says his parents were skeptical at first.

"They didn't know if I knew what I was getting myself into," he says. Now in basic training in Mississippi, Ringwolski says he is excited about the possibility of being shipped out to Iraq.

"That's what I'm here for," he says.

He says his father, Darrin, who did not serve in the military, tells him all the time how proud he is.

"I think he's a little jealous of me," says the younger Ringwolski.

Occasionally, someone will sneer or make a snide comment about how stupid the military is, he says. "Usually, that's from old people in their 40s and 50s," he says.

Last year, the Army exceeded its goal in recruiting more than 77,000. The Marines beat their goal of 36,773 by 21. But National Guard numbers were down 30 percent in the last few months of last year, a trend that is expected to continue and spread to other branches of the armed forces. Military recruiters say that's largely because of the war and worried parents.

"We're seeing a lot of objections by the parents," says Lt. Col. Tim Lawson, commander of recruiting and retention for the Wisconsin National Guard, which fell short of its goal of 1,300 by about 6 percent last year. "There is a war going on, and no one wants to sign a paper that makes them responsible for what can happen over there."

Jittery parents are making recruiting efforts much more difficult, says Lawson. They tend to hover over their children, peppering the recruiters with questions. Recruiters say they used to tailor their appeal to the recruits. But that has changed.

"Not only do we have to sell the kid, now we have to sell his parents, too," Lawson says. "That's two or three for the price of one."

The new federal law known as the No Child Left Behind Act requires public schools to turn the names and addresses of high school juniors and seniors over to military recruiters. This bothers some people, especially some parents who don't like the idea of recruiters encouraging their 16- and 17-year-olds to join the military. Groups such as the Quakers are sponsoring seminars on how to offer alternatives to military duty, such as joining faith-based volunteer corps.

"We want to make sure kids know all of their options," says Mark Helpsmeet of the Eau Claire Friends.

Michelle Ringwolski, 38, of Milwaukee, Jeramy's mother, had just gotten used to the idea of her son in the Marines when her daughter, Tiffany, a high school junior, announced that she plans to sign up for the U.S. Air Force's delayed entry program when she turns 17 in June.

"I'm proud as hell of her, but it is tough to take," Michelle Ringwolski said. "There is a war on. So, of course I'm freaking out."

The anxieties of the families have spiraled with last week's helicopter crash that killed 31 Marines and the recent increase in deadly attacks by insurgents as today's elections drew near.

"We can't hardly bear to watch the news," said John Treslley. They learned late Thursday that their son, John IV, better known as Fridge, was not one of the Marines who had been killed.

His wife, Cindy, 46, says she has been on edge since Fridge came home one summer day in 2002 to announce that he had signed up for eight years of service in the U.S. Marine Corps. Two weeks after his high school graduation in June 2003, Fridge went off to boot camp.

At first, Cindy Treslley says, she was angry at her son for joining the military and at her husband for signing the papers allowing him to do so.

"I couldn't even talk for several days," she says. "I was the mom who had the post-prom party at my house so I could watch and make sure that these guys were all safe."

In time, her anger would abate, and she grew proud of her son.

On the night Fridge came home from boot camp, he and his mother stayed up and ironed clothes and made breakfast for the rest of the family.

"Believe me, he had never done those things before," she said.

After infantry school and working for nearly a year as a recruiter in northern Wisconsin, Fridge was deployed to Iraq on Sept. 14, 2004.

"I remember everything about that day, the way he looked, the way he smelled," says Cindy Treslley. "I remember staring at the shape of his head as we were driving to the airport and memorizing every little detail. I didn't want to forget, you know?"

He is an infantryman in southwest Iraq, the area known as "the Triangle of Death."

Now the Treslleys hold a nervous vigil in their home as candles flicker next to Fridge's picture, the stuffed clown that he got from his grandparents on the day he was born and a picture book of the World Trade Center attack on Sept. 11.

"I hold my breath every time I turn into the driveway down there," says John Treslley. "I honestly don't know what I'd do if I came home one day and found two Marines parked up here. That's how they tell you, you know. You don't get a call. They show up at your door."

Fridge lives in temporary quarters where there is no easy access to e-mail. He gets to call home on a satellite phone about every 10 days.

Cindy Treslley says she dreams about her son two or three times a week.

"I dream that I'm hugging him, and then I wake up, and he's not there," she says.

She doesn't have the heart to make his bed.

"It's just like the day he left," she says, smoothing down the comforter. "I'm waiting for him to come home."

Even parents who are familiar with military tradition say they find it hard to watch their sons and daughters prepare for war.

Meghan Phillips, 19, of Hustisford, Wis., says her father, Pat, a 30-year veteran of the Army Reserves, had a hard time when she enlisted in the Army National Guard. Phillips said she signed up when she was 17 years old after she was recruited by a friend who let her drive the Humvee around the school parking lot.

Meghan is well-versed in the ways of the military. Both of her parents were in the Army. Her oldest brother, Austin, was in the Air Force, and her other brother, Matt, is in the Army National Guard.

"Still, my dad wasn't too happy about it when I signed up," says Meghan, a film student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee who tends bar at nights and on the weekends. "I'm Daddy's little girl, you know? He doesn't want me to get sent over to Iraq."

Pat Phillips, 48, says he trusts his daughter and respects her right to make choices as an adult.

"My only concern is that she is making the choice for the right reason, because she wants to go, not because I went and her brothers."

Pat Phillips, who returned from Afghanistan last year at this time, says it has been fascinating to see soldiers his children's ages and compare them with the men and women he served with at the beginning of his military career in 1974.

"We went in for something to do," he said. "These kids today, they are on a mission. I think they're more like their grandparents than their parents. They remind me of soldiers who went in right after Pearl Harbor. They are very directed, very clear in their focus and what their obligation is to their country. We had peace and love and all of that. These kids have Sept. 11. It did something to them."


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Distinctions of War - General Mattis's mistake <br />
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- <br />
By Mackubin Thomas Owens <br />
National Review Online <br />
<br />
There is an old...

[thedrifter]

January 24, 2005

Tales from the sandbox, II



Military Times staff writer Gina Cavallaro and photographer Rick Kozak will spend the next two months in Iraq and the Middle East, covering U.S. military operations after the Iraqi national elections.
Gina is filing occasional updates to this Web log.

Please feel free to e-mail her with your thoughts.


No beverage service on this flight

The Green Zone, Baghdad — Jan. 18

We are in The Green Zone after a memorable landing at Baghdad International Airport in Iraq. I have flown into this airport several times and experienced the mix of jarring, evasive maneuvers the pilots perform to avoid getting hit by enemy fire as they approach the runway.

I thought I had experienced what they call a corkscrew landing.

I was wrong.

I will never forget this, my first real corkscrew landing. Just imagine approaching a runway that is directly underneath you, diving down from 10,000 feet. Incredible. Even the passengers who had taken these flights umpteen times were talking about it.

Flying at 13,000 feet about 38 miles from the airport, a voice from the control tower instructed the pilot to descend to 12,000 feet. The pilot works for a private security company and he and his co-pilot fly to Baghdad from their headquarters in Amman almost every day, ferrying the company’s employees to the war zone.

“There it is,” the pilot said, pointing to the airport.

I was sitting in the jump seat in the cockpit and I saw the two long runways through the brown Iraqi haze, way down there, like you see in a satellite photo.

As we descended to about 10,000 feet, we cruised right over the airport and I assumed we would descend farther when we looped back from a distance away, like the commercial airliners do. Instead, the pilot slowed the plane down until it seemed to come to a stop and I had this ominous feeling, a sick, silent, slow panic. He and his co-pilot looked at me when I naively suggested “we’re going to loop around and come back, right?”

The co-pilot laughed.

“Yeah, we’re gonna loop around. Ha, ha.”

“Don’t scare me,” I begged them, and even though the pilot looked directly at me and said sincerely, “I won’t scare you,” I knew I was in for the most terrifying ride of my life.

Before I could take another breath, the pilot had plunged the aircraft into a deeply vertical left bank, an outrageous swirl of a turn in which the sky disappeared and the ground spun wildly before my eyes.

The brain told me all was under control. The body didn’t get the message.

My arms stretched stiffly toward the pilots’ armchair rests and my fingers clutched them tightly in some pathetic reaction to falling out of the sky. My heart sprinted through my rib cage and my eyes opened so widely I felt as if they were pushing my hair back on my head. I stopped breathing, too. I felt like I was inside someone else’s life. Good thing the pilots were too busy to see the look on my face. I can only imagine what that was.

With no time to recover from the rush of the first turn, the pilot made another gigantic swirl and the earthly landscape spun ever closer as if in one of those old cartoons where the bulldog is strapped to a rocket that’s plunging to the ground. My body was now in a full tremor of total exhilaration, but the pilot was barely breaking a sweat.

On the third and final sweep we were suddenly and shockingly close to the ground. I was stunned, but at this level it felt more familiar, like the maneuvers I had seen other pilots perform. Now we were just sideways, not vertical and sideways. I laughed and howled uncontrollably as I knew the landing was only seconds away.

Safely on the ground, I couldn’t stop shaking or smiling. We had all survived and it had been spectacular. I had never considered approaching a runway from straight overhead, although I know helicopters do it all the time.

I can’t imagine having that pilot’s job. I only hope I’m half as skilled.


Simple pleasures

Forward Operating Base Paliwoda, Balad, Iraq — Jan. 26

Iraq is a pretty dangerous place to be by anyone’s standards, and it can be quite uncomfortable at times.

What a day of rain can do to an otherwise rock-hard dirt landscape is dramatic. Giant lakes the color of chocolate milk emerge quickly and the heavy vehicles driven by the soldiers, especially the tanks, make deep undulations in a rich, rocky, wet, dark-brown mud that everyone has to walk through to get where they’re going. The air smells like earth, boots get caked with plastered mud, which eventually dries, drops off and leaves trails of clumped dirt everywhere, and the windy, low, oyster-colored sky blows the rain horizontally.

Gunners who ride the Humvees’ turrets are especially vulnerable to the sporadic mischief of otherwise kind and caring drivers who can’t seem to help occasionally plowing through the middle of one of those chocolate lakes to deliberately soak the gunner.

Those same gunners are open to more than just mud baths, however. A lot of attention is paid to how far above the protective steel barrier a soldier is sitting. They didn’t used to have that shield and even though they have it now, it’s no guarantee that a roadside bomb isn’t going to harm or kill that gunner.

The gunners are supposed to sit at name-tag defilade, or chest level, but they sit much lower. “That name-tag defilade is overrated,” I heard one soldier say recently when the truck commander ordered him to get low. He readily complied, hunching down below the barrier. “I just don’t want to get my head blown off,” the gunner said.

But there are these little pockets of happiness everywhere, too. Like when it’s turkey potpie night at the dining facility. When the locally run convenience market gets a new video game in. Or when a patrol rolls back through the front gates with every soldier in one piece.

As soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Division trickle in to begin their one-year rotation in the sandbox here in Balad, the smiles on the faces of the 1st Infantry Division soldiers who have been eagerly awaiting their arrival get wider, and their behavior giddier.

“I am so ready to get out of this place,” is a standard mantra among 1st ID soldiers. In July, the same soldiers might have said something like “yeah, a year’s a long time, but we’ll manage.” They no doubt meant it at the time, but now they’ve learned what a year feels like and it is a long time. They also realize there are no guarantees.

They remember what happened last April to the 1st Armored Division, which got orders to extend its rotation in Iraq by four months, even though some elements were already home in Germany. Still, plans are being made for the homecoming.

“It’ll probably be the first time in history Germany’s out of beer,” said one young soldier, a scout who predicts massive beer consumption by returning soldiers. He also hopes to be home by Valentine’s Day. Just in case he’s not, he’s going to order flowers for his wife through the Internet.

Vacations are being planned, too, but many soldiers are just stoked at the prospect of the most basic comforts of home — standing in the shower with bare feet, walking to the bathroom in the middle of the night without body armor or a helmet, and casting their eyes upon the lush, green landscape of home.

The process of mentoring the 3rd ID guys can be seen and heard every day as the seasoned guys teach them everything they think they’ll need to know. I’ve seen their eyes glaze over sometimes at the magnitude of the task and the enormous amount of information they have to absorb.

It’s hard to forget that the 3rd ID was one of the divisions at the tip of the spear when this whole operation began almost two years ago. But things were different back then and that was a completely different mission. The tip of the spear is a relative term now and the enemy could bite back at any time in any place. Now there is a lot of work to be done that they don’t teach you in basic training.

“I have zero training. I’ll just learn from these guys. It’s like trial by fire,” said a 3rd ID captain who will assume the S-5 duties in Balad when his unit takes over around mid-February.

This armor battalion took over from an infantry battalion of the 4th Infantry Division and has worked hard to improve on the work of the previous soldiers. Even though there is still violence and the town of Balad looks nothing like what Americans enjoy back home, the rank and file soldiers, who can be cynical about practically anything, seem to have noticed changes.

Driving back to the base after a city council meeting in town, this was the conversation between the driver and the truck commander.

“At least they’re starting to clean up some of the trash. The place is starting to look a little better,” the TC said.

Pause.

“All they need now is a McDonalds, a Wal-Mart and a 7-11,” the driver said. “I haven’t seen one Slurpee since I’ve been here.”

continued.........

[thedrifter]

Hard rain

Forward Operating Base Paliwoda, Balad, Iraq — Jan. 27

The unmistakable “thump” of an incoming mortar round sent everyone calmly walking for cover in a well-rehearsed drill that has probably saved more than a few lives on this base.

Within seconds, everyone had donned body armor vests and helmets, and the number of people in the tactical operations center swelled with responders and onlookers alike.

“Controlled detonation. False alarm. Everything’s OK,” bellowed Lt. Col. David Hubner, commander of 1st Battalion, 77th Armor, 1st Infantry Division, which has occupied the building in Balad for the past year.

The thumps heard on this sunny afternoon were 40 miles away in Tikrit and signaled the destruction of munitions found by soldiers on patrol somewhere in the province.

FOB Paliwoda has been one of the most heavily mortared forward positions in the province since operations began here close to two years ago. It is named for Capt. Eric Paliwoda, who died Jan. 2, 2004 when a shower of mortars rained down on the FOB. He was commander of Bravo Company, 4th Engineer Battalion, of the 4th Infantry Division’s 3rd Brigade Combat Team out of Fort Carson, Colo.

Since then, the living quarters for soldiers have been enclosed in a canopy of mega steel beams and reinforced concrete and no one goes anywhere on the FOB without wearing their protective gear.

The battalion’s headquarters building is an old community center that was renovated by the 4th ID’s 1st Battalion, 8th Infantry Regiment, and expanded and improved over the past year by the 1-77. It recently withstood a direct hit by a mortar, which broke a thin layer of concrete off the ceiling in an unoccupied room. It scared the hell out of everyone and knocked out all power, but the roof proved strong.

Where soldiers once ate one hot meal a day brought in under extreme danger by a logistics combat patrol, which got attacked repeatedly on the way here from Logistics Support Area Anaconda about 15 miles away, there is now a proper dining facility with two hot meals a day and refrigerated storage capacity that holds up to 18 days’ worth of such meals for 1,000 soldiers a day.

Oh, and the dining facility is made with reinforced concrete, as are the Internet Café, the gym and the rec room.

There are Texas barriers, the ones that are about 12 feel high, in front of most all the windows, which are also sandbagged from the inside. A counter-mortar radar system was installed at the FOB a few months ago, which helps the mortar platoon on the far end of the FOB respond more quickly with counter fire.

Even with all the protection, though, the mortar showers are unpredictable and have caused pain.

On Aug. 5, three rounds sailed into the FOB, striking just feet away from a combat patrol, a line-up of Humvees, that was preparing to drive off on a mission. Ten people were wounded by shrapnel that sprayed the vehicles. All of them were returned to duty.

“Had those rounds come in five minutes earlier, it would have been a lot worse,” said a staff officer, explaining that they had just finished their safety briefing in which everyone stands in a group in one place.

Indirect fire attacks with mortars and rockets are a part of life here. The new guys, the 5th Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division, will now inherit the legacy.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Army Mistakenly Bills 129 Wounded Soldiers <br />
<br />
By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer <br />
<br />
WASHINGTON - The Army has identified 129 wounded soldiers who mistakenly received bills for expenses upon...

[thedrifter]

Marines to use Vietnam-era weapon
February 07,2005
Eric Steinkopff
Freedom ENC

CAMP LEJEUNE - Marines fighting in Iraq's cities will eventually use a weapon relied on by U.S. forces more than 30 years ago in the jungles of Vietnam.

Older versions of the M-72 light antitank weapon (or LAW), used extensively during the Vietnam War, were phased out when Cold War experts believed only larger, shoulder-fired rockets would work to stop a Soviet tank blitz. Post war, the AT-4 - which is bigger and has a longer range than its predecessor - has became the Marine Corps' rocket of choice.

But the old boy is making a comeback - albeit with significant technological enhancements.

Retired Army Lt. Col. Mark Trexler, the East Coast marketing rep for Tally Defense Systems, was at Camp Lejeune last week to show Marine gunners how to use the M-72A7 shoulder rockets.

At only about 2 1/2 feet long and about 7 pounds, the LAW is significantly shorter and lighter than the AT-4, which measures about 40 inches long and weighs more than 15 pounds. Improvements in the LAW's rocket propulsion reduce the back blast, so it can be fired from a concealed window in urban house-to-house street fighting. Additionally, the launcher is disposable.

That capability and versatility isn't possible with other rockets.

"There have been a lot of improvements since the M-72A2 version (from) 1972," said Chief Warrant Officer 5 Pat Woellhof, 48.

"The weight and size allow any Marine to strap it to an assault pack. Â… (It's) better for moving down an Iraqi alley to seek cover. It's as wide as your shoulders, and you can get in a window or doorway."

The Marines also employ a shoulder-launched multipurpose assault weapon (or SMAW) that is about the same length as the LAW, but twice as heavy and quite bulky. Likewise, Woellhof said, the AT-4 still has its place in the U.S. arsenal, especially firing long distances against armor across open ground.

"With the AT-4 or the SMAW, you have to expose yourself to fire," Woellhof said.

"The LAW is designed to augment the AT-4 against the technical Toyota (pickup truck) with a machinegun on board or against four to five urban positions. It's an all-Marine system. It's so simple you can just read the directions on the side."

And recent tests at Camp Geiger's School of Infantry met with good results.

"When we tested it at SOI, they were busting targets at 300 to 350 meters after two or three tries," Trexler said. "You can reach 500 meters with laser sites."

A family of designer rounds is being developed for the LAW - those will include a high-heat and high-pressure warhead capable of destroying a bunker, an antipersonnel warhead that can detonate at 100 meters or more and throw shrapnel fragments at enemy troops, and the traditional antitank warhead.

"It's easy to use, and (there aren't) many moving parts," said Lance Cpl. Andres Moratalla Jr., 22, an infantryman from Jacksonville. "It's lightweight and seems a lot more versatile for the field in Iraq."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marine faces Iraq - again
By BRYAN MITCHELL, mitchellb@knews.com
February 7, 2005

Sandy Arnold's son used to scamper around their Halls neighborhood playing soldier in homemade fatigues. Two decades later, her son still dresses in fatigues, but he's no longer playing.

"You just can't express what it's like to have him home safe," she said Sunday afternoon from Salem Baptist Church, 8201 Hill Road. "My heart is just overflowing."





U.S. Marine Corps Cpl. Troy Arnold returned from a seven-month tour in Iraq last July and wed his fiancee, Corinne, a day later in San Diego.

The couple was treated to a delayed wedding shower Sunday afternoon.

"She's a good little gal he's got there," Cpl. Arnold's grandfather, Berle Arnold, said as his grandson and wife posed for pictures with family and friends.

The 26-year-old Knoxville veteran will depart soon for his second tour in Iraq, where he will once again serve in the perilous Al Anbar province.

"It's the second go-around now, and we're going to be on pins and needles just like the first seven months," his grandfather said.

Corinne Arnold held back tears when she spoke of her husband's pending deployment.

"Part of you just knows that he's going to be right back home," she said. "I send him mail every day, and that's what keeps me going, knowing that he knows what's going on back home."

Troy Arnold will deploy this time with a wealth of combat experience.

He was part of the Marine Corps contingent that stormed the city of Fallujah last April following the massacre of four civilian contractors.

For his bravery in combat, the 1996 Halls High School graduate was awarded the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal with Combat Valor.

His exemplary service also translated into a meritorious field promotion to corporal. His position as a noncommissioned officer means he will serve as a squad leader in his next tour.

Despite the fact that he'll be stationed in Ramadi, one of the most dangerous cities in Iraq, he said he would lead his squad of Marines with both combat and diplomacy in mind.

"The way we handle ourselves is just like you see here, even though it's combat," he said as he pointed across a room full of family and friends. "We handle ourselves pretty calm."

His father, Johnny Arnold, gushed with pride when he spoke about his son.

"The Marine Corps does not select squad leaders who aren't mature individuals," Johnny Arnold said. "He knows this time that he will have more to think about than just himself. He has to bring those 12 Marines home safe, too."

Bryan Mitchell may be reached at 865-342-6306.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Ohio Marines Eulogized in Separate Services

WHEELERSBURG, OHIO -- Friends of two Ohio Marines killed in a helicopter crash in Iraq tearfully eulogized the men at separate weekend memorial services. Friends and family gathered in Wheelersburg on Friday to remember Lance Cpl. Jonathan Edward Etterling, and mourners filled a Dayton funeral home to pay tribute to Cpl. Richard Gilbert Jr. on Saturday.

Thirty-one servicemen, including two other Ohioans, died in the helicopter accident in bad weather in Iraq's western desert on Jan. 26. It was the greatest loss of life for the Marines since the 1983 bombing of a Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, that killed 241 people, including 220 Marines.

Gilbert's boyhood friend, Staff Sgt. Lonnie McMurchy, addressing a crowd of 300 on Saturday, recalled how the two would play military strategy games with toy soldiers when they were children. "I always knew he was going to beat me. He was going to beat me so I had no choice but to cheat," said McMurchy, describing how he would hide reinforcements in his pockets and sneak them onto the make-believe battlefield. "I told him this the last time I saw him. And he said, 'I knew it!'"

McMurchy, who enlisted before his friend did, said he was proud and sad when Gilbert decided to join the Marines after the Sept. 11 attacks. "I knew how much grief it would cause his mother and mine," he said. "He wanted to go fight. He wanted to defend our country. And that's what he did."

Etterling, 22, and three friends joined the Marines in 2002 after graduating from Wheelersburg High School in southern Ohio. One man, Alex Watts, said Etterling helped him get through the rough parts of boot camp. "We had so many good times. Jon had a way of getting along with everyone," childhood friend Watts said during his teary eulogy.

Etterling's family sat near the Marine's flag-draped casket, in the front row of the crowd of 700 gathered in a Wheelersburg gymnasium. More than 50 flower arrangements were on the stage.

Many in the crowd could be heard sobbing during the friends' remarks, and went silent as six Marine pallbearers carried the casket to a waiting hearse. A pianist softly played "America the Beautiful" as people left the building.

Posted 9:43pm, Saturday, February 5, 2005 by AEB

Ellie

[thedrifter]

'Face Of War' Marine Speaks Out
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NEW YORK, Feb. 7, 2005



(CBS) In his first television interview since returning from Iraq, Lance Cpl. Blake Miller, who was dubbed "the face of war" after his photo was featured prominently in newspapers and on television nationwide last November, sits down with The Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith to talk about his tour of duty in Iraq, finally coming home, and his newfound celebrity status.

The interview will be broadcast Tuesday, Feb. 8, on The Early Show.

Miller tells Smith that he is content to be just another Marine now, speaking openly about his time in Iraq and the bond he formed with fellow Marines.

"I lost a few of some of my dearest friends," he tells Smith. "People don't understand how you can be so close to someone that you've only known for such a short time, but when you spend a year and a half with someone, you know some things about them their own family doesn't even know.

"People say that the Marine Corps is a brotherhood and you truly do not realize that until you actually need your brothers, and that's when they're there."

During the interview, Miller tells Smith that he's glad to be home: "It's amazing. Marines don't share very much emotion, even in rough times, but it's nice to know you can come home and share that."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Months of waiting, worrying over
February 07,2005
ERIC STEINKOPFF
FREEDOM NEWS SERVICE


They were long trips for the three families. Two of them drove more than 12 hours from Alabama to get to Jacksonville, and the third one endured an 18-hour journey and a New England snowstorm to get here.

But the hours were mere minutes compared to the seven anxious months they endured as their Marines served with the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit in Iraq. And late Saturday night at Camp Lejeune, their wait ended with the return of about 250 members of the MEU.

"I can't wait. It's been a living hell worrying about that kid," said Lawrence Phillips Sr. of Salem, N.H., who has worn the chain of his son's crucifix around his neck since the last time he saw him.

His son, Lance Cpl. Lawrence "L.J." Phillips Jr., is a 21-year-old mortarman assigned to Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment who was among those who returned to loved ones Saturday night. Returning with him were Lance Cpl. Thomas "T.J" Hess, a 22-year-old infantryman, and Lance Cpl. Ricky J. Watson, a 20-year-old machine gunner, whose families traveled from Huntsville, Ala., for a much-anticipated reunion.

A year ago, the three families did not know each other, but they now share a bond unique to those in the military. They got to know each other through the friendship of their Marines, who shared holidays with each other's families during their pre-deployment training, and they wound up sharing the same Jacksonville hotel as they waited for the troops' return.

On hand to welcome Hess home were his mother, Bonnie; sister and brother-in-law, Belinda and Hal Roper; and the Ropers' three children.

"We kept in touch with a lot of phone calls, not much e-mail," Bonnie Hess said. "(The calls were) usually about once a week, but sometimes we went three weeks or a month with nothing."

And that lack of contact added to the anxiety when bad news broke from Iraq such as the recent helicopter crash that killed 15 Marines.

"It's scary. You don't know if it's your son or someone you know," Bonnie Hess said.

Carla Taylor, Watson's mother, said she put her son in God's hands and leaned on her faith during his deployment.

"You don't take things for granted. You figure that out real quick when they're over there," said Taylor, who was in the area with Watson's grandmother, Patsy Nayman, and his fiancée, Amy Payne.

"Two of his friends were killed," Taylor said. "(But) he wouldn't talk about it much; he didn't want to worry us," Nayman said.

They brought a banner 3 feet high and roughly 10 feet long that read, "Welcome Home, Ricky J."

About 40 to 50 people at the hospital where Taylor and Payne work as nurses signed the banner.

Along with his father, Phillips was welcomed back by his mother, Holly Phillips; two sisters, Melissa, 24, and Lauren, 13; and two brothers, Derek, 10, and Andrew, 7.

Andrew's second-grade class, instead of giving Christmas gifts to each other last December, sent presents to L.J.'s unit in Iraq.

"L.J. plans to come in and talk to Andrew's class while he's home on leave," Holly Phillips said proudly.

The weekend return of parts of the 24th MEU continued Sunday night as about 50 more troops with Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron 464, who reinforced Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 263, returned to the New River Air Station.

The remainder of the 2,200-person MEU is scheduled to return to eastern North Carolina in waves over the next couple of weeks.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

February 07, 2005

Battalion comes home

By Seth Hettena
Associated Press


CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. — Even if it is February, it’s Christmas time in the home of Marine Lance Cpl. Victor Oseto. The 21-year-old returned home Sunday and the celebrations that were put on hold can finally begin.
His Christmas stocking and the stocking of his twin brother, also a Marine, have been waiting over the fireplace in the Oseto home in Rocklin, outside Sacramento.

Nancy Oseto will be cooking up her traditional, if belated, Christmas prime rib dinner later this month. First, though, she plans to serve her 21-year-old son some Thanksgiving turkey.

Nearly 180 Marines with the 11th Marine Expeditionary Force’s battalion landing team returned Sunday from an eight-month deployment to Iraq, where they battled radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s forces in the cemetery of Najaf over three weeks in August. Seven Marines with the battalion were killed in the fighting.

On Sunday, the survivors came home marching three abreast in their desert cammies and were quickly engulfed by screaming and cheering families and loved ones who last saw them when they set sail from San Diego in May.

Marine Lance Cpl. Gabriel Aponte will be having Christmas on Feb. 20, his mother, Regina Aponte said. The Apontes bought a fake tree for the first time this year so they could celebrate Christmas in their Lake County home when the 23-year-old radio operator returned from Iraq.

“You find special ways to make them a part of Christmas,” she said.

The tree is still up in the Sonora home of Navy Hospital Corpsman Ben Powers, who turned 23 on Christmas Day — a double celebration the family will make up.

There was catching-up of another sort to do, as well. The boys mothers and fathers had raised were coming home as combat-hardened men.

“I’m anxious to see how he’s changed,” Nancy Oseto said as she waited for her son’s return in a Camp Pendleton gymnasium. “I know he’s seen a lot since he left. ... He’s an adult now. I can’t call him my baby anymore.”

Gary Joslin, who served in the Navy during Vietnam, saw something different in the eyes of his 22-year-old son in a photo taken after the cemetery battle in Najaf. Navy Hospital Corpsman Garrisson Joslin spent three days without sleep and lost comrades to battle.

“When I saw it, I knew his whole life had changed,” Joslin said.

Garrisson Joslin plans a different celebration with his father. He wants to have a beer, a good cigar and talk.

Way in the back of the crowd, a black-and-white sign for Navy Hospital Corpsman Eric Muether stood out from the sea of red, white and blue homecoming fanfare. Muehter is a member of Com Station Z, a San Diego science-fiction fan club and community service organization, and members of the group were waiting to greet him.

“May the force be with you,” the sign read. “Live long and prosper.”

Ellie