The young and the brave: fighting for freedom

[thedrifter]

The young and the brave: fighting for freedom
By: Eamon McNiff, Staff Reporter02/10/2005


DOVER PLAINS
Francis Bennett Jr. celebrated his 20th birthday on Feb. 2. While his mother and father sat in their Dover Plains home, quietly celebrating their son's day, Bennett was in Jacksonville, N.C.
He wasn't taking a break from the harsh New York winter, but hard at work training for his job: He's a member of the U.S. Marine Corps and is stationed at Camp Lejeune, preparing to leave for Iraq.
Bennett's mother, Ella, and her husband, George Heck, will see their son one last time before he's flown to the Middle East.
Bennett's orders are that between Feb. 15 and March 15 he could be called for duty and flown to Iraq with only a day's notice.
"He said, 'This is the best weekend, after that it's a days notice,'" Mrs. Heck explained in a recent interview. These past few weeks, Bennett has been at Camp Lejeune, getting ready to go to war.
"He's in advanced combat training," Mr. Heck, who served in the U.S. Army, said. "He's learning how to deal with the situations and people over there, so it's not so strange."
Bennett is a lance corporal whose job is in LVS Operation, Logistic Vehicle Operation for 35-33 Motor Transport. In civilian speak, he primarily works with massive vehicles that transport troops, supplies and other vehicles.
His duties include overseeing the maintenance and repair of the trucks, driving them with convoy security teams, supporting the front lines and working with the squad he is stationed with. Yet one duty supercedes all others.
"To stay alive," Mr. Heck stated.
Bennett entered the armed forces in 2003, enlisting right out of high school. He made the decision to enlist after a Marine recruiter came to his high school, and after speaking with his boss, who was an ex-Marine, where he worked at the Harlem Valley Beverage Center.
Bennett knew that a war was going on in Iraq. He received a certificate from the Marines for enlisting during a war, starting off in boot camp at Parris Island, S.C.
"That was the hardest day of my life," Mrs. Heck said. "When they took my baby," she briefly choked up, before swallowing the memory behind a forced laugh.
"He chose to do it, that was his decision. I respected it, not that I liked it," she said.
"He was into wrestling," Mrs. Heck recalled. "Funny part of it, when he went down to Parris Island, you know, boot camp, they make you do all these things, like fall off a building, and he was always as a kid afraid of heights. You could not get that kid to climb a tree, a ladder, nothing," Mrs. Heck joked.
"The Marines made him realize he can do a lot of things he never thought he could do. He's proud of himself, I'm proud of him," Mrs. Heck said.
Bennett left Parris Island on Feb. 13, 2004, one of only eight who graduated with the rank of private first class, out of roughly 800 Marines.
"He was so proud," Mrs. Heck said. She recalled that day when she and Mr. Heck and one of Bennett's three siblings, his sister, Stacie, 22, went down to watch him earn his stripes.
Bennett moved on to Camp Lejeune for more training and it was there he started in LVS Operation, learning how to inspect the vehicles, drive them, and if something broke he had to fix it.
From Camp Lejeune he shipped off to Okinawa, Japan to begin his necessary two years overseas.
Bennett also made close friends with other Marines whom Mrs. Heck would get to know and whom she described as her other "sons."
"At least he's not alone, he's with his friends," Mrs. Heck said.
Bennett then got word he would be going to Iraq, and returned to the U.S., immediately going to Camp Lejeune for more training.
Mrs. Heck said she knows his next trip, to war, is on the young man's mind.
"He's scared," she said. "When he returned, you could hear the excitement in his voice that he was back in the States," she said, adding, "He sounds nervous. I'm sure he is, he's going to a strange country."
Wherever she goes, Bennett's spirit hugs her tightly. Mrs. Heck keeps pictures of him at the Wingdale Liquor Store, where she works. She hangs photos of him in her truck. His image is found on the walls of the Heck's home.
A tense air of uncertainty hangs over Mr. and Mrs. Heck. They don't know much. Bennett only tells his family bits and pieces, as much as he's allowed. They know he'll be somewhere outside of Fallujah, the site of a major U.S. offensive, and that his stay will be around 220 days.
For now, they said they're concentrating on seeing him, and being strong for him when they say goodbye.
"It hasn't really hit me yet. I get thinking of him and I start getting teary eyed and stuff," Mrs. Heck said. "I know when I say 'goodbye' to him, I'm going to totally lose it."
Having a son involved in a war has changed Mrs. Heck's look on society. Two boys down the road are in Iraq, and other young men and women seem different to her.
"I look at our kids differently. Kids I see on the streets, things like that. You know, you look at some and it's like, they really could be doing something better, then you see the kids who are doing something like going to war, and it's like, how can you do that? I'm afraid of driving in the snow," Mrs. Heck said.
Aside from the fear and uncertainty of not knowing what to expect or hear Mrs. Heck said she thinks of soldiers building hospitals, which she said fills her with an indescribable pride.
"I can't describe the feeling, you can come out with these words, but it's like those words are not enough. There has got to be a better word, you know, like, like even fantastic isn't even it," she said.
"Maybe three years from now, we can all look back and everything will be fine," Mr. Heck said, reassuring his wife.
"It'd be nice if he called us in a couple of weeks and said he didn't have to go," Mr. Heck said.
When he's deployed, they'll be in touch. Bennett has a general mailing address in Iraq that Mrs. Heck hopes she can send him her peanut butter cups and other treats. And, they'll write to him as much as they can.
Most of all, though, Mrs. Heck said she wants her son to come home, she wants all her other "sons," like her son's friends, Ortega and Fitzpatrick, to come home, too.
"I just want him to come back safe, I want all those kids to come back home," Mrs. Heck said.



Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marines Will Reduce Iraq Presence
Associated Press
February 11, 2005

WASHINGTON - The Marine Corps will shrink the size of its ground combat force in Iraq this spring, with the Army making a corresponding increase, the Marines' operations chief said Thursday.

Lt. Gen. Jan Huly, the deputy commandant for plans, policies and operations, said in an Associated Press interview that the Marines will draw down from about 33,000 to about 23,000 when a fresh contingent headed by the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force is fully in place in Iraq in March.

"This has been planned all along," he said. He said it does not suggest the Marines are too taxed by commitments around the globe, including duty in Afghanistan and training at home.

Overall, the U.S. force is scheduled to drop by March or April from the current 153,000 to the 138,000 level that prevailed before a buildup late last year in advance of the Jan. 30 elections. Much of that temporary increase was achieved by extending the tours of Army units. The Marines also added several thousand, and they are now getting ready to return home.

Huly said that for planning purposes the Marines expect to maintain their force level in Iraq at about the 23,000 level "for the foreseeable future." He declined to define that more precisely.




A former deputy commander of Marine Corps Recruiting Command, Huly said he has seen no evidence that the fast pace of deployments since the start of the Iraq war - with Marines spending seven months in Iraq, then returning with only seven months' break at home - is hurting recruiting.

"So far it's not breaking their spirit, their morale or their will to fight," he said.

In fact he thinks the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts are a plus for attracting and retaining Marines.

"My 35 years in the Marine Corps have shown me that that's why young men and women join the Marines - to go do that kind of stuff," he said. "Most of them would rather be going back to Iraq than sitting around at Camp Lejeune or Camp Pendleton shooting blanks. They make more money over there. It's more exciting."

The Marines say they are on track to meeting their recruiting goal for this year, although in January they fell short of their monthly target for the first time in almost 10 years.

More than 450 Marines have died in the Iraq war. Marines bore the brunt of the fighting in Fallujah last November when U.S. forces attacked the city to eliminate a stronghold of the insurgency.

Huly said the Marine Corps is holding up well under the strain, although the Corps is operating its vehicles and aircraft at a faster pace than officials had budgeted for before the war began.

"I think the strain on the equipment will probably show up before the strain on the people does," he said.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Homeless Vets Buried With Full Honors <br />
Associated Press <br />
February 11, 2005 <br />
<br />
DALLAS - Harold Dean Harris died homeless and destitute in an abandoned building and might have gone to a pauper's...

[thedrifter]

Rumsfeld Meets With Troops In Iraq
Associated Press
February 11, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on a one-day trip to Iraq told U.S. and Iraqi soldiers on Friday that Iraqis, not Americans, will have to defeat the continuing insurgency here.

Rumsfeld spoke to troops in Mosul in northern Iraq before departing for Baghdad and meetings with U.S. and Iraqi officials and a review of Iraq's security forces.

In his address at the Mosul airfield, Rumsfeld told American troops "you have shown that America is in fact a land of liberators, not a land of occupiers." But, he added, "It is the Iraqis who have to over time defeat the insurgency."

He spoke after presenting the Army Commendation Medal to a group of Iraqi and American soldiers.

Rumsfeld also visited a combat hospital in Mosul, and spoke briefly with Sgt. Sean Ferguson, a California native who was shot in the hand by a sniper. Ferguson was awarded his second Purple Heart for the wound.





Rumsfeld daylong visit was not announced publicly in advance for security reasons.

Rumsfeld is the most senior U.S. official to arrive in Iraq since the nation's elections on Jan. 30. Rumsfeld's spokesman Larry di Rita said the purpose of the trip was "to recognize the great success of the elections."

Rumsfeld flew in from France, where he met with NATO defense ministers and discussed ways to increase their contributions to the U.S.-led efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In December, Rumsfeld made a surprise Christmas Eve visit to U.S. troops in Mosul, where he met many of the victims of an insurgent attack on a mess tent that had been bombed several days earlier. He also shared a Christmas Eve dinner with troops at a base outside of Baghdad and, amid tight security, visited others in Tikrit.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Army Life: Long Hours, Some Comforts
Cox News Service
February 11, 2005

TIKRIT, Iraq - There's hot chow, or at least lukewarm, and there are showers, too, although they sometimes run out of hot water, leaving lathered-up soldiers yelping as they try to rinse the soapsuds under a suddenly cold stream of water.

There's a giant screen television, complete with a seemingly endless stack of DVDs, most of them action movies. There are computers hooked up to the Internet, phones for calling home, exercise machines and a punching bag strung up from the rafters of a porch.

There's even an outdoor fast-food court at a nearby base, where soldiers coming in hungry off patrol can wolf down a Whopper from Burger King, a steaming slice fresh from Pizza Hut, a foot-long sandwich from Subway or a triple-shot latte brimming with whipped cream from the Green Beans Coffee Shop.

Life for American soldiers on the front line in Iraq is far from easy, but today's Army has managed to import enough of the comforts of home to keep its volunteers from griping too much about the legendary deprivations of duty in a combat zone.

While conditions vary from base to base, the set-up at Forward Operating Base Omaha near Tikrit, home for some of the soldiers just arriving from the Army's 3rd Infantry Division from Ft. Stewart, Ga., is probably typical for many Americans serving in Iraq.





With U.S. bases subject to mortar fire, there's been an effort to billet the troops in buildings if possible. At Omaha, home is a huge mansion said to have been under construction for one of Saddam Hussein's relatives at the time of the U.S. invasion in 2003. Although the sprawling building was only half-completed at the time of the war, the soldiers have rigged the high-ceilinged rooms into dormitories.

The three-story structure is cut up into a maze of bunk areas for different squads, with rough-built walls fashioned from 2-by-4s and plywood. Eight to 10 soldiers live in each of the rooms, most fashioning their own plywood cubicles for at least a semblance of privacy.

But the place is open, drafty and loud. The makeshift plywood walls don't reach the 15-foot-high ceilings, so sound echoes inside the brick structure.

Despite frequent cleaning by soldiers wielding brooms, dust covers everything.

There are heaters for all the bunkrooms, to ward off the winter cold. While far from homey, there is a set of three couches surrounding the large-screen TV in the ground-floor recreation room, where soldiers sprawl as they wait for mess call or to go back out on patrol.

Learning to sleep anywhere at any time under any conditions seems a talent the troops quickly learn. Many soldiers coming in from patrols simply sprawl out on their cots, instantly falling asleep.

Bathroom facilities are about 100 yards out the front door: a line of green portable toilets. Elsewhere on the compound there are slightly nicer bathroom facilities in portable trailers and small buildings, complete with flush toilets, sinks and showers.

"You've got to try each of the trailers and buildings to find the ones with hot water," a veteran sergeant advised a visitor. "Mornings are usually better, too, although sometimes you have to get up really early to beat the rush."

The walled compound around the base is a giant parking lot for the trucks, tanks and various machines dedicated to fighting or supply. Vehicles coming in through the main gate must first run a gauntlet of checkpoints, barriers and blast walls, then stop at a station where every soldier must step out and clear his weapon, pointing the barrel into a metal drum filled with sandbags.

On the way to the mess hall is a small trailer with a hand-lettered sign, "Barber shop," where soldiers can get a trim.

Soldiers can drop off laundry at a facility run by a contractor, with the clean clothes coming back in 2 to 3 days.

Food is trucked from another nearby base, and served out of large insulated trays. There are endless supplies of fruit juices and sodas, deserts like cake and pudding and even a large freezer in the corner of the mess hall brimming with ice cream sandwiches and other frozen treats.

For all the comforts, though, the soldiers often work exhausting days. Patrols roll out the heavily guarded gate at all hours of the day and night, sometimes stretching into 12-hour ordeals. Gunners in the Humvee turrets have tough duty, their heads sticking up through the open hatches, catching the cold winter wind, their legs and backs aching after hours of sitting suspended in the turret's web sling.

The patrols are often out during mess hall hours, so the soldiers miss meals, although they can always pick up a packaged Meals-Ready-to-Eat to tide them over until the next mess call.

As with soldiers in any era, there are the inevitable complaints.

"I came all the way to Iraq and now they have me cleaning out the toilets," one young soldier told another as the two had a smoke on the building's roof. "I can't take this much longer."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Lawmakers Press Military On Cuts
Associated Press
February 11, 2005

WASHINGTON - Lawmakers overseeing the military questioned the chiefs of staff for the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps on Thursday about proposed budget cuts to weapons systems and wondered about the wisdom of wartime reductions and their impact on national security.

Although the Pentagon's budget would increase by $19 billion next year, President Bush's $419 billion proposal would scale back production of a stealth fighter, a transport plane and ships, and eliminate one aircraft carrier.

At a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, the chiefs of staff said the proposed cuts were driven by budget constraints and that the reductions ran counter to what the military previously had estimated it would need to perform at a high level.

"I want to make sure that we don't engage in a process that is in some ways penny wise and pound foolish," said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.

The committee chairman, Sen. John Warner, said he was shocked at the plan to reduce the number of carriers to 11, because that was not part of the Navy's original proposal. Warner, R-Va., also said the committee was "astonished" at the notion of cutting back production C130J transport aircraft.




Adm. Navy Adm. Vernon Clark said the decision to eliminate a carrier was made late last year after the administration sought additional spending cuts.

Gen. John Jumper of the Air Force told lawmakers that the Pentagon probably will reconsider its decision to cut the transport aircraft because curtailing its production will cost more than anticipated.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said he feared the cuts in the shipbuilding budget would produce "a significantly diminished Navy" in 10 years to 20 years.

Clark said he was concerned that with the amount of money spent on vessels over the past 15 years that "we cannot afford over a 250-ship Navy." But he said the Navy must change the way it buys ships because it buys too few per order, which makes each more expensive.

Questioning the proposed cuts to the F/A-22 stealth fighter, Sens. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., asked whether the Air Force can guarantee air supremacy without it.

"General, I don't want us to be in a fair fight. I want the men and women that fly for you to have the capability of knocking anything off the ground that might be shot at us, or anything coming out of the sky that might shoot at us or shoot at our men and women on the ground," Chambliss said.

Jumper said the fighter would put U.S. forces ahead of all others for the next 10 years to 20 years and that there are no other weapons systems better than the F/A-22.

Also at the hearing, Democrats criticized the budget for failing to include the billions of dollars it will cost to fight wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan, the committee's top Democrat, said the request before the committee amounted to a "peacetime budget" that "hides the true size" of the federal deficit.

Both Republicans and Democrats pressed Jumper and Gen. Michael Hegge of the Marine Corps about why the budget did not pay for a permanent increase in troop levels for both branches. The money for 30,000 extra Army troops and 3,000 more Marines is to be included in an upcoming one-year war-funding request.

"We need more troops," Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., said. "By essentially kicking the can down the road every year, we're losing time."

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Merchant Mariners Seek Belated Thanks
Associated Press
February 11, 2005

WASHINGTON - The bullets and torpedoes they faced were just as real, but World War II merchant mariners say the government hasn't given them the same treatment as military personnel.

When the fighting ended, they got no homecoming parades, "no GI Bill, no nothing," said former mariner George Duffy of Seabrook, N.H.

Now there's proposed legislation to pay $1,000 monthly to the aged former civilian sailors, who hauled troops, tanks, bombers, fuel and other wartime goods to keep Allied forces supplied.

"My bill is a belated thank you," said Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif.

Similar measures have failed, and supporters say time is running out because the mariners are now in their 70s and 80s. Some were on Capitol Hill on Thursday to lobby lawmakers to support this latest effort.




A bill to give mariners or their widows $1,000 a month died last year before being reintroduced last month. Estimates on who might benefit vary widely, with some saying 60,000 are surviving and others saying only 10,000 need the money and would apply for it.

The merchant marine of the 1940s was a crucial third leg of the massive U.S. war effort. The military fought on the battlefront; American factories and workers produced equipment and goods on the homefront; merchant mariners were a link between the two.

Thousands were lost or injured in rough seas, to Japanese kamikaze pilots who crashed into their decks, or to German submarines that sank ships in their convoys.

But the sailors were technically civilians and had a traditional rivalry with military sailors, said Jack Green, a spokesman for the Naval Historical Center.

A Navy movement to put them under military control was scuttled during the war by shipping companies that held lucrative government contracts and by the men's union, which didn't want to lose control of the workers, historians say.

The rivalry and later general disinterest in the merchant marines' cause conspired to relegate them to second-class veterans.

Duffy recalled the disparate treatment he received compared with a friend in the Coast Guard.

Captured by the Germans at 20 and delivered to the Japanese, Duffy spent 37 months - exactly 1,119 days, he said - in Pacific prisoner of war camps. He endured scarce food and medicine and his prisoner work detail was forced to build the Japanese a railroad across Sumatra.

"I came home after this experience and had no benefits, no (paid college tuition under the) GI Bill, no nothing," Duffy said.

His friend got full military benefits after spending the entire war as a clerk in a New York office of the Coast Guard.

A little like today's civilian contractors working with the military in war zones, the 1940s seamen got higher pay than military counterparts - though not that much higher. They say the difference was negated once they calculated that they were paid only for time at sea - not shore time like the military - and they didn't get the insurance, health care, lower mortgage rates, preferred employment status and educational opportunities that returning armed forces got.

Frank Medeiros said he was paid $3,000 in 1943 for what had been billed as a four-month convoy to supply allied Russian troops at Murmansk. The round-trip run ended up taking 13 months, and two dozen of its three dozen merchant ships were lost to attacks along the way.

Now an 83-year-old part-time dispatcher for the union Masters, Mates and Pilots in San Francisco, he says grateful Russians later invited former mariners to visit, awarding them medals.

"And I got a letter from former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev," said Medeiros. "They called us patriots."

Of his own government, he says: "They shouldn't have done what they did to us."

A benefits bill was killed in the 1940s - "torpedoed by powerful military lobbyists who influenced congressmen and senators," said author Brian Herbert, who drew from government documents, diaries and survivor interviews to write his 2004 book, "The Forgotten Heroes: The Heroic Story of the United States Merchant Marine."

The mariners got veteran status - and therefore some limited benefits - when they sued the military in 1988, by which time some postwar programs had expired.

In 2000, Canada approved $34 million for one-time payments of up to $16,400 to its World War II merchant seaman, who also belatedly got veteran status.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

With America at war, Hollywood follows <br />
By César G. Soriano and Ann Oldenburg, USA TODAY <br />
Hollywood has gone to war. <br />
<br />
In a reflection of America's conflict in Iraq, a proliferation of TV and film...

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Golf 2/11 winning hearts, minds across Southwestern Iraq
Submitted by: 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing
Story Identification #: 200521034233
Story by Sgt. Nathan K. LaForte



AL ASAD, Iraq (Feb. 10, 2005) -- For the last several months, Battery G, 2nd Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment, has been practicing a good neighbor policy with the Bedouin residents in Southwestern Iraq.

They have been supporting the Iraqi populace in every way possible since arriving in country last fall, while supporting the multinational forces effort elsewhere in the country as well.

“Our mission was to secure our area of operations, which is about 45 square kilometers of desert,” said Staff Sgt. Joseph Kepler, “Golf” Battery Combat Operations Center watch officer. “We’ve been out here pretty much doing a (Security and Stabilization) mission, but have gone as far as supporting operations in Fallujah, Iraq and other places.”

The battery’s version of SASO includes close interaction with local Iraqis.

“When we’re working within our AO, we’ll go out and patrol along (main service routes) and set up (Vehicle Checkpoints) and have also held town hall meetings,” said the 30-year-old from Jamestown, N.Y. “We’ll also go down to the point of entry (between Saudi Arabia and Iraq) and conduct interviews on the Iraqi border patrol guys down there and see how they are doing. We also check on the outpost along the border, which act as watches to prevent people from coming across the Saudi border.”

Relations with the Iraqis were a little strained in the beginning, noted Kepler.

“At first people were a little shy of us, because the local populace wasn’t really accustomed to having us around. They knew we were here and had some familiarization with us, but it wasn’t to the degree of having us out there on the streets, shaking hands and talking to kids the best we could through a translator,” Kepler explained. “As time went on, everybody has gotten more comfortable with us including the local Iraqi leaders, the border patrol, the mayor of An Nukhayb, Iraq and the local Sheik himself. Even when we’re stopping guys out there on the street, they’re telling us they’re just happy we’re here.”

The Marines not only bring peace of mind to the local Iraqis, but they have also given the local law enforcement training and confidence to conduct their own missions, Kepler added.

“When they see us, it makes them feel better, because they know somebody’s actually out there patrolling the streets,” Kepler said. “The Iraqi Police in this area have really picked up with their operations. Before you’d only see them very rarely if at all. But now you’ll see them out in the streets setting up VCPs outside their town. They’re becoming more and more involved with taking over and providing for their own safety.”

While Multi-national forces continue to counter the rampant terrorist threat in larger cities across the country, the types of crime here are proportionate to the smaller size of the city. It is still important to help the Iraqi forces deal with these problems, said Sgt. Adam Acuna, squad leader, Golf Battery.

“We basically support the (Iraqi Police) even if it’s going out looking for what they call ‘Ali-Babas,’ or thieves, which is a big deal out here,” Acuna said, referring to the Iraqi’s reference to carjacking. “We give them the support they need to take responsibility for their own actions. They have come a long way since we’ve gotten here.”

The Battery has run some operations and captured a few high-value targets since arriving, but the carjacking remains one of the larger crimes in the area. The small area is still an integral part of the country.

“This border area is important to the success of this country,” Kepler said. “Back in the old days, An Nukhayb was the gateway to Iraq (from Saudi Arabia). It’s important that we get that place re-established, so they can open it up to (trade). If it weren’t for our small unit out here supporting, they wouldn’t get anything from anyone because they are out in the middle of nowhere.”

Just recently the Marines at the outpost oversaw the safety of over 25-thousand Iraqi pilgrims crossing the border to Saudi Arabia on their way to Mecca for the Hajj.

The attention and care that the Marines have given the local villagers in the area has made a visible impact with the local population.

“The Iraqi populace here loves us. They are local Bedouins here and are really hospitable. They’ll offer you what food they have and if they don’t have any available, they’ll offer to go out and slaughter one of their sheep and feed you that,” Kepler said. “You’ll be driving down the street and the kids will beat feet to get up to the road just to say ‘hi.’ The Iraqis will come out of their Bedouin tents waving and come right up to the vehicles.”

The Battery supported Operation Al Fajr, or the Dawn, in the city of Fallujah, Iraq last Nov., supported the movement of pilgrims during the Hajj and the Iraqi elections Jan. 30. The battery is proud of the accomplishment, Kepler mentioned, because since it has been in theater, it has been operating as a provisional rifle company instead of an artillery unit.

With more than 200-thousand miles of traveling under their belts and more than 450 missions completed, the Battery has managed to complete their deployment relatively unscathed. The Battery will bring home all of its Marines except for the tragic loss of Cpl. Bryan S. Wilson, a 22-year-old Marine from Otterbein, Ind. Dec. 1 in a non-hostile Humvee accident.

The Marines have maintained their focus since the event and will continue their mission until their scheduled departure from Iraq this spring. The success of the mission continues to be the junior Noncommissioned Officers, sometimes nicknamed “strategic corporals,” Kepler said. A “strategic corporal” refers to junior NCO’s who are constantly making decisions during wartime that directly affects policy after the fact.

“It’s that ‘strategic corporal’ out there. Considering the AO that we’re in and the area we’re responsible for, we’re not always stopping vehicles, pointing weapons and treating people aggressively,” he revealed. “We’re talking to them and treating them humanely, as if we were police officers stopping anyone on the street. The majority of the population and the traffic in the area are either travelers or local residents here so we have to remember that every time we stop a vehicle we’re not dealing with bad guys.”

Acuna noted that the leadership couldn’t be more pleased with their artillery-trained, infantry-operating Marines.

“Our overall mission is to give the Iraqis confidence on taking control of their own country. The Marines work hard out here,” Acuna said. “Motivation goes up and down, but when it’s time to get the job done, they come through.”

Ellie

[thedrifter]

America Supports You: Network Brings World to Military Families
By Samantha L. Quigley
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 10, 2005 – Moving to unfamiliar places can make anyone feel a bit like a fish out of water.

Combined with frequent moves, such as those in the military can be, that unsettled feeling can be much more intense.

Caroline Peabody is attempting to help by "making the world a home for military families."

To do this, Peabody introduced the Military Family Network, an online community-building organization. The network's goal is to help bridge the gap between military installation and civilian community life.

"Military families learn best from other military families and their experiences with whatever they experience when they're in a community," Peabody said.

The MFN Web site gives them a place to share their experiences and gain insight into the communities they live in or are moving to. It is designed to provide servicemembers and their families core information about the community surrounding the military installation where they are stationed.

And the same core information is offered for each installation. "What we're trying to do is standardize all these (topics and) have military families be confident that when they go from one (installation) to the other, this is the kind of information that they can find here, all the time, in the exact same place, no matter where they go," Peabody said.

While information is not yet available for all installations and communities, Peabody said that the Web site is a work in progress and will continue to grow.

"We have a lot … in our database now," she said. "It's just not live. We want to make it all live at once."

That includes information for 300 installations that are due to be added to what's already available, she said. She added that information on nearly all major military installations should be ready to go live within about six weeks.

"There will always be more that we can do," she said.

Peabody's quest to continually better the two-year-old endeavor resulted in the Community Connection Outreach project that started several months ago. The outreach portion of the Web site serves to flesh out the core information that the Web site provides.

It encourages non-profit groups, community organizations and government agencies, including local governments, to join the forum and the individuals who meet there. Their participation will make the Community Connections Forums interactive by providing information on services, events and happenings that will be able to be accessed on the site, Peabody said. It's a sort of cyber- networking of people and services.

"I like the word 'network,' she said in describing what happens through Community Connections. "It's a very powerful thing."

Peabody knows how helpful that network can be. She is the spouse of a recently retired soldier. Her husband served with the Army on active duty for 22 years and was in the National Guard for six years. He retired from the Continental Army Band based at Fort Monroe in Hampton, Va., where the Military Family Network is headquartered.

What she found is that the knowledge gained by a civilian family that lives in the same area for years is lost on military families. The network Web site is her way of remedying that.

"Over time, we're creating that intergenerational knowledge for the military community," Peabody said.

The city of Hampton has formed a partnership with the Military Family Network to help bridge that generational knowledge gap, said Tammy Flynn, marketing and community outreach manager for the Hampton Neighborhood office.

Flynn said she thinks that the military is more in touch with what Hampton is doing because of the partnership with Military Family Network.

"We have resources (and) information that military folks need that we're sharing with them," Flynn said. She said the opposite also is true: The city is also more in touch with what the military needs.

"It will take awhile to see the big results of (the partnership)," Flynn said.

But a good indicator, she said, will be the number of military members who attend an event being planned for May.

City officials will be highlighting Hampton to potential homebuyers, Flynn said. The city relied on the Military Family Network for assistance to ensure that the event is useful for the military community.

"They're providing an incredible service for the military community," Flynn said, adding that it's a needed service because often communities forget that the military community has unique needs.

Peabody said she started the Military Family Neighbor of Choice Business Network to fund the Military Family Network. Businesses recommended by servicemembers because they are supportive of military families can, for a fee, elect to be included in the community directories.

For their fee, their name and services are put on the Web site in front of the military community as being "military friendly" and military families are encouraged to patronize them. There also are a few paid advertisements that appear on the site, Peabody said.

Once a member of the network, families can also leave comments about their experience with a specific business.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

3/4 motor transport keeps battalion mobile <br />
Submitted by: 1st Marine Division <br />
Story Identification #: 20052862735 <br />
Story by Lance Cpl. Paul Robbins Jr. <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
CAMP ABU GHURAYB, Iraq (Feb. 5, 2005)...

[thedrifter]

Enemy action critical to win a Purple Heart
February 11,2005
ANDREW DEGRANDPRÉ
DAILY NEWS STAFF

These days, Marine Lt. Dustin Ferrell tells just one war story from his time in Iraq.

Ten others can say the same. At least five of them, including Ferrell, left for Iraq in early 2003 with units based at Camp Lejeune. Each was wounded during the initial invasion, and each received a Purple Heart only to have it taken away less than two years later.

Their injuries, although sustained in a combat environment, were not caused by enemy action, the official revocation notice states. And that's the critical distinction a Purple Heart recipient must possess, according to the rules - and the guys who wear one today.

Mac McGee, a retired sergeant major from Jacksonville who served three tours in Vietnam, received his Purple Heart in 1968 after being struck with shrapnel from an exploding grenade.

"It was a minor wound," he said Thursday, "but I shed my blood and left some flesh there."

Ferrell, 26, who is back at Camp Lejeune, will medically retire from the Marine Corps on June 30. At that time, he will have served for five years.

A member of Camp Lejeune's Task Force Tarawa in March 2003, Ferrell and his infantry battalion had just crossed the Kuwaiti border - their convoy racing toward the Marines' first major hurdle in the city of an-Nasiriyah - when the Humvee in which he was riding collided with a vehicle operated by Army personnel.

He'd been in Iraq for fewer than 48 hours, and already he was being sent home.

Although Ferrell remembers nearly nothing about the incident, he bears plenty of reminders. He's partially blind in his right eye and 14 teeth shy of a full set. His face, which suffered several broken bones, was reconstructed with plastic and metal.

Arguably, he, too, left flesh on the battlefield.

"I have a lot going through my head right now," Ferrell said Thursday. "On the one hand, I think people should know about this. On the other hand, I want them to know I am faithful to the Marine Corps. I don't want people to think I'm just whining and complaining - I am a faithful Marine."

According to Marine Corps documents provided to The Daily News by Ferrell's family, the other Lejeune-based troops whose Purple Hearts were revoked are Cpl. Travis Eichelberger, Lance Cpl. Shawn Eshelman, Lance Cpl. Christopher Hanna and Lance Cpl. Bret Westerink.

Lt. Darlan Harris, a spokeswoman for the Marine base in Quantico, Va., confirmed the names. The five others who lost their medals are stationed in various places.

The story spread

In September 2004, Lt. Gen. James T. Conway, who commanded the I Marine Expeditionary Force for two combat tours in Iraq, notified the secretary of the Navy that the 11 medals had been awarded "erroneously." Ferrell was notified by letter in early December. Papers throughout the Midwest - Ferrell calls Indiana his home - picked up the story at that time; it made CNN this week.

Eichelberger, who's presently on leave at his home in Kansas, was wounded and subsequently honored after a U.S. Abrams tank rolled over him. It's a tragic story, McGee said, "but if no one was shooting at them, they don't rate a Purple Heart - as far as I'm concerned."

Purple Heart recipients, McGee said, "share a common bond."

"It's not like being a hero," he added. "We didn't choose to be awarded."

McGee commands the Military Order of the Purple Heart's Jacksonville chapter, known as the Beirut Memorial chapter. His adjutant, retired Marine Master Sgt. John Cooney, echoed McGee's sentiment. He called the current situation unfortunate but agreed with the Marine Corps' decision.

"I feel sorry for them - I do," Cooney said. "But the gist of the order says that (the wound) must come from enemy action. Now that might seem a little harsh. But sometimes, that's the way it goes.

"The kid got run over by a (U.S.) tank. It was an accident."

The Purple Heart differs from other military decorations because an individual is not so much recommended for it - he or she is entitled to it once wounded or killed and provided specific criteria is met. Those wounded or killed in combat by friendly fire earn a Purple Heart so long as the "friendly projectile or agent" is intended to damage or destroy enemy troops or equipment. Regulations stipulate that those wounded in accidents, be it explosive, aircraft or vehicular, are not eligible.

Currently, active-duty personnel are awarded the Purple Heart following an endorsement from their chain of command that states the nature of the injury and the circumstances in which the service member was wounded. Often considered an automatic for anyone hurt in combat, each Purple Heart is, however, reviewed to ensure the wounds were received from enemy action.

What next?

In the cases of these 11 troops, it seems those reviews were performed too hastily, said U.S. Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C.

"It's sad that this mistake was made," said Jones, a member of the House Armed Services Committee. "But it was a mistake - no question about it.

"They should have been more careful in reading the reports about their injuries."

Jones predicted there will be "some discussion" concerning the situation. Already, Eichelberger has petitioned U.S. Rep. Jim Ryun, R-Kan. Ferrell has found an ally in U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-Ind., who's seeking congressional support for a resolution to have four of the medals reinstated. As yet, the legislation has not been introduced.

A sense of obligation to "younger enlisted people who might be in this situation in the future" prompted Ferrell to speak up, he said.

"We want to make sure that when they come back, they don't feel the same indignity," Ferrell said.

"In the long run, it'll be better for the Marine Corps."


Contact city editor Andrew deGrandpre at adegrandpre@freedomenc.com or at 353-1171, Ext. 224.



Ellie

[thedrifter]

Expeditionary Fighting Vehicles among items cut in ’06 budget
Supplemental funds counted on to fund war needs

By Christian Lowe
Special to the Times


The Marine Corps’ $17.5 billion budget request for fiscal 2006 includes a proposal to drastically reduce the number of Expeditionary Fighting Vehicles it will buy over the next five years in a move that will severely affect the critical program.
The Corps will cut 213 vehicles over the next five years, including 16 it planned to buy in 2006.

Budget officials said affordability problems and issues with key components of the vehicle, slated to replace the aging Amphibious Assault Vehicle, forced the cuts.

“It’s a more realistic schedule,” a senior Navy budget official said Feb. 3, referring to the EFV procurement plan.

The change is one of a few other highlights in the Corps’ budget request, a proposal reflecting efforts to keep annual spending levels steady despite escalating war costs.

The request will be submitted to Congress on Feb. 7 along with the Navy’s budget. It includes $10.7 billion for personnel, $4 billion for operations and maintenance, and more than $2.4 billion for procurement, research and development.

A Corps budget official said the service is requesting more money for Marine recruiters to offer bonuses of up to $5,000 to infantry applicants. Otherwise, there are few surprises, he said.

“This go-around, there really wasn’t a whole lot of movement or adjustment to Marine Corps programs. Where you see the major muscle movements going on are on EFV,” said the official, who spoke on background.

The Corps’ request grew a modest $747 million over its 2005 request, and senior budget officials admit they will rely on supplemental funding bills — during both fiscal 2005 and 2006 — to pay for much of the Corps’ current and future wartime needs.

The Marine Corps already has received more than $2 billion in extra funding since the fiscal year began Oct. 1. Corps officials declined to say how much they would seek in a second supplemental request in coming weeks, but the Pentagon reportedly plans to request $75 billion for the services to help offset war bills.

Many believe the Pentagon’s budget request is simply a “place holder” because recommendations from the Quadrennial Defense Review, expected this fall, will likely recommend significant shifts in military spending.

But Corps officials said their 2006 request is not a place holder and reflects a peacetime budget that counts on supplemental funds to pay for equipment recapitalization and other wartime costs.

Programs slashed

In addition to the EFV cuts, the Corps slashed several other high-profile programs, including the MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft and the KC-130J Hercules refueler-transport plane.

The Marine Corps cut 35 MV-22 Ospreys through fiscal 2011, a setback to an already struggling program. Technical hiccups have delayed the aircraft’s operational debut since its return to flight in May 2002 following a nearly 18-month grounding, but budget officials say the cuts are geared more toward saving the Corps money than to change the procurement schedule.

In another blow to aviation, the Corps will have to forego 19 KC-130J Hercules planes it had expected because of the cancellation of the Air Force’s C-130J program.

The Corps was purchasing the aircraft in tandem with the Air Force, but is forced to buy only 12 in fiscal 2006, leaving the fleet with 33 of the aircraft rather than the 52 the service needed to replace its aging KC-130F and R models.

The Corps is assessing options on making up the difference of having fewer than expected J models.

On the plus side, the new budget will mark the introduction of the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, with 15 to be purchased in 2006 and 19 planned for 2007.

The 2006 budget also will buy 20 Assault Breaching Vehicles, the Corps’ newest mine countermeasures vehicle, which will augment the MK155 Mine Clearance Launcher.

The budget request also funds more than 1,300 Humvees in 2006.

Christian Lowe is a staff writer for Defense News.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

'Complete warrior' nets Navy Cross
Submitted by: MCB Camp Pendleton
Story Identification #: 200527193530
Story by Lance Cpl. Daniel J. Redding



MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. (Jan. 27, 2004) -- Injured Marines and Iraqis needed help - their lives hanging in the balance. Sgt. Scott C. Montoya risked his own life - time and again - to give it to them.

Consequently, Montoya was awarded the Navy Cross - the U.S. military's second-highest award for heroism stemming from Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Montoya, a member of Company F, 2nd Battalion, 23rd Marines, received the award Sunday at the Marine Corps Reserve Center here for his actions on April 8, 2003, two weeks into OIF.

Small-arms fire rained down on the men of Company F, injuring both Iraqi civilians and Marines. Pinned down, with the injured needing assistance, Montoya rushed through enemy fire to whisk four injured Marines and one Iraqi civilian out of harm's way, according to his award citation.

Montoya's "extraordinary heroism" arose out of the battle for Baghdad.

Montoya pulled off a string of harrowing rescues shortly after killing an insurgent at point-black range with a single rifle shot, according to the citation.

One Marine was wounded in the leg and bleeding badly, the citation said. Montoya fireman-carried him 500 yards to safety.

He returned to the cross-fire to cart away another wounded Marine, then returned again and dragged another - who'd been dazed by the concussion of a grenade blast - to a casualty collection point.

In all, he rescued five people while "repeatedly exposing himself to fire-swept streets," the citation said.

"I'm overwhelmed by the support I have received," Montoya said about the award ceremony. "It hasn't sunk in yet."

Montoya received the award in front of family, friends and the men of his unit. Other guests included a local congressman, a judge with the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the 4th Marine Division commanding general and Michael S. Carona, the Orange County Sheriff.

A deputy sheriff in Orange County, Montoya drew praise from many of his co-workers - including Carona.

"He is a complete warrior," Carona said. "Whether as a Marine or as a law enforcement figure, he is always putting the community or the country above his own personal safety."

Carona alluded to Montoya's rapid response under fire.

"These things happen in the blink of a second, and an individual has to decide to be a hero or not. He decided to be one."

Charlene J. Thairs, Montoya's mother, said her son always makes her beam.

"I'm so incredibly proud of him," Thairs said. "He is always doing something amazing. It's a joke with his brothers and sisters - what has he done now? What is he being awarded today?"

Thairs said the award stemmed from her son's character and training shining through when the opportunity presented itself.

"He just reacted," she said. "It was complete reaction (to) what needed to be done."

Montoya described it this way:

"I saw a hurt Marine and all my training came into play. It wasn't a cognitive thing; I just saw the situation and cared for my Marines."

Sgt. Jose N. Sanchez, a supply clerk with 2/23, has known Montoya for six years and wasn't surprised when he heard the news.

"The level he went - it's above and beyond the call of anyone, even a Marine," Sanchez said, adding: "What matters to him are his Marines, not the awards or the actions he took."

In the end, Montoya said, "It's just a medal.

"Service before self is something I teach in the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program," said Montoya, a MCMAP instructor for his unit. "I feel the award represents the character of the Corps."

Thairs said her son's actions were all about selflessness and devotion to others.

"He thinks his actions are those of a Marine. He is loyal to a fault to his fellow brothers. Totally, completely loyal. It didn't matter who the men he rescued were," she said.

Col. Geffery L. Cooper, the battalion's commanding officer during OIF, said Montoya's award was well-deserved.

"As we all know, we don't wear the uniform to tally up awards," Cooper said. "It means a great deal to me that the Corps can recognize such Marines of valor in combat.

(Montoya) is a man of integrity and leadership, and his loyalty is unquestionable. He is a great example and advocate for all reservists."

As an added bonus, Montoya received a flag flown over the U.S. Capitol from Rep. Howard L. Berman, congressman from the 28th District.

Montoya is the seventh Marine to receive a Navy Cross stemming from OIF.

E-mail Lance Cpl. Redding at daniel.redding@usmc.mil

http://www.marines.mil/marinelink/image1.nsf/Lookup/200527193726/$file/crosstn.jpg

Sgt. Scott C. Montoya with 2nd Battalion, 23rd Marine Regiment, was awarded the Navy Cross Sunday in Encino for his actions in Operation Iraqi Freedom. He's credited with braving enemy gunfire to whisk five people, including wounded or injured Marines, to safety. Montoya also received a flag that flew over the U.S. Capitol from a local congressman during the ceremony. Photo by: Lance Cpl. Daniel J. Redding

Ellie

[thedrifter]

The big hand for a few real heroes
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NewsAndOpinion.com
Feb. 11, 2005

The churls, knaves, blackguards and other aging lobberheads who long for the days of their vanished youth, when the proper '60s salute for an American soldier was insult and spittle, are having a hard time adjusting to the times.

That Super Bowl commercial, of American soldiers getting a round of applause as they walked through the passenger lounge of an airport somewhere deep in Middle America, is squeezing tears from the eyes of millions.

But it's driving some folks nuts.

Internet Web sites are seething with the anger of dingbats who ought to be grateful for a little relief from the fatigue of their full-time jobs of hating George W. Bush. They're getting encouragement from the usual suspects, such as Teddy Kennedy and Nancy Pelosi with their ritual sneers at good news from Iraq. A columnist in the London Guardian, searching the ladies room for a fainting couch, sums up the anger on the looney left:

"Pass the sick bag, Alice," writes one Stefano Hatfield. "I was too stunned by the [commercial] to really take in the full import of a beer company waving off 'our boys' (and girls) to battle. But battle? Where? The war in Iraq's over, isn't it, or so they keep telling us? ... Pure propaganda, and it picked up on one of the themes of the night: patriotism."

The contents of one knave's spleen does not a consensus make, nor the racket on the Internet an anvil chorus of any size, but it brings into sharp focus the reality that's driving the anvil chorus crazy. A certain kind of nut imagines he's a hostage at the Nuremberg rally every time he sees the flag on the breeze, or hears the sweet and innocent notes of a hymn to the home of the brave and the land of the free. But these scamps and skeesicks had best get a life, because it's true, patriotism is back, and with it the traditional appreciation for the sacrifice of the soldier.

The news gets worse for the haters. The TV commercial, unlike a lot of television, actually reflects real life. One traveler tells the Wall Street Journal Online: "Last Thursday I was on a flight from Dallas-Fort Worth to Portland, Ore. There were four soldiers returning home for a two-week leave from Iraq. As the plane arrived at the gate in Portland, the pilot mentioned and thanked them for their service and asked that they be allowed to disembark first. As each of them walked toward the front of the plane, the rest of the passengers erupted in spontaneous applause."

Another traveler reports a similar experience: "In the past two weeks I have witnessed American Airlines giving empty first-class seats to soldiers and an entire terminal in Denver giving a plane full of disembarking soldiers a standing ovation on a busy Friday night." Still another traveler: "I, too, was spit upon and called a 'baby killer' in September 1971, in the San Diego airport, while wearing my Navy uniform. ... The Super Bowl ad brought me to tears, not of pain remembering my experience, but from pride in today's American patriots."

My cousin Chris Sarris died the other day in New Orleans at 80. The most momentous four years of his life were reduced to a single line in a modest obituary in the newspaper: "He was a Marine Corps veteran of World War II." Five decades afterward he reluctantly told me about a single night of terror in a foxhole on Okinawa. Two Marines who shared the hole were killed within a single hour. He was haunted ever afterward by the question of why them and not him. "They carried photographs of wives and children, but I never knew their names."

When I told him what a hero he had always been to me, he mumbled embarrassed thanks and left the room to get more coffee. When he returned he said: "The only mark I got in four years was a small burn when a piece of shrapnel hit my hand." Enough, maybe, for a Purple Heart for John Kerry, but he was chagrined to talk about it.

Americans make lousy imperialists. We don't do Nuremberg rallies. Americans make pretty good soldiers, as a lot of men in Valhalla could tell you, but when the shooting stops the American GI only wants to come home, marry the girl next door, pop the top on a cool one and watch the Patriots clock the Eagles. It's what makes him distinctively American.

So here's another round of heartfelt applause for the lousy imperialist: This Bud's for you.

---Wesley Pruden is editor in chief of The Washington Times.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

The fire's in Iraq - again
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By MELISSA GRACE
NY DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

He wants to serve his city, but FDNY probie Peter Regan keeps getting called to serve his country.

The 23-year-old Marine corporal, whose firefighter dad was killed at the World Trade Center, is headed to Iraq for a second year-long tour of duty.

But this time, he'll be going as one of New York's Bravest.

He was to have graduated from the Fire Academy in March with the rest of his class.

But because he's set to ship out to North Carolina's Camp Lejeune on Sunday, the Fire Department is holding a special graduation ceremony today - just for him.

Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta will officiate at Rescue 3 in the Bronx, the storied company where Regan's father, Donald, 47, was last assigned.

"I've been waiting for five years for this job, and now I'm going back to Iraq," the freckled, blue-eyed Marine said yesterday.

Peter Regan's mom said she was angry when he told her he was headed back overseas.

"Then he said he was going because 'My job is not done,'" she said. "I had no answer to that."

After 9/11, Peter Regan, who was stationed in California as a Marine, came home and went to work at Ground Zero.

"I started going down to the pile with my dad's company," he said quietly. "We didn't find anything of my father."

The younger Regan said that after 9/11 he could have gotten out of his Marine duties and never even gone to Iraq.

But, he said, his dad "was pretty proud that I was in the Marines. I think he would have rather I finished what I started."

Regan signed up with the Marines after taking the FDNY test in 1999 because he knew there was a four-year waiting list to get into the Fire Academy.

He was accepted into last fall's class. Though he was not injured in Iraq, Regan broke his arm in a drill on Randall's Island. He had to wait to finish his training this spring.

The youngest of four children, Peter lived in Park Slope, Brooklyn, until age 7, when his family moved to Pine Bush, in Orange County.

His dream to become a firefighter began as a kid in Brooklyn when he visited his dad at work.

"I used to get in trouble for messing up the hose beds," Regan joked when members of his father's old company, Ladder 174 in East Flatbush, showed up at the Fire Academy yesterday to wish him well.

FDNY Lt. Mickey Conboy, who worked with Donald Regan at Rescue 3, said, "His father was a great guy, and he's a great kid. He's filling his shoes."

Regan's Fire Academy buddies, two of them former Marines, also expressed their admiration.

"It's pretty honorable," said Kevin Wessolock, 31. "He's a young guy, he's got his whole life ahead of him and he already did his time."


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marine gets an apology
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Kansas City Star

WASHINGTON -- Prompted by Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas, the commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps apologized Thursday to Cpl. Travis Eichelberger for a mistake in awarding him the Purple Heart.

Eichelberger, of Atchison, was seriously injured in the early days of the Iraq war when an American tank ran over him. He and 10 other Marines were awarded the Purple Heart for injuries that the Corps later determined did not merit the medal because they were not caused by enemy action.

"I regret that our Marine Corps has handled this case badly," said Roberts, a Republican and former Marine who is a member of the Senate armed services committee.

Another GOP lawmaker from Kansas, Rep. Jim Ryun, has called for reinstatement of the medal.

Roberts spoke with Gen. Michael W. Hagee, the Corps commandant, who called Eichelberger. The senator also called Eichelberger.

"As a result of these conversations, I think it is fair to say that Travis understands the Marine Corps' decision," Roberts said. "The commandant also agrees with me that our Corps has put these Marines in embarrassing circumstances and should have handled this situation more appropriately."

Eichelberger should be proud, Roberts said. "My message to Travis was: Semper Fi."


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Jet display gives Fightertown new look
Submitted by: MCAS Beaufort
Story Identification #: 20052783938
Story by Cpl. Micah Snead



MARINE CORPS AIR STATION BEAUFORT, SC (Feb. 4, 2005) -- The main entrance to Fightertown received a new addition in the form of an F/A-18 Hornet restored by the Corrosion Control Facility team, Jan. 26.

The Hornet was painted with the markings of Navy Strike Fighter Squadron 86 and positioned off Geiger Boulevard, just inside the main gate of the Air Station.

Marines, Sailors and Civilians from CCF oversaw the complete tear down, cleaning, restoration and movement of the jet, which originally belonged to Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 312.

"There were a lot of working parts in the overall process, so now we're just glad to be done with it," said Cpl. Jason Woodard, an ordnance technician with Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 251 who joined the CCF to fill a Fleet Assistance Program billet. "Most of us had a hand in every minor detail that goes into preparing a jet for a display like this."

While Corrosion Control falls under Marine Aviation Logistics Squadron 31, the facility is normally manned by FAPs from the nine Navy and Marine Corps Hornet squadrons aboard the Air Station. Contract civilian employees from DynCorps also assist the Marines and Sailors at the facility. The work at CCF is almost always different from the original jobs of the Marines and Sailors, and certain tasks like preparing the new jet make for a unique billet, according to Lance Cpl. Todd Gleason.

"It might not be fun because it is difficult, but you don't often get an opportunity to have your work put on display like this," Gleason said. "You know other people will appreciate the work you did."

All of the main components of the aircraft, from the engine to electrical systems, are removed prior to its' restoration.

"We have to pull every working part of it out," Woodard said. "We want the jet to be accessible to everyone but not the technology and systems that go into it. All of that stuff has to come out to properly display the aircraft."

After stripping the insides, the team began the laborious task of cleaning and sanding the Hornet, and not missing a spot on the 56-foot long, 40-foot wide jet was important, according to Lance Cpl. Sammie Aziz.

"That was probably the hardest part," Aziz said. "The layers of dirt and crud that can accumulate on a Hornet are really unbelievable, but it wouldn't be a completed job unless we made it shine."

In order to compensate for missing parts and pieces, the restoration team had to fabricate panels and covers to give the jet a more streamlined appearance.

"It was almost like a Hornet 'Monster Garage' kind of thing where people had to use their imaginations to come up with some of the covers," Woodard said. "That was another difficult part but it definitely paid off in the end."

Finally the team applied paint to the skin of the aircraft and put the finishing touches on their static display masterpiece. The Marines transported the aircraft off the flight line by pulling it down Perimeter Road and to the front gate. The trip was a unique way of celebrating their finished work, but nerve-wracking as well, according to Sgt. Marcus Roy, who drove the aircraft tug.

"We clipped a few branches, but the team did good," Roy said. "It would have been a shame to spend so much work on one thing only to clip a wing off or get hung-up in a power line."

While the aircraft currently bears the logo of the Sidewinders and is probably destined to wear many more squadron colors in the future, the CCF team that restored it from flight line to display slab will always know it carries the mark of a job well done.

"At the end of the day, it is nice to be proud of what you have accomplished," Woodard said. "We worked on it for a while and it wasn't easy work. But, at least we are leaving our mark on the Air Station. We hope people enjoy it now and in the future."


Ellie

[thedrifter]

CENTCOM Reports Progress in Iraq, Other Regions


By Dennis Durband
Talon News
February 10, 2005

U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) is reporting some "good things" from its recent views of Africa and Asia, according to Lt. Gen. Lance Smith, the unit's deputy commander. Smith addressed concerns over several nations, to members of the media Wednesday morning at a Department of Defense briefing.

"We do have some good things that have happened in the last several months in our area of responsibility," Lt. Gen. Smith said in his opening remarks.

Smith called the peace treaty between northern and southern Sudan "a step in the right direction."

"No resolution on Darfur; we still worry about that, but certainly that's good for Sudan," Smith noted.

CENTCOM has observed some movement on the transitional government into Somalia, which is significant because it is currently ungoverned space and a known haven for terrorists. Border tensions between Eritrea and Ethiopia are yet to be resolved, and U.S. officials are hoping for negotiations leading to resolution there.

Despite bad winter weather, CENTCOM reports that Pakistan is continuing its efforts to go after al Qaeda in its northern Waziristan region and other areas. Pakistan, Smith said, has been very effective in South Waziristan efforts.

U.S. forces continue to provide support for the government of Afghanistan, which is preparing for elections in the spring.

In turning his focus to Iraq, Smith said, "We still feel very good about the elections in Iraq. Our commanders in the field are telling us that they have seen some level of attitude change within the country, all very positive."

Acknowledging the continuing violence in Iraq, Smith said coalition forces assessed the violence at preelection levels. Election results have been delayed in order to conduct several recounts.

Smith said the attitude change is believed to be due to the Iraqi security forces acquitting themselves very well during the election and the citizens' pride in their security forces.

"I think they feel good about it," Smith said. "So there is a level of self-confidence out there that maybe they didn't have before. We see some pride on the part of the Iraqi people for the performance of the Iraqi security forces. So there is some, you know, beginning levels of mutual trust between the security forces themselves and the people."

Smith called the levels of trust and confidence vital to U.S. interests in drawing down forces and eventually withdrawing. Coalition forces are in the process of decreasing forces to preelection numbers -- more than 150,000 troops.

Preelection and postelection, Iraq has averaged between 30 and 40 acts of violence per day. There were between 200 and 300 violent actions on Election Day, January 29. U.S. casualty figures have markedly decreased since the election.

"We continue offensive operations to go after these guys," Smith said. "We are getting a significant amount of help from Iraqi citizens. ... We have very aggressively gone after the insurgents, and we've been very effective in taking out leadership and in rolling up some of the bad actors that are out there. ... We capture almost 100 -- and please, this number is really soft -- folks every night."

Coalition forces claim to have been very effective against senior leadership of -- particularly the Zarqawi network which has taken credit for recent suicide attacks.

Smith characterized the identity of the insurgents as Iraq's former regime elements, extremist elements, "Islamists or the Muqtada Sadr kind of folks."

"And all of them have different reasons for doing the things that they're doing," Smith added.

Some of the insurgents are acting of a feeling of disenfranchisement, such as Ba'athists who don't see a role in the future of Iraq. Some insurgents are holding out for a return to the old days of a Taliban-like society with Sharia law, Smith said.

Lt. Gen. Smith added that there is also a large criminal element willing to commit crimes in exchange for pay.

"And their motivations are mixed," Smith explained. "Some are ideologues. Many, we think, are doing this for money. You know: 'here's $200, here's an RPG (rocket-propelled grenade), go out and shoot somebody in a coalition' or something like that."

Violence is likely to begin until Iraq gets its economy revved up, which could reduce the insurgents' recruiting base. Smith does not believe that Hezbollah has become as significant a threat as al Qaeda.

Coalition forces have not sealed completely the Syrian border but are patrolling that region and training Iraqi border patrols.

A major effort is currently aimed at turning over more of the responsibilities, particularly inside the cities, to the Iraqi security forces and to focus more in the training and mentoring roles.

In addressing Iran, Lt. General Smith said he is not spending any of his time worrying about their nuclear proliferation efforts. Nor, he said, is the U.S. drawing up military plans for action in Iran. Smith cited diplomatic efforts on the part of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as adequate for U.S. needs.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Legislature adopts resolution on Marine's Purple Heart
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Associated Press

TOPEKA, Kan. - A Marine from Atchison whose Purple Heart was revoked should have the award reinstated, Kansas legislators declared in a resolution they adopted Friday.

The resolution, approved on voice votes in both chambers, asks Congress to direct the U.S. Marine Corps to allow Cpl. Travis Eichelberger to keep the medal "he so richly deserves."

The Marine Corps took the award away from Eichelberger because it said his injuries in Iraq weren't caused by hostile or combat action, as required under military rules.

The resolution declared: "It is through the patriotic efforts of young men such as Cpl. Eichelberger that the United States is able to take military action to bring freedom and democracy to nations such as Iraq."

Legislators acted after conferring Friday with Rep. Jim Ryun, R-Kan., who is calling for reinstatement of the award.

Ryun was preparing to send a letter to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld asking the Pentagon to reinstate the Purple Heart, but held off late Friday so he could confirm that is what Eichelberger really wants, spokesman Nick Reid said.

Eichelberger, 22, was accidentally crushed by a tank driven by another American on the second day of the Iraq war in 2003. He is among 11 Marines who were notified recently that their Purple Hearts were awarded by mistake.

He was among the first wave of casualties to return from Iraq and the Marines said there was a rush to honor them, but there was also confusion about whether they were wounded in a combat zone or by hostile action.

The commandant of the Marine Corps, Gen. Michael W. Hagee, called Eichelberger on Thursday to apologize after Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., a former Marine, criticized the corps for handling the case badly.

Roberts' office said the senator was not asking for reinstatement of the award because Eichelberger has said publicly he does not want the medal if he does not deserve it.

"He did not dispute the Marine Corps decision in the phone call with Roberts," said Roberts' spokeswoman Sarah Little. "His only dispute was the manner in which the Marine Corps handled the issue."

Legislature's resolution is SCR 1607.

On the Net: Kansas Legislature: www.kslegislature.org


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Policeman awarded for heroic achievement
Submitted by: MCRD San Diego
Story Identification #: 200524112547
Story by Staff Sgt. Scott Dunn



MARINE CORPS RECRUIT DEPOT SAN DIEGO, Calif. (Feb. 4, 2005) -- A military policeman who rescued a woman from a flooded subway in October received an award for heroic achievement here Tuesday.

In a Headquarters and Service Battalion formation, the battalion's commanding officer, Col. Ana R. Smythe, presented the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal to Cpl. Daniel A. Walker for his actions Oct. 27.

According to Smythe, Walker was not awarded this medal simply for swimming to save the endangered woman; he received it for responding as swiftly and accurately as he did, passing the real-life test with which he was faced.

According to the award citation, "Walker responded without hesitation to a woman's cries for help. Without concern for his own well being, he proceeded into the cold water continuing to provide words of comfort to the stranded victim. In water that rose above his head, he made contact with the victim, gained her confidence, and pulled her off the car. Once he had gained positive control over the victim, he used his Marine Corps water-survival skills to move the victim to safety."

At the flood scene some three months ago, about 300 feet from Gate 4, the depot's main entrance, Rosa Maria Miranda, a scullery worker at the recruit mess hall, said she would have drowned if Walker did not come to her aid when he did. Walker was finishing a 12-hour shift when Miranda drove her car into the flooded subway.

According to Walker, around 4 a.m., a car stalled in the flooded subway. The driver safely exited her car and approached Walker at Gate 4. About 20 minutes later, Walker heard another woman screaming.

"At first, I didn't know what was happening," said Walker. He said a woman was yelling, "Help me! Please, help me!"

Witnesses from the nearby Vietnam Veterans of San Diego shelter, whose residences and office spaces suffered flood damage, said they heard the same distress.

With streetlights on inside the Witherby Street subway below Pacific Highway, Walker said all he could see was Miranda holding her purse sitting on water. She was actually on the roof of her Ford Focus, which was submerged in six feet of water. When she had driven in the water, the engine died and the car began floating. Miranda said she climbed out when she felt water around her ankles.

Walker called for backup and MPs arrived to man the gate. With rain pouring, Walker, a husband and father, removed his police gear, swam to a frantic Miranda, and tried to calm her.

"(Lance Cpl. Walker) kept talking to me and telling me to relax," Miranda told local TV reporters through Spanish interpreter Lance Cpl. Oscar Gonzalez-Millan. "He saved my life. Without him, I would have drowned because I don't know how to swim. I thank God and Daniel for helping me."

Walker said there was no technique to his rescue: "She grabbed on, choking me. I thought, 'I guess we're doing it this way."

The shortest distance to safety was across the water from Gate 4, so Walker swam until he touched bottom and carried Miranda to solid ground.

"Being at my post - being an MP, being a Marine - we're first responders. That's our job," said Walker. "I just thought someone needed help, and I was the man on duty."

Portions of this story are from earlier news reports.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Providing election possibilities to farthest reaches of Iraq <br />
Submitted by: 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing <br />
Story Identification #: 20052615424 <br />
Story by Sgt. Nathan K. LaForte <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
AN NUKHAYB, Iraq...

[thedrifter]

Truck Bombing, Shootings Kill 23 Iraqis

By JASON KEYSER, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A vegetable truck rigged with explosives blew up Friday outside a Shiite mosque northeast of Baghdad, and gunmen sprayed automatic fire into a bakery in a Shiite district of the capital in sectarian violence that killed at least 23 people.


The attacks occurred as election officials announced provisional final results from the Jan. 30 elections for provincial councils in 12 of the 18 provinces, showing Shiite religious groups winning handily over secular tickets in local races in much of the country.


Final results from the more closely watched national race for the 275-member National Assembly are expected in a few days. A Shiite-dominated ticket endorsed by the clergy is also leading in the national contest, indicating the growing influence of religion in the politics of the new Iraq (news - web sites).


Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld made a surprise one-day visit to Mosul and Baghdad, hailing what he called progress in Iraqi security forces after seeing some of them in training. But he said it was too soon to discuss when U.S. troops could begin coming home.


An American soldier from Task Force Baghdad was killed in a bombing Friday west of the capital, the U.S. military said. More than 1,450 U.S. service members have died in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion.


In other violence:


_ A suicide driver rammed a U.S. Bradley Fighting Vehicle and exploded in Salaheddin province north of Baghdad, injuring three soldiers, the military said.


_ Two Iraqis were killed by a roadside bomb near Tal Afar in northern Iraq, the U.S. military said.


_ Two other Iraqi civilians were killed during a clash between U.S. troops and insurgents in Mosul.


_ U.S. Marines killed two insurgents during an attack Friday night on a Marine position near Husaybah along the Syrian border, the military said.


Overall, at least 31 people were killed Friday, including 23 in the two sectarian attacks.


The bombing outside the Shiite mosque took place in Balad Ruz, 45 miles northeast of Baghdad. A pickup truck loaded with vegetables exploded just as worshippers were leaving prayer services. At least 12 people were killed, according to police Col. Tahseen Mohammed.


In the attack on the bakery in the Shiite area of eastern Baghdad, gunmen in several cars blocked the street in front of the shop and stormed inside, shooting and killing 11 people, police said. The assailants escaped.


The attack appeared to fit a pattern of brutality by Sunni extremists against Shiites as the majority community stands on the verge of taking power as a result of the elections.


The country's most feared terror leader, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, has accused the Americans of manipulating the elections to install Shiites and Kurds in power. More than 70 Iraqis, many of them police and soldiers, have been killed in the last three days.


Many Sunni Arabs, who form the core of the insurgency, are believed to have stayed away from the polls, either out of fear of insurgent reprisals or opposition to an election with tens of thousands of U.S. and other foreign troops on Iraqi soil.


A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said turnout in the insurgency stronghold of Anbar province was believed to be "in single digits," although no figures have been released from that area.





On Friday, the election commission released what it said were final results and turnout figures from local races in Baghdad and 11 other provinces, most of them predominantly Shiite or Kurdish.

Turnout in Baghdad for the local races was 48 percent, despite long queues in Shiite and religiously mixed neighborhoods. Polling centers in the heavily Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah never even opened.

The biggest turnouts reported Friday were from two Kurdish provinces — Dohuk with 89 percent and Sulaimaniyah at 80 percent. The lowest figure — 34 percent — came from Diyala, which is home to Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. Diyala includes the town of Balad Ruz, where the car bombing occurred Friday.

The biggest surprise was Babil province, a mixed area that includes the insurgent stronghold known as the "triangle of death," where 71 percent of registered voters turned out.

Turnouts in the other areas ranged from 59 percent in largely Shiite Maysan province to 73 percent in the Shiite religious centers of Karbala and Najaf.

Winners in the local races are not widely known and the candidate lists do not necessarily correspond to national race tickets. However, the U.S. official said Shiite religious parties dominated in races in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city, and elsewhere.

Despite their strong showing, Shiite and Kurdish parties are under strong pressure to reach out to Sunni Arabs and offer them a role in drafting a new constitution, one of the chief tasks of the National Assembly.

Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, head of the Shiite ticket expected to win most National Assembly seats, told Al-Arabiya television Friday that he was ready for "any dialogue with any faithful Iraqi" — including former members of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s Baath Party — as long as they were not "terrorists."

The U.S. official said one proposal was to include Sunni leaders in advisory committees that would assist the assembly in drafting the constitution.

However, some leading Sunni groups have laid down tough conditions, including a demand for the United States to set a firm timetable for withdrawing its troops.

The Americans have refused to set a deadline, saying they would leave when an Iraqi force was capable of providing security and defeating the insurgents.

"Once they have that confidence, that capacity and capability, our forces, coalition forces, will be able to go home," Rumsfeld told U.S. troops in Mosul. "It is the Iraqis who will have to over time defeat the insurgency."

Sunni groups are also demanding an end to the policy of denying places in the military and bureaucracy to former ranking members of the Baath Party. Shiites, whose 1991 uprising in the south was crushed by Baath Party militias, have opposed opening the ranks of the government and military to their former enemies.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Homeless Vets Buried With Full Honors <br />
Associated Press <br />
February 11, 2005 <br />
<br />
DALLAS - Harold Dean Harris died homeless and destitute in an abandoned building and might have gone to a pauper's...

[thedrifter]

PHOTO ESSAY: Marines fortify, secure Iraqi polling site
Submitted by: 1st Force Service Support Group
Story Identification #: 200521085149
Story by Sgt. Luis R. Agostini



BAGHDADI, Iraq (Feb. 10, 2005) -- Marine engineers with Charlie Co., Combat Service Support Battalion 7 fortified the Baghdadi polling site with several thousand yards of concertina wire, several high-powered generators, vehicle roadblocks and sturdy barriers.

A relatively quiet, agricultural town of approximately 30,000, Baghdadi was one of several polling sites in Iraq's Al Anbar Province supported by Marine units.

As soldiers from the Iraqi Army provided security within the polling site, infantrymen with the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment kept vigilant eyes from surrounding rooftops for any signs of intimidation or violence.

Although the final voter tally at the Baghdadi polling site was far less than estimated - 87 eligible voters walked into the polling site -the elections were the first steps toward a free, prosperous future for Iraq.

The election will create a 275-member National Assembly and 18 provincial legislatures. The newly elected assembly will draw up the country's permanent constitution and select a president and two deputy presidents, who will name a new prime minister and Cabinet to serve for 11 months until new elections are held.


To see pix's click link...
http://www.marines.mil/marinelink/mcn2000.nsf/main5/0D439D117C870CDD85256FA4004C27F0?opendocument

Ellie

[thedrifter]

CMU building armored robot for U.S. Marines
University gets $26.4 million government contract
Friday, February 11, 2005

By Jerome L. Sherman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Carnegie Mellon University will develop a new generation of armored reconnaissance robots for the U.S. Marine Corps, beating out defense giant Lockheed Martin for a $26 million government contract.

Working with United Defense Industries of Arlington, Va., Carnegie Mellon is to deliver six Gladiator Tactical Unmanned Ground Vehicles, known as TUGVs, by July 2007, the university and the Department of Defense announced yesterday.

Carnegie Mellon researchers will receive an initial payment of $12.4 million on the $26.4 million contract.

A successful prototype of the robot was created by scientists with Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute, and as many as 200 robots may eventually be manufactured at United Defense's Fayette County facility in Uniontown.

The U.S. military has increasingly been turning to unmanned vehicles as a way of surveying hostile terrain while keeping soldiers away from enemy fire. Unmanned Predator drones armed with Hellfire missiles have been used extensively in Afghanistan and Iraq to swoop over battlefields, transmitting real-time images to controllers on the ground.

Military officials hope the Gladiator will do the same thing, moving into potentially hostile areas ahead of U.S. troops.

"The idea is to get it out front and take the Marines out of harm's way," said Bill Thomasmeyer, executive vice president of the newly formed Technology Collaborative, which helped put Carnegie Mellon's National Robotics Engineering Consortium together with United Defense. "This has the potential to save thousands of lives."

The Gladiator will resemble a bulky, armored all-terrain vehicle, weighing about a ton, with six wheels. A Marine will control it with a remote.

According to Dimi Apostolopoulos, Carnegie Mellon's lead scientist on the project, the Gladiator will use sensors to warn soldiers about a variety of dangers: enemy positions, barbed wire, mines, and even chemical, biological or nuclear threats.

The Gladiator will also be able to detect and avoid obstacles such as craters.

Scientists with Carnegie Mellon's National Robotics Engineering Consortium started working on the Gladiator project in 2002, under the auspices of the Office of Naval Research. In February 2004, the team completed a prototype, which was tested twice by the military at the Marine Corps' headquarters in Quantico, Va., Apostolopoulos said.

First, the Gladiator's mobility was tested. Military officials were looking for a unit that can function on all types of terrain, in temperatures ranging from 25 degrees below zero to 125 degrees, while withstanding fire from automatic weapons like the AK-47.

Second, the military tested the robot's sensory capabilities.

Apostolopoulos was thrilled when he found out that the military had awarded the contract to Carnegie Mellon.

"It's recognition by the Marine Corps that we have the solutions to address their needs in a practical way," he said. "That's huge for us."

Eventually, the Marines hope to arm the Gladiator with machine guns and other weapons.

Carnegie Mellon needed to work with an experienced partner in the defense industry to advance to this new phase of the Gladiator project, Thomasmeyer said.

Herb Muktarian, a spokesperson for United Defense, described his company's partnership with the university as a natural fit.

"Carnegie Mellon has a long history with robotics, and our company has a long history in the integration and production of military vehicles," he said.

United Defense and Carnegie Mellon will open a joint office at the university's robotics facility in Lawrenceville. The development team also includes General Dynamics Armaments and Technical Products, Tadrian Electronic Systems, and Timoney Technologies Ltd.

The Technology Collaborative was formed last month in a merger of the Pittsburgh Digital Greenhouse and the Robotics Foundry.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Jerome L. Sherman can be reached at jsherman@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1183.)

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Air Force Grounding Some Older Planes <br />
Associated Press <br />
February 12, 2005 <br />
<br />
WASHINGTON - The Air Force said Friday it is grounding 30 of its oldest C-130 cargo planes and putting flight...

[thedrifter]

82nd Troops May Come Home Early
The News and Observer
February 12, 2005

FORT BRAGG, N.C. - Two battalions sent from the 82nd Airborne Division to beef up security during the Iraqi elections should return home next month, which is about a month earlier than expected.

"My hope is within, perhaps, a month or so that they will be flowing home," Lt. Gen. John Vines said Tuesday. Vines is commander of the 18th Airborne Corps, which includes the 82nd, and this week took over as commander of coalition forces for a year.

The Defense Department said Friday that units of V Corps in Heidelberg, Germany, will take over from the Fort Bragg forces in early 2006.

Vines took command of the Multi-National Corps Iraq in a ceremony Thursday. He will oversee combat and stability operations for all coalition forces in Iraq.

About 1,500 paratroopers from the 2nd and 3rd battalions of the 82nd's 325th Airborne Infantry Regiment deployed in mid-December. The soldiers were expected to be gone about four months.




No return date has been set, said 82nd spokeswoman Maj. Amy Hannah.

Families of the soldiers were relieved to hear that the length of the deployment is not expected to be extended. But most said they won't believe that their soldiers are coming home until they march off the transport planes.

"It would be great to get our guys home sooner than we expected, but I also know that nothing is concrete in the Army," said Amanda Barlow, who is married to Capt. Adam Barlow, commander of 3rd Battalion's C Company.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Vehicle Accidents Kill 2 GIs In Iraq
Associated Press
February 12, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A U.S. Marine and an Army soldier were killed Friday in separate traffic accidents in Iraq, the U.S. military said.

The Marine, assigned to the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, died in an accident while conducting security operations in Anbar province west of Baghdad, the command said.

Separately, a U.S. Army soldier assigned to the 1st Marines was killed in an accident during security operations in the northern Babil province south of the capital.

Names the victims were withheld pending notification of relatives.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Car Bomb Kills 17
Associated Press
February 12, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A car bomb exploded in front of a hospital south of Baghdad Saturday, killing 17 and wounding 16, police said, a day after 23 were killed in two attacks aimed at the Shiite community.

A police captain, who refused to give his name, said the Saturday blast occurred in front of the Musayyib General Hospital, about 35 miles south of the capital.

Elsewhere, a prominent Iraqi judge under Saddam Hussein, Taha al-Amiri, was assassinated Saturday by two gunmen in the southern port city of Basra, said Lt. Col. Karim al-Zaidi.

Al-Amiri, a former chief judge at Basra's highest criminal court, is one of several former Baath Party figures assassinated in the Basra area the past 18 months.

Police in Mosul said they discovered the bodies of six men dressed in Iraqi National Guard uniforms dumped on a main highway near the city.

The men had been shot in the chest and head, said police Lt. Ali Hussein. They were found in the area of Intisar, east of Mosul.




Attacks against Iraq's security forces have steadily risen following the Jan. 30 national elections. Insurgents have vowed to up their attacks against the Iraqi forces at a time when the United States is trying to pass them more of the responsibility of securing the country.

But the body count of police seems to be most particularly high in Mosul, the country's third-largest city. Mosul has now become another flashpoint in the running battle between insurgents and U.S. and coalition troops.

Last week a suicide bomber walked into a crowd of Iraqi policeman in Mosul and blew up explosives, killing himself and 12 policemen. In December more than 150 bodies of mainly Iraqi security forces were found in Mosul in the space of one month.

On Friday, a vegetable truck rigged with explosives blew up outside a Shiite mosque northeast of Baghdad, and gunmen sprayed automatic fire into a bakery in a Shiite district of the capital in sectarian violence that killed at least 23 people.

The attacks occurred as election officials announced provisional final results from the Jan. 30 elections for provincial councils in 12 of the 18 provinces, showing Shiite religious groups winning handily over secular tickets in local races in much of the country.

Final results from the more closely watched national race for the 275-member National Assembly are expected in a few days. A Shiite-dominated ticket endorsed by the clergy is also leading in the national contest, indicating the growing influence of religion in the politics of the new Iraq.

In other violence:

- A suicide driver rammed a U.S. Bradley Fighting Vehicle and exploded in Salaheddin province north of Baghdad, injuring three soldiers, the military said.

- Two Iraqi civilians were killed during a clash between U.S. troops and insurgents in Mosul.

- U.S. Marines killed two insurgents during an attack Friday night on a Marine position near Husaybah along the Syrian border, the military said.

Overall, at least 31 people were killed Friday, including 23 in the two sectarian attacks.

The bombing outside the Shiite mosque took place in Balad Ruz, 45 miles northeast of Baghdad. A pickup truck loaded with vegetables exploded just as worshippers were leaving prayer services. At least 12 people were killed, according to police Col. Tahseen Mohammed.

In the attack on the bakery in the Shiite area of eastern Baghdad, gunmen in several cars blocked the street in front of the shop and stormed inside, shooting and killing 11 people, police said. The assailants escaped.

The attack appeared to fit a pattern of brutality by Sunni extremists against Shiites as the majority community stands on the verge of taking power as a result of the elections.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Gay Discharges Drop In 2004 <br />
Associated Press <br />
February 12, 2005 <br />
<br />
WASHINGTON - The number of U.S. military members discharged for making it known they are homosexual declined last year by 15...

[thedrifter]

Marine gets an apology

The Kansas City Star


WASHINGTON –– Prompted by Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas, the commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps apologized Thursday to Cpl. Travis Eichelberger for a mistake in awarding him the Purple Heart.

Eichelberger, of Atchison, was seriously injured in the early days of the Iraq war when an American tank ran over him. He and 10 other Marines were awarded the Purple Heart for injuries that the Corps later determined did not merit the medal because they were not caused by enemy action.

“I regret that our Marine Corps has handled this case badly,” said Roberts, a Republican and former Marine who is a member of the Senate armed services committee.

Another GOP lawmaker from Kansas, Rep. Jim Ryun, has called for reinstatement of the medal.

Roberts spoke with Gen. Michael W. Hagee, the Corps commandant, who called Eichelberger. The senator also called Eichelberger.

“As a result of these conversations, I think it is fair to say that Travis understands the Marine Corps' decision,” Roberts said. “The commandant also agrees with me that our Corps has put these Marines in embarrassing circumstances and should have handled this situation more appropriately.”

Eichelberger should be proud, Roberts said. “My message to Travis was: Semper Fi.”


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Illinois Marine loses hearing, receives Purple Heart in Iraq
Submitted by: 1st Force Service Support Group
Story Identification #: 200521192535
Story by Lance Cpl. T. J. Kaemmerer



AL ASAD, Iraq (Feb. 8, 2005) -- Lance Cpl. Nick J. Pate, a 20-year-old native of Bloomington, Ill., was awarded the Purple Heart, Jan. 27, 2005, for injuries he suffered while deployed to Iraq.

Pate, a reserve Marine and truck driver with Charlie Company, Combat Service Support Battalion 7, received the medal for injuries sustained during an otherwise routine supply convoy Nov. 5, 2004.

“My grandpa, he got one in World War II on Okinawa,” said Pate, whose grandfather died shortly before Pate was mobilized to Iraq. “It’s an honor to receive it and it’ll be something I never forget.”

Behind the wheel of a 7-ton truck in a convoy headed to a U.S. military base in western Iraq, Pate ran over a pot-hole, which concealed an enemy improvised explosive device.

The ensuing explosion blew out his eardrum and caused temporary hearing loss. He lost nearly 75-percent of his hearing in his left ear.

“I’ve got mixed feelings about getting a Purple Heart,” said Pate. “I think there is a fine line between rating one and deserving one. I hit a mine but all I have is an eardrum problem, I didn’t really think I should get one.”

When the ringing in Pate’s head stopped after the explosion, and he realized he could hear out of his right ear, he got a safe distance away from the truck and hunkered down in the sand. He wasn’t sure if the explosion marked the beginning of an insurgent’s ambush, but no-one fired at him.

Soon after, Pate and several other injured Marines were evacuated to a medical facility for treatment.

“Afterwards all I kept thinking was, ‘Man, my family is never going to believe this’,” said Pate, who made nearly daily convoys throughout western Iraq prior to his injury. “I knew they were going to be scared as hell, but I knew that I was alive and that everything was going to be okay.”

Pate’s reserve command in the U.S. informed his family in Illinois of the event. His parents called his girlfriend, Sarah, to let her know what had happened.

“I talked to them and let them hear directly from me that I was okay,” he said. “They were pretty shook up and scared, but they were glad I was okay. They said they had stayed up by the phone waiting for me to call because they knew I would, so they hadn’t gotten any sleep.”

“We were in shock,” said James Pate - Lance Cpl. Pate’s father - recalling the phone call he and his wife, Nancy, received. “We didn’t know what questions to ask, but the Marines did a good job at keeping us informed. We were still uneasy until we heard his voice.”

More than a month after the explosion, Pate was “sitting here doing desk work” in an office because his chain of command didn’t want to risk further damage to his hearing, according to Pate.

After a month of pushing paperwork, Pate’s eardrums slowly healed. Pate said he has recovered 80 percent of his hearing from the accident.

Now, he’s back on the road driving trucks in military convoys, where he belongs, he said.

“As crazy as it sounds, just sitting at this desk - all day, every day - just got to me. I wanted to be back out on the road. I need it,” he said.

Pate says he still has occasional trouble hearing, though even with a bona-fide injury and some permanent hearing loss, he remains humble about receiving the Purple Heart.

“They (doctors) said the eardrum grows back on its own and mine’s pretty much all grown back,” said Pate. “At least the pain and ringing in my ears is gone.”

http://www.marines.mil/marinelink/image1.nsf/Lookup/200521194553/$file/PURPLEHEART_LO.jpg

Lance Cpl. Nick J. Pate, a 20-year-old Bloomington, Ill., displays the Purple Heart medal he was awarded, Jan. 27, 2005, for injuries he suffered while deployed to Iraq. Pate temporarily lost his hearing when he hit an improvised explosive device in the 7-ton truck he was driving in a military convoy Nov. 5, 2004 in Al Anbar Province, Iraq. He drove over a pot-hole, concealing a mine used by anti-Iraqi forces as an IED. Pate, a truck driver with Charlie Company, Combat Service Support Battalion 7, is now the second male in his family to receive the medal – his grandfather received the Purple Heart for injuries sustained during World War II. Photo by: Lance Cpl. T. J. Kaemmerer

Ellie

[thedrifter]

3/4 staff brings the game to Fallujah
Submitted by: 1st Marine Division
Story Identification #: 20052102622
Story by Lance Cpl. Paul Robbins Jr.



CAMP ABU GHURAYB, Iraq (Feb. 8, 2005) -- For the second time in two years the Marines of 3rd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, Regimental Combat Team 1, found themselves deployed during the Super Bowl; but that wasn’t going to stop them from watching it.

Less than two weeks before the “big game” officers and staff non-commissioned officers of the battalion got together to find a way to bring the Super Bowl to Camp Abu Ghurayb.

“There were a few of us that all started talking about it,” said Navy Lt. Matthew S. Weems, 33, a native of Yucca Valley, Calif., who serves as battalion chaplain, “We wanted to figure out how to bring the Super Bowl to the men.”

After bringing the concern to the battalion executive officer, Maj. Phillip M. Zeman, the responsibility was passed to the chaplain.

“When the direction came from the XO, I was appointed as the responsible officer,” Weems said.

The chaplain’s first stop was the battalion communications office, to determine if the game could be viewed with the equipment the battalion had on hand, Weems said.

“The satellite we had was the wrong carrier,” said Sgt. Aaron Mora, 25, a native of Portland, Ore., who serves as the data Chief for 3/4. “That carrier just wasn’t showing the Super Bowl.”

After realizing the game couldn’t be shown with just battalion assets, 3/8 contacted the regiment.

“That’s when I engaged the regimental XO,” said Zeman, 33, a native of Rockport, Mass.

With just a phone call, Zeman located an extra satellite dish inside of regimental headquarters.

“Once it was found, they decided to dedicate it to us for the game,” Zeman said.

The very next day, a Marine from regimental headquarters arrived with a satellite for the battalion.

With the satellite in place, Gunnery Sgt. Kevin L. Davis, 34, a native of Philadelphia, Penn., who serves as the battalion mess chief, set up the camp chow hall for the battalion super bowl party.

Steak, chicken, chips, soda and non-alcoholic beer were made available for the kickoff of Super Bowl Monday at 2:16 a.m. on Feb. 7.

Marines from various elements of the battalion, and both ends of the rank scale, filled the chow hall to enjoy hot food, cold drinks and American football.

“It was good for all of us,” said Lance Cpl. Michael R. Turner, 21, a native of Lansdale, Penn., who serves as an administrative clerk for 3/4, “It took us all home for a little bit.”

For approximately four hours, the Marines of 3/4 drank, ate and cheered as they watched one of the most popular American events of the year.

“The Super Bowl is a very American thing, and it’s a definite plus that we could bring it to the Marines here,” Zeman said.

Following the long hours of cheering, laughing and cursing, 3/4's Marines picked up their weapons and walked out the doors back to another day in Iraq.

“Home is supposed to be six months away, but that morning we we’re there,” Turner said. “Iraq was through the doorway, and that’s where we need to be; but home is just around the corner and that game was a reminder of how great our home is.”


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marine arrested for desertion <br />
<br />
Associated Press <br />
<br />
<br />
MOBILE, Ala. — A man arrested by police in Mobile for allegedly being a Marine deserter has been flown to Camp Lejeune, N.C., where his brother...

[thedrifter]

Medal winners to be honored at Pro Bowl
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By William Cole
Advertiser Military Writer

Approximately 80 Purple Heart recipients with service from World War II to Iraq and Afghanistan will be recognized during pre-game ceremonies and during the singing of the national anthem at tomorrow's Pro Bowl at Aloha Stadium.

About 40 Schofield Barracks soldiers wounded in recent deployments, about a dozen Marines, a couple of Navy corpsmen and Hawai'i veterans from World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars will be among those honored, organizers said.

"From what I got, everybody's pretty excited and think it's an honor that they would be asked," said Capt. Kathy Turner, a Schofield spokeswoman.

The Military Order of the Purple Heart, the only congressionally chartered organization exclusively for combat wounded veterans, arranged to have a salute to service members at six NFL games during the regular season and is behind the Pro Bowl tribute.

Dale Wilson, a retired Army major, Vietnam combat veteran, and Region 6 commander for the Purple Heart organization on the Big Island, said, "We're really trying to reach out to this younger generation of casualties."

Adm. Thomas B. Fargo, head of Pacific Command, will get coin-toss honors with several Purple Heart recipients from different services and Navy Region Hawai'i commander Rear Adm. Michael C. Vitale assisting, said Erin Olmstead, the pregame producer for the Pro Bowl.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Navy Reservist With 11 Kids Heads to Iraq

By JOHN GEROME, Associated Press Writer

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Johnnie Chennault has no regrets about joining the Navy Reserve, even though it means he's going to Iraq (news - web sites) later this month. But he does worry about not being around to help take care of his house full of 11 kids.


"Leaving my children, leaving my wife for so long — you're going to miss all the little things as the kids grow up," he said.


Chennault and his wife Ronda have a full range of children of all ages growing up at their home in Springfield, a small town about 30 miles north of Nashville: Terr'i, 17; Stephen, 15; Jobie, 14; Joshua, 12; Zakari, 8; Johnnie IV, 7; Mikal, 6; Syerra, 4; Gracee, 3; Jakob, 1; and Nikalus, 8 months.


"Yeah, I have more kids than most people, but I don't think my kids are any more important to me than somebody who has two kids. His kids are important to him, too — I just have more to miss."


The Chennaults knew deployment was possible when he joined the Navy's Construction Battalion, the famed Seabees, two years ago.


Chennault, 29, had inquired about enlisting in the Army, the Air Force, the Marines and the Navy, but they all told him it was against policy to take someone who has that many children to support on a newly enlisted man's pay. The Navy, however, said that wouldn't matter if he joined the Reserves.


But with the war in Iraq, his unit was called up for duty, and he leaves Sunday for training at Gulfport, Miss., and then on to Iraq.


"After 9-11 it just seemed like a big need, like there was something else I could do," Chennault said. "My country has done so much for me and my family — why couldn't I take a little time out and do something for it."


His employer, Sears, will make up the difference in pay while he's in Iraq, an assignment Chennault thinks will last seven or eight months.


He has worked for Sears for nine years, mostly as an auto mechanic. But he recently took a promotion to assistant manager in the auto department.


"He's big-hearted, and he'd do whatever it takes to help someone else out," said his boss, Chris Nokes. "I wish he wasn't going. I just hope he comes home safe."


After entering the reserves, Chennault remained committed to his military service. He recalls that when the Navy announced that his unit was getting called up, his name wasn't on the initial deployment list because of a clerical error.


"I raised my hand and the first question I asked was, 'Why am I not going?' ... I said, 'Look, I don't think it's fair for my brothers and sisters here to be going. They have children, and their children are just as important to them as mine are to me.'"


Chennault's wife is supportive.


"We go to a really good church, and they talk in there a lot about the husband's and the wife's role, what the Bible says is the husband's and wife's role," she explains. "And my role is to support my husband. My mother told me when I got married, 'Your life is about him, and you need to be there for him.'"


They met while working on the General Jackson excursion boat and married when she was 25 and he was 19. Four of the children are hers from a previous marriage.


While her husband is away, Ronda Chennault will rely more on her parents and on their church, South Haven Baptist. The children will have to do more for themselves.





Still, she worries.

"I have trouble sleeping when he's not here. That's one of the hardest things," she said.

She knows she's going to miss him, but Ronda Chennault is proud of the example her husband is setting.

"It's important for the kids to see that he can't just weasel out of the duty that he volunteered for," she said.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

New armor saves Marines
Submitted by: MCB Quantico
Story Identification #: 2005210125340
Story by Cpl. J. Agg



Marine Corps Base Quantico, Va. (Feb. 10, 2005) -- Marine Corps Systems Command acquisition experts have announced that all vehicles for the 11th, 24th and 31st Marine Expeditionary Units deployed in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and all Marine vehicles deployed in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan have been sufficiently armored in response to the threat of improvised explosive devices or roadside bombs that have hampered coalition forces.

While the Marine Corps plans to ultimately replace all M1043A2 HMMWVs with the more heavily armored M1114, the problem of providing immediate armor protection to currently deployed forces has been addressed with improved “zonal armor” including the Marine armor kit for all non-M1114 variants of the HMMWV, and Medium Tactical Vehicle Replacement Armor System for all 7-ton MTVR trucks, as well as armor kits for LVSs and 5-ton trucks. The “zonal” armor consists of 3/8 inch steel doors, flanks, tailgates, underbody and ballistic glass as appropriate.

According to Marine Corps Systems Command, the Marine Corps has hardened more than 5,000 vehicles to date at a cost of $285 million, including equipping 159 armor kits for the pending deployment of the 26th MEU. Production of another 3,100 HMMWV Marine Armor Kits is underway at a cost of $29.9 million, and 498 M1114s have been ordered by the Corps for use in Iraq with a price tag of $83.9 million. Additionally, $70.7 million has been earmarked for production and installation of MTVR armor systems.

The Army has continued to cooperate with the Marine Corps and Air Force by providing armored vehicles to units in theater based on operational needs, demonstrating the services’ joint interoperability. Currently, the 1st Marine Expeditionary
Force is operating 423 M1114s provided by Multi National Corps-Iraq.

Maj. James Washburn, a Marine Corps Systems Command project officer who has worked on the Marine armor kit program, said that while uparmoring the Corps’ fleet of deployed vehicles is a daunting task, every measure is currently being taken to ensure the safety of Marines on the ground.

“It’s a huge task to match armor protection against the evolving threats while staying within a carrying capacity of the wheeled vehicle fleet. You simply can’t retrofit a Humvee to match the armor protection of a main battle tank,” said Washburn. “Our main objective is to make sure that Marines get the best protection possible in the time frame that they need it.”

Ellie

[thedrifter]

UPI.com
February 8, 2005

We Can't Handle The Truth

By Pamela Hess, United Press International

WASHINGTON -- When a Marine lieutenant general last week said in public it was "fun to shoot some people" much hand-wringing ensued. The public outcry revealed less about him than it did about the hypocrisy of the United States.

It is not unreasonable to expect such a senior officer to exercise better judgment than that, and indeed he was "verbally counseled" by the commandant of the Marine Corps.

The judgment the Marine Corps expected Lt. Gen. James Mattis to make was that a "civilian" audience would not respond well to such bald truth. (It was, in fact, a room full of defense contractors who tend to be more cavalier about warfare than actual soldiers, as they profit directly from it. But there was a civilian television crew present.)

"Actually it's quite fun to fight them, you know. It's a hell of a hoot," Mattis said at a panel discussion sponsored by the Armed Force Communications and Electronics Association in San Diego last Tuesday. "It's fun to shoot some people. I'll be right up there with you. I like brawling.

"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil," Mattis said. "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."

To his credit, Mattis did not try to weasel out of the controversy by saying he meant to be "deliberately provocative," a common excuse proffered by public figures criticized for what they say. Anyone who has ever met Mattis knows this is how he talks all the time, and he means every word.

Let's get a few things out of the way: I am not quite objective when it comes to Mattis. I've embedded with units under his command for each of the last two summers in Iraq, and I came away with an overwhelmingly positive impression of both his professionalism and personal character.

The Marines I embedded with held him in awe and several volunteered to me they would jump on a grenade to shield him. I know he feels the same way about them.

However, this is not a defense of Mattis, who has already been eloquently defended by the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, fellow Marine Gen. Peter Pace.

"The last three times that that general has been in combat, when he was leading Marines in Afghanistan and the two times that he led his division in Iraq, his actions and those of his troops clearly show that he understands the value of proper leadership and the value of human life," Pace said last week.

This is instead an indictment of a country that frets for days whether a general speaks palatably enough about combat while apparently forgetting that it is we who sent him there to ply his trade. Mattis, who commanded the 1st Marine Division until last fall, spent three of the last four years in combat.

The U.S. military is a lot of things, chief among them a powerful killing machine that our nation, with almost no official debate, unleashed twice on countries most Americans couldn't find on a map before the bombs began to fall. The Council of American-Islamic Relations, a civil-rights organization that has consistently criticized the Iraq war -- in large part because innocent Muslims would die in the war and the occupation -- took justifiable offense at his words.

"We do not need generals who treat the grim business of war as a sporting event," said CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad in a statement.

Many Americans were more forgiving but still understood the problem.

"Well of course he feels that way, and it's perfectly appropriate to say that to his Marines to get them steeled for combat," a friend and veteran of the Persian Gulf war told me. "But he shouldn't say it here."

We apparently don't mind that we have sent Mattis to kill in our name. We just don't want to hear about it. And if by God he has to talk about it, can't he at least be ambivalent about the "grim business," like the rest of us?

I think I expected ambivalence when I embedded with the 2nd Battalion , 4th Marine Regiment in downtown Ramadi last summer, at the time perhaps the most dangerous place for U.S. troops in all of Iraq. I found instead a mix of camaraderie, sadness, adrenaline, fear and revenge. There was ambivalence about the reasons given for the war. But there was not ambivalence about the fighting. People tried to kill them every single day. They meant to kill them first.

Last May, members of the 2/4 dropped in on an elementary school they had paid an Iraqi contractor to rebuild. He told them he was finished, but before they handed over the cash, they wanted to see that the work was actually done. So they got into four Humvees loaded with soccer balls, coloring books and candy and went to the school. They were in and out within 10 minutes. By the time they got outside, children were crowded around the trucks, scrambling for the candy and toys they had come to associate with the Marines.

This part was actually something they all look forward to -- tossing balls to the kids, seeing happy faces in a town that was roundly hostile to them.

Within moments the air around them exploded: two "insurgents" down a side alley had fired a rocket into the crowd of children, killing five instantly and wounding many others.

Marines are trained for crisis. Some went after the shooters. Others, carrying wounded children, ran from door to door to try to call an Iraqi ambulance. No one would let them in. Still others tended the children lying like litter around the Humvees. That's when a second rocket came, tearing the leg off a Marine who was tending to the injured kids. He died a week later.

I defy anyone to suggest to the Marines present that day they should feel ambivalent about killing their enemy in Ramadi.

When I returned to Mattis' headquarters after my time with the 2/4, he summoned me into his office -- rarely a good thing -- and asked for my observations. I was still sorting out my thoughts, so I repeated something a young lieutenant told me: If nothing else comes out of this war, the Marines have a battle-hardened force.

Mattis nodded, not at all ambivalently. He then told me this: Go into any VFW or American Legion Hall in the United States and the true combat veterans are easy to spot. They are invariably huddled together off to the side. They are not talking about war, or battles, or the friends they lost. They talk about anything but that.

After General Mattis' experience last week, perhaps we know why. We don't want to hear it.


Ellie

[yellowwing]

Very true. Every Marine that I have asked about their Silver Star or Bronze Star with combat "V", have been very reluctant to tell the whole tale.

To them they were just doing their job.

Semper Fi Brothers!

[thedrifter]

Marines return home from Iraq


The Associated Press










CHICOPEE, Mass.— The arrival home Saturday after seven months in Iraq couldn't have come any sooner for Marine Lance Cpl. Anthony D'Amato, Jr., whose pregnant wife, Heidi, greeted him at Westover Air Reserve Base.

"Now my job can be to be with my family, instead of being over there," said D'Amato, 23, a computer specialist whose wife is eight months pregnant. "It's amazing. There are no words that can describe how I feel right now."

D'Amato was among 30 Marines from Wing Support Squadron, 472 Detachment Bravo, which arrived home after a seven-month deployment supporting aircraft at an air base in the Al-Anbar province. About 100 family members and friends greeted them in Chicopee.

Family members carries signs that read "welcome home" and "we love you." Another 100 members of the detachment remain in Iraq and are due to return in a few weeks.

There were no deaths from this detachment, said Sgt. Sherry Haetinger.

The Marines returned to the U.S. on Wednesday in Pennsylvania, and had a police escort for their bus trip Saturday. Members of the detachment are from Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York.

Cpl. Amber Keddy, 26, was impressed that a dozen members of her family greeted her in Chicopee.

"It's really weird and surreal," said Keddy, a combat engineer who in civilian life is on a waiting list to become a firefighter in Plymouth. "It's beautiful to see my beautiful family."

Her 12-year-old nephew, Darren Lopes, said the family has catching up to do, such as belated Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations.

"We're going to do stuff when she gets back, like all the stuff she missed, so it doesn't seem like she missed anything," Darren said.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Marines killed in Iraq copter crash mourned

500 remember Texas natives

By ELLIOT SPAGAT

Associated Press


SAN DIEGO - Four Marines who died in a helicopter crash that claimed 31 lives in Iraq -- the single deadliest incident of the war -- were honored Friday at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar.

More than 500 mourners, most wearing green camouflage fatigues, packed into Airman Memorial Chapel under steady rain for the one-hour memorial.

Large photographs of the dead were placed at the altar behind four M-16 rifles, each with a pilot helmet draped over the butt. Four folded uniforms and pairs of boots were placed on the floor.

Although the men were stationed in San Diego, all were born or raised in Texas and never forgot their roots, friends said.

''He carried the Texas flag everywhere he went,'' Jenni Garavaglia said of Lance Cpl. Tony L. Hernandez, 22, a native of New Braunfels, Texas.

''Tony really, really loved Texas... God bless Tony and God bless Texas.''

The men, along with 26 Hawaii-based Marines and a Navy medic, were killed when their transport helicopter crashed shortly after midnight on Jan. 26 during a fierce sandstorm near the Syrian border.

The cause of the crash is under investigation, said Lt. Victoria Jennings, a Miramar spokeswoman.

The Marines were providing security for Iraq's Jan. 30 elections, Lt. J.R. Logan said. They were deployed overseas in August with the Heavy Marine Helicopter Squadron 361, Marine Aircraft Group 16, 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing at Miramar.

Capt. Paul Christopher Alaniz, 32, was remembered as a sure-footed man and avid reader who knew he was the best-dressed in any room.

Alaniz was born in Greeley, Colo., but grew up in the Texas panhandle town of Dumas and graduated from Texas Tech University.

''He was a very solid young man,'' said a friend, retired Marine Sgt. Maj. Everett Ibarra. ''You could tell that right from the start. He had a confidence about him.''

Ibarra read a letter by Marine Capt. Dan Feliciano, a friend of Alaniz who is in Afghanistan.

''Swagger is the best word I can choose to describe him,'' Feliciano wrote. ''Everyone who knew him and loved him knows exactly what I'm talking about.''

After the ceremony, Alaniz's wife, Thelma, said her husband loved flying and reading. She got an e-mail from him five days before his death in which he said the war improved his self-worth.

''He loved what he was doing, he believed in what he was doing,'' she said. ''He knew there was a purpose behind it all.''

Staff Sgt. Dexter S. Kimble, 20, died doing what he loved -- being a Marine, Master Sgt. Daniel Villanueva said.

The Houston native ''may have been a bit headstrong but I always admired that he held true to his beliefs,'' Villanueva said, calling him '' a gentleman and a gentle man.''

Capt. Lyle L. Gordon, 30, loved his Ford F-350 pickup truck and pressed Wrangler jeans, fellow Marine Capt. Paul Lee said.

Gordon was born in Dallas and raised in Midlothian, about 30 miles southwest.

''Lyle stayed true to himself,'' Lee said. ''He was always comfortable just the way he was. He didn't feel the need to change.''

Gordon's father, Dickey, said his son decided to join the military after watching the movie, ''Top Gun.'' He left Texas for the Marines but never gave up his boots and pickup truck.

''He never considered himself above anyone -- anyone,'' said his mother, Mary Gordon. ''He was just down-to-earth, and he was always smiling.''


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Brooklyn community group establishes fund for fallen Russian-American Marine
Submitted by: New York City Public Affairs
Story Identification #: 2005211115941
Story by Cpl. Beth Zimmerman



NEW YORK (Feb. 11, 2005) -- The Be Proud Foundation and Russian-American Servicemen of Armed Forces established a fund for a Russian-American Marine killed in the Jan. 26 helicopter crash in Iraq that killed 30 Marines and one corpsman.

Lance Cpl. Mourad Ragimov was 20 years old when he died. According to Raisa Chernina of BPF, Ragimov immigrated to the United States in 1989 from the Republic of Azerbaijan.

"We left (Azerbaijan) so we could save our children," said Dinara Ragimov, the Marine's mother. "Now he joined the military to save other people's children. It's a weird cycle to me."

"He was protecting his country," said Vadim Zeldin, a 19-year-old Brooklyn native who immigrated from Russia the same year as Ragimov. "It's sad that he died (in the helicopter)."

Ragimov's father, Rufat Ragimov, recalled talking to his son about his choice to serve in the United States military.

"When we asked him why, he used to say, 'while you are sipping your coffee and enjoying your life, someone needs to be protecting this country," said Rufat.

BPF and RAS set up a fund in the name of "Lance Cpl. Ragimov." According to a statement released by BPF, Ragimov "lost his life defending his country and his people."

"For that he is a true hero and will never be forgotten," the statement continued.

For more information on BPF or Ragimov's fund, call 718-788-7773.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Station Marine awarded Bronze Star
Submitted by: MCAS Yuma
Story Identification #: 2005211154310
Story by Lance Cpl. Natasha Green



MARINE CORPS AIR STATION YUMA, Ariz. (Feb. 10, 2005) -- Capt. Stephen Oertle, Marine Wing Support Squadron-371, received the bronze star here Feb. 1 for courageous actions against the enemy while serving as a forward arming and refueling point commander in Support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The ceremony took place next to the MWSS-371 headquarters building while Oertle's mother, father, grandmother, and colleagues looked on.

"This is work you don't take very lightly," said Lt. Col. John Broadmeadow, MWSS-371 commanding officer. "We as professional war-fighters take this seriously. This award that he is receiving today will be a part of Marine Corps history.

"This man, like thousands of other Marines, has distinguished himself on behalf of his fellow Marines. He put his life on the line. He put himself in between fire to save the lives of other young men. It is important that we recognize men like this, Marines like this. I want to thank his parents for sharing a son like this," he added.

While serving as FARP team commander, Oertle took actions under fire that will be long remembered by the Marines in his unit.

According to the citation, the convoy was ambushed by a group of undetectable insurgents March 26, 2003, outside of Nasirayah, Iraq.

"We were moving north through Nasirayah, waiting for an escort. While waiting, we started taking fire," said Oertle. "We couldn't see anyone. We couldn't even see muzzle flashes, so we had no idea where the shots were coming from."

According to Oertle, there was a nearby ditch that the Marines were able to position themselves in for cover.

While in his secured position, Oertle said he witnessed two Marines go down from enemy fire.

"In the first two to three minutes we took two casualties," he said.

According to the citation, upon witnessing the Marine casualties, Oertle left his secured position to assess the victims' injuries and pull them to a covered position.

The Marines were under attack for nearly half an hour.

Contemplating their next move, and the safety of his Marines, Oertle led his Marines to fight through the ambush and get into positions that provided the most cover.

"I am very grateful that he survived the situation," said Oertle's father, Ernest Oertle. "I feel honored that my son did what he did. It was a moment where a decision was made, and I feel confident that the other Marines there would have made the same one."

According to Oertle, while he appreciated the award, he also felt humbled by the experience.

"I have no doubt that if I was the one that had fallen that day, they would have done the same exact thing for me," Oertle said. "You don't think about it in that type of situation. To receive an award for something instinctual is ridiculous. I saw (the Marine casualty) get hit; there is no doubt that I did the average Marine thing. I feel humbled. I know I did what any Marine would do. It does not illustrate anything on my part. It illustrates what the Marine Corps is about."

Both Marines Oertle pulled out of harm's way survived the attack and are still serving with MWSS-371.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Gear delivered from above
Submitted by: II Marine Expeditionary Force
Story Identification #: 20052815500
Story by Cpl. Christi Prickett



MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. (Dec. 16, 2004) -- There are some jobs within the Marine Corps that people may overlook. Air delivery is one of them.

A convenient means of re-supplying units, 2nd Air Delivery Platoon meets the mission requirements, without endangering a mounted patrol.

"We have a safe and practical way to help the units get what they need. It costs a little more, but it takes some of the danger out of re-supplying by vehicle, which makes it all worth it," said 1st Lieutenant Phillip B. Davis, 2nd Air Delivery Platoon Commander, 2nd Force Service Support Group, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. "We are three dimensional versus the two-dimensional method of convoys."

During a recent training exercise on Drop Zone Pheasant, the unit got to practice what it does best - dropping heavy equipment loads and troops. That particular drop consisted of four equipment loads and 15 (three sticks) Marines. The first humvee landed on the heavy equipment point of impact, or HEPI. That's what the group strives for every time.

"We can't make the aircraft drop the load on target, but we can make it possible. We rig the loads, make wind calls and set up points of impact," said Corporal Joe Pruett, 2nd Transportation Support Battalion embark chief. "Our job is a necessity."

The unit can re-supply things as simple as meals-ready-to-eat or something as large as a 7 ton. All it takes is a request sent through your command's training department.

Pruett, from Holton, Kansas, says that when 2nd AD prepares for a drop, they do it right.

"Out of 1,000 drops, we try to get 995 on target," Pruett said.

According to Pruett, other services may be happy with 500, but that isn't good enough for the Marines, "That's why we should be utilized more."

He also said non-commissioned officers in his platoon are like father figures. They teach new Marines basic skills plus helpful tips and techniques.

"The first six months of our job is so important. It's life and death when jumping up there," Pruett said. "It may not seem like it, but it's dangerous. Us NCOs are here to pass our information along."

The unit has already sent a handful of its approximate 20 personnel to the Middle East. About 10 of those Marines will be going early next year.

"When I was in Iraq, I know we could have been better utilized," said the 2nd AD Marine. "It felt like not too many people knew about us, about what we do. Hopefully this time we'll be used a little more."

The Marines are enthusiastic about their job. When freight is released, they eagerly watch it come down, waiting for impact. Then they run to stop parachutes caught in the wind, or help those that have landed.

Parachute riggers start their training at Fort Benning, Ga., for jump school. Following the month long course, they then go to Fort Lee, Va., for three months for additional schooling. Then they are off to their first duty station.

"We live and die by the manuals we have. There are about 40, but you have to know your stuff. Our job is completely hands on," said Pruett.

The unit continues to train not only for deployments, but to keep the Marines skilled and ready at all times.

"Our mission is to distribute supplies, equipment, and, personnel to the Marines. We are fully able to do that. I'd like to see us taken out of the background and used to our fullest capacity," said Davis.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Packing for OIF 3, emotional baggage stays behind
Submitted by: 1st Marine Division
Story Identification #: 2005211154023
Story by Cpl. Tom Sloan



MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. (February 9, 2005) -- Zoe Orend was just a few days old when her dad, Sgt. Robert C. Orend, a mortarman with Weapons Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Her big sister, Mackenzie, was one.

Orend, 28, from Marion, Iowa, returned safely to his two daughters and wife, Kat. He enjoyed some quality time at home with them in Stuart Mesa Housing, here before shipping out again seven months later for OIF 2. He will leave his family a third time when the infantry battalion he’s with deploys to Ar Ramadi, Iraq the end of this month.

The Orends are one of many Marine families feeling the effects of separation caused by combat deployments. The Corps is full of them.

The family members of Marines deployed to combat often have a fight of their own. It doesn’t involve bullets and the threat of flesh wounds. Their fight is with distress and heavy emotions.

“The majority of the time, I’m a single parent raising my two girls,” Kat said while fighting back tears. “I’m sad for him because he’s missing out on watching them grow up. They grow up so fast.”

Mackenzie is now four, and Zoe is three. They’ve spent most of their lives apart from their father, whom they call “Papa.”

Orend’s deployments to combat are hard for his two daughters to understand and even more difficult for his wife. Kat explains his absence to them the best she can.

“I tell them that Papa is at work on the other side of the world and he’ll be back soon,” she said. “I remind them every day that he loves them very much.”
Kat is aware of the realities of war but supports her husband of six years.

“It’s hard to deal with, because I’m afraid he won’t come back,” she explained voice quivering. “I don’t want my kids growing up and not having a father, and I don’t want to live without him. We support him, though, because he is taking care of us and protecting our country. We support him no matter what.”

It’s a pattern, too, that Orend doesn’t plan breaking. He has hopes of being a career infantry Marine. He said he’s glad he has his wife’s support despite the dangers it posses.

“The Marine Corps is a good job overall,” he said. He likes the financial security and the many benefits available to him and his family.

“She and I are willing to take the risks,” Orend added I know I’m getting a steady paycheck. If I have to go off to war sometimes, I will.”

Kat has developed a strategy to help her get through the tough times when her husband is deployed to combat.

“I tell myself that he will return,” she said. “I call my parents and other family here for support. I talk with other Marine wives who have husbands gone too.”

Kat said she doesn’t watch the news as much as she did the first time her husband was deployed.

“I watched the news a lot the first time,” she said. “That didn’t help. It made it worse for me because I would see reports of all the gunfights where he was and think the worst had happened to him. It got my mind going and was just too much for me to handle.

Kat seldom flipped to the news channel during her husband’s second deployment.

“I would just check it briefly,” she said. “I couldn’t watch it very long because it made me very emotional. “I wont watch it much this time either.”

Kat is better prepared for her husband’s deployment this time. She plans on keeping herself busy by concentrating on her two daughters. Helping them write letters, draw pictures for their Papa will help the time go by easier, she said.

They will also record themselves on mini cassette to send to him.

Kat also set their home computer up to show a slideshow of all the photos of her and her husband’s history together, more than 9,000 in all. Sergeant Orend is in the process of video taping himself reading stories, which his girls can watch while he’s away.

“I’ve gone over there twice and made it back safely,” Orend said. “I’ll do the same this time. We’ll make it though it.”

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Reserves face grim training
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
February 13, 2005
ERIC STEINKOPFF
DAILY NEWS STAFF

Sometimes a dead Marine is brought to them. Sometimes they find their way to the dead Marine.

Their work is called mortuary affairs. Their mission is to identify the fallen, recover his or her remains and get the body home swiftly so the family can have closure.

With deployment to Iraq now days away, about 75 reserve Marines and sailors at Camp Lejeune are learning the particulars of this highly sensitive work.

Most are mobilized reservists from Headquarters Company, Headquarters and Service Battalion, 4th Force Serviced Support Group out of Marietta, Ga. Now, however, they're called Personnel Recovery Detachment, Service Company, Headquarters and Service Battalion, 2nd Force Service Support Group. The unit was activated Jan. 3.

"There is no tougher job and no greater honor," said Maj. Ken Gillis, the detachment commander. The 28-year-old native of Boston Mass., led a 200-person mortuary affairs company when he last went to Iraq in 2003. "We treat that Marine just like he's alive. It's a solemn thing.

"One death normally impacts about 500 lives. It's kind of like a pebble in a pond. The ripples affect 500 people."

The Defense Department has a systematic process that Gillis' team will practice repeatedly until it becomes second nature. They collect ID tags, make sure they have the right Marine and then move the body to a "mortuary collection point" in theater. A chaplain at that location will normally render last rites.

And every death is investigated - whether it happens during training or combat, whether it's accidental or intentional, said Warrant Officer Bo Causey, 33, a Cobb County police officer from Marietta, Ga. Once the body returns to the United States, the Armed Forces Mortuary in Dover, Del., makes positive identification using dental records, fingerprints or DNA, Causey said.

"We treat them with dignity, reverence and respect. The U.S., in general, does a good job; one way you measure a country is how they treat their elderly, young and their dead," Causey said.

There is protocol even for loading the dead for evacuation, said Gunnery Sgt. Jamie Karnes, 34, a special agent with the Georgia State Bureau of Investigation. Karnes, from Nashville, Ga., will supervise troop performance at three different collection sites in Iraq.

"We receive their gear and (conduct a) personal effects inventory," Karnes said. "Obviously the family is going to want those. We take great care that they are documented and someone accompanies the remains."

Troops assigned to mortuary affairs participate in about two weeks of classroom training and scenarios in which they learn, for example, how to preserve a crime scene for forensic investigators. That's on top of traditional Marine Corps training: land navigation, map reading, military leadership and basic battle skills.

"We may have to provide our own security while others do the search and recovery," Karnes said.

The work is intensely demanding - both physically and mentally, Karnes said. The detachment has its own Navy chaplain to counsel those who might struggle emotionally with its otherwise grim nature.

"No Marine ever wants to see another Marine killed," Causey said. "You have to be a really strong and dedicated Marine to do this job."


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Shiites Win Nearly Half of Iraqi Votes

By JASON KEYSER, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq (news - web sites)'s majority Shiite Muslims won nearly half the votes in the nation's landmark Jan. 30 election, giving the long-oppressed group significant power but not enough to form a government on its own, according to results released Sunday.


The Shiites likely will have to form a coalition in the 275-member National Assembly with the other top vote-getters — the Kurds and Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's list — to push through their agenda and select a president and prime minister. The president and two vice presidents must be elected by a two-thirds majority.


"This is a new birth for Iraq," Iraqi election commission spokesman Farid Ayar said while announcing results. Iraqi voters "became a legend in their confrontation with terrorists."


Minority Sunni groups, which largely boycotted voting booths and form the core of the insurgency, rejected the election — raising the prospect of continued violence as Iraqis try to rebuild their country.


In an interview with Al-Jazeera television, Mohammed Bashar of the anti-American Association of Muslim Scholars said the fact that there were no international or U.N. monitors in Iraq made him question the figures.


"Those who boycotted the elections are more than those who took part in it," he said. "Boycotting the election does not mean that the boycotter will renounce his rights."


The Shiite-dominated United Iraqi Alliance ticket received 4,075,295 votes, or about 48 percent of the total cast, Iraqi election officials said. The Kurdistan Alliance, a coalition of two main Kurdish factions, was second with 2,175,551 votes, or 26 percent, and the Iraqi List headed by the U.S.-backed Allawi finished third with 1,168,943 votes, or about 14 percent.


Those three top finishers represent about 88 percent of the total, making them the main power brokers as the assembly chooses national leaders and writes a constitution.


"That's really part of that democracy that we're all so happy that they're working toward," said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.


Of Iraq's 14 million eligible voters, 8,550,571 cast ballots for 111 candidate lists, the commission said. About 94,305 were declared invalid.


The Iraqi Electoral Commission said the turnout was 58 percent, about what was predicted.


In the ethnically mixed, oil-rich city of Kirkuk, Kurds took to the streets to celebrate the results. Cars sped through the streets blaring their horns and waving flags of Kurdistan.


Since Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s ouster, Kurdish leaders have focused on influencing political decisions in Baghdad with the aim of reinforcing autonomy in their northern provinces.


"I'm a Kurd. I'm the mother of a martyr. I feel like he has come back to life. We have a chance now," said Shamsa Saleh, 57, carrying a Kurdish flag in her hand.


People crowded the street and police patrolled to keep the peace.


The figures also indicate that many Sunni Arabs stayed at home on election day, either out of fear of insurgent attacks or opposition to a vote with thousands of U.S. and foreign soldiers on Iraqi soil.


In Anbar province, a stronghold of the Sunni Muslim insurgency, only 13,893 votes were cast in the National Assembly race — a turnout of 2 percent.





In Ninevah province, which includes the third-largest city, Mosul, only 17 percent of the voters participated in the National Assembly race and 14 percent voted in the provincial council contests.

"They're going to have to see more Sunnis brought into the constitution writing if there's going to be any legitimacy at the end of the day, and I think we'll see that," Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden (news, bio, voting record), the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told "Fox News Sunday."

Sahib al-Amiri, an aide to radical Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, said his group expected the United Iraqi Alliance to receive a higher percentage of the vote. Turnout would have been higher if there was a U.S. withdrawal plan, he added.

A ticket headed by the country's president Ghazi al-Yawer, a Sunni Arab, won only about 150,000 votes — less than 2 percent. A list headed by Sunni elder statesman Adnan Pachachi took only 12,000 votes — or 0.1 percent.

Pachachi told Al-Arabiya television it was clear that "a big number of Iraqis" did not participate in the election, and "there are some who are not correctly and adequately represented in the National Assembly" — meaning his fellow Sunni Arabs.

"However, the elections are correct and a first step and we should concentrate our attention to drafting the constitution which should be written by all Iraqi factions in preparation for wider elections."

Parties have three days to lodge complaints before the results are considered official and assembly seats are allocated, the election commission said.

"Until now there is no estimation regarding how many seats the political parties will get. When the counts are final the number of seats will be divided according to the number of votes," commission member Adel al-Lami said.

The balloting was the first free election in Iraq in more than 50 years and the first since Saddam was ousted from power after the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

Voters chose the National Assembly and ruling councils in the country's 18 provinces. Iraqis living in Kurdish-ruled areas of northern Iraq also elected a new regional parliament.

About 1.2 million Iraqis living abroad were eligible to vote in 14 nations. More than 265,000 of those Iraqis cast ballots in the United States, Australia, Britain, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Iran, Jordan, the Netherlands, Sweden, Syria, Turkey and United Arab Emirates.

In the United States, where more than 24,000 Iraqis cast ballots, the alliance was strongest with more than 31 percent, while Allawi's list came in sixth with about 4 percent — finishing not only behind the Kurds but also behind two tiny Assyrian Christian parties and a communist-led party.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

Heartfelt homecoming for Marines
By JOHN ANASTASI
Bucks County Courier Times

Danielle Hill of Abington was practically trembling with anticipation Saturday morning as she waited for a plane carrying her fiance and other Marines to land at Willow Grove Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base.

"I'm a bundle of nerves," said Hill, who was looking out for Lance Cpl. Aaron Houston of Horsham. "I can hardly stand it."

Hill was waiting in a hangar where all around her excited family members clutched balloons and "Welcome Home" signs as they got set to greet about 100 members of Marine Wing Support Squadron-472.

For Hill, the tears started once the plane taxied to a halt, and the welcoming party cued up Lee Greenwood's patriotic anthem, "God Bless the USA."

"It wasn't easy because he is so young, and he had never really been away from home," Wyndmoor resident Thomas Barber said of Houston, his 19-year-old grandson.

In June, the wing, which is comprised largely of reservists, was activated and sent to Camp Pendleton in California.

They left in August for Iraq, where, according to the U.S. Marine Corps Web site, they repaired, refitted and fortified a large hangar in Al Asad to prepare it for incoming F/A-18D Hornets, ED-6B Prowlers and their crews.


"What they did was fabulously important," said base commander Capt. Harry L. Myers, who was on hand to welcome the Marines. "These folks can put an airstrip together in days under arduous conditions. These are great Americans, and they are keeping us safe and the world free. ... It's a wonderful thing for the base."

Cheers rained down on the Marines as they stepped off the plane, and hugs and kisses greeted them when they reached the hangar where their families were waiting.

"It's fantastic, indescribable," Sgt. Daniel Dorff of Levittown said of being home again.

His wife, Jamie, and their children Katelyn, 10, Daniel, 7, Victoria, 5, and McKenzie, 3, got up early Saturday to greet Dorff when the plane touched down shortly after 8 a.m.

"I'm going to hug my kids about a million times, then get some Papa John's [pizza]," Dorff said.

John Anastasi can be reached at 215-957-8166 or janastasi@phillyBurbs.com.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

MARINES A WELCOME PRESENCE AT TRACK MEET

By TIM KERRIGAN

February 13, 2005 -- Given the contrasting opinions on U.S. military action in Iraq, one might imagine the presence of military recruiters at a high school track event would be met with trepidation and dissent.
But the overwhelming reaction to the appearance of a U.S. Marines information tent at the 168th Street Armory's track events, including yesterday's CHSAA Indoor Championships yesterday, was positive.

"Whether we agree with their intention or not, we need the Marines," said Kellenberg girls coach Marty Brown, who oversaw Kelsey Malmquist's school record 10:14:78 in the 3000-meter run yesterday. "Kids need to see the [Marines] in a different light than they're [sometimes] presented."

The Marines got involved at the Armory earlier this year when a Parris Island drill sergeant visited to train a group of recruits. Happy with the publicity garnered by the visit, the Marine Corps established the information tent and sponsored the Armory's Holiday Classic meet. Sergeant Felix Recio, one of the recruiters, noted the information tent, located at the track's entrance, is not a place where student-athletes can enlist.

"It's just for publicity," said Recio, who, as a recruiter, attends local high school and college events. "There aren't a lot of Marines from New York City. We're just putting our name out there."

The tent is certainly a popular spot. The recruiters attract student-athletes with an assortment of Marine Corps goodies — T-shirts, key chains, bumpers stickers — and a pull-up bar on which they test their strength. Chaminade coach Tom Kehrli, whose athlete, Kevin McDermott, won the 3200-meter run, sees the pull-ups as a way the students can relate to the sacrifice made by servicemen.

"When they jump up there and try to do pull-ups after a long day of running, they see what it's like to be a Marine," Kehrli said. "It shows our sacrifice [training for track meets] is minimal."



Idealistic and patriotic rhetoric come easy to the tongue when nothing is sacrificed. But how would a parent react when, influenced by the information received at the Armory, his or her student-athlete chose to pursue a future in the military.

"Danay's a very intelligent young lady and if she decided that was the way she wanted to go with her life, I'd encourage it," said Leslie Spencer, mother of Danay Spencer, who won the shot put and triple jump yesterday.

Nor do the student-athletes bemoan the intrusion of recruiters on their event.

"I think it's good that they're supporting track and field," said Msgr. Farrell's Brian Duggan, who won the pole vault and long jump yesterday. "It's good that they're showing kids their options."




Ellie

[thedrifter]

3/8 Marines patrols streets with ISF
Submitted by: 1st Marine Division
Story Identification #: 200521262233
Story by Lance Cpl. Athanasios L. Genos



FALLUJAH, Iraq (Feb. 4, 2005) -- Children peeking around corners and out windows waved their hands and gave thumbs up as Marines from 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, Regimental Combat Team 1, and Iraqi Security Force members patrolled through local villages in their area of operations.

Marines of Lima Company with members of the ISF conducted foot patrols, mounted patrols and vehicle check points through outlying villages around Fallujah. The patrols demonstrated a security presence in the villages and were used to instruct members of the ISF on how to police and secure the area.

“We are working as street cops policing the streets and doing what we can,” said Lance Cpl. Matthew B. Cree, a native of New Kent, Va.

As they patrolled through the streets, the Marines integrated the ISF into their squads. The plan was to prepare the Iraqis through practical application how to move and where they should be located during actual movements.

“They are going to be the first line of defense once we get them completely ready to take over,” Cree explained. “The sooner we train them and take the time to work on the job with them, the sooner they will be able to leave their ‘nest’.”

Having the Iraqi personnel working with the Marines at vehicle check points helped teach the Iraqis how to properly stop and check suspicious vehicles.

“While I was standing about 100 meters in front of everyone else with just one Iraqi with me, I knew he was covering his fields of fire and he had my back,” stated Cree. “When we are out there with them, I will always stand and fight beside him.”

As the Marines and ISF conducted their patrols, the locals started to come out of their houses to show their support for the job Marines and the local ISF were doing.

Moving through the streets, the Marines and ISF presented themselves as a strong military presence. However they also worked on keeping good relationships with the community by handing out candy to children and talking with locals.

Once finished with the patrols and entry check points, the platoon moved out and returned to their base to continue the tasks of training and teaching the ISF.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Published Sunday
February 13, 2005

Bonds forged in battle create lasting image

BY CINDY GONZALEZ



WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
With more than half his blood draining onto an Iraqi battleground, a bullet-riddled Brad Kasal feared he might never again see his family in Afton, Iowa.

But the first sergeant's resolve to save a younger Marine lying next to him pushed aside such thoughts.

"I was losing consciousness," a recuperating Kasal recalled last week. "I forced myself to stay awake. I was worried about saving him and keeping the enemy at bay."

Both Kasal, 38, and Pfc. Alexander Nicoll survived that Nov. 13 Fallujah firefight, albeit with life-altering injuries. Nicoll lost part of a leg; Kasal is fighting to save his.

Kasal's heroics have been memorialized by a journalist's photograph that's quickly spreading over the Internet.

The powerful image shows the bloodied warrior with his arms wrapped around the necks of two comrades pulling him to safety. By then, Kasal, leader of 170 Marines, had absorbed seven rounds from a fully-automatic rifle and up to 40 pieces of grenade shrapnel. Still clenched in Kasal's right hand is his 9 mm Beretta.

What happened during the hour or so leading up to that moment is a story of wartime loyalty, bravery, brotherhood.

The events highlighted a bond among three Marines: Kasal, Nicoll and 24-year-old R.J. Mitchell of Omaha. They earlier had served together in the same Marine company.

As with any photograph, there is more than meets the eye. In interviews, Kasal, Mitchell and others recounted the deeper story behind the picture.

They were five days into Operation Phantom Fury, the American assault on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah.

Troops were clearing buildings of terrorists when Kasal spotted a wounded American who said at least three Marines were trapped in a nearby house filled with "bad guys."

Kasal rounded up a crew and led the way.

"I knew it was the toughest fighting we were doing," he would recall.

He entered first to give the Marines more confidence.

He noticed several dead Iraqis on the floor. He pointed two of his men toward a wounded American, then took Nicoll with him to check an "uncleared" room.

Shots burst from an AK-47 assault rifle 2 feet from Kasal. He backed up, then returned fire.

"I stuck my barrel right in his chest, we were that close," said Kasal. "I kept pulling the trigger until he went down . . . then I shot him two more times in the forehead to make sure he was dead."

From a staircase behind him came another barrage. "I never even saw it coming," Kasal said.

Round after round after round, nearly cutting his leg in half.

He watched Nicoll get sprayed, too, and saw him bleeding from the midsection.

In spite of his own wounds, Kasal crawled back to help his comrade.

Sliding on his belly, Kasal kicked away the insurgent he had killed and pulled Nicoll into a tiny adjoining room for cover. On the way, he was shot in the buttocks.

Both men were bleeding profusely but protected by a wall. Kasal wrapped a field dressing around Nicoll's leg.

Then came the grenade-exploding just 4 feet away.

Kasal rolled on top of Nicoll, trying to protect him from the blast.

Omahan Mitchell came running into the room to help. He, too, was hit by grenade shrapnel.

At Kasal's behest, Mitchell tended to Nicoll's injuries. Kasal laid his rifle in the doorway - a sign to other Marines that friendly forces were inside - then pulled out his 9 mm for protection.

Mitchell radioed other troops, who came later to pull the wounded Marines out.

The dire circumstances brought together three Marines who had served together in Kilo Company before Kasal shifted to Weapons Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines.

Mitchell calls Kasal the epitome of a Marine. Kasal says he was honored to fight beside a trusted comrade like Mitchell. Both praised the younger Nicoll's courage.

And they did not forget other Marines, who ultimately collapsed the house on remaining insurgents. Mitchell said the two lance corporals shown in the photo pulling Kasal to safety are heroes, too.

"It's crazy what a human body is capable of doing when you actually have meaning to do something," Mitchell said. "You're completely willing to put your life on the line for your fellow Marine."

Shot multiple times in the firefight was yet another Marine with Midlands ties, Cpl. Ryan Weemer. The Fremont, Neb., native had hobbled out to seek help, passing Kasal and Mitchell on their way in.

The final rescue phase of the battle claimed the life of Sgt. Byron Norwood, whose parents were spotlighted during President Bush's State of the Union address.

Joseph H. Alexander, a retired Marine colonel who is now a military historian, said the photo of Kasal's rescue is making the rounds in the tight-knit Marine community.

"He's badly shot up, but he's still got his weapons and he's not quitting," Alexander said of the photograph. "That's the kind of men you want fighting for your country."

Alexander, who saw his share of bravery in the Vietnam War, said he wouldn't be surprised to see high military honors bestowed on Kasal.

"He was conspicuously brave at the risk of his own life, took care of his troops and was such a warrior. That's not going to escape the attention of any of his superiors," Alexander said.

Sixty percent of Kasal's blood was shed that day.

"I'll be honest. A couple of times I didn't think I was going to make it out," he said. "I thought I was going to bleed to death."

Separation from his unit during recovery ached more than the wounds, he said. "It's hard to explain - just that bond."

The hospital stay, however, did produce lasting memories. Kasal's father, Gerald, beams over a photo of a special December visitor, President Bush, who met with his son at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md.

"It ain't every day an Iowa boy gets to meet the president and talk to him one on one," his dad said.

More surgeries are ahead as doctors try to stretch Kasal's lower leg, which lost 4 inches of bone in the firefight. Time will tell whether it can be saved.

His days now are divided between military hospitals and his home in Oceanside, Calif.

Nicoll is on the mend, and Mitchell is heading home to Omaha later this month. Mitchell's wound on Nov. 13 was his fourth injury since enlisting in 2001. He is processing out as his contract ends in March. He was promoted to sergeant after the battle. He'll leave with at least two Purple Hearts.

Kasal plans to retire in 2006, capping two decades of active duty. He wants to get into real estate and settle in Iowa, near the farm where he and four brothers, all of whom served in the military, grew up.

Retirement will wait, though, until Kasal gets better.

"I want to go out as I came in - healthy and in uniform, with pride."


http://www.omaha.com/toolbox/imglib/mainsite/pub_0/photos/large/212jbkasal.jpg

This photograph of wounded Marine 1st Sgt. Brad Kasal in Fallujah, Iraq, is making the rounds of the tight-knit Marine community. Kasal, of Afton, Iowa, shares a bond with two other Marines who also were wounded in the Nov. 13 firefight.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

February 14, 2005 <br />
<br />
Haiti lessons valuable for Iraq <br />
Services study how tactics used inmission translate to current fight <br />
<br />
By Laura Bailey <br />
Times staff writer <br />
<br />
<br />
It’s been nearly a year since...

[thedrifter]

3/8 provides security in Fallujah for elections
Submitted by: 1st Marine Division
Story Identification #: 200521255659
Story by Lance Cpl. Athanasios L. Genos



FALLUJAH, Iraq (Jan. 30, 2005) -- Third Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, Regimental Combat Team 7, was tasked with providing security at and around two polling sites just outside of Fallujah on election day, one at a cement factory and one at a school house.

Incorporating the Iraqi Security Forces and Iraqi National Guard units within the Marines’ inner and outer cordons allowed the Iraqi people to safely vote for their Transitional National Assembly.

Marines were placed all around the complex to provide security to deter insurgent attacks, while the locals lined up to be searched prior to entering the voting site. Many locals in line were excited to take part in this historic event.

“We provided security around the perimeter as well as passed out food, water and some soccer balls to children who ran off so quick we couldn’t even get a picture with them,” Religious Program Specialist, Navy Seaman Christopher Johnson explained.

The Marines were there to provide extra security at the school house polling site. Johnson and the Marines provided security where locals were standing in line. Keeping the locals safe was a major priority for the combined forces at the election sites.

Some people began to push and shove and some started to get out of control. While taking on indirect fire, the Marines managed to keep control of the excited locals to make sure they did not hurt each other or themselves on the concertina wire.

The security was vital for the Marines, ISF and ING as there were no casualties where the battalion was located. The Iraqi forces are learning what is needed to provide security after working at the election sites on and during the elections.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Anthrax shots could resume under emergency-use ruling
But Pentagon could not force vaccine on troops

By Deborah Funk
Times staff writer


The Pentagon may give anthrax vaccine to service members — but won’t be able to force them to take shots — under the first vaccine emergency-use authority granted by the Department of Health and Human Services.
Vaccinations won’t resume immediately because government officials say they need approval from Judge Emmet G. Sullivan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

In a lawsuit filed by six plaintiffs whose names have been kept anonymous, Sullivan ordered the Pentagon to halt its mandatory anthrax vaccination program Oct. 27, and in January directed the government to tell him how it is complying with his order. As it turns out, vaccinations did not completely stop, despite instructions to the field from the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the services to cease the program.

The Justice Department, which represents the Pentagon in the suit, said a records review shows that 931 anthrax vaccinations were administered since Oct. 27.

The Defense Department “recognizes and takes seriously its obligation to cease all inoculations and is redoubling its efforts to ensure that all DoD personnel comply fully with the court’s order,” Justice Department lawyers said in a Feb. 1 court filing.

Pentagon spokesman Jim Turner said anthrax vaccinations have been reduced by at least 99.6 percent and that officials are validating the accuracy of the 931 entries of anthrax vaccinations since the program stopped.

Defense officials have issued another message to the services directing clinics to find and sequester anthrax vaccine stocks, and are monitoring the electronic immunization tracking system daily to ensure the shots are not administered, according to the court records and Turner.

Justice Department lawyers said they will ask Sullivan to modify his order so the Pentagon can resume anthrax shots under the emergency-use authority, which allows troops to refuse the shots without reprisal.

But John J. “Lou” Michels, an attorney who represents the six plaintiffs in the lawsuit, said he expects troops will be pressured to take the shots even in a supposedly voluntary scenario.

No one will be pressured to take the shots, Turner said.

Sullivan halted the mandatory vaccinations after finding that the Food and Drug Administration failed to follow its own regulatory procedures in determining that the vaccine was licensed to protect against inhalation anthrax. He said the FDA should have sought public comment on its proposed final rule on the vaccine, including comment on the data that it relied upon to reach its decision.

Under Sullivan’s order, until the FDA follows its own rules, vaccinations could continue only if service members give informed consent or if President Bush waives their right to informed consent.

Pentagon officials — who continue to maintain that the vaccine is safe, effective and needed to protect troops against a germ warfare threat — have launched a three-pronged effort to try to restart their program.

First, the Justice Department is appealing Sullivan’s ruling to a higher court. Second, the FDA has opened a period of public comment on its plans to approve the vaccine for protection against inhalation anthrax.

The third prong has been to seek emergency-use authority to administer anthrax vaccine under Project BioShield, a law that allows the government to defend against an unconventional warfare or terrorism attack by using vaccines that may not be fully licensed.

Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson approved that request just before leaving office in early February.

According to a Feb. 2 notice posted in the Federal Register by HHS, service members who refuse the shots can’t be punished under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, nor can they be held back from deployment.

“There may be no penalty or loss of entitlement for refusing anthrax vaccination,” according to the HHS notice.

The right to refuse vaccination must be explained in a brochure given to troops. However, the Pentagon also may include other information, such as telling troops that refusing the vaccine could threaten the lives of their comrades and that military and civilian leaders “strongly recommend” taking the shots, according to the notice.

Permitting service members the right to refuse vaccination was a condition of the FDA granting the emergency-use authority, and the Defense Department has agreed to comply, according to Justice Department lawyers.

Turner said that “a major consideration” in the decision to resume the program on a voluntary basis “is that DoD expects the [emergency-use authority] to be in effect for only six months,” although the FDA may “extend it if necessary.”

Depending on the outcome of the FDA’s administrative review, the Pentagon “will then reconsider the future of the vaccination program, which could include a return to a mandatory vaccination program,” he said.


Ellie

[thedrifter]

4th CEB sounds final roll
Submitted by: MCAGCC
Story Identification #: 2005211133038
Story by Gunnery Sgt. Frank Patterson



MARINE CORPS AIR GROUND COMBAT CENTER TWENTYNINE PALMS, Calif. (Feb. 3, 2005) -- "Read the final roll call," commanded 2nd Lt. Paul Mainor, company commander, Combat Engineer Support Detachment, 4th Combat Engineer Battalion.

"Cpl. Jonathan Bowling," read company 1st Sgt. Timothy Degrauwe, as a member of the rifle detail drove a bayonet-affixed M-16 into a sandbag, which was followed by another Marine placing a helmet atop the rifle. The boots/dogtag bearer followed, carefully hanging the deceased Marines' dogtags on the pistol grip of the rifle and arranging the boots in front of the rifle.

"Staff Sgt. Jesse Strong," read Degrauwe, and the ritual was repeated.

"Cpl. Christopher Weaver ..."

Another rifle, another helmet, another set of dogtags, a third pair of boots ...

"Lance Cpl. Carl Linn."

The last set of gear was ceremoniously placed just as carefully and gently as the first.

Marines from the CES Detachment attached to the 3rd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment on Feb. 3 honored four Marines from the 4th CEB that were killed Jan. 26 in the Al Anbar Province in Iraq.

"We gather here this day to bid farewell to these our fallen brothers," said Navy Lt. Richard E. Malmstrom, 3/25 chaplain. "Freedom is not free, and many of our fellow Marines have paid the ultimate sacrifice for the freedom of the Iraqi people including those whom we gather together today to bid our final farewell."

"It is on this day, with our hearts full of sadness, that we turn to the Holy scriptures for comfort," said Malmstrom. "We find comfort in the promise of the resurrection ... for we know that we do not say 'good-bye' forever. We will be reunited someday ..."

Along with the four deceased Marines, the unit honored the other Marines that were wounded during the Jan. 26 attack: Lance Cpl. Mark Miller, Cpl. Timothy Franklin, Cpl. Charles Gentry and Sgt. William Meyers. Chaplain Malmstrom offered prayers for the wounded Marines as well as the deceased ones.

The final roll read, the eulogies delivered, the Marines were given the command "Fall Out" and filed off to offer their last respects. Some of them wept for lost friends whose short lives were extinguished like the slowly setting Combat Center desert sun.


Ellie