thedrifter
08-31-05, 12:56 PM
August 31, 2005
Bush presents Purple Heart to corpsman in San Diego
By Gidget Fuentes
Times staff writer
SAN DIEGO — During a whirlwind visit Tuesday morning, President Bush awarded a Purple Heart to a Navy corpsman who was wounded during the battle for Fallujah last fall and U.S. citizenship to a young Marine who was wounded during battle in Iraq last year.
The president presented the honors during a 30-minute visit to San Diego Naval Medical Center, where he addressed about 30 medical staffers in the hospital’s quarterdeck and met with several service members recovering from combat injuries, said hospital spokeswoman Amy Rohlfs. The medical workers had deployed with the hospital ship Mercy on Jan. 5 to assist in the Indonesian tsunami relief mission.
Navy Hospitalman Alonso A. Rogero, who is assigned to the medical center, received the Purple Heart medal from Bush for chest wounds he suffered from AK-47 rifle shrapnel during gun battles in Iraq on Nov. 10, Rohlfs said. Rogero was a platoon “doc” with Kilo Company of 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment from Camp Pendleton, Calif.
While visiting with several of the combat wounded, Bush learned that one of them had applied for U.S. citizenship but hadn’t yet received it.
“So on the spot, he said, ‘You are an American citizen,’ ” Rohlfs said.
So it was that Lance Cpl. Ivan Flores-Garcia, a native of Veracruz, Mexico, met the president in his wheelchair, Rohlfs said. Members of the Bush staff collected the information from the young Marine infantryman, who had deployed to Iraq with India Company of 3rd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, she said.
Early that morning, several thousand sailors in summer whites and Marines in green camouflage utilities craned their necks to see Bush, who delivered a speech marking the 60th anniversary of “V-J” Day, the end of World War II. The destroyer McCampbell, part of the Reagan Carrier Strike Group, and a Mark V patrol craft loomed nearby in San Diego Bay during Bush’s 35-minute address, which was carried lived by local television and radio stations.
Scores of silver-haired veterans, prompted by local Navy calls a day earlier to participate in the commemoration, joined the crowd at the North Island Naval Air Station pier.
Bush thanked them for their service. “Your victory came at great cost. And many of the heroes who fought by your side would not live to make the return journey home,” he told them. “More than 400,000 Americans gave their lives in that war, and some of them are buried a few miles from here at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery.”
“As we look into your faces, we see the same quiet resolve that defeated our enemies,” he added. “And we count it a privilege to be the citizens of the country that you served.”
Bush, in a speech peppered with history lessons and anecdotes of personal sacrifice and service, drew parallels between the threats from global war in the mid-20th century and the threats from terrorists today. “Once again, we face determined enemies who follow a ruthless ideology that despises everything America stands for. Once again, America and our allies are waging a global campaign with forces deployed on virtually every continent,” he said. “And once again, we will not rest until victory is America’s and our freedom is secure.”
The president arrived in San Diego on Monday and had anti-war protestors outside his Coronado hotel, including an Escondido, Calif., man whose son, a Marine, was killed in Iraq in 2003.
Bush, in his speech, vowed to continue the course to support the fledging democracy in Iraq. “This is the choice we face: Do we return to the pre-September the 11th mind-set of isolation and retreat, or do we continue to take the fight to the enemy and support our allies in the broader Middle East?” he said. “I’ve made my decision: We will stay on the offensive. We will stand with the people of Iraq, and we will prevail.”
“In this war, some of our best citizens have made the ultimate sacrifice,” he added. “We mourn the loss of every life. We pray for their loved ones. And we will honor their sacrifice by completing the mission and laying the foundation for peace.”
Bush, accompanied by first lady Laura Bush, had cut short his visit to the medical center to return to Texas and then on to Washington to oversee Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. They departed on Air Force One, which had landed at North Island the previous day, before noon.
His previous trips to visit military service members in the San Diego area came Dec. 7, when he addressed Marines at Camp Pendleton; Aug. 23, 2003, when he met with Marines and sailors at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station; and May 1, 2003, when he flew aboard an S-3B Viking aircraft to the carrier Abraham Lincoln at the tail-end of its 10-month deployment to the Persian Gulf.
Ellie
Bush presents Purple Heart to corpsman in San Diego
By Gidget Fuentes
Times staff writer
SAN DIEGO — During a whirlwind visit Tuesday morning, President Bush awarded a Purple Heart to a Navy corpsman who was wounded during the battle for Fallujah last fall and U.S. citizenship to a young Marine who was wounded during battle in Iraq last year.
The president presented the honors during a 30-minute visit to San Diego Naval Medical Center, where he addressed about 30 medical staffers in the hospital’s quarterdeck and met with several service members recovering from combat injuries, said hospital spokeswoman Amy Rohlfs. The medical workers had deployed with the hospital ship Mercy on Jan. 5 to assist in the Indonesian tsunami relief mission.
Navy Hospitalman Alonso A. Rogero, who is assigned to the medical center, received the Purple Heart medal from Bush for chest wounds he suffered from AK-47 rifle shrapnel during gun battles in Iraq on Nov. 10, Rohlfs said. Rogero was a platoon “doc” with Kilo Company of 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment from Camp Pendleton, Calif.
While visiting with several of the combat wounded, Bush learned that one of them had applied for U.S. citizenship but hadn’t yet received it.
“So on the spot, he said, ‘You are an American citizen,’ ” Rohlfs said.
So it was that Lance Cpl. Ivan Flores-Garcia, a native of Veracruz, Mexico, met the president in his wheelchair, Rohlfs said. Members of the Bush staff collected the information from the young Marine infantryman, who had deployed to Iraq with India Company of 3rd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, she said.
Early that morning, several thousand sailors in summer whites and Marines in green camouflage utilities craned their necks to see Bush, who delivered a speech marking the 60th anniversary of “V-J” Day, the end of World War II. The destroyer McCampbell, part of the Reagan Carrier Strike Group, and a Mark V patrol craft loomed nearby in San Diego Bay during Bush’s 35-minute address, which was carried lived by local television and radio stations.
Scores of silver-haired veterans, prompted by local Navy calls a day earlier to participate in the commemoration, joined the crowd at the North Island Naval Air Station pier.
Bush thanked them for their service. “Your victory came at great cost. And many of the heroes who fought by your side would not live to make the return journey home,” he told them. “More than 400,000 Americans gave their lives in that war, and some of them are buried a few miles from here at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery.”
“As we look into your faces, we see the same quiet resolve that defeated our enemies,” he added. “And we count it a privilege to be the citizens of the country that you served.”
Bush, in a speech peppered with history lessons and anecdotes of personal sacrifice and service, drew parallels between the threats from global war in the mid-20th century and the threats from terrorists today. “Once again, we face determined enemies who follow a ruthless ideology that despises everything America stands for. Once again, America and our allies are waging a global campaign with forces deployed on virtually every continent,” he said. “And once again, we will not rest until victory is America’s and our freedom is secure.”
The president arrived in San Diego on Monday and had anti-war protestors outside his Coronado hotel, including an Escondido, Calif., man whose son, a Marine, was killed in Iraq in 2003.
Bush, in his speech, vowed to continue the course to support the fledging democracy in Iraq. “This is the choice we face: Do we return to the pre-September the 11th mind-set of isolation and retreat, or do we continue to take the fight to the enemy and support our allies in the broader Middle East?” he said. “I’ve made my decision: We will stay on the offensive. We will stand with the people of Iraq, and we will prevail.”
“In this war, some of our best citizens have made the ultimate sacrifice,” he added. “We mourn the loss of every life. We pray for their loved ones. And we will honor their sacrifice by completing the mission and laying the foundation for peace.”
Bush, accompanied by first lady Laura Bush, had cut short his visit to the medical center to return to Texas and then on to Washington to oversee Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. They departed on Air Force One, which had landed at North Island the previous day, before noon.
His previous trips to visit military service members in the San Diego area came Dec. 7, when he addressed Marines at Camp Pendleton; Aug. 23, 2003, when he met with Marines and sailors at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station; and May 1, 2003, when he flew aboard an S-3B Viking aircraft to the carrier Abraham Lincoln at the tail-end of its 10-month deployment to the Persian Gulf.
Ellie