thedrifter
04-26-07, 08:13 AM
Utah's Charlie Company Marines returning to starker, deadlier war
For many in unit, last time in Iraq came on heels of victory
By Matthew D. LaPlante
The Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated:04/26/2007 06:34:10 AM MDT
CAMP WILLIAMS - At the time, they felt like victors.
They watched as statues and paintings of Saddam Hussein fell. They cruised in unarmored vehicles through cities of seemingly supportive Iraqis. And they returned home as their president declared an end to major combat operations.
It's been four years since the men of Charlie Company, of the 4th Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, left Iraq.
Now the Utah-based unit of reservists is returning to a still war-torn nation embroiled in sectarian fighting - a nation where victory remains evasive.
"It's definitely different," said Chris Schumacher, a Navy corpsman who deployed with Charlie Company in 2003 and who recently returned from his second tour with a separate unit.
Like many Marines, Schumacher spent his recent tour in the Sunni-dominated Al Anbar Province, the same Utah-sized expanse of desert where Charlie Company is now headed. The 13-year veteran reservist said his former Charlie comrades should expect to find things much different than what they left four years back.
Then about 170 members strong, Charlie Company missed the first rounds of fighting in the swiftly completed invasion. And though some platoons encountered pockets of resistance, Schumacher said his greatest concern, as a medic, was doling out anti-malaria pills and making sure his Marines were minding their health and hygiene.
This time around, Schumacher said, "there were the same health and hygiene issues, but we had more gunshot wounds to deal with."
The gunfire that caused those wounds came from an enemy far more elusive that the one the unit fought in 2003.
"Back then, we pretty much had a set mission - with rules of engagement that were geared toward traditional war," he said. "We had a clear-cut enemy."
This time around, Schumacher said, "we really didn't have a good feeling of the person we were engaged against. It could have been anyone."
About a third of the 145 Marines on the Charlie Company battle roster served with Schumacher in 2003.
One of those men, Jon Whall, remembered Wednesday how it felt to leave Iraq in 2003.
"It felt like everything was going great," he said.
Though he now is married with a 5-week-old daughter, the Riverton resident did not complain about having to return to a place he once believed to be well on its way to freedom and security.
"It's going to be tough to leave the two people I love the most, but this is what we do," he said. "We're Marines."
More than 3,100 U.S. service members, including more than 800 Marines, have been killed since Charlie Company returned from its first tour. In that time, the number of Americans reporting optimism about Iraq plummeted from 72 percent to 31 percent, according to regular polls conducted by CBS News.
But Morgan Andros, who also will be leaving a wife and infant child, said he was nonetheless excited "to fight for my country."
It will be the 25-year-old's first war tour. And he does not lament that the mission is not as popular now as it was when his fellow Charlie Company Marines deployed the first time around.
"We just have a mission to do," he said. "And we are going to do it."
Whall and Andros, part of an early-deploying detachment of about a dozen Charlie Company Marines, are scheduled to leave Utah next week.
The rest of the company will follow in June.
mlaplante@sltrib.com
Ellie
For many in unit, last time in Iraq came on heels of victory
By Matthew D. LaPlante
The Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated:04/26/2007 06:34:10 AM MDT
CAMP WILLIAMS - At the time, they felt like victors.
They watched as statues and paintings of Saddam Hussein fell. They cruised in unarmored vehicles through cities of seemingly supportive Iraqis. And they returned home as their president declared an end to major combat operations.
It's been four years since the men of Charlie Company, of the 4th Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, left Iraq.
Now the Utah-based unit of reservists is returning to a still war-torn nation embroiled in sectarian fighting - a nation where victory remains evasive.
"It's definitely different," said Chris Schumacher, a Navy corpsman who deployed with Charlie Company in 2003 and who recently returned from his second tour with a separate unit.
Like many Marines, Schumacher spent his recent tour in the Sunni-dominated Al Anbar Province, the same Utah-sized expanse of desert where Charlie Company is now headed. The 13-year veteran reservist said his former Charlie comrades should expect to find things much different than what they left four years back.
Then about 170 members strong, Charlie Company missed the first rounds of fighting in the swiftly completed invasion. And though some platoons encountered pockets of resistance, Schumacher said his greatest concern, as a medic, was doling out anti-malaria pills and making sure his Marines were minding their health and hygiene.
This time around, Schumacher said, "there were the same health and hygiene issues, but we had more gunshot wounds to deal with."
The gunfire that caused those wounds came from an enemy far more elusive that the one the unit fought in 2003.
"Back then, we pretty much had a set mission - with rules of engagement that were geared toward traditional war," he said. "We had a clear-cut enemy."
This time around, Schumacher said, "we really didn't have a good feeling of the person we were engaged against. It could have been anyone."
About a third of the 145 Marines on the Charlie Company battle roster served with Schumacher in 2003.
One of those men, Jon Whall, remembered Wednesday how it felt to leave Iraq in 2003.
"It felt like everything was going great," he said.
Though he now is married with a 5-week-old daughter, the Riverton resident did not complain about having to return to a place he once believed to be well on its way to freedom and security.
"It's going to be tough to leave the two people I love the most, but this is what we do," he said. "We're Marines."
More than 3,100 U.S. service members, including more than 800 Marines, have been killed since Charlie Company returned from its first tour. In that time, the number of Americans reporting optimism about Iraq plummeted from 72 percent to 31 percent, according to regular polls conducted by CBS News.
But Morgan Andros, who also will be leaving a wife and infant child, said he was nonetheless excited "to fight for my country."
It will be the 25-year-old's first war tour. And he does not lament that the mission is not as popular now as it was when his fellow Charlie Company Marines deployed the first time around.
"We just have a mission to do," he said. "And we are going to do it."
Whall and Andros, part of an early-deploying detachment of about a dozen Charlie Company Marines, are scheduled to leave Utah next week.
The rest of the company will follow in June.
mlaplante@sltrib.com
Ellie