Part IV: For 2 soldiers, families, lives change

[thedrifter]

Part IV: For 2 soldiers, families, lives change
By Sharon Cohen - The Associated Press
Posted : Friday Aug 8, 2008 5:50:10 EDT

In that dreadful December, every day brought bloodshed, every week hundreds of attacks on Americans and Iraqis.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Roadside bomb blasts change everything for two soldiers and their families back home. Fourth of a seven-part series on the longest deployment of the Iraq war.

Car bombings. Drive-by shootings. Kidnappings. Torture. Bullet-riddled bodies. Sectarian fighting. It was a horrible end to a horrible year in the Iraq war.

And for two young soldiers, December 2006 was the month that changed everything, forever.

The sky was clear on Dec. 2 when Sgt. John Kriesel’s armored Humvee rolled out to check a report of suspicious activity: people digging on a dirt road near Fallujah.

His Humvee was turning a corner when the left front tire ran over something. Riding shotgun in the vehicle, Kriesel heard a metallic plink — like a rock striking a 55-gallon drum.

Then: BOOM!

The Humvee flew into the air, its doors blowing open, the gunner shooting out of the turret like a Roman candle before the vehicle crashed down on its side.

Kriesel’s helmet and glasses flew off as he was thrown to the ground. Rocks rained down in a concrete storm, and Kriesel heard the screeching of twisted metal, then moans, groans, screams.

Strangely, he was calm. He saw the underside of the Humvee; the axle was blown off.

Then he looked down.

His left leg was nearly severed, still tucked in his pants leg, hanging by a piece of skin. His left thigh was split open, with a bone jutting out and blood oozing.

His right leg, from about six inches below the knee, was badly mangled.

“I’m going to die,” he told himself. “This is how it ends.”

Sgt. Kriesel, the eternal optimist, had lost faith.

He tried to get up, but it was useless. The bones of his lower left arm were broken; the arm flapped like a door off its hinge. Kriesel, who had trained to be a paramedic, was clear-minded enough to brace his arm to his chest, hoping to avoid nerve damage.

His right biceps had burst; they were peppered with shrapnel. A bracelet in honor of a fallen soldier sliced his right wrist down to the bone.

Kriesel closed his eyes. He couldn’t bear to see more.

“Help me! I need help,” Kriesel cried.

“Stay still,” said Sgt. Adam Gallant, who had jumped out of the Bradley ahead of him and had run back. Gallant did a quick assessment. One soldier was dead, another trapped and likely gone. Two others were walking. Kriesel was top priority.

“Kries,” he said, “I’m not going to lie to you, man. Your legs are real bad.”

But he tried to comfort him, too.

“You’re going to be OK,” he said. “We’re going to take care of you.”

Gallant and another soldier wrapped tourniquets on Kriesel’s legs. They propped him up on stacked boxes of MREs so blood would flow to his organs. No one knew it then, but beneath his armor the force of the 200-pound bomb had ripped open his abdomen, and his intestines were exposed.

Kriesel closed his eyes. It was almost like the movies: His life really was flashing before his eyes. He thought of Little League back in Minnesota, his elementary school days...

Then he felt someone shaking his shoulder.

“Keep your eyes open,” he heard. He didn’t want to.

He thought of his wife, Katie.

His gunner sat by his side to keep him awake. But the blast had left him with a concussion, and he kept asking Kriesel the same questions:

What’s your wife’s name?

Your kids’ names?

What state do you live in?

Kriesel answered over and over, until he lost patience.

“Leave me alone!” he snapped. “Let me die.”

The soldiers needed to move Kriesel so they could tip the Humvee wreckage and remove another soldier trapped beneath it.

“I ain’t going to lie to you, buddy,” Gallant said. “This is really going to suck.”

“What could suck worse?” Kriesel said. “Just go! Let’s do it.”

As they picked him up, Kriesel’s nearly detached leg flopped onto his chest. He howled in pain. No one knew then that his pelvis was shattered.

He was getting cold. Again, he felt sure he was going to die.

“Tell Katie I love her,” he implored.

“Shut up, you’re going to tell her yourself,” Gallant said.

When a young medic arrived, he administered morphine, and Kriesel was loaded onto a chopper. The drug was kicking in. But he managed to give his Social Security number.

Then he closed his eyes again.

At the hospital at the Al Taqaddum Air Base, six surgeons worked on Kriesel as a chaplain stood by in a corner. Once Kriesel was stabilized for transfer to another hospital in Iraq and then to Germany, the doctors placed him in a “hot pocket” — a heated nylon bag from which only a breathing tube was visible.

Some of those who saw him wheeled by felt sure he was dead.

A doctor tried to reassure them. His heart is still beating, he said. He’s still alive.
Back home in Minnesota

It was almost midnight in Minnesota, and Katie Kriesel was asleep when the phone rang.

“Katie, I need you to sit up,” her mother-in-law said.

John must be dead, she thought.

He wasn’t, but the news was grim: John had lost both his legs, one above the knee, the other below.

Katie Kriesel started crying. She called her mother, who lived about a mile away, but she was so choked up, her mother thought something had happened to the boys. She was getting dressed, she said; she’d be right over.

The commotion woke 4-year-old Broden, and Katie tried to calm him, stretching out in his bed, where he dozed off again but she simply watched the clock, hour by hour, waiting for morning and more news.

Over the next two days, Katie tried to maintain normal routines — even taking the boys for a breakfast with Santa — and struggled to keep her voice steady and her eyes dry.

As calmly as she could, she told her sons their dad was hurt and she had to go to Germany to help him.

“What kind of hurt?” They asked.

“Dad doesn’t have his legs anymore,” she said.

They looked puzzled.

Everything will be OK, she said. He’ll get a wheelchair.

Later as Katie read her sons a bedtime story, 5-year-old Elijah had a question.

“Are Dad’s legs going to grow back?” he asked.

“No, honey, they don’t grow back.”

“I just don’t want to talk about it anymore,” Elijah said.
Terrible news

That Sunday, Sgt. Travis Ostrom received a call at home.

Terrible news for the 1st Brigade Combat Team: Three casualties from an IED attack. John Kriesel was badly injured, and two other Minnesota National Guardsmen — Spcs. Corey Rystad and Bryan McDonough — had been killed.

Rystad, just a few weeks shy of his 21st birthday, was an avid hunter and a natural athlete, a quiet guy who was always asking questions, always interested in learning how to be a better soldier. McDonough, 22, liked to crack jokes; everyone enjoyed being around him. But he had a serious side, too. In an online entry, he had written that he was proud to defend his country and there was “no other place I would rather be.”

Ostrom had to start coordinating the military aspects of two funerals.

It was the most unwelcome part of a job he never wanted.

Ostrom, who had served in Bosnia, Somalia and the Persian Gulf, had expected to be a platoon sergeant in Iraq, but he never got there. A knee injury at the worst possible time, during pre-deployment training in Mississippi, had sidelined him.

While his comrades fought, he was assigned to a lonely armory in Minnesota serving those on the home front.

He felt guilty, but plunged into the crucial job helping families with bills, cutting red tape — and, as now, making preparations for final goodbyes.

That December day, Ostrom quickly called other Bravo Company soldiers on home leave. That way, they’d hear the news from him first. Also, some would be among the dozens of soldiers he’d tap for the sad necessities at hand: to carry flags in honor guards, to drive dignitaries at the two funerals, and to serve as pallbearers.

He scheduled rehearsals at the armory, bringing in a borrowed casket. The soldiers practiced folding the flag, synchronizing the 21-gun salute.

The dutiful sergeant had the same message for all of them: You have just one chance to do it right.
Waking up

“Did everybody make it out OK?”

It was John Kriesel’s first question when he woke up more than a week later at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. He had no memory of the nine or 10 surgeries he’d undergone, first in Iraq, then at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany.

The look on his wife Katie’s face gave him the answer even before she spoke. His two buddies had been killed.

Though Kriesel couldn’t recall some things, he knew he had lost his legs.

In fact, he had come close to dying: His back was broken, his stomach, arms and face were pocked with shrapnel. His left arm was broken and part of his colon had to be removed. His pelvis and spine had to be fused with screws and pins.

He’d hardly had a day without surgery.

But already, Kriesel looked better than when Katie had arrived in Germany. She had fallen to her knees when she first saw his swollen face and blood seeping from his wounds. She decided immediately to sleep by his side every night, convinced if he knew, he’d fight harder to survive.

Kriesel wanted to see their sons, and in time he was well enough. Katie already had conferred with a child psychologist about how to prepare them and to describe what they’d see. Elijah and Broden had never visited a hospital or been around anyone disabled.

Put one hand under your knee and one hand above the other knee, Katie told the boys. Now pretend there isn’t anything below that anymore. That, she said, is what Dad is like.

When the boys arrived in the lobby, they weren’t interested in hearing explanations about bandages, machines or wounds. Dad. Dad. Dad. They just want to see Dad.

As Elijah entered his father’s room, Kriesel covered his amputated legs with a blanket.

“You don’t have to cover up your ovals, Dad,” said the boy, describing the shape of his wounds. “I’m just glad you’re alive.”
A similar story

That bitter December was winding down when Sgt. J.R. Salzman of Menomonie, Wis., just back from home leave, heard about Kriesel. His convoy commander happened to be Kriesel’s cousin.

On Dec. 19, Salzman was in the scout truck leading three other Humvees and a 20-vehicle fuel tanker convoy through northwest Baghdad to Tallil Air Base. He was talking with his driver, when there was an enormous blast.

He lost consciousness, then woke to the sound of his gunner screaming obscenities; hot shrapnel had spattered over his legs.

Salzman smelled something sickening, like burning wires, mixing with the smell of burning flesh.

Bleeding and trapped in the still-idling Humvee, he thought of his wife, Josie, whom he’d married just nine months before. He muttered her name.

He tried to grab the right door lever to get out. But he couldn’t.

He felt terrible burning and when he looked down, he realized why: His right hand and wrist were gone. About six inches above his wrist, he saw two bones sticking out.

Salzman’s Humvee had been hit by an armor-piercing bomb called an explosively formed penetrator, which was hidden in a pile of rocks on the right side of the road.

Despite excruciating pain, he kept his cool, checking quickly to see if his left hand was there. It was. But it was swelling in his glove, and he couldn’t move two fingers.

He continued the inventory of his body. He rotated his shoulders. He felt below his waist. Everything was there.

He shuffled his feet — and at that moment, he had an incongruous thought that carried him far away, if only for a split second: He could still log roll, something he’d loved since he was 5, something that had made him a champion.

Then his mind snapped back: He needed a tourniquet. He carried two but there was no way he could put one on. He tried to call for help, pressing a radio button with his left thumb, but the blast had fried the electronic equipment.

“Get the medic up here,” he ordered his driver and gunner, “... if I don’t get a tourniquet on, I’m going to bleed out.”

Salzman wondered if this was the end, then pushed that thought away.

“No. No. NO WAY am I dying here,” he said to himself. “Not here. Not now. Not today. Not in this country, I’m not dying.”

———


NOTE: The story of 1st Brigade Combat Team/34th Infantry Division of the Minnesota National Guard and its tour in Iraq was reconstructed from scores of interviews with more than 20 soldiers and members of their families. Most quotations are as remembered by the speakers. In addition, the series draws upon numerous official documents, including after-action reports; videos of news conferences; correspondence provided by the families (including e-mails and letters); television coverage of the unit’s return; personal journals and blog postings.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Part V: Joy over survival, tears at extension
By Sharon Cohen - The Associated Press
Posted : Saturday Aug 9, 2008 8:06:45 EDT

Christmas Day arrived — and for two 1st Brigade Combat Team soldiers, there was a gift like no other: their very survival.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Can the long separation be extended further? Yes, and for some there’s major fighting ahead. Fifth of a seven-part series on the longest deployment of the Iraq war.

Sgt. J.R. Salzman had arrived at Walter Reed Army Medical Center hours earlier, days after being critically injured in a roadside bomb in Iraq.

A few doors down, Sgt. John Kriesel already had settled in as a patient after he, too, was maimed by an explosion.

For both, there would be a long hospital stay and an even longer recovery. The two bombing survivors had much in common but they took different paths in starting over.

Kriesel had to learn to walk again with prosthetic legs.

Salzman would learn to write, feed and dress himself with an artificial arm.

Through their many months of rehabilitation, their wives remained at their sides, standing vigil through surgeries, sharing their triumphs and their setbacks, counting the days until they could return home.

Some of those days were especially memorable.

Just before Christmas, Kriesel had a special visitor — President Bush.

Ever since he had arrived at Walter Reed, when nurses would ask what they could do for him, Kriesel had one reply: “I want to meet my boss. I want to meet the president.”

On a visit to the hospital, Bush and his wife, Laura, met with the family. The president called Kriesel a hero. He turned to the soldier’s two young sons. “Are you proud of your father?” he asked. The boys solemnly nodded in unison.

Leaning over Kriesel, who was still unable to sit up, Bush pinned a Purple Heart on his hospital gown.

As Bush prepared to depart, 4-year-old Broden, sensing the momentous occasion, turned to his mother and asked: “Is George Washington leaving now?”
Tears of comfort, joy

When Josie Salzman, J.R.’s wife, arrived with her in-laws at Walter Reed on Christmas Day, she didn’t know what to expect.

Would she able to hug J.R. without hurting him? Would he have a bunch of tubes stuck in him? Would he even recognize her?

J.R., as it turned out, looked scruffy and exhausted but he seemed OK, thank goodness. After he talked with his parents, Josie stayed behind and gently gave him a sponge bath, head to toe, and brushed his teeth.

It was something she never anticipated she’d be doing for her husband. Certainly, not as a 20-year-old.

As she prepared to pull out a chair in his room to sleep, Josie realized she had barely eaten all day. But it was Christmas night and the cafeteria was closed.

A nurse came to her rescue. He warmed up an untouched meal a patient had passed up. It was just hospital food — steak and potatoes — but it seemed like a holiday feast.

Josie cried. At first, she wasn’t sure if it was the meal, her exhaustion or J.R.’s wounds. But then she realized why.

“I had my husband alive and in front of me,” she wrote in her blog. “I could see his face and touch his skin, he was real. What more could I possibly ask for?”
Extended mission

New Year’s Day and the turning of the calendar to 2007 meant one thing to the soldiers of the 1st Brigade Combat Team.

They were going home.

They were due back in spring, and couldn’t wait. Many simply wanted to resume lives that were in limbo. They had crops to plant, colleges to attend, families to see.

Some had special vacations planned. In his office at Tallil Air Base, the unit’s commander, Col. David Elicerio, displayed the postcards of Hawaii that his wife had sent, anticipating their spring trip.

The soldiers had been gone 16 months, including six months training in Mississippi. It was a long time. But soon they would leave for home.

Or would they?

Sgt. 1st Class Janelle Johnson was on the Webcam with her husband, Chad, back home when he said, “You got extended, huh?”

“Don’t believe any of the rumors,” she said calmly. “They’re not true.”

“Well, that’s kind of funny,” he replied, “because the governor’s on TV right now ...”

Janelle ran a mile to the battalion office. As she raced up the stairs, she heard a voice on a speaker phone talking about an extension. She ran to the bathroom to cry, and returned to the office to see an older soldier crying.

Janelle dreaded telling her 5-year-old daughter, Elizabeth. The family would have to put off a trip to Disney World, planned for April.

“The president says Mom and the troops are doing such a good job and we need to stay here a little longer,” she told Elizabeth on the phone.

Elizabeth was quiet at first. Then she said: “You’re going to miss my birthday again.”

“Don’t worry,” her mother said, searching for words of comfort. “I’m still coming home.”

The extension was ordered as part of the surge in troop strength to try to quell violence that had been convulsing Iraq for months. The brigade was extended another 125 days. The soldiers would not return to Minnesota until the summer.

But somehow, news of the new orders reached families before the troops — even before the commander.

“When were you going to tell me?” Elicerio’s wife, Leslee, asked.

Reporters in Minnesota took up the question in a satellite news conference where the colonel tried to explain what had happened.

Standing in the darkness at the Tallil Air Base, Elicerio acknowledged the error. “Do I feel bad about apologizing for the Army? Hell no,” he said. “Certainly we admit that a mistake was made.”

Yes, he said, his soldiers were upset at first, but they’d get over it. They had a mission, and they were performing very well.

He acknowledged this would create hardships — but they’d be back, he promised, before the leaves changed colors in the fall.
Stress on the homefront

That promise was little consolation to Teri Walen. She hadn’t wanted her son, Chad Malmberg, to go to Iraq in the first place. She had been awaiting his return, clearing the decks so she could devote herself to him full time.

She had worried from the day he left — and now she’d worry for another four months.

Walen became so depressed she couldn’t drag herself out of bed. She felt as if she were walking in quicksand. The pressures mounted at home, too: Her mother was dying, as was her husband’s father. Two of their children were getting married. It all became too much to bear.

After talking with the church counselor, she visited a doctor, who prescribed antidepressants. Within weeks, she was better.

On the afternoon of Jan. 26, Teri Walen, mother of a soldier and wife of a Lutheran pastor, spoke to about 100 women at a Christian retreat. She talked about technology that bridges the gap between troops and their families.

As wonderful as it is, she said, maybe it isn’t always a good idea for loved ones to expect daily contact with Iraq. It puts too much stress on the troops.

As Walen finished her talk, a new day had dawned in Iraq.

Before that day ended, Chad would lead a convoy into hell.
Under attack

Chad Malmberg saw the white-yellow flash and giant plumes of smoke a mile down the road. Even before the ground shook, he knew what it was.

He had traveled this main supply route south of Baghdad dozens of times and seen the yawning craters left by IEDs that had killed and maimed others.

As the convoy inched forward, Malmberg knew the enemy was somewhere. The left side of the six-lane road was wide open desert; they had to be on the right, somewhere among hilly palm groves, berms, canals and trees.

The soldiers scanned the inky darkness, consulting by radio, trying to pinpoint the enemy’s location. Could it be that bomb ahead was all the insurgents had planned?

Within minutes, they got their answer.

The crackle of AK47s soon filled the night air, along with the whoosh of rocket-propelled grenades.

The American troops responded with machine gun fire, moving their Humvees to get a better view of the enemy.

About 20 enemy muzzle flashes — evenly spaced — lined the route. This was a well-coordinated attack. There was a convoy ahead of them, and others behind.

They were trapped.

“Wolf 5-6,” Malmberg radioed. “Troops in contact! Just north of checkpoint 30 on MSR Tampa.”

He was the convoy commander, in the lead vehicle among five armored Humvees embedded with 20 civilian flatbed trucks that had just delivered construction materials.

Malmberg was a methodical guy. He liked to draw up lists in his head.

He ticked off possibilities. What do we do if we have a casualty? What do we do if a Humvee blows up?

He instructed one truck to call in air support, one to alert other Army units in the area.

At the rear of the convoy, a gunner in Truck 4 blasted away with a .50-caliber machine gun, but the insurgents kept advancing.

“We need to end this,” Malmberg told his driver.

“Truck 4,” he barked over the radio. “En route to your location with AT-4.”

The AT-4 — an anti-tank shoulder-fired rocket — was the biggest weapon in their arsenal. Malmberg’s driver made a U-turn and raced down the pocked highway to the back of the convoy a quarter-mile away.

Malmberg adjusted the sight on the AT-4 for distance, removed the safety pin and released the battle lock on his door. He told his gunner and Truck 4 to keep shooting.

When he jumped out of the passenger door, it sounded like a rifle range. Using the hood of the Humvee as a shield, Malmberg aimed and fired the rocket. It spiraled through the air, then struck the target — a cluster of muzzle flashes.

Malmberg rocked back from the force. His ears, covered by a headset, rang as he dashed back into the truck. He was thrilled he didn’t demolish the hood.

He plugged in his headset connected to the internal radio network.

“AT-4 out!” he shouted, so everyone in the convoy knew he had deployed the rocket.

Helicopters had swooped in and out, but had been unable to open fire on the insurgents because rifle and machine gun fire were bouncing around everywhere.

After he launched the rocket, there was a lull. Malmberg gave himself a mental high five, thinking: We’ve got them. His truck headed back to the front of the convoy.

But minutes later, there was more enemy fire.

It was louder. And faster.

Instead of pop. Pop. Pop. It was poppoppopoppop.

The insurgents still were out there. Lots of them. And they were moving closer.

—————

NOTE: The story of 1st Brigade Combat Team/34th Infantry Division of the Minnesota National Guard and its tour in Iraq was reconstructed from scores of interviews with more than 20 soldiers and members of their families. Most quotations are as remembered by the speakers. In addition, the series draws upon numerous official documents, including after-action reports; videos of news conferences; correspondence provided by the families (including e-mails and letters); television coverage of the unit’s return; personal journals and blog postings.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Part VI: An ambush produces a hero
By Sharon Cohen - The Associated Press
Posted : Sunday Aug 10, 2008 14:50:39 EDT

It all looked as if a video game had come to life. Through his night-vision goggles, Staff Sgt. Chad Malmberg saw the insurgents scurrying from berms to canals. Some popped up, ran a few yards, then fell to the Americans’ gunfire. But others kept advancing toward his convoy.
EDITOR’S NOTE — An insurgent ambush yields a hero, and a wounded soldier recovers back home. Sixth of a seven-part series on the longest deployment of the Iraq war.


Malmberg’s rocket counterattack hadn’t stopped the enemy. And Truck 4, at the back of the convoy, had just radioed two urgent pleas for help.

It was running out of ammunition. And the enemy was within shouting distance.

Once again, Malmberg ordered his truck to race to the back — this time with two other Humvees, one of which supplied .50-caliber machine gun bullets.

The insurgents, once five or six football-field lengths away, were now within 50 feet, hunkered in a ditch. When their muzzles flashed, Malmberg saw their faces and their turbans.

When his truck stopped, he flung open his door and hopped out, quickly lobbing a grenade into the ditch.

“Frag out!” he shouted so others could take cover, then repeated the alert on the radio. Then his truck stopped again and Malmberg’s driver threw a second grenade.

Finally, that threat was eliminated.

Still, the fight wasn’t over. Insurgents near the front of the convoy, where Malmberg now returned, were launching rocket-propelled grenades as all five Humvees sprayed the area with gunfire.

In the midst of this, Malmberg’s gunner alerted him that smoke was billowing from both sides of the cab of a civilian truck. Malmberg looked through his rearview mirror. Surely, he thought, the driver was dead. He radioed an order to a Humvee crew: Remove the body.

But when the sergeant opened the door, the driver popped out and hugged him. Miraculously, the man had survived, so frightened that he then crawled under his truck for safety.

The sergeant pulled him out. They had to go. Now! They had to get out of the kill zone.

And they did.

When the Humvees returned to base, Malmberg and the others set up a board to reconstruct what had happened in the 55-minute firefight. It was almost impossible. There had been so much chaos. The gunners had shot so many targets. No one knew for sure how many of perhaps 30 to 40 insurgents were killed.

They did know this: No one in the convoy — soldiers or civilian drivers — was dead. No one was even injured.

And Malmberg, whose greatest worry was that he might somehow fail his men, would be decorated as a hero.
Middle of a firestorm

U.S. troops were not the only targets of the violence that flared across parts of Iraq in early 2007. Ordinary Iraqis, too, found themselves in the middle of a firestorm.

Sgt. 1st Class Cassandra Houston was in her second day as a nurse in the intensive care unit at the sprawling Balad Hospital when an Iraqi family was wheeled in for “comfort care” — the father, mother and son were about to die. All she could do was help them go peacefully.

They’d all been shot in the head, apparent victims of sectarian hatred, and the parents succumbed quickly.

Their son, around 14, was unconscious but still breathing. Houston suctioned blood from the boy’s mouth, changed the gauze bandage on his head and tenderly held his hand.

She wanted to make sure he did not die alone.

She thought of her son, Josh, who was about the same age.

Afternoon gave way to evening as Houston stayed by the boy’s side. She watched the monitors as his labored breathing subsided, his blood pressure dropped and his heartbeat dwindled.

When the boy died, a chaplain returned, and Houston, along with other nurses, gathered around his bed for a prayer.

That night, back in her room, she cried. She called Josh and told him she missed him.

And she was back in intensive care the next morning.

As she stood by others — including wounded, frightened troops — in the months that followed, her eyes might tear up but she learned not to cry every time she saw something terrible.

At times, she wondered if she had a heart anymore.
A terrible injury

At the end of February, a dump truck loaded with gravel and explosives veered into a crowd of worshippers leaving a Sunni mosque in Habbaniyah, where the imam had spoken out against extremists.

Dr. Joe Burns heard the sirens wailing. Within minutes, dozens of injured Iraqis arrived at the gates of Al Taqaddum Air Base.

One was a little boy, around 8. He was unconscious. The top of his head was wrapped in a blood-soaked bandage, a bone jutted through his left leg. His breathing was shallow, his pulse rapid.

Burns called for breathing tubes and when he removed the bandage from the boy’s matted hair, he saw a hole the size of a quarter in the back of his skull. The gray matter of the brain was visible.

He gingerly felt for shrapnel or any foreign material, but found none. That was good news.

Suddenly, the boy regained consciousness, sat up, started crying and reached for his head.

He told the interpreter his name was Youssef — Joseph, like the doctor — but little else before lapsing back into unconsciousness.

Burns and others lifted Youssef’s stretcher from the floor, weaving through a crowded hallway toward an open bed. As Burns prepared to give Youssef medicine so he could insert a breathing tube down his throat, an emergency room doctor arrived.

“What have you got?” he asked.

“Open fracture. Open head wound,” Burns replied.

The doctor shook his head.

“No,” he said, “make him expectant.” Put him aside to die, because others could be saved.

Burns protested gently.

No, he talked, he regained consciousness, Burns said. He’s young, this isn’t beyond hope.

Eyeing the boy again, the doctor reconsidered.

“OK,” he said, “do you want me to fix the head wound?”

The doctor sutured the scalp as Burns trained a flashlight on it and held a temporary breathing tube in the other hand. He and five other doctors worked shoulder to shoulder, their arms, legs and heads tangled around a nest of tubes, cables and medical equipment. Dozens of other doctors and nurses struggled to save other patients, wading through ankle-high piles of torn-off bandages.

Some died, but others survived.

And Youssef? Once the boy was stabilized, he was flown to Baghdad for treatment.

Later, Burns would try to check on the boy whose life he helped save, using a computer that tracks patients. For six weeks, Youssef’s name appeared. Then suddenly one day, it was gone. Burns heard rumors the boy had gone home; he would never know for sure.

But on that February day when he fought for Youssef’s life, the North Dakota doctor had a final duty.

He walked a mile to a base morgue to establish the cause of death for two Iraqi civilians killed in the blast and two U.S. soldiers.

He signed the paperwork, then ended his 19-hour day with an e-mail to his wife, Becky. He feared she’d hear news of the bombing and worry. “I am fine,” he wrote. “Disregard news reports.”

As it turned out, she hadn’t seen the news at all.
Realities of loss

At Walter Reed, a new reality was setting in for Sgt. J.R. Salzman, recovering after the loss of his lower right arm.

He’d thought he would get a prosthetic arm, rebound quickly and be just fine. But after several surgeries — including the amputation of his left ring finger — it was becoming clear: This wasn’t a two-week recovery. It would be months, even years.

Salzman, who had been the go-to guy when a Humvee needed fixing in Iraq, now had to learn how to do the most rudimentary things: Zip a jacket. Brush his teeth. Write with his left hand.

He was haunted by nightmares. Sometimes he dreamed he saw the flash of an IED explosion. Other times, he woke screaming that his arm was gone, begging for a tourniquet.

The methadone and Lyrica he took for nerve pain left him dizzy, confused, drowsy. He had trouble remembering appointments.

Even proud moments turned into ordeals.

When Salzman was invited to the president’s State of the Union address, it took 20 minutes and help from his wife, Josie, just to put on his dress uniform. It was his first trip outside Walter Reed; he didn’t like leaving his safe haven.

As they listened to the speech, which was interrupted several times by applause, J.R. couldn’t clap. Josie felt like crying, and applauded loudly on his behalf.

Josie was insistent that J.R. talk with a therapist. She didn’t want to put it off. Her husband, an athlete, a champion log roller, had lost his right hand. He needed to talk with someone about it.

When they finally arranged to meet together with a therapist, it did not go well.

Josie thought J.R. wasn’t being honest, that he said he was eating and sleeping well, when he was having nightmares and living on pudding snacks.

Tensions mounted. He threatened to send her home. He thought she expected him to be the same person with whom she had fallen in love, and he wasn’t.

But as the months passed, Josie stayed and J.R. improved. He learned to write left-handed, to dress himself, even to fly fish with a prosthetic arm.

His sadness, though, lingered. He found himself remembering small details about the hand he lost, down to the scars he had from carpentry work. He’d think about that day when his wedding ring was snipped off by bolt cutters at the Green Zone Hospital in Baghdad.

Salzman knew others had worse injuries. He wanted to be positive, but sometimes it was hard.

“I think having given two years of my life and my right arm is more than enough for my country,” he wrote in his blog. “Now I want to get back to my private life, and learn how to live again all over.”
New life as amputee

As spring approached, Sgt. John Kriesel prepared to take his first steps on prosthetic legs.

He wanted to walk earlier, but he had to heal from back surgery needed so he could bear weight on his legs. His spine, sacrum and pelvis had to be fused.

Kriesel had prepared for months, watching other amputees being fitted with prosthetic legs. His left leg — which was amputated above the knee — was replaced with an aluminum limb that bends like a real leg; a computer chip inside senses if he’s going to fall and lock ups to prevent it.

His artificial right leg — shorter because his leg was amputated six inches below the knee — has a carbon-fiber foot with a high-tech shock absorber.

On March 12, 2007, Kriesel donned a stars-and-stripes T-shirt and red shorts, wheeled into the therapy room, grabbed the parallel bars and stood.

At first, he felt as if he was on stilts.

But he was thrilled to look at people at eye level and kiss his wife, Katie, standing up. He walked back and forth, heel to toe, heel to toe, to perfect his form.

A doctor had warned Katie that because John’s spine was fused, he’d lose mobility in his lower back and would waddle. His gait, though, was smooth.

Kriesel worked up a sweat but was reluctant to quit. Only when therapists started switching off the lights at the other side of the room did he stop. They locked up his prosthetic legs so he didn’t try to practice when no one else was around.

Five days later, Kriesel graduated to a walker.

Two weeks later, he had two canes.
A return

At the end of April, Dr. Joe Burns headed home.

When the plane refueled in New Jersey, some soldiers kissed the American soil. For Burns, the smell of humidity and the sight of greenery almost made him giddy.

After a debriefing in Texas, he flew to North Dakota on April 25, his 26th wedding anniversary. When the plane pulled up to the gate at Fargo, Burns’ daughters, Anna and Sarah, waited, along with his wife, Becky.

His gift to Becky, purchased in Kuwait, was a brass Aladdin’s lamp, the kind you rub to make a wish.

His own wish had already come true.

Shortly before midnight, Burns arrived home. Within minutes, Becky was asleep. A teacher, she had to be at school the next day.

But Burns was wired.

He wanted to savor the comfort of his own bed, the closeness of his family, the quiet he had desperately missed. And the peace.

Finally, he fell asleep.

———

NOTE: The story of 1st Brigade Combat Team/34th Infantry Division of the Minnesota National Guard and its tour in Iraq was reconstructed from scores of interviews with more than 20 soldiers and members of their families. Most quotations are as remembered by the speakers. In addition, the series draws upon numerous official documents, including after-action reports; videos of news conferences; correspondence provided by the families (including e-mails and letters); television coverage of the unit’s return; personal journals and blog postings.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Part VII: Homecoming brings joy, new struggles
By Sharon Cohen - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Aug 11, 2008 10:26:39 EDT

The chartered plane loaded with soldiers descended slowly in the summer sky as Sgt. John Kriesel watched eagerly on the tarmac, clutching a walking cane. He had been waiting for this reunion for more than seven months.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Homecoming at last, with troops and families reunited, though struggles remain. Conclusion of a seven-part series on the longest deployment of the Iraq war.

Kriesel hadn’t seen his “guys” since he lost his legs in a roadside bombing in Iraq. Now, finally, on this bright July day at Volk Field in Wisconsin, the soldiers who served with him — several of whom he had known since high school — were home after a 22-month tour of duty, including 16 months in Iraq.

And he was there to welcome them.

Wearing shorts, sunglasses and bright yellow running shoes and standing firmly with his prosthetic legs, Kriesel beamed as a long line of soldiers formed, snaking from the plane’s steps across the tarmac.

One by one, Kriesel greeted them with hugs, hand shakes, smiles and jokes.

One soldier carried his battered M-4 weapon that survived the IED attack. “Is that my rifle?” Kriesel exclaimed, touching it again.

“You look good!” another friend said. “You look better than me.”

“No, I don’t,” Kriesel replied. “YOU look good. You got legs, bro.”

Staff Sgt. Tim Nelson, who was Kriesel’s roommate in Iraq and squad leader, jumped ahead in line and the two men embraced, holding each other tightly. Nelson was in the Humvee seat behind him when it ran over an IED.

Nelson flew with Kriesel to the military hospital in Balad, Iraq, and held his hand when Kriesel’s survival was in doubt.

“Good to see you, dude,” Kriesel said to Nelson. “I heard you yelling and I wasn’t going to let go.”

Staff Sgt. Todd Everson was also there. He was one of Kriesel’s rescuers, binding his left leg in a tourniquet.

“I’d be dead without you,” Kriesel said.

The next day, as Kriesel watched the soldiers’ formation at Fort McCoy, they surprised him by shouting, whistling, waving — and pointing to the place he had always stood.

Kriesel walked over and took his regular spot at the formation, and his battalion commander pinned the Combat Infantryman Badge and the Bronze Star on his chest.

For Kriesel and others who were part of the 1st Brigade Combat Team/34th Infantry Division, the summer of 2007 was a time of reunions and readjustment. Most had been gone nearly two years; their children had grown, their parents had aged, the world they left behind was different — and so were they.

When Janelle Johnson ran off the bus at Camp Ripley in Little Falls, Minn., she was amazed to see how big her two daughters looked. Emily, who’d been just 6 months old when she left, didn’t want to come to her mother or pose for a family photo and when the little girl relented, she clung to her father.

A general watching the scene put a comforting hand on Janelle’s shoulder.

“It’ll get better,” he whispered. “It’s going to be a long haul.”

And it has gotten better. Over the last year, while continuing to work for the Guard, Janelle has settled back into motherhood, reading bedtime stories to her girls and celebrating birthdays with them, not missing them anymore.

Seth and Alicia Goehring, who got married by proxy, are expanding their family. They’re expecting their second child in August, a girl they’ll name Audrey Florence.

Others have picked up where they left off.

Dr. Joe Burns went back to the emergency room of a Fargo, N.D., hospital, though he probably will return to Iraq next year.

Cassandra Houston entered a nursing program in college — something she postponed when she went to Iraq. Seeing so many needy people in Iraq inspired her. She wants to work for a humanitarian organization.

She had to adjust, too, to changes at home. During her 22-month absence, her son, Josh, turned 16, got his driver’s license and his first car. He proudly picked her up in the dented 1997 Sunfire to take her home.

Chad Malmberg came home to glory.

On Sept. 22, 2007, hundreds of friends, family and dignitaries gathered to watch him receive the Silver Star for his bravery during a January firefight.

Malmberg “deliberately and courageously exposed himself to enemy fire in order to prevent the enemy from assaulting through the kill zone and overwhelming his convoy,” the citation read. “His selfless actions prevented the enemy from turning the tide of the battle and undoubtedly saved the lives of his soldiers.”

The medal now hangs on the wall. And the hero has gone on with life. He finished Minnesota State University at Mankato with a 3.4 average and will enter the St. Paul, Minn., police academy in September. For now, he works for the department, issuing parking tickets.

In his first few days this spring, he was cussed out a half-dozen times.

It didn’t upset him. He has been in tighter spots.
Transitioning back to civilian life

For Dathan Gazelka, it wasn’t easy to put aside military rigor when he returned home and went to rejoin his wife, Mandy, in the real estate business.

He hated wearing a coat and tie, wasn’t sure what to say, and didn’t like Mandy being the boss.

He likes clear rules. Yes or no. Not maybe — or, I’ll think about it overnight.

He had an unorthodox sales pitch to prospective home buyers: “Listen, we’re going to look at three houses today and you’re going to buy one of them.”

Made perfect sense to him. Mandy, of course, found herself doing damage control.

And so, when the National Guard invited him to return to his job as a recruiter, Dathan (and Mandy) quickly accepted.

And he has a second job now: being a father. Mandy gave birth to Nyah last July.

J.R. Salzman was relieved to be back in Wisconsin after nine months at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

His wife, Josie, was happy to be back in her own bed, sitting on her own couch, watching her own TV. But she worried, too. When they traveled to a Minnesota veterans hospital, she noticed that her husband — who had lost his lower right arm — was the youngest patient by far. She wondered whether the government would be there helping them for the next 50 years.

Both Salzmans enrolled quickly at the University of Wisconsin-Stout in Menomonie.

But college life wasn’t easy for J.R., who had stopped taking medicine that made him groggy. He couldn’t sleep more than three or four hours a night.

His memory failed him often. He missed classes because he couldn’t remember his schedule. He had trouble focusing. Then one day, while researching a paper he read a report about traumatic brain injury.

He reviewed the symptoms — confusion, anxiety, memory problems — and realized he had every one of them. Then he discovered from his Walter Reed records there was something he had been unaware of: He had minor traumatic brain injury. Bingo. It all made sense.

As the months passed, Salzman improved. His memory got better. And he took a big step toward returning to his old life.

It happened last summer when he and Josie visited Lumberjack Days in Stillwater, Minn. — trailed by an ESPN crew chronicling his recovery.

“You’re going to log roll,” Josie told him. “You’re done putting it off.”

She tied his tennis shoes and watched.

Wearing his prosthetic arm, he stepped onto the log. First tentatively, then more confidently, he took a few steps. He rolled for a few seconds, stopped, then rolled some more, getting into the rhythm.

He smiled broadly.

J.R. Salzman had to relearn how to tie his shoes, to write his name. But log rolling? It came back naturally.

Just like he never was away.
Remembering the fallen

In the year since he arrived home, Col. David Elicerio has traveled to several states, advising Guard units, telling them what to expect when they are deployed to Iraq.

In May, the colonel was on hand for the unveiling of a “Fallen Heroes” memorial to Minnesota soldiers who died. A sculpture of a helmet, a rifle and combat boots stands atop a granite slab inscribed with their names.

Elicerio also carries his own personal memorial: a chain with replicas of 21 dog tags, each bearing the name of a 1st Brigade soldier who died in Iraq.

Every time a soldier in his command was lost, Elicerio wrote the family a letter, vowing to remember their sacrifice. In a small way, he feels those tags are holding up his end of the bargain.

One bears the name of Staff Sgt. Joshua Hanson.

Nearly two years have passed since his death but for his parents, Robert and Kathy, there still are days when they feel he might call or walk into the room.

Their home is filled with memories of Josh. Outside, there’s a bench a friend made, with “Remember Sanchez,” his nickname, carved in it. His old room remains the way it was when he left it. The stuffed bass he caught as a boy, the Minnesota Twins 1987 World Champion baseball pennant, the taekwondo belts.

His military medals rest on a corner table in the dining room, illuminated with a prayer candle.

On Aug. 30, the second anniversary of Josh’s death, a picnic shelter at Maplewood State Park, where Robert Hanson is a ranger, will be dedicated in Josh’s honor. Much of the work on the shelter was done by Josh’s Guard friends.

It will have a polished black granite marker inscribed with the words: “YOU WILL NOT BE FORGOTTEN.”
Moving forward

John Kriesel knows how close he came to death. He’s determined to savor every minute of life.

In December, he, Katie and the boys moved into a wheelchair-accessible house — built by a construction company for cost and paid for with two fundraisers.

Kriesel is taking broadcasting classes at a local college. He interns at a sports radio station, where he’s on the air one morning a week.

This fall, he’ll start a marketing job with the Guard, working with sports teams, the media and businesses.

In the mirror, he can still see the faint scars of war etched on his 26-year-old face. And sometimes, he has tingly phantom sensations as if his feet were still there. He realizes, of course, he’ll never have the feel of walking on freshly cut grass or a plush carpet. He does not dwell on the past or his injuries

He is a grateful man. Every night, he kisses his two sons as they go to sleep. Every morning, he hops in his wheelchair, showers and puts on his prosthetic legs.

There’s no time to waste. He’s got lots of plans. Even for next summer. That’s when he hopes to start running again.

———

NOTE: The story of 1st Brigade Combat Team/34th Infantry Division of the Minnesota National Guard and its tour in Iraq was reconstructed from scores of interviews with more than 20 soldiers and members of their families. Most quotations are as remembered by the speakers. In addition, the series draws upon numerous official documents, including after-action reports; videos of news conferences; correspondence provided by the families (including e-mails and letters); television coverage of the unit’s return; personal journals and blog postings.

Ellie