Marines heading to Iraq

[thedrifter]

Marines heading to Iraq


Quantico personnel gear up for deployment to Iraq.

By PAMELA GOULD


Date published: 1/11/2004

Quantico to send at least 14 over


At least 14 Marines from Quantico Marine Corps Base are being deployed as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom 2--the second rotation of Defense Department personnel into Iraq.

The Marines from Quantico will be among 25,000 deploying servicewide, Maj. Douglas Powell, a spokesman at Marine Corps headquarters, said.

The deployments will be for seven months and will begin on a small scale next month, Powell said. The vast majority of the Marines will depart in March.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in November announced plans to send to Iraq a second rotation of military personnel to keep deployments no longer than 18 months.

The Marines are planning a one-year tour of duty carried out in two waves of seven-month deployments, Powell said.

Though the number could change, Quantico is currently sending 14 people--a group comprising communications specialists, combat correspondents, an infantryman, someone from the intelligence field and a chaplain, according to Capt. Jeff Landis, a base spokesman.

Additionally, the Marine Corps Combat Development Command--based at Quantico--is putting together a team that will spend four to six months gathering information to compile a list of lessons learned from efforts in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Known as the Enduring Freedom Combat Assessment Team, the group will include at least 40 people, Landis said. A departure date for that group hasn't yet been established.

Quantico routinely sends what are referred to as "augmentees" for military operations. As a training command, the base can offer people with specialized skills to complement units that are deployed.

To reach PAMELA GOULD: 540/657-9101 pgould@freelancestar.com

Date published: 1/11/2004

http://www.freelancestar.com/News/FL...112004/1224447

Sempers,

Roger

[thedrifter]

Duty calls Q-C-based Marine Reserve
By Thomas Geyer

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For the first time since the Korean War, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve members attached to the General Support Maintenance Company, 4th Maintenance Battalion, 4th Force Service Support Group, based at the Rock Island Arsenal, have been called to active duty, a spokeswoman for the unit said.
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Marine Staff Sgt. Stephanie Borges said that 25 members of the company will be heading to Camp Pendleton, Calif., for an indefinite period. From there, they will be deployed to Operation Iraqi Freedom.
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Their orders are for one year, she added.
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“Our job is to provide general support, and perform maintenance on the supply trucks, Humvees and other Marine Corps ground equipment,” she said. “It is our job to keep the supply line up and running and on the move.”
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She said the company was notified of their deployment Dec. 26.
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On paper, there are about 110 members of the company at the Arsenal, she added. But only about 85 of the unit’s members drill. Out of that number, 25 were selected for duty overseas based on their skills and the needs of the Marines overseas. They reported for duty Monday.
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“Since their notification they have been getting all their supplies ready, and taking care of all administrative and personal business,” she said.
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A final formation for the 25 will be held at 1 p.m. today at the Naval and Marine Corps Reserve Center at the Arsenal.
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Thomas Geyer can be contacted at
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(563) 383-2328 or tgeyer@qctimes.com.

http://www.qctimes.com/internal.php?...ws&c=2,1022809


Sempers,

Roger

[thedrifter]

Departing Area Marines Include Greene Countians

By: By BILL JONES/Staff Writer
Source: The Greeneville Sun
01-10-2004

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GRAY — If not for their camouflage uniforms, the eight young men who met with a Greeneville Sun reporter at the Armed Forces Reserve Center here on Thursday afternoon might have passed for members of a high school or college athletic team.

All lean and athletic-looking, they are, instead, U.S. Marine reservists from Greene County who are being called to active duty and likely are destined for service in Iraq.

The young Greene Countians, along with about 170 other Marine reservists, are members of Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 24th Marine Regiment.

The local Marines agreed to be interviewed on Thursday as their unit prepared to leave for active duty, possibly as early as next week.

During the joint interview, they were proud to point out that their company is one of few infantry companies in the entire Marine Corps Reserve.

The oldest man in the group, at 26, is Corporal (Cpl.) Aaron E. Massey, a Kingsport Highway resident who also is the only married man in the group.

He and Cpl. Joshua A. Campbell, 25, also are the only members of the group older than 22.

Cpl. Chris Cochran and Lance Cpl. Derick Shannon are both 22, while Lance Cpls. Chris Easterly, Berkeley Bell III, Kevin Blow and Daniel Silvers all are 21.

Cpl. Jason Maddison, another Marine reservist from Greene County, could not take part in the Thursday interview sessions because of his duties that day.

Cross-Section Of County

The eight young men appear to be a cross-section of Greene County's young men. They include graduates of Greeneville High School and of Chuckey-Doak, North Greene and South Greene High Schools.

All were leading ordinary civilian lives as recently as last month.

Shannon and Bell were roommates in Knoxville, where he and Bell were attending the University of Tennessee before the unit was mobilized.

Campbell, who holds a technical degree from Northeast State Community College, was working for defense contractor Aerojet Ordnance in Telford.

Easterly was driving a truck for Boone Distributing, a Johnson City beer distributor. Blow was working as an assistant manager at the McDonald’s restaurant on the Asheville Highway.

He had proposed to his girlfriend, Nicole Carmody of Kingsport, four days before learning that Lima Company was being activated, he said on Thursday.

Massey was a delivery driver for Evans Office Supply of Morristown.

All said the support of their employers was very important to them, and most said they had been promised that their jobs would be waiting when they return from an anticipated year on active duty.

Military Job Titles

But the military job titles of the young Greene County residents paint a clear picture of the dangerous missions for which they’ve been training for the last few years.

Cpl. Massey, the oldest of the group and a veteran of nearly seven years in the Marine Corps Reserve, is a mortar gunner. Most of the other young Marines carry the most basic job title a Marine can have — rifleman.

Lance Cpl. Bell is a SAW (squad automatic weapon) gunner, while Cpl. Cochran is a rifleman who has the additional duty of being a “fire team leader.”

Cpl. Massey said his wife, April, isn’t happy about the unit's call to active duty, but understands. “I was in the Marine Corps when we met,” he said.

Massey Rejoined Unit

Massey easily could have missed the call to active duty, having left the Marine Corps Reserve about six months ago when his last enlistment ended.

But on learning this past fall that Lima Company had been placed on alert for a possible call to active duty, Massey rejoined the unit, partly out of loyalty to his comrades, he said.

“I just wanted to go with the Marines I had trained with for six and a half years,” Massey said. “I knew they were going, and I wanted to go with them.

“It (the Marine Corps) is a brotherhood. You just want to do your duty.” To a man, the young Marines interviewed said they were not surprised that their unit was being mobilized. They noted that they had been training for war for as long as they had been Marines.

“When we drill, we drill hard,” Massey said, noting he feels the unit is ready for whatever it encounters in coming months.

No Previous Combat

None of the young Marines has had any combat experience, they said, and their only previous active duty experience has been the time spent in “boot camp” (basic training) and infantry school.

Lance Cpl. Bell said he had been in Marine Corps boot camp on Sept. 11, 2001, when terrorists crashed airliners into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. He said he had expected that his unit would be called to active duty at some point once the war on terrorism began.

Cpl. Cochran said he had packed his gear on Sept. 11, 2001, because he felt Lima Company would be called to active duty soon thereafter. But the call didn’t come until this past Christmas Eve.

Officially, the young Marines said, they don’t know where they're headed after they leave the Armed Forces Reserve Center where they’ve been completing paperwork, attending briefings, and packing equipment this week.

But one man said the unit expects to move next to the Marine Corps’ Camp Pendleton base in California and remain there for additional training for about a month.

Individual Equipment Inspected

Thursday afternoon the Lima Company Marines continued preparation for mobilization to active duty.

The floor of the gymnasium-like “drill hall” at the Armed Forces Reserve Center in Gray was covered with the equipment of individual Marines, all neatly arranged atop each man's quilted “poncho liner.”

Non-commissioned officers were busy inspecting the individual equipment, including everything from neatly folded socks and underwear to entrenching tools, that the Marines must carry with them to Iraq.

Anything found worn or damaged was being replaced with a new item, according to Sgt. Ernest Scherman, a squad leader from Sylva, N.C., who was inspecting the equipment of the members of his squad.

Scherman explained that all the items neatly displayed on Thursday had to fit into individual Marines’ “sea bags” and “rucksacks.”

Earlier, Major Pete Gill, officer in charge of the unit's Peacetime Wartime Support Team, said he understood that each Marine would be allowed to take two sea bags and one rucksack with him.

While some Marines were undergoing their equipment inspections on Thursday afternoon, others were outside running around the building in formation for physical conditioning.

Still others were playing football in a field behind the Gray Community Center near the Armed Forces Reserve Center.

Adding a serious note to the scene was the presence of guards in full combat gear who were carrying M-16 rifles fitted with what appeared to be 30-round ammunition magazines.

The armed sentries were posted at the entrance to the Reserve Center's parking lot and at other points around the building.

Private ‘Family Day’ Set

A private “family day” for the young reservists and their families is scheduled for Saturday at Washington County's Daniel Boone High School, according to Major Gill.

The unit is expected to move to its U.S. active duty station sometime around Jan. 15. Once Lima Company's members leave Gray, Major Gill said, their families will need all the support the local community can provide.

“A lot of people say they will pray for them while they're gone, but I'm talking about things like, if all of a sudden a Marine's family has a car that needs work or their refrigerator breaks down," he said.

"If a church would come through and say ‘We'll get you a new refrigerator,’ that could be very important (to the family).”

Asked how the public could learn what kind of help the families of local Marines might need, Major Gill said Lima Company has a “key volunteer network” made up of members of Marine families that attempts to identify and meet the needs of deployed Marines’ families.

“Our key volunteer network is very tuned in to who needs what,” he said. “If anyone in the community wants to help or has something to donate, they can call up here at (423) 467-2196, and we will put them in touch with the key volunteer network.”



Sun Photo by Bill Jones
Pictured above are eight young Marine reservists from Greene County who are being called to active duty for possible service in Iraq with the U.S. Marine Corps’ Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 24th Marines. The unit is based at the Armed Forces Reserve Center in Gray, where this photo was taken on Thursday afternoon. They are, from left, front row: Chris Cochran, Derick Shannon, Daniel Silvers, Aaron E. Massey; and in back row: Kevin Blow, Joshua A. Campbell, Berkeley Bell III and Chris Easterly. Jason Maddison, another young Marine reservist from Greeneville, could not be present for the photo.

http://www.greene.xtn.net/index.php?...&newsid=107383


Sempers,

Roger