The Veterans Word

I'm posting this article on a buddy of mine who went to Iraq with me on my tour. I had the pleasure of serving along side this man for 15 months in the desert.

The article is about SSG Mike Caldwell. I remember SSG Caldwell as a dedicated soldier, a good worker, a soldier who always had need to be in the thick of things, and one you could always depend on to get things done.

Half-way through his second tour..............
FOB Falcon, Iraq - A Multi-National Division - Baghdad Soldier re-enlisted from his hospital bed at the 10th Combat Support Hospital in Baghdad June 13.

Staff Sgt. Michell Caldwell, a scout with the 4th Infantry Division, reenlisted just hours after he was wounded in a gun battle in Hawh Rajab, a town in southern Baghdad.

His platoon was on patrol when it surprised a group of terrorists preparing to attack a nearby checkpoint. The Soldiers came under intense automatic-weapons fire from both sides of a road - some from as close as 15 feet away.

Caldwell ordered his Soldiers to engage the insurgents.

During the battle, Caldwell was shot through both forearms but continued to fight.

After the firefight he was evacuated to Forward Operating Base Falcon for emergency treatment.

Caldwell was then transported to the 10th CSH in Baghdad where Lt. Col. James Love, his battalion commander, and other members of his unit visited him.

"Sir, I was supposed to reenlist today. I want to reenlist before I leave," Caldwell said to Love.

The day before the patrol, he had asked a sergeant in his unit to schedule his reenlistment ceremony to begin another six years of service.

Soldiers assigned to the 10th CSH helped Caldwell with the paperwork instead. Sgt. 1st Class Jason Koutsalas, a 10th CSH career counselor, prepared the reenlistment documents – his first for a Soldier in the intensive care ward.

Doctors prepared Caldwell to be loaded on a stretcher for his trip to Germany for further treatment, while members of the platoon hung the American flag over Caldwell's bed and propped him up.

Caldwell was unable to raise his right arm due to multiple fractures, and 1st Sgt. David Yost signed the paperwork on Caldwell's behalf.

Capt. Jon Bodenhamer, Caldwell's company commander,administered the oath of reenlistment as the platoon stood at attention in the hospital ward.

Caldwell was later sent to Germany and then to the U.S. for surgery and rehabilitation.

On this day, the day after Veterans Day, I would like to thank SSG Caldwell, and all the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines like him, for their dedication to duty, honor, and country. Thank You!

   On the morning of September 11th, 2001 at approximately 0849 hrs, I was driving in to work at the barracks in Ft. Drum NY. I was a Sergeant in the 10th Mountain Division and I was nearing the end of my tour there. We had been in early that morning like usual to do PT, bright and early at 0630 hrs. After PT I had driven home, about 5 minutes away to shower, change and eat breakfast. On the way back into work I was listening to my favorite morning radio show, The Bob and Tom Show. These clowns were always cracking jokes and it helped to get me in the right mood for the day ahead. However, I thought the joke this morning was rather morbid. It took me a few seconds to realize that even these two weirdos wouldn't joke about something that bad. "This just in," Bob said. "An airplane has struck the World Trade Center building in New York." "They think the plane may have been hijacked," Tom said.

   I arrived at work about two minutes later and a group of soldiers had begun to mingle around the back door of the barracks awaiting the 0900 morning formation. The word spread quickly among the soldiers as everyone speculated on what must have happened. Everyone instantly became an expert on terrorism and hijackings. "WAR," was the first and foremost answer in everyones mind. But.......war with who we wondered?

   After formation we quickly made our way up to the recreation room on the second floor of the barracks to turn on CNN and get an update on what was going on. We watched as a second plane hit, hundreds of lives ended in a blink of an eye right there on TV. We watched as reports came in of a plane going down in PA. We watched as our brothers in arms evaporated in the Pentagon. We watched, and we waited, and we wondered. "WAR." Surely we were going to war. Suddenly training became a little more serious. But still, war with who? 

   Three months later I left Ft. Drum and attended the Basic Non Commissioned Officer training course at Ft. Knox Kentucky in order to gain my promotion to Staff Sergeant. I passed the course and moved on to my next duty station, Baumholder, Germany. In the mean time, Afghanistan was invaded and the Taliban was overthrown.

   I wasn't in Germany very long before talk of more war began to brew. One war wasn't enough apparently. In the winter of 02/03, we received our marching orders to prepare for combat. Now we knew who we were going to war with and the intense training and preparation began. I watched the invasion of Iraq from my livingroom while I was packing my bags to get ready to ship out on the night of March 19th and the morning of March 20th, my 24th birthday.

   We shipped out for Kuwait on 27 April 2003, a month after the war began. I was a Staff Sergeant and a Scout Section Leader in a Scout Platoon in the Brigade Reconnaisance Troop of the 2nd Brigade of the 1st Armored Division. We landed in Kuwait and immediately began preparations to join the fight up north. At that time, the invasion was nearly complete. Baghdad had fallen to the coalition. We moved north and took up a position in downtown Baghdad at one of Saddams former palaces, the Al-Sijood, which had suffered several direct hits from JDAM missiles. This is where I would spend the entire next year of my life. Our orders said we would be deployed for up to 365 days. About 2 weeks from going home, Al-Sadr's militia staged an uprising and started taking over some of the cities in southern Iraq, namely Al-Kut, Karballa and An Najaf. At the time, the coalition wasn't really sure what to do about Sadr and his militia, but one thing was sure, we couldn't allow him to gain too much power.

   Our unit was given orders to respond to the city of Karbala and then to An-Najaf, where Sadr's militia had a coalition compound under seige and had killed several members of the coalition who were holding out against the attack with everything they had. We took over the compound, secured it against the attacks and endured barrages of sniper fire, mortars and rockets. Our men performed superbly and we suffered no casualties.

   Once the compound was secured, we were given orders to move to the city of Al-Kut, were the Bulgarian Army unit there was also under attack. Our Brigade moved into the city and took it back from the militia and held it until we turned it back over to the Bulgarians a few days later. We then moved back up to Baghdad Airport were we spent the next three months running more missions and waiting to go home. During this time I personally witnessed 2 separate IED attacks, both of which narrowly missed my vehicle. 15 months after we deployed, we drove south into Kuwait, and then flew back to Germany on the 9th of July, 2004. I left the Army for greener pastures in March of 2005.

   Now.....five years later, I wonder what we have learned from all of this. I wonder what, if anything our government is really doing to secure our country. Last night on patrol as a Deputy Sheriff, I learned that they definitely aren't doing enough. Around 0200 hrs this morning, yes, on September 11th of all days, we responded to a call for a motor vehicle accident. When we arrived on scene, the driver of the vehicle had fled. After doing a little investigative work we found the driver at a house a mile or so away from the scene. The driver was an illegal alien who had snuck into the country from mexico. In broken english he explained to us that he works on the farm up the road and he has been in this country for a few years, maybe three or four. A few years........maybe three or four.......... Hmmmmmm. It dawned on me right then, If one Juan Carlos, a poor immigrant farm hand from Mexico managed to sneak his scrawny ass all the way up here to backwoods New York, who the hell else is here? Oh, and by the way, it wasn't just one Juan Carlos, there are several farms in the area here that employ illegal aliens by the dozen. BY THE DOZEN!!!

   To make matters worse, when we tried to call immigration on him, they informed us that it was noted that he is here, however, no names on their registry matched the info we gave them..............     No shit Einstein, HE'S HERE ILLEGALLY!!!!!!!!    Do they think he stopped by the INS to let them know he was here? What a buncha f'in morons. THEN....the idiot lady on the phone even asked me if I knew his social security number.   WTF?!?!?!?   Are you a friggin retard or what? HE'S ILLEGAL!!!! He doesn't have a social security number! Needless to say I was a little bit furious.

   Can you moron politicians pull your heads out of your asses just long enough to do something right? Notice I didn't say republicans or democrats either, I said politicians. You're all equally guilty of screwing this up. Fix it.

   Five years later.........

   Later.

P.S. Thank you to those who have served since 9/11 and continue to serve to this day, whether military, fire, or police.

  

  

An explanation........

The photo above of the multi-celled organism is my offspring preparing to seize the day on the 19th of February 2007.

Anyway, yeah, the wife is preggy. I put the pic up last week and I just haven't had time to actually explain what it was all about. We are both kinda nervous. We've been wanting to get pregnant for a while but didn't actually think it could/would happen. I actually wanted to wait until this police training was over with, but I guess it wasn't gonna be that way.

We don't know the sex yet, but she wants a girl and I want a boy. Go figure. We will probably find out the sex at the next sonogram which is three weeks from now. We'll just have to wait and see.

Hope you all enjoy whats left of summer.

Later

   One day I wonder what the hell is going on in this world and other days I am sure I know what is going on. Some days I want nothing to do with the war or the memories that come with it. Some nights I still wake in a cold sweat, but as hard as I try to remember what had happened in the dream I can't. Sometimes I wonder why I was lucky enough to make it back when I read the list of names of those who didn't. Men and women like you and I, who wanted nothing more than to provide service for their country, who had dreams, and dying on a shitty Baghdad street was not one of them. I read the list of names again this morning and found another man I knew while I was in who will not be coming home alive. Times like this I can't help but to feel that I didn't do enough while I was there, and I just want to go back to give it my all again. But, I look at my old war relics, my Iraqi flag signed by my platoon members, my captured Iraqi bayonette and gas mask, my medals, a dime a dozen. Some of that stuff feels so strange, so foreign that I ever wore it, or that it ever was mine, or someone else's.

   I go outside on these beautiful summer days, in my bare feet to feel the grass between my toes, and think of how our world here is so far away from our comrades world over there. I wonder what my old friends are going through there once again, the ones who are still in, and the ones who have just gone back again. I wonder how much harder it must be for the ones who where there with me on that first tour who had to get back on the plane and have another go at it, knowing that this time they might not be so lucky. I marvel at their dedication. They knew, they hoped it wouldn't happen, but they knew, if they stayed in they would go back, again and again.

   I've toyed with the idea. I've come close to going to see a National Guard recruiter and checking on my options. I'm still young, only 27. Still young enough to help and to go back if I were asked. I find it hard to sit here in my leather recliner, air conditioner blasting out cool, refreshing relief. I even find it hard to watch the Israeli soldiers marching off to another war, and then as they marched back south, the look in their eyes so familiar to me, for what they have seen, for what they have done, for what they will never forget. I eat a meal and I am nearly certain that it will not be my last, unlike our troops who are over there. Every meal may be their last.

   When will this end? Elimination of a race is not an option. Can we eliminate half a race? The bad half? The extremists? This will never stop until either we are all dead or they are all dead. The non-extremist half can not talk the extremist half into submission. Bombs can't even do that. Death is what they want. When will the 72 virgins run out? Is there and endless supply there, in paradise? When the Mujadin are having their way with the virgins in paradise will they remember the 20 or 30 little kids or completely innocent people they killed on their journey with their cowardly homicide car bomb?

   I remember looking into the eyes of a dead Iraqi bomb maker who was caught planting explosives. I wonder what he was really thinking right before the hot metal ripped him open. I wonder if he knew his brothers would continue the fight, and probably die as well. I wonder if he knew that the bomb he was planting may have killed an innocent family driving down that road. I'll never know.
   It's been nearly five years since this holy war started. This IS world war three people. From the continental US, to Europe, to Russia, to Asia, to Africa, even to South America now, the whole world is at war in one way or another over this. This is just as much a world war as any of the last two........with no end in sight.......... hell, it's just begun.

Just my deep thoughts for the day, and no, I'm not losing my mind.