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Friday, August 19, 2005
Deaths hit remote base hard
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Forward Operating Base Michael, Iraq — The deaths earlier this week of four soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment, hit those stationed at this remote base especially hard.
The four were scouts and scouts are naturally closer to one another because of the type of work they do, said Staff Sgt. Sean Sibert. Typically, scouts run reconnaissance patrols to secure treacherous roads before military convoys head out.
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Capt. Michael Barnett of Loganville, with the 1st Battalion, 108th Armor Regiment, wears spurs, a cavalry tradition, during Friday’s memorial service.
“We go out in small groups to find the enemy,” said Sibert, a landscaper from Martinez, near Augusta. “That makes us a very tight group.”
But part of their closeness, said 108th soldiers posted here, also is a result of the harsh conditions under which they operate.
These soldiers have been enduring spartan facilities at the three FOBs they occupy; one here, one in nearby in Lutafiyah and another at Yusufiyah. The soldiers are not privvy to the distractions and entertainment options available at other more permanent facilities such as Striker, Liberty or Taji.
“Being here is like going from Manhattan to the wild, wild West,” said Staff Sgt, Joe Wilson, a fulltime Guard soldier from Canton, who is assigned to the battalion’s Headquarters Company.
The FOBs are located in an area of lawlessness and insurgent activity. At Michael, the 118th Field Artillery Regiment’s Alpha Battery from Springfield has four Paladin 155mm howitzers ready to fire in any direction. Capt. Jeff Schneider, the battery commander, said the guns are fired almost every day to counter insurgent fire or thwart potential attacks.
Soldiers at the three FOBs are required to wear body armor and helmets at all times because of the frequent attacks.
Lt. Col. John King, commander of armor battalion, said his soldiers are under constant enemy watch. At other camps, he said, soldiers behave one way when they are “inside the wire,” in the relative safety of the base and go into war mode when they exit the gates. At his FOBs, however, there is no “on-off switch.”
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Sgt. 1st Class Joseph Anzano of Columbus, Ga., attends memorial service.
Communications, too, are sketchy for 108th soldiers. At Yusufiyah, the Internet connection is far from reliable. Soldiers there live inside an old potato factory, share two wooden shower facilities and have salvaged a Ping Pong table for relaxation. They tend to rely more on each other when they cannot talk to loved ones at home.
“It’s a morale kicker,” said Spc. Joshua Lee Oxford, who works as a code enforcement officer in the Griffin Police Department. “It’s hard being under these conditions. When a soldier dies, it’s not like a friend dying - it’s like losing a family member. All we have here is each other to depend on.”
A few days earlier Oxford had heard from a friend, Spc. Rodney Davidson, a soldier in Alpha Company of the 2nd Battalion, 121st Infantry Regiment, which lost eight men from the same platoon within six days in late July. Davidson had witnessed both tragedies.
Oxford and Davidson often hunt deer and wild turkey together in Thomaston. Davidson had talked about the deaths of his friends. Oxford said they had “hit him hard.”
Now, it was Oxford’s time to feel that kind of grief.
“Before, you’d think [about the danger] real quick on your way to the vehicle,” Oxford said. “Now you actually stop and take a minute to pray.”
Soldiers held a memorial service Friday to remember those who died; Sgt. Thomas Strickland, 27, of Douglasville; Spc. Joshua Dingler, 19, of Hiram; and Sgt. Paul Saylor, 21, of Bremen; and Sgt. Michael Stokely, 23, of Loganville.
After the tears that were shed during the service, two of Stokely’s friends, Cpl. Jeffrey Vennemann and Spc. Jason Buice, traded stories about their buddy. They were known as a trio. Each had ignored Army hair regulations and launched a contest to see who could grow their hair the longest.
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A 48th soldier holds the dog tags of Sgt. Paul Saylor.
“There’s no barber shop where we are,” said Buice, who lives in Cumming.
They remembered their fallen friend as a “being one of a kind” who always spoke his mind. They remembered, too, the prankster in him. “Stokely put a mousetrap in my bunk once,” Buice said.
He laughed as he described how the trap got him in the behind when he was wearing just his Army-issue black shorts.
The soldiers said the Yusufiyah base is being renamed FOB Stokely to honor their friend. As disheveled and tired as he was, Vennemann found it in him to make one last joke about the only military man with whom he shared his fears and frustrations.
“Yeah,” said Vennemann, “they’re going to name a craphole after a great guy.”
