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Tuesday, December 6, 2005
State leads U.S. in citizen soldier fatalities
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A vehicle accident in Iraq on Friday helped push Georgia into an unwanted position: first in the nation in the number of Army National Guard soldiers killed in Iraq, according to an analysis by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Spc. Philip Allan Dodson Jr., a corrections officer from Forsyth, was among three Georgia Guard soldiers killed in a rollover accident near Nasiriyah. The names of the other two have not been released. Dodson’s wife, Melissa, said Monday that she did not have additional details of her husband’s death.
The Journal-Constitution reviewed data on the home states of fallen National Guard soldiers compiled by icasualties.org, an independent Web site that tracks troop deaths, and the National Guard Bureau. Since the start of the Iraq war, 27 of Georgia’s citizen soldiers have died, most of them members of the 48th Brigade Combat Team. Louisiana, which has lost 23 soldiers, has the second-highest total, according to icasualties.org.
Jack Harrison, a spokesman for the National Guard Bureau in Washington, said officials there do not compare troop deaths by state and believe that could be seen as disrespectful to fallen soldiers and their families. “We really don’t get into comparing which state has the most or the least, because it really serves no purpose,” Harrison said. “Every single death is unfortunate and unique.”
Gov. Sonny Perdue, who went to Iraq to visit Georgia Guard soldiers during the Thanksgiving holidays, released a statement Monday expressing gratitude for their service.
“I saw firsthand that our guardsmen are performing dangerous missions in and out of combat zones every day,” the statement said. “These fallen comrades were Georgia’s citizen soldiers who paid the ultimate sacrifice in the name of freedom.”
With more than 2,500 Georgians and nearly 2,000 soldiers from other states, the 48th Brigade represents the largest overseas deployment of the state’s Guard since World War II. Friday’s accident brings the death toll for the unit to 25.
Dodson was assigned to the Headquarters Company of the 148th Support Battalion, a unit of the 48th Brigade.
“He was a good father, a good provider, a good husband, and he was proud to serve his country,” said Melissa Dodson. The couple had been married 18 years and had a 16-year old daughter, Allison.
Dodson, 42, was born on Robins Air Force Base while his father was serving in the Army. He graduated from Mary Persons High School in Forsyth and spent four years in the Army.
Melissa Dodson, who runs a computer lab at an elementary school in Bibb County, said her husband was a state corrections officer for 18 years and had worked for the past 16 years at the Al Burrus Correctional Training Center in Forsyth. He joined the Guard just before Sept. 11, 2001, to work toward military retirement.
His deployment to Iraq was his first experience in combat. The couple communicated for the last time on Thanksgiving evening, swapping computer messages about what he had eaten and how the weather had turned cold in Iraq.
Melissa Dodson said that when her husband’s unit was called to go to Iraq, he did not complain. “He wanted to do it,” she said. “He felt it was his duty to do what he was asked to do and serve his country.”
She said he enjoyed woodworking and knew how to lay floors, put up walls, build decks and make cabinets. He also liked to spend time with his family, collect guns and knives, and watch westerns and war movies.
Other survivors include his father, Phil Dodson Sr. of Macon; his mother, Janice Hughes of Smarr; and brothers Jeffrey Dodson of Big Canoe and Louis Hughes Jr. of Savannah.
