- "The worst-case scenario keeps getting worse."
-
-
- The soldiers in Iraq and Kuwait ask their families to
send toilet paper, bottled water and even antibiotics for wounds that won't
heal.
-
- What many service members can't give their families in
return is a definite homecoming date -- a square on the calendar they can
mark, and then count down the days.
-
- U.S. Rep. Sherrod Brown, D-Lorain, listened Saturday
to a group of about 40 friends and family members of soldiers deployed
in the Middle East who gathered at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Akron.
-
- Congress is preparing to vote on whether to approve $87
billion in emergency spending that President Bush has requested for Iraq
and Afghanistan.
-
- Brown was one of 133 representatives who voted against
giving Bush the authority to attack Iraq. He said Saturday's forum was
not to debate the wisdom of the war, but to hear about how well the military
is taking care of its soldiers and their families.
-
- About three weeks ago, Dale Nelson of Norton drove to
Dover, Del., to pick up his son Jason, who, after some wrangling, had been
allowed to come home on emergency leave for his grandfather's funeral.
-
- "I didn't recognize him when he got off the airplane,"
Nelson said. "The kid has lost 35 pounds in six months. He'd been
treated with IVs for dehydration several times."
-
- The father, a veteran, said he was better supplied in
the jungles of Vietnam than his son, who is in the Army Reserve, has been.
"The private contractors over there have plenty of food," Nelson
said. "Why can't our soldiers have plenty of food?"
-
- One Akron mother said her son asked her to send antibiotics.
He had wounds that weren't healing, which he blamed on having to shower
in Iraqi water.
-
- Several speakers told Brown that their loved ones in
Iraq were having intestinal problems.
-
- Some said they feel isolated because they're the only
ones in their workplaces with a loved one in Iraq. Meanwhile, they live
with the almost-daily reports of soldiers being attacked and killed.
-
- Nobody was satisfied with the information they've received
from the military about how long their family members will be deployed.
-
- Eric Mansfield, anchor of Akron's newscast on Channel
23, thought he was coming home for Christmas, according to a letter written
by his wife, Lisa, that her sister read to Brown.
-
- The National Guard captain has been in Kuwait for several
months and was told in writing he could go home to his wife and three young
children from Dec. 14 until Jan 4.
-
- But the trip was canceled.
-
- "Eric has already purchased an airline ticket for
$1,300 and told us to get excited because daddy was coming home,"
according to Lisa Mansfield's letter. "Not only was this a morale
boost for him, but it would also give the kids and me a countdown on a
calendar, something we have not been able to do since we had no idea when
he was coming home. We got to 77 days, and it stopped there."
-
- A woman from Kent said she needs her husband home because
his mother is ill and she can't take care of her by herself. He was able
to come home for 15 days, but she needs him home permanently, she said.
-
- "What does it take to get a soldier home?"
asked Sonya French. "Does his mother have to die for him to get home?"
-
- Many of those serving in Iraq and Kuwait are in the Army
Reserve or National Guard; Lisa Mansfield and others believe those called
to active duty are being treated less favorably than regular full-time
soldiers.
-
- Ohio has 1,650 National Guard members deployed in Iraq,
not counting 150 members of the 1-107th Armored Battalion of the Ohio Army
National Guard who were activated last week, said Brown spokesman Ted Miller.
That group faces an 18-month deployment that includes a one-year assignment
abroad in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
-
- Miller said the Pentagon is expected to add 15,000 troops
from the Army National Guard in addition to the 20,000 Guard and Army Reserve
troops already in the region.
-
- But Kylie Graham of Hartville wonders if they'll be the
right people with the right training sent to the right places to do the
right jobs.
-
- She married her husband, Joshua, four months before he
was deployed. He has been in Kuwait six months. The Army reservist is trained
as a refueler, but he spends most of his days watching a private contractor
do that.
-
- He thought he was going to serve his country doing an
important job. Instead, he mops floors in the mess hall and makes sure
that soldiers don't wear tennis shoes into the showers.
-
- It all seems pointless to his wife. "Why is he there?"
Graham asked Brown, lips trembling.
-
- She is proud of her husband, she said, but she doesn't
know what good he's doing there. She said she's been told by military officials
that it's all part of a bigger picture, but she doesn't know what that
is.
-
- "The worst-case scenario keeps getting worse,"
she said.
-
- - John Higgins can be reached at 330-996-3792 or 1-800-777-7232
or jhiggins@thebeaconjournal.com
-
- © 2003 Beacon Journal and wire service sources.
All Rights Reserved.
-
- http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/news/6937290.htm
|
