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Stryker soldiers think of family as return begins

Sep- 9-2007 » Filed Under: 3/2 SBCT

KAREN MCCARTHY; For The News Tribune

BAGHDAD – Sgt. 1st Class Jason Dalton looks forward to his December wedding, Sgt. Larry Clapper to seeing his 1-year-old son, Lt. Jacob Czekanski to kayaking with his wife.

Staff Sgt. James Jastrzebski wants to hit the track on his bike, and Sgt. George Hudgeons wants to “drive on roads that won’t blow up.”

The Strykers of the 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division are the local face of the U.S. troop surge that President Bush ordered in January. The Fort Lewis soldiers were already in Iraq at the time, but they moved down from Mosul to help secure the capital and then later back north to clear out enemy fighters who had fled to Baqouba.

Now they’re coming home after 15 months – an advance party of nearly 150 soldiers arrived last week – and family and cold beers seem to be the most eagerly awaited activities.

The brigade headquarters in Baghdad is unusually quiet, a far cry from the last base in Baqouba that was milling with missions, officers racing between meetings, Stryker soldiers rolling in after days at combat outposts filled with men in dire need of showers and hot meals.

‘HE’S NOT THERE ANYMORE’

They are soldiers ready to put the past behind them, but not the memory of the 47 comrades who lost their lives on a deployment that was supposed to end at 12 months.

Czekanski’s friend of seven years, Sgt. Jacob Thompson, was one of four Stryker soldiers killed in an Aug. 6 house bombing in Baqouba.

“It’s hard knowing he’s not there anymore,” said Czekanski, a member of the 1st Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment. “He was a great guy, effective leader. He didn’t know how effective he was.”

Clapper, a squad leader in the same battalion, has wrestled with his conscience since one of his men took a bullet in the back in Baghdad when they came under fire securing a convoy. Seeing one of his soldiers wounded made him feel like a failure.

“Nothing will top the catastrophic loss of life,” said Lt. Col. Avanulas Smiley, who lost 11 men as commander of the 1-23 Tomahawk battalion. “It makes you ask yourself, did you do enough to safeguard your soldiers? You never know. You take that to the grave.”

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