State Sen. Steve Stivers (R-Columbus, OH) has made at least two big choices this year.

The first was to interview for a promotion in an organization he's worked in for 19 years: the Ohio Army National Guard. Having started out the year a major, Stivers is expected to be promoted this month to lieutenant colonel.

The second decision was to join his unit, the 237th Personnel Services Battalion, when it was ordered to deploy to the Middle East for what is expected to be a one-year tour.

Stivers knew that the 237th was on the list of units eligible to be called to active duty when he signed on to lead it.  "I just took command of this unit in June," he said. "They went on alert in April, so I knew there was a possibility they were going to be activated."

As a former vice president of government relations at Bank One and now a state senator, Stivers has the skills and experience to have had options in the Guard, but he has chosen to remain at troop level, where the chances of deployment are high.  "I've purposely stayed in regular army troop units," he said. "I didn't want to go to state headquarters where you can't have an impact. You can't have a direct impact that you can see as well as when you're down with the soldiers."

As an elected office-holder, particularly one engaged in his first campaign, after being appointed to an open seat almost two years ago, Stivers also could have avoided the war by taking advantage of an exemption that would have allowed him to stay stateside.  "That was never anything I've ever considered," Stivers said, sitting in his office at Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base, noting that none of the several hundred men and women under his command had the same option.

"If I'm going to say I'm a leader of these soldiers, how can you say you're a leader of these solders and then not deploy with them when they have to go? Because they don't have an option, I'm certainly not going to consider the option for myself."

When the 237th leaves Camp Atterbury in Indiana sometime next month, after completing its final training before heading for Iraq or Kuwait, Stivers will join a short list of deployed, elected office-holders. In Ohio, Bill Saxbe was deployed to the Korean War. Former state Rep. E.J. Thomas was deployed to the first Gulf War. Last year, John Boccieri (D-New Middletown) was deployed to Iraq. Boccieri returned to Ohio only last week, although his duties as an airman have given him flexibility to return home for stints during the year.  (MICHAEL J. MAURER, ThisWeek Staff Writer )

November 5, 2004 - Hillsdale woman finds long-lost dad, who's Iraq-bound

HILLSDALE, Mich. (AP) -- A 33-year-old woman who met her father for the first time Saturday soon will have to say farewell as he heads off to use his explosives expertise in Iraq as a member of the Indiana National Guard.

"I'm worried," Jen Benson, 33, said of her father, Ronald G. Bucher of Laporte, Ind. "I'm scared because I just found him. I'm going to write him and pray for his safety."  Benson's birth mother, Candance, was adopted from a German orphanage at the end of World War II by Helen Kane and her U.S. serviceman husband, W.R. Kane.

Candance Kane met Benson's father at a Halloween party and soon married but separated before Benson was born.  "I basically stayed with my grandparents from then on," Benson told the Hillsdale Daily Newss. When Benson was 3, her mother died of a drug overdose, and Benson's grandparents adopted her.  Helen Kane died soon after, and W.R. Kane remarried. He and his new wife corresponded with Benson's paternal grandmother but did not allow Bucher to have contact with Benson.

Over the years, Benson had tried unsuccessfully to find her father.  Then about six months ago, her grandfather began sending Benson items that had belonged to her mother. Among them was a scrapbook containing letters, pictures and other items.  On Oct. 28, Benson and friend and co-worker Mary McCaskey were going through the scrapbook and came across a reference to Bucher's brother Frank. The two women turned to the Internet.

"Mary and I printed off all the Frank Buchers in the country, and it was the third phone call," Benson said.

A shock came when Benson learned her father was living only a short drive away in Laporte, Ind. Benson spoke to her father by phone late that night and received yet another shock.  "He said, "We have to (see each other) Saturday because I'm leaving for Iraq," Benson said.

Benson took McCaskey with her for the meeting Saturday.  "I had no nervousness ... but when we pulled into Laporte it was surreal, it was like a dream," Benson said.  Benson found out she looks like her father and has a half-sister in California. She also found that her father had never stopped looking for her.

"He had a photo album of all the pictures my grandmother had sent," she said. "He said he felt guilty, and I don't ever want him to feel that way because he made the best decision for me."  Now Benson is facing another worry that tens of thousands of American families are facing -- the thought of a loved one in peril in Iraq. Bucher left for training at Camp Atterbury in Indiana on Monday.

Bucher will have a chance to see his daughter one more time before he leaves. He should have a four-day break around Thanksgiving and should be able to meet his grandchildren, Benson said.  She said 11-year-old Peyton, 10-year-old Donni Leigh and 8-year-old Isabella are eager to meet the grandfather they have heard about so often. (Detroit Free Press)

November 8, 2004 - Church adopts troops at Camp Atterbury

Services are more crowded these days at Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Edinburgh. While most of the congregation wears their Sunday best, some church-goers come in head-to-toe camouflage.  About 165 people squeeze into pews, crowd a balcony and pull up extra chairs to attend Sunday Mass at the church that was built to hold about 150.

The hilltop church, on the town’s west side, has been flooded with attendees since waves of Army reservists started arriving at Camp Atterbury in mid-September for training. The Army Reserve’s 98th Division, based out of Rochester, N.Y., includes troops from New York, New Jersey and New England. After several weeks of training, the soldiers will leave the Edinburgh training and mobilization station for Iraq, where they will train the country’s national army for at least one year.

The reservists left behind their families, homes and jobs to complete the mission. So for many, the church and its members help to make the Catholic soldiers feel closer to home.  When Atterbury officials notified the church about the incoming troops, church staff and members decided they wanted to do what they could to adopt the 98th Division, Monsignor Fred Easton said.

Most of the soldiers who attend services wear camouflage-colored rosaries around their necks. Church staff ordered the strings of beads from an Indianapolis business as gifts for the troops, said Deb Thurston, the church’s music coordinator.  Families gave the soldiers sunglasses and homemade cookies as a thank-you for the sacrifices they continue to make.

“I think it’s wonderful,” Easton said about the extra attendees. “I just wish the church was larger for them.”  But church staff have a backup plan if more members and troops show up than the building can hold. Willing parishioners will forego the first service for a second Mass one hour later, said Jean Martin, pastoral assistant at Holy Trinity.

Maj. Ed Griffin, a married father of two who works as a technical writer for a computer software company in New Hampshire, attends Mass regularly back home. So Holy Trinity is a welcome substitute for the practicing Catholic during his short stay in central Indiana.

The friendly smiles, warm conversation and fellowship provide the 19-year reservist with a little piece of home, he said.   “Home is no farther away than the nearest church,” Griffin said after he and nearly a dozen other soldiers kneeled to pray in the church’s entryway.

Maj. Brian Adelson has attended the church’s services every Sunday since he arrived at Atterbury last month. The husband and father of two from Saratoga Springs, N.Y., said he makes it a priority to balance his military duties and spiritual needs.

“The job we are going out to do is dangerous,” said Adelson, a 20-year reservist.  The services and generous church members give him strength for the upcoming mission, he said.

Mary Ann Hudecke, a 13-year church member and Columbus resident, has enjoyed watching the flurry of activity as staff and families rally around looking for another coffee pot or more doughnuts to put in the church’s Community Center for the added visitors.  The tight quarters are overshadowed by the warm exchanges made between soldiers and church regulars, Hudecke said. Many troops sit alongside church members and chat about their families, hometowns and churches back home before the service.

“I absolutely don’t mind the church being more crowded,” said Pam Thompson, a 24-year church member. “We’ll make room for (the troops).”

The reservists get help making their church connections from Atterbury training officers who note religious preferences on the soldiers’ paperwork. Buses transport the soldiers from the base. (By BLYTHE RICHARDS, Franklin Daily Journal (IN) staff writer)

November 11, 2004 - Veterans honored while others train

Pressure, for military police it's about knowing your enemy's weaknesses. For soldiers heading to war it's a way of life.  For Major Deedra Thombleson, "It's kind of nerve-racking and exciting."  "There's a little fear of the unknown," adds Sgt. Shane Stephens. "I think like, anything, not knowing exactly where you might go."  Pictures of the assault on Fallujah fill the television screens as the US military reports 178 American soldiers were wounded and 18 killed in action. 

At Camp Atterbury, the 939th Military Police Detachment based in Indianapolis is among more than 2,500 troops training for their own missions overseas.  And if they think about the dangers, they don't show it.  "As far as reservations, no, I'm proud to do it," says Sgt. Bryan Mason.

Thursday, the group practiced tactics designed to control prisoners without resorting to gunfire.  "A lot of the information we get from troops getting back, we use that in training," points out Mason.  Much of what they learn comes from the experiences of soldiers who've fought before them.  Their willingness to put themselves on the line, it's own common thread that binds them to a longstanding American military tradition.

Colonel Tom McKevitt says, "A lot of these units haven't been activated or deployed since World War II."  Thombleson adds, "They feel proud to serve in the military now because of the heritage."  And Mason says his "grandmother gave me my grandfather's Purple Heart from World War II. She told me, now I had one I didn't need one of my own."

Just as they did decades ago, citizen soldiers step up as protectors of freedom.  And although the pressure is great, the will is greater.

Thombleson says these soldiers want to "show the American people we're capable and trained to do what we've got to do." (Kris Kirschner/Channel 13, Indianapolis Eyewitness News)

COLUMBUS, Ind. -- Several cities are worried their airports and economies could suffer if the Air Force wins approval to train in controlled air space near two southern Indiana military bases.

The Federal Aviation Administration, at the request of the Air Force, has proposed creating military operations areas near Camp Atterbury, about 30 miles south of Indianapolis, and the Jefferson Proving Grounds north of Madison.

Military operations areas are sections of airspace where the military can train.  The designations do not restrict most planes, but they tend to scare away pilots who do not want to encounter F-16s, said Chris Dancy of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, based in Frederick, Md.  "The military will tell you anyone can fly through a MOA," Dancy said. "Technically, yes, that's true. But our surveys tell us overwhelmingly pilots will fly around it."

Some of proposed military operations areas begin at 500 feet above ground, a very restrictive altitude, airport officials said.  Dancy said they usually extend to around 15,000 feet above ground.

Among the mayors and airport directors concerned after the possible designation is Columbus Municipal Airport Director Rod Blasdell. He and his board of aviation commissioners have spearheaded efforts to raise awareness about the issue.  "If I'm an industry that wants to locate here, that's something I'm going to take into consideration," Blasdell said.

The Columbus Municipal Airport last week hosted a meeting with about 40 people, including pilots, businessmen and officials from surrounding cities, to talk about the issue ahead of a Dec. 6 deadline set by the FAA to comment on the issue.  Pilots for Cummins Inc., who make about 24 flights each week out of the Columbus Municipal Airport, are concerned about the possible designation, company spokesman Mark Land said. The company has not taken a stance on the issue yet, he said.

"The pilots' concerns are that if these areas were instituted, it would cost us more air time and more money. We would have to detour everything that came in from the south."  Seymour has invested millions of dollars into navigational equipment to update its Freeman Municipal Airport, Mayor Jim Bullard said.  "Any time that we have a possible interruption in our airport operation, it brings concerns," Bullard said.  Seymour pilot Jack Hildreth said the military operations areas would create the biggest disruptions in air traffic that he has seen in his 30 years of flying in southern Indiana.  (Associated Press)

November 17, 2004 - Pentagon To Cut Boy Scouts From Bases

CHICAGO - The Pentagon has agreed to warn military bases worldwide not to directly sponsor Boy Scout troops, partially resolving claims that the government has engaged in religious discrimination by supporting a group that requires members to believe in God.

The settlement announced Monday is part of a series of legal challenges in recent years over how closely the government should be aligned with the Boy Scouts of America, a venerable organization that boasts a membership of more than 3.2 million members.

Civil liberties advocates have set their sights on the organization's policies because the group bans openly gay scout leaders and compels members to swear an oath of duty to God. The ACLU believes that direct government sponsorship of such a program amounts to discrimination.

"If our Constitution's promise of religious liberty is to be a reality, the government should not be administering religious oaths or discriminating based on religious beliefs," said ACLU attorney Adam Schwartz.

The Pentagon said it has long had a rule against sponsorship of non-federal organizations and denied the rule had been violated. But it agreed to send a message to posts worldwide warning them not to sponsor Boy Scout troops or other such groups.

The rule does not prevent service members from leading Scout troops unofficially on their own time, and Scouts will still be able to hold meetings on areas of military bases where civilian organizations are allowed to hold events.

The settlement does not resolve other ACLU claims involving government spending that benefits the Boy Scouts, such as money used to prepare a Virginia military base for the Boy Scout Jamboree and grants used by state and local governments to benefit the Boy Scouts, Schwartz said.

He said the Pentagon spends $2 million every year to prepare the Virginia base for the jamboree, held once every four years. He said the Defense Department also makes annual allocations of $100,000 to support Boy Scout units on military bases overseas and $100,000 to improve Boy Scout properties, such as summer camps.

Attorney Marcia Berman, who represented the Defense Department, declined to comment on the settlement Monday. But Justice Department spokesman Charles Miller said the message that will be sent to bases represents "a clarification of an existing rule that DOD personnel cannot be involved in an official capacity."

The original ACLU lawsuit named as defendants the Department of Defense, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the Chicago Board of Education. The schools settled, agreeing not to engage in official sponsorship of scouting activities.  (Associated Press )

November 17, 2004 - Amvets adopts reservists Group raising funds to make holidays happy for local unit headed to Mideast.

The 980th Quartermaster Army Reserve unit has been called to duty again and will spend Christmas, and probably the next several months, in the Middle East.  But the unit won't leave without something to open Christmas morning.

Amvets Post 22, 520 Pine St., has taken the 980th under its wing.  The post hopes its Operation Christmas for the Troops campaign will raise enough money to send each soldier a $20 gift card that can be used at a post exchange.

The 980th, which trains out of Bay City's James J. O'Rourke Army Reserve Center, is now at Camp Atterbury in Indiana, and officials say it likely will be in Iraq or Kuwait sometime in December.

There are about 140 soldiers in the 980th, a support unit that is trained to provide supplies, transport gasoline and purify water.  The unit was activated in October and will be on orders for 18 months.  It was also activated in February 2003, but spent about three months at Fort McCoy in Wisconsin before returning home in May.

Folks from the Amvets group collected more than $1,000 Saturday for Operation Christmas for the Troops in about two hours from drivers in Bangor Township.

This is the second year the Amvets group has adopted a unit stationed in Iraq. Last year, $10,000 was raised and 300 soldiers from two units all received $30 gift certificates.  (By Patti Brandt, Bay City Times Writer )

 
Indiana's contribution of National Guard soldiers and reservists for Iraq and the war on terror has reached its highest level since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

More than 600 Indiana National Guard soldiers are training this month at Camp Atterbury south of Indianapolis. They are among more than 5,600 Indiana-based troops headed to duty or serving in Iraq, Afghanistan and other hot spots, according to a Department of Defense tally released Wednesday. Those numbers include more than 100 reservists from Air Force, Navy and Marine units.

The Hoosier buildup comes as the fighting in Iraq has entered one of its bloodiest stages. This month, 91 U.S. troops have died in Iraq, making November the second-deadliest month since American forces invaded the country in March 2003, Pentagon records show. The worst month was April, with 135 deaths, when the insurgency intensified and Marines fought fierce battles in Fallujah.

Although most of the Indiana reserve units are not typically considered combat outfits, the lack of a clear front line in Iraq puts clerks and truck drivers in as much danger as riflemen.

Just two years ago, the state had 63 Guard and Army reservists on active duty. By May 2003, two months after the start of the Iraq war, the Defense Department said 3,467 had been called up.

Soldiers now training at Atterbury belong to four Indiana Guard units and an Army Reserve unit. The once-quiet base has been transformed since the war began and now trains mainly rear-echelon troops in everything from surviving an ambush to evacuating the wounded -- vital skills as bloody urban combat continues in Iraq.

With their supporting roles, such as issuing equipment and hauling fuel, these troops are seen as key to winning the war.

"We always refer to the Army as the Green Machine. What do you suppose it is that kept the Green Machine running?" said Tim Lomperis, a St. Louis University professor of international security. "The tip of the spear is kept fluid, dynamic and mobile by all of these support units."

Traci Estes' husband, Roger, is in a support post with the Indiana Army National Guard in Afghanistan, helping ensure that soldiers in the Afghan army get their paychecks. She believes he is relatively safe but fears a potential ripple effect of terrorism spurred by the heavy fighting in Fallujah.

Word of the toll this month in Iraq hit her hard, and she said she was in tears when her husband's most recent phone call came through.  "I could only think about their families and the grief they must be experiencing," she said.

The training at Atterbury tries to re-create conditions in Iraq, said Lt. Col. Thomas McKevitt, the Army's 3rd Brigade operations and training officer. Soldiers ride in convoys through mock villages and fire live rounds at pop-up targets.

Soldiers also learn how to treat the wounded.  "If you can stop the bleeding, treat for shock and administer an IV," McKevitt said, "you have just prolonged the life of that soldier."

Army Sgt. James Daniel Faulkner's comrades didn't get that chance. The combat engineer from Clarksville was killed instantly when a bomb exploded near his vehicle outside Baghdad in September. Two other soldiers riding in the vehicle were injured.

Faulkner's stepfather, Greg Gilkey, said the bomb was detonated from a distance.  "It wouldn't matter how he died. It's difficult to take. But I guess I could accept it a little easier (if) . . . they were in a head-on battle and knew what they were up against."  Gilkey said he has met some of the other soldiers in Faulkner's unit and prays for their safety.  "We'd like for everybody to finish the job and get home."

About 160 members of the Indiana National Guard's 38th Infantry Division finished their jobs -- keeping the peace in Bosnia-Herzegovina -- and returned home early Tuesday morning.

While there is one Indiana Guard unit in Iraq, the 138th Personnel Services Battalion, the Guard at one point had more than 1,200 infantry in the Middle East. Those units have returned.

Among those soldiers was Spc. Lee Greenamyer, who came home to his family in Angola just more than a year ago after serving in Iraq with Fort Wayne's 1st Battalion, 293rd Infantry Regiment.

His unit could be called back to Iraq, but he isn't worried yet.

"I know that the possibility exists," said Greenamyer, a 27-year-old maintenance worker for the Indiana Department of Transportation. (By Richard D. Walton and Jon Murray, IndyStar.com)

November 18, 2004 - Indiana’s troop commitment climbs.  Camp Atterbury is as busy as it’s been since the Korean War.