U.S. Army Sgt. Neal McElroy Jr. joined the military in 1996. He served active duty as a hand-to-hand combat instructor – a good fit with his civilian job of martial arts instructor. He loves the Army and he loves teaching martial arts. But for now, he can’t do either.

Like thousands of men and women who were physically or mentally disabled while serving their country on home or foreign soil, his well-being and his future lie in the hands of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

“I volunteered for service. I loved doing it,” said McElroy, 31, a 1993 Northrop High School graduate. He was discharged from the Army in 2000, but a year later, when the war in Afghanistan started, he was called back into active duty with the Army’s 384th Military Police Battalion.

The unit was sent to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where Afghan enemy combatants are detained. During his time there, he suffered a serious injury to his right leg. He cannot talk about the details of how and where the injury occurred because the information is classified.

Military doctors wanted him to get treatment in a stateside hospital as soon as possible, but it was more than a month before he was sent home. When McElroy arrived at the Fort Knox, Ky., military base, a gaping hole consumed his leg below the knee. Three weeks later, Army officials said he could return to Fort Wayne for care.

McElroy endured 40 surgeries in attempts to save the leg. Because of the pus and infection, his leg was swollen to twice its normal size. “No matter what part of the house you were in, with the doors shut or not, you could still smell it,” he said.

On Dec. 23, 2003, the leg was amputated. He now uses a prosthesis. “I’ve gone through several because the stump keeps shrinking,” said the father of three daughters, ages 3, 7 and 10.

He remains on active-duty medical leave as he awaits the VA’s decision on his disability retirement.

In 2003, McElroy started the application process for disability retirement, but says, “I haven’t received a penny yet.” Twice, the application period has expired, with no word from the VA.

“You have to do the physical again, all the paperwork, everything each time after it expires. The only place I can do that is Fort Knox.” Meanwhile, he is not working because he is still considered active duty. Twice a week he checks in with his commanding officer at Camp Atterbury south of Indianapolis.

“They’ve told me I can’t work. If they’d let me, I would.” He gets a little over $2,000 a month in active duty pay, “but that’s not enough to make ends meet and try to support my children.” He is getting a special foot made and hopes one day to resume teaching martial arts.

As if the loss of a leg and delays in disability compensation are not bad enough, McElroy still owes about $14,000 for medical expenses from the injury. The amount was not covered by TriCare, the military health insurance provider, partly because he chose civilian care and partly because of what he calls “other snafus” incurred from being a reservist called into active duty. “There’s just so many hassles.”

But he doesn’t let his situation get him down as he waits for a resolution. “I hope it comes through by my birthday in May,” he said.

There’s no bitterness. “I’d serve again in a heartbeat if I could.” Yes, the paperwork, the delays, the lack of communication are frustrating, “but it’s something you get used to,” he said. “The inside joke of the military is, ‘Hurry up and wait.’ You get used to the screw-ups. You just have to wait.”  (By Jennifer L. Boen, FortWayne.com)

March 11, 2005 - A chaplain returns to his congregation

The Rev. Jim Cotter has just completed a two-year tour of duty at Camp Atterbury in southern Indiana.

At services Sunday, members of Praise Lutheran Church on Dupont Road will wear name tags.

The tags won’t be for the benefit of visitors, however. They will aid their founding pastor as he tries to place faces and names again after a two-year tour of duty as a U.S. Army chaplain.

Praise will welcome back the Rev. Jim Cotter with receptions following both its morning worship services. Cotter, whose first day in the office was Thursday, also is scheduled to preach at both services. It marks a big day for the church and its members.

“They are pretty excited,” said the Rev. Fredrick Hearn, Praise’s associate pastor.

Cotter, a member of the Indiana Army National Guard, left the congregation 26 months ago when called up for duty. A lieutenant colonel, he was stationed at Camp Atterbury in south-central Indiana, which serves as a training and mobilization site for National Guard and Army Reserve units deploying for Iraq and Afghanistan.

As the only full-time chaplain on the base, Cotter said he typically put in 100 to 120 hours a week counseling and praying with soldiers as they prepped for deployment or prepared to return home after active-duty service.

Before deployment, soldiers worried mainly about what would become of their families if something happened to them, Cotter said.

“He made it a point to be at every departure when they flew out to shake their hand and bless them,” said Col. Ken Newlin, Camp Atterbury commanding officer. About 20,000 soldiers passed through the camp on their way to active duty during the last two years.

Cotter also came to the airport to welcome home returning units, Newlin said.

“We are very grateful,” Newlin said. “He was a tremendous asset to me and to the installation.”

Soldiers’ arrival home signaled a time of intensive ministry, Cotter said.

He had about four days to assess their mental and spiritual health. He also talked with them about fitting back into their families and civilian life, he said. In addition, he taught them how to recognize signs of stress-related problems and where to seek help if they need it.

Many of the soldiers had been shot at, had fired at the enemy or had seen Americans wounded, Newlin said.

“Those are life-changing events,” he added. “He (Cotter) would do a lot of one-on-one, face-to-face counseling to see if they thought they needed spiritual help.”

Cotter related easily to the soldiers problems because he experienced some of them himself.

Because of his long hours, he saw his wife only sparingly during the last two years. Their married daughter became pregnant and had a baby. Their younger daughter graduated from college and entered the workforce.

“I would say, in my daughters’ lives, I missed two years of their lives,” he said.

He spent more time with their son than he expected because the younger Cotter, an active-duty Army soldier, was stationed at Camp Atterbury as a trainer.

Just as with other soldiers, however, Cotter said his intense focus on army duty squeezed out some memories from civilian life. That’s why congregation members will be wearing name tags Sunday.

The congregation also has grown by about 80 members during the last two years, so there are many new faces, associate pastor Hearn said. Praise now has about 500 members and about 300 people in attendance at Sunday worship.

In addition, the congregation — in consultation with Cotter — developed architectural plans to build a new sanctuary in front of its current church building, Hearn said. The congregation hopes to launch a fund drive soon to raise the $1.5 million to $2 million needed for construction.

Now that he is home, Cotter will take the next few months to make the transition back to the role of church pastor.

He does plan to stay in contact with some army units he prepared for deployment who now are overseas. He also hopes to welcome some of them home when they return.

But his main focus will be on the people at Praise.

“I am very happy to be back,” he said.  (By Kevin Kilbane, Fort Wayne News Sentinel - Fort Wayne,IN)

March 14, 2005 - 113th: New Army gets old equipment

Outside of Tall Afar in Iraq, soldiers with the Indiana National Guard 113th Engineer Battalion were embarrassed by the slow-moving, out-of-date equipment they brought from Indiana.

At times, the local soldiers said they were relegated to guarding towers inside the base because the command didn’t trust their aging personnel carriers inside the often dangerous city.

“The vehicles we have are antiquated. They are almost museum pieces and we don’t have parts for them. ... It’s what we have, and the active duty guys don’t understand that,” said Sgt. Steve Foss of Michigan City while sitting in the office inside the motor pool.

Indiana and U.S. National Guard officials insist that they are doing everything they can to field the best equipment for reserve units deployed overseas. Nearly three years after the war began in Afghanistan, Guard officials frankly said they had not expected their role would expand to make up 40 percent of the force deployed in Iraq.

They said it will take time to break the decades-old practice of equipping reserve units with equipment cast off by the regular Army.

In early February, after the 113th Engineers were in Iraq about a month, one of the four armored personnel carriers brought from Indiana had blown its engine’s head gaskets and was leaking oil so badly that it could not be used. The chassis of another of the four M113 armored personnel carriers had a manufacture date of 1967 — a year before the Tet offensive in the Vietnam War. Its engine and transmission had been refurbished 24 years ago, in 1981, the year Ronald Reagan took office.

The National Guard unit, based in Gary with companies in Valparaiso and LaPorte, deployed with bulldozers manufactured in the mid-1970s.

Soldiers with the 113th Engineer Battalion suffered with equipment failures on election night in Mosul. A front loader broke down. Local soldiers had been taking fire in the city that night. They had inherited front loaders built in the early 1980s, from the Virginia National Guard unit they replaced. The aging front loaders — which had already been heavily used in the months before the Indiana soldiers arrived in Mosul — often broke down.

In at least one critical case, local soldiers left behind better equipment back in Indiana. The Northwest Indiana unit was sent into Iraq with an older model of armored personnel carriers, even though soldiers trained on newer equipment at Camp Atterbury in southern Indiana.

The commander at Camp Atterbury, Col. Kenneth Newlin, speculated that the training equipment could have come from other units that could later be deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan. Newlin began his military career as a soldier in the 113th Engineer Battalion, based in Gary. He later commanded the unit before taking over as the commander of the National Guard training base in Edinburgh, Ind.

“I have to believe the 113th (armored personnel carrier) issue was simply beyond their ability to fix,” he said.

The Indiana unit replaced a Virginia National Guard unit. Newlin pointed out that commanders with the Virginia National Guard unit recommended the Indiana soldiers not bring any M113 armored personnel carriers to Mosul. But the Virginia unit was more mechanized, with a larger array of “up-armored” Humvees — a term to describe a street version of the Humvee that is armored with a metal plating from a kit or scrap to make it more resistant to attack.

The Indiana unit had fewer Humvees and none of them had been up-armored before they left Indiana.

Newlin and 113th Engineer Battalion Commander Lt. Col. Richard Shatto discussed taking personnel carriers anyway, because the Indiana unit had “fewer ways to get around on the battlefield.” Newlin said he could not recall being asked to hand over newer A-3 armored personnel carriers so they could be sent to Mosul.

A week after Newlin was contacted, Indiana National Guard spokeswoman Capt. Lisa Kopczynski confirmed the local soldiers had trained on newer A-3s at Camp Atterbury.

Why weren’t the 113th Engineers, who were deployed to one of the most dangerous regions in Iraq, given a priority for the newest equipment?

Kopczynski could only site military procedure. Atterbury was given the A-3 armored personnel carriers for training. The 113th Engineers took their own equipment to Iraq. It was inspected at Camp Atterbury and deemed fit for service.

“The unit leaves with the equipment on their authorization documents,” she said.

Deadly game in Iraq

At Forward Operating Base Sykes in Iraq, Foss and other local soldiers were frustrated that active duty commanders were leaving them out of missions.

But old and poorly armored equipment could be more than embarrassing; it could be deadly.

None of the 113th Engineers understood that more than Foss. He was the first Purple Heart recipient from the local unit. He was hit by a piece of shrapnel the size of a rabbit’s foot when his convoy was ambushed on the way from Kuwait to Tall Afar.

Ironically, the day before Foss’s convoy left Kuwait, his friend, Sgt. Jason Otto of LaPorte, talked about the poor quality of the steel plate being installed on the Humvees and trucks for the drive through Iraq.

Soldiers from Northwest Indiana had arrived roughly a month after a Tennessee National Guard soldier in Kuwait on Dec. 8 publicly asked Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld why they were being forced to scrounge for scrap metal to armor their vehicles.

In early January, the jagged steel panels the U.S. Army was issuing to armor the Humvees and trucks still had the look of hastily assembled scraps.

Local soldiers covered jagged edges with duct tape so they wouldn’t cut themselves on the doors or the gun turrets.

Anxiety was running particularly high because soldiers were originally told they were going to deliver a fleet of factory up-armored Humvees to Task Force Olympia in Mosul. The plan fell through the day before the convoys were preparing to leave for Iraq.

A group of soldiers took one of the metal panels for the trucks into the Kuwaiti desert and tested it with various weapons. The makeshift steel panel didn’t do much to repel small-arms fire. Their larger weapons cut the steel door panel in half.

Otto described how the soldiers had been instructed to modify the vehicles, attaching steel to the exterior and placing sandbags on the floor. Factory up-armored Humvees had larger engines to handle the extra load and a bulletproof windshield. Soldiers had already dubbed the kits “Mad Max” armor or “hillbilly” armor.

Would it work?

“To be honest, I don’t know how it’s going to work. I’ve never previously deployed with equipment such as this. In theory, it will deflect any of the shrapnel thrown up by IEDs (roadside bombs), small arms fire,” Otto said.

On the third day of the convoy, Otto’s group was caught by a roadside bomb during the ambush outside Tall Afar. The blast would miss his Humvee, exploding in front of the vehicle. The windshield broke but no one was injured.

Foss was ahead of him. His Humvee would take a direct hit when a second roadside bomb exploded. The glass windshield shattered. The gunner, Spc. Michael Kieszkowski of Rolling Prairie, received a Purple Heart after being hit in the leg by flying glass.

A chunk of metal hit Foss’ body armor in the seam between the detachable collar and shoulder. The metal slid around and lodged in his back, near the spinal cord. The heavily armed convoy returned fire but kept moving until it reached the base.

Dazed by the explosion, Foss got out of his Humvee. He checked the soldiers in the other Humvees for injuries. When Otto saw the blood, he told Foss to sit down. After Otto opened the vest, Foss began to feel dizzy from the blood loss.

After the ambush outside Tall Afar, Shatto said the Kuwait-armored Humvees would not be allowed off the bases. The local unit would use the Humvees left by the Virginia unit until its Humvees were up-armored. The same guarantee could not be made for trucks. There remains a shortage of up-armored packages for trucks throughout Iraq.

Shatto said the trucks were not as vulnerable. They ride higher. Roadside blasts tended to detonate underneath, rather than destroying the crew compartments, as they would with a Humvee.

Armor kits are quickly being manufactured, including up-armor kits for the M113 Armored Personnel Carrier.

In January and February, the Indiana National Guard in Mosul sent the M113s into Mosul without additional armor. The M113s were operating on election night in the Palestine section of Mosul — possibly the most dangerous neighborhood in Iraq.

According to soldiers with the Stryker unit that patrols the area, American troops are attacked by insurgents nearly every time they enter the Palestine neighborhood.

On Jan. 4, Stars and Stripes reported that the Pentagon was spending $84 million to up-armor its fleet of track vehicles, including the M113 Armored Personnel Carriers.

'A bit of turmoil’

The National Guard Bureau in Washington defends its ability to outfit the increasing number of units being called to active duty. The agency has asked Congress for $20 billion for new equipment and upgraded training.

“What they need has evolved over the last 24 to 28 months, as the mission on the ground changes,” said Lt. Col. Tolson, chief of logistics operation at the U.S. National Guard Bureau.

Before the war in Afghanistan, the reserves often had been equipped through a process called cascading. Guard units would get used regular Army equipment from active-duty forces when they received new equipment.

That culture is changing, but it will take time, Tolson said.

“There is a bit of turmoil in the logistics world because we cannot react that quickly,” Tolson said.

Guard units are still sent with their own equipment. If they do not have what they need, they can ask their home state. If the state cannot find the equipment, the request is funneled to the National Guard Bureau in Washington. The Guard then calls units throughout the country. If the Guard can’t find the equipment, it asks the regular Army for additional supplies, Johnson said.

Asked if active-duty forces go through a similar process, Tolson said, “No, active-duty units are pretty much prepared for this sort of deployment.”

The National Guard Bureau disputes any notion that it has left units unprepared for duty in Iraq. In the case of the better M113s left at Camp Atterbury, there is no evidence that a request was ever made to take the newer equipment.

Not all of the equipment sent with the Indiana National Guard to Iraq was built for Vietnam. The local soldiers were outfitted with the latest body armor, lightweight Kevlar helmet and new M-4 carbine rifles.

For Foss, the layer of new equipment appeared to run thin. After his injury, he requested new body armor to replace the jacket damaged in the ambush. He showed what he was given — an old, torn jacket. The rear panel was so torn that it could not hold the ceramic plate that is crucial to stopping bullets. Instead of using it, the resourceful guardsman cut up some of the extra Kevlar sheeting they had been given for the M113s, stuffed it in the hole and taped up the shoulder piece.

Some of his troops found a collar piece, left on the floor by the Virginia National Guard unit they replaced.

“I scrubbed it up and used it. It was better than what they sent me,” Foss said.  (Steve Walsh / Post-Tribune)

March 14, 2005 - FORT KNOX, Ky. -- Court-Martial Scheduled For Soldier In Iraqi's Death

An Indiana National Guard soldier charged with murdering an Iraqi police officer will face a court-martial in May, the Army said.

Cpl. Dustin Berg, 21, is shown here at a February 2004 ceremony at Camp Atterbury in Johnson County.

Cpl. Dustin Berg, of Ferdinand, Ind., is accused of killing an Iraqi police officer in November 2003 and then shooting himself.

Berg, 21, is charged with murder, false swearing and the wearing of an unauthorized award, as he received a Purple Heart for wounds sustained in the incident.

An investigator testified during a hearing at Fort Knox last month that Berg changed his story multiple times before admitting he killed the man. Berg's attorney says the soldier acted in self-defense.

Military prosecutors have never specified a motive for the shooting.

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March 30, 2005 - Coalition Joint Task Force Phoenix Public Affairs Office

News Release

On the Web: http://www.tfphoenixiii.org

IMMEDIATE RELEASE Mar. 28, 2005

Fallen Soldiers honored in memorial service at Camp Phoenix

Story and photos by U.S. Army Sgt. Joe McFarren, CJTF Phoenix Public Affairs

CAMP PHOENIX, KABUL, Afghanistan – A memorial service for four Soldiers killed in a land mine attack Saturday was held here Monday morning by members of Combined Joint Task Force Phoenix, 76th Infantry Brigade to honor its fallen comrades.

Amidst clear skies and a light breeze, more than 400 U.S. Soldiers and Marines, as well as Soldiers from Great Britain, Romania and France participated in the hour-long ceremony at day break. The ceremony was overseen by Brig. Gen. Richard Moorhead, the commander of the 76th Inf. Bde., and Lt. Gen. David Barno, the commander of Combined Forces Command-Afghanistan. Christopher Alexander, the Canadian ambassador to Afghanistan was also in attendance.

“We stand before you today realizing how fragile we are, and how unpredictable life is,” said CJTF Phoenix Chaplain Lt. Col. Steven Hall in his prayer.

The four Soldiers were killed when the vehicle they were traveling in struck a land mine in eastern Afghanistan as they were part of a mission to access possible locations for new ranges for the Afghan National Army.

“It’s not easy to summarize one’s life into a paragraph,” said. Maj. Larry Rodgers, the 76th Inf. Bde. chief of operations, in his dedication to the soldiers during the ceremony. “It’s not much easier to sum up the last eight months into a 30-second biography. Each one of these soldiers was special.”

Perhaps the most profound, and certainly most emotional, moment of the ceremony was when 1st Sgt. Mark Ireland called attendance for the Headquarters Company in which the four soldiers were apart.

As each name was called, Ireland reported each fallen soldier not in the formation, rendering many soldiers to tears.

The roll call was followed by the playing of taps by 1st Lt. Paul Polyniak of Headquarters Company, 76th Inf. Bde.

“Today, we pay a profound tribute to four soldiers who have given the ultimate sacrifice, their lives,” Moorhead said in his address at the ceremony.

“We all lost part of ourselves Saturday in the deaths of four of our fellow soldiers.

“Their deaths have left a void in mind and spirit that will be hard to fill. But we must remember these soldiers died carrying out a role in history that will show how they helped in an incredible task by helping the world advance to be a more peaceful place to live.”

CAMP PHOENIX, KABUL, Afghanistan – (L to R) Maj. Fred Richards, Maj. Robert Burke and Capt. Jason Zigler of the 76th Infantry Brigade express their grief at the death of four Soldiers during a memorial service for the Soldiers here on Saturday. More than 400 servicemen attended the hour-long ceremony.

CAMP PHOENIX, KABUL, Afghanistan – Soldiers from the Headquarters Company, 76th Infantry Brigade out of Indiana, pass the Fallen Comrade Memorial erected in memory of the four Soldiers who died Saturday morning in a land mine attack. The four Soldiers were members of the Headquarters Company where they worked in the brigade operations shop.

CAMP PHOENIX, KABUL, Afghanistan – Maj. Richard Rabe renders honors to the Fallen Comrades Memorial erected here in memory of the four Soldiers who died in a land mine attack Saturday. More than 400 servicemen from five countries attended the hour-long ceremony held at the Camp Phoenix Flag Poles Monday morning.

 

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March 31, 2005 - WW2 Warship Closer to Docking in Evansville, Indiana

(Evansville, Ind.) - The Vanderburgh County Council has approved spending over $1 million to build a permanent dock on the Ohio River for a World War II ship to be used as a museum.

Combined with contributions from the city of Evansville, nearly $2 million is available to build a permanent home for the LST325.
Evansville has also agreed to build a 1,500 square foot tourist center and pay for utilities. The county funding for the dock will come from a tourism capital projects account, which is supplied by Vanderburgh County’s tax on hotel and motel rooms.

Evansville beat out eight other cities to be the permanent home for the ship that played a role in the 1944 D-Day invasion.

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