Army Ranger Earns Silver Star at Eglin Air Force Base

Army Ranger Earns Silver Star
Army.mil/News
by Aniesa Holmes
Mar 12, 2014

FORT BENNING, Ga. -- Sgt. 1st Class Anthony Fuentes was presented the Silver Star Medal March 4 at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., for his actions in 2011 during an insurgent attack in Kunar Province, Afghanistan.

Fuentes, who is now with the 6th Ranger Training Battalion, was presented the Silver Star by Maj. Gen. H. R. McMaster, Fort Benning's commanding general.

While serving as a platoon sergeant for B Company, 2nd Battalion, 27th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, in October 2011, Fuentes led the defense of Shal Mountain during Operation Rugged Sarak. For more than a week, the company was in near-continuous enemy contact as insurgents sought to defeat coalition efforts to build a permanent Afghan base.

Fuentes, under heavy recoilless, rocket-propelled grenade and small arms fire, led the defense of his lightly armed and undermanned section and repelled a nighttime enemy attack intent on overrunning his patrol base. He supervised the casualty collection point and enabled the successful evacuation of nine casualties.

Fuentes said he could only think of the men who fought beside him as he received the medal.
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Saluting Soldier Hargis looking forward to being new Dad

Soldier wounded in Afghanistan on road to recovery
WLWT News
By Adrianne Kelly
March 8, 2014

Hargis caught nation's attention during his salute in ICU at field hospital in Afghanistan

CINCINNATI —A Tri-State soldier wounded in Afghanistan is now on the road to recovery.

Sgt. Josh Hargis caught the nation's attention during his salute in the intensive care unit at a field hospital in Afghanistan.

Hargis' brother organized a warriors' walk to honor him and other wounded veterans.

Hargis is already looking ahead to his next big challenge: he and his wife Taylor are expecting a baby in May.
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A Dream Come True Ends in Suicide for Soldier

A Dream Come True Ends in Suicide for Soldier
News21
by Chase Cook
Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation Fellow
Published Aug. 24, 2013

The roadside bomb blasted the safety hatch and blew away the windshields on the heavy transport that Army Pfc. Kimberly Agar rode across Iraq during the 2007 surge. As she regained her composure, insurgents rained rocket-propelled grenades and small-arms fire on the convoy for about 15 minutes. Agar climbed into the back seat and returned fire as the convoy pushed through the ambush.

Agar’s group didn’t suffer fatalities in that attack but she was diagnosed as having a concussion after she complained of headaches and insomnia, about a day after the bombing.

About a year later, Agar finished her 15-month deployment and went home to Dallas for a two-week break before returning to Fort Benning, Ga. Her mother, Margy Agar, though, noticed her daughter was different, saying she was distant, withdrawn and not “my Kimi anymore.”

In 2009, Kimberly Agar re-enlisted and was posted to Germany, a place she had always wanted to visit. There, the talented vocalist who swept pageants in her childhood and teen years eventually made the U.S. Army Europe Band and Chorus, singing with the elite, selective military musical troupe that performs at diplomatic and military events.

It was a job that the younger Kimberly would have envied — getting paid to travel the world as an entertainer. Agar told everyone it was her dream gig. But there were lingering effects of her injuries, fragile emotions and even a suicide attempt.

The mother of Army veteran Kimberly Agar, Margy Agar, talks about her daughter's struggles with symptoms related to a traumatic brain injury.

Early in October 2011, Agar killed herself in Germany after struggling with a minor traumatic brain injury.
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Vietnam vet recalls life as Combat Tracker

Air Cav Vietnam vet recalls life as Combat Tracker
Fort Hood Sentinel
By Sgt. Christopher Calvert
1st ACB, 1st Cav. Div. Public Affairs
JULY 25, 2013

Growing up with World War II veterans as close friends and a Battle of Manila hero as a father, John Dupla had little doubt what he wanted to do when he grew up. It was his turn to give back as a Soldier like those who sacrificed so much before him.

Surrounded by a rich military history, Dupla said hearing war stories of the past from friends and family inclined him to volunteer for enlistment in 1966, despite the ongoing Vietnam War.

“I grew up influenced by men who parachuted into Normandy with the 101st Airborne,” Dupla said. “Hearing of their valor, as well as of my dad’s in the Philippines as an (Military Police), really made me feel like it was my turn to serve. They had done their share, and it was just natural for me to do mine.”

Upon graduating initial entry training and the U.S. Army Airborne School at Fort Benning, Ga. as an airborne infantryman, Dupla was immediately deployed to Vietnam with the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile), 9th Cavalry Regiment.

No sooner than Dupla hit the ground, he was given the opportunity to volunteer for a new and upcoming program that was being developed and about which he knew little.
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Wife arrested in Benning soldier's shooting death

Wife arrested in Benning soldier's shooting death
Apr. 30, 2013
The Associated Press

SEALE, ALA. — The wife of a Fort Benning soldier whose body was found in a ditch has been arrested in the man’s death.

Russell County Sheriff Heath Taylor Tuesday said 34-year-old Gloria Wilson was being held in the Russell County Jail in connection with the death of 34-year-old Donald LaShon Wilson.
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Fort Benning Captain and fiancee killed in murder-suicide

Army Captain, fiancee killed in murder-suicide identified
Ledger Enquirer
Published: February 6, 2013
By BEN WRIGHT

A Fort Benning soldier accused of shooting his girlfriend at American Storage Rental Spaces before turning the gun on himself Tuesday had been in the military more than four years and never deployed, a post spokeswoman said Wednesday.

Authorities identified the Army captain as Gonzalo Raphael Garcia, 38, of California and the woman as Victoria Andrea Jacquez, 27, of Las Cruces, N.M. Both died of a gunshot wound to the head in what police called a murder-suicide at 3560 Victory Drive.

Elsie Jackson, a public affairs spokeswoman, said Garcia entered the military in November 2008.

In October 2012, he was assigned to the 199th Infantry Regiment, a training unit at Fort Benning. His last duty station was at Fort Bliss, Texas, she said.

Garcia was a graduate of the Airborne School at Fort Benning but was never deployed.

Muscogee County Coroner Buddy Bryan said the soldier and the woman were engaged. She was wearing what appeared to be an engagement ring on her finger. "She was here to see him," he said. "Her family didn't know she was here."
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Operation Homefront Launches Annual Holiday Meals for Military

Operation Homefront Launches Annual Holiday Meals for Military Program
By Operation Homefront
Published: Monday, Oct. 29, 2012
SAN ANTONIO
PRNewswire-USNewswire

Operation Homefront, the national non-profit dedicated to providing emergency financial and other assistance to the families of our nation's military, has announced today that it is launching its annual Holiday Meals for Military program.

The Holiday Meals for Military Program began Thanksgiving 2009 as a result of a chance encounter in a supermarket in Utica, N.Y., near Ft. Drum. A soldier, his wife, and infant had a handful of grocery items they could not afford, so a Beam Inc. employee picked up the $12 cost for the groceries. Since that time, the program has grown from initially providing 500 meals kits to military families in 2009 to providing 5,200 this holiday season.

The 5,200 meal kits, which include all the grocery items necessary for a full holiday meal, will be distributed to lower and mid-grade ranking military families, E-1 thru E-6, at seventeen bases nationwide in December 2012, including Camp Pendleton, Calif.; Fort Benning, Ga.; Fort Campbell, Ky.; Fort Carson, Colo.; Fort Drum, N.Y.; Fort Hood, Texas; Fort Knox, Ky.; Great Lakes Naval Base, Ill.; and MacDill Air Force Base, Fla.
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Master Sgt. Brad "Iceman" Colbert encourages getting help for PTSD

‘Iceman’ aids others with post-combat stress
Marine Corps Times
By Bethany Crudele
Staff writer
Posted : Sunday Oct 14, 2012

GRANT BLANKENSHIP
Master Sgt. Brad Colbert talks with Marine Sgt. Zachary Lira on the morning of the final two jumps of Lira's Airborne certification class in Fort Benning, Ga.

In “Generation Kill,” he was known as the Iceman. Today, nearly 10 years removed from the events that inspired the popular book and subsequent TV miniseries, Master Sgt. Brad Colbert is still one cool customer.

A special skills operations chief at the Army’s airborne school in Fort Benning, Ga., Colbert is responsible for making sure that Marines who attend the program receive the necessary skills and meet their requirements. He also regularly leaps from C-130s to reinforce proper jump techniques.

As depicted in author Evan Wright’s rendering of 1st Reconnaissance Battalion’s role during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Colbert’s gungy persona resonated with Marines, earning him a place in the annals of Marine Corps culture. Even after leaving 1st Recon in 2010, Colbert said he still felt the need for speed — particularly when behind the wheel. But as a senior staff noncommissioned officer, he’s now concerned with setting a positive example and helping Marines find appropriate outlets for their energy.

Colbert recently signed on as a speaker with the Heroes and Healthy Families Leadership Awareness Conference, hoping to use his notoriety from “Generation Kill” to help younger Marines identify behavioral red flags that could be detrimental to their careers. Marine Corps Times spoke with him Oct. 3. Here are excerpts from the interview, edited for clarity and brevity:

Q: What is your objective when you speak to Marines?

A: It’s perfectly human to admit that you have a problem. It means that you are willing and mature enough as a Marine to identify that there’s something within yourself that needs changing and that you’re willing to get the help that you need. This is not a lecture on speeding, safe driving or even motorcycle safety. It’s strictly: hey, you guys know me or at least a version of me and I’m telling you that it’s ok to seek help if you need help. It’s not strictly limited to risky behavior, it’s managing adrenaline post-deployment.
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Fort Benning soldiers team up to help disabled Vietnam Veteran

Fort Benning soldiers roll up their sleeves to help their own
COLUMBUS, GA
WTVM
August 11, 2012

Some Fort Benning soldiers rolled up their sleeves to help one of their own on Saturday.

News leader 9 was at the home and talked to the former soldier who says it's nice to finally have someone do something for him.

At his home on Memphis Street in Columbus that he shares with his wife Katie, 77 year-old Jackie Kirkpatrick Sr. told us old stories of his days as a soldier in Vietnam.

He's a highly decorated veteran who spent 24 years of his life serving in the army.

"His overall spirit was just awesome and to see the struggles that they're going through right now, he's just an awesome energy. He's told me on several occasions that he would be out here doing it himself but unfortunately he's just not physically able," team captain and soldier in Delta Company 146th Infantry, added Lt. E. Thomas Bowen

1st Lt. Bowen and soldiers from 146th Infantry, teamed up with the organization House of Heroes to help Kirkpatrick out around his home.
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1 gold, several defeats for military Olympians

1 gold, several defeats for military Olympians
Staff report
Army Times
Posted : Tuesday Jul 31, 2012

A fast-fingered 23-year-old Sgt. Vincent Hancock shattered multiple Olympic records while staking his claim for gold at the London Games on Tuesday even as other military athletes suffered through the agony of defeat.

The Fort Benning, Ga.-based Army Marksmanship Unit skeet shooter drilled 123 out of 125 targets in his record-setting qualifier and then a perfect 25 in the finals for another record and his spot at the top of the podium.

His score of 148 broke the Olympic skeet record of 145 he set en route to his first Olympic gold at the 2008 Games in Beijing.

Hancock’s win also marks the first time an Olympic skeet shooter has nailed back-to-back gold medals.
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Fort Benning Sergeant defends Olympic gold in men’s skeet

Sergeant defends gold in men’s skeet
By Gary Mihoces
USA Today
Posted : Tuesday Jul 31, 2012

LONDON – Army Sgt. Vince Hancock became the first American man to defend an Olympic gold medal in skeet shooting by winning the event Tuesday afternoon at the Royal Artillery Barracks.

Hancock, of Eatonton, Ga., shot a 148 to hold a two-clay advantage over silver medalist Anders Golding of Denmark. Nasser Al-Attiya of Qatar won the bronze with a 144 after winning a shoot off over Russia’s Valeriy Shomin.

With Hancock's result Tuesday and Kim Rhode’s on Monday, the United States swept the skeet gold medals.
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Fallen soldier in Iraq didn't tell family he was there

One thing about tracking all of this across the country is that some reports stun me. This is one of them. A US soldier, born in South Korea, wanted to join the military and serve this country. He didn't want his family to worry about him, so he didn't tell them he had been deployed. If that isn't strange enough, this part really got me.

"I didn't trust this document, so they called someone in the military. They were told when a soldier is born outside of the United States, they change his birthplace to a U.S. state. His had been changed to Kansas.

Slain Soldier Didn't Tell Parents He Was at War
Knight Ridder
by Imani Tate
Jun 02, 2012

Besides helping freedom-loving citizens of his adopted homeland and countries fighting tyranny, Jang Ho Kim of Placentia was fighting to protect his parents and sister.

Jang Ho, the son of La Verne's Nikuni Japanese Grill owner Steve Kim, thoroughly believed people everywhere should be free of worry and fear, so he enlisted in the Army in June 2005.

Not wanting his dad, mother Sang Soon Kim or little sister Michelle to fret about his safety, he fudged in conversations about his exact whereabouts after finishing basic training at Fort Benning, Ga., and combat training in Germany.

So, when two soldiers came to tell them Jang Ho had been killed in Baghdad, Steve Kim knew it had to be a mistake.

"I had just come back from lunch when I got a phone call from my wife," said Kim, then Samsung's information technology director in La Mirada. "She said two soldiers were at the house and asked me to come home."
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Supporting a Family Member with PTSD

One Day at a Time: Supporting a Family Member with PTSD
Filed under FAMILIES, LEADERSHIP
By Paul Ross
U.S. Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery Public Affairs and Editor, Navy Medicine Magazine

Author and brother

When my kid brother left for Iraq he was just that — a kid.

He returned home shattered inside. The “dark pit,” as he calls it, was hidden underneath his gruff, infantry-tattooed exterior. No one in our family could have predicted what he would experience or the after-effects that continue to haunt him today.

Many Sailors, Soldiers, Marines and Airmen return from deployments with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. As a family member of a person suffering from PTSD, we must be strong for them in a variety of ways to help them combat the disorder.

I received an up-close and personal look at how it can affect a person, when my younger brother came to live with me after separating from the U.S. Army.

Shortly after graduating from the U. S. Army Infantry School at Fort Benning, Ga., my younger brother found his newly-issued boots on the sandy ground in Mosul, Iraq — during a time that would turn out to be one of the bloodiest during the war. His main duties were to provide infantry support to convoys, security detail, and to locate and apprehend insurgents.

He came home with an inescapable burden on his back. He continually woke up, drenched in sweat, with nightmares so real he could still see the terrifying images in his dark room. His mind was filled with the lives he had to take, the friends he lost — some to the enemy, some to suicide — and the near-misses of death’s cold, bony grip on his own neck.
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Widow of Fort Benning soldier talks about PTSD misdiagnosis

Wife Of Serviceman Shares Story Of PTSD Misdiagnosis
By: Jocelyn Tovar
KARK 4 NEWS
Updated: May 18, 2012

An unfortunate reality for as many as 30% of our veterans is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and just this week the United States Army announced they'll be reviewing the PTSD practices in veteran's hospitals across the country.

The review stems from cases of PTSD at an army medical center outside of Seattle and possible misdiagnosis of the disorder.

"He got really withdrawn," said Alicia McElroy whose husband Staff Sargent James McElroy returned from his second tour in Afghanistan in 2010. "He couldn't sleep in bed at night, he wasn't even sleeping at night he was pacing the halls, laying in bed all day. crying."

All text book definitions of PTSD that his wife said he sought treatment for at Fort Benning in Georgia.

"They found him June 6th dead in his barracks," McElroy told KARK.

She said her husband died from multiple drug toxicity as a result of medications to treat PTSF, but that somewhere along the way army officials downgraded his disorder.

"Even though he'd been diagnosed by three different doctors as having PTSD," said McElroy. "They kept saying he had anxiety."
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Fort Benning looking at Veterans Courts

In Military Courts, Considering Alternative Punishment for Troubled Service Members
By JAMES DAO
May 7, 2012

By treating the underlying condition that led to the charged offense, Major Seamone writes, “The military can meaningfully reduce recidivism and restore veterans to a status where they can contribute to society, even if they are unable to continue their military service.”

Since the first one opened in Buffalo in 2008, veterans treatment courts have spread to more than 80 locations across the country. The special courts give civilian judges discretion to consider a veteran’s service-related drug or mental problems in sentencing, and have been praised by many experts as helping to ensure troubled veterans get needed treatment.

Now a senior military prosecutor at Fort Benning, Ga., is arguing that the same concept be applied to the military’s judicial system so that judges can sentence service members to treatment programs rather than automatically issuing punitive discharges that put them on the street without benefits.

In a deeply researched, 200-page article published in a recent edition of The Military Law Review, Maj. Evan R. Seamone argues that military courts may be aggravating the problems of service members by discharging them without first treating them for conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder. (The article can be found in Volume 208, the summer 2011 issue, which was actually released earlier this year.)

And when those troubled service members become troubled veterans — who, because of their punitive discharges may be denied certain veterans benefits — they are likely to create problems in civilian society, he contends.
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Communities need to "invest in these soldiers"

Colorado war veteran: Communities need to "invest in these soldiers"
POSTED:05/01/2012
By Nancy Lofholm
The Denver Post

MONTROSE — Tim Kenney is almost in his element behind the counter at Toads Guide Shop. Here, bits of brightly colored fly-tying fluff fill glass bins, and a blue inflatable raft reminds customers — and Kenney — of the promise of future fly-fishing trips. Kenney had been a fishing, rafting and hunting guide and a contract trapper before he, then 41, decided to join the Army National Guard. He was tired of seeing 20-somethings disproportionately losing their lives in faraway wars. He reasoned that if he served, he might be able to keep his own children — two daughters, now 20 and 18, and two younger children — from having to go to war.

So this wiry outdoorsman reported for duty at Fort Benning with a company of fresh-faced youngsters who laughed at his love of Toby Keith's hyper-patriotic songs and who couldn't fathom Kenney's unfamiliarity with iPhones.

Physically, he was strong enough from years of rowing rough waters and tramping miles in big-game tracks to keep up with the younger soldiers, even when he volunteered for a combat unit headed to a mountainous region of Afghanistan.

A few years, several rocket-propelled-grenade hits, a blown-out disc, a torn shoulder, a shrapnel strike to the face, broken teeth and a rattled brain later, he is struggling to figure out whether he will ever be able to do what he did before he became Army Spec. Tim Kenney.
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Fort Benning families walk for suicide awareness

Suicide awareness walk on Fort Benning
By: RAQUEL RODRIGUEZ
WRBL News 3
Published: April 26, 2012

FORT BENNING, Ga.
Walkers organized on Fort Benning Thursday to bring awareness and education to the risk of suicide.

Tricia Radenz’s 12-year-old son committed suicide during his dad's deployment in 2009. The mom from Fort Hood, Texas wants to help other parents look for warning signs.
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Suicide awareness walk on Fort Benning
Walkers organized on Fort Benning Thursday to bring awareness and education to the risk of suicide.

Fort Benning soldier is charged with hit and run

Fort Benning soldier is charged with hit and run
By: LIZ BUCKTHORPE
WRBL
Published: February 14, 2012

COLUMBUS, Ga.

"The fact that he took off, i couldn't understand. From one soldier to the next, even if we weren't involved in the accident we would pull over to provide aid, not leave our brother or sister."

The Muscogee County Jail confirms a Fort Benning soldier is out on bond after being arrested for fleeing the scene of an accident that police say he is responsible for. 24-year-old Andrew Kelly of the Army's 3rd Brigade is facing multiple charges after a Monday afternoon incident.

Reports show that Kelly was driving east-bound on Manchester Expressway when he made a sudden lane change to avoid the car in front of him, in turn, smashing into the side of Army Veteran Ingar Parker’s Ford Explorer. She explains, "and then I was hit. And when I was hit I was startled, I didn't know what to do. I think I freaked out and I was screaming and I was hurt and I just didn't understand it."

Parker says that immediately after the collision she jumped out of the car to talk to Kelly and ensure he was okay.

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Fort Benning soldier arrested in 5-vehicle crash that kills one, injures 7

Fort Benning soldier arrested in 5-vehicle crash that kills one, injures 7

Posted: Feb 05, 2012
By Taylor Kinkade
COLUMBUS, GA (WTVM) -
A five vehicle crash in Columbus Saturday night left one man dead, injured several others and has landed a Fort Benning soldier in jail.

Jacob Keller is in the Muscogee County Jail, charged with vehicular homicide, reckless driving, and DUI after police say he caused the five car crash.

Columbus police responded to a multiple car crash at the intersection of Buena Vista and Floyd Roads just before 7 o'clock Saturday night. Upon arrival they discovered five cars that were involved in the accident, and a total of seven people who were injured from the crash.
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Fort Benning soldiers acquitted after facing court-martial

Fort Benning soldiers acquitted after facing court-martial in beatings of ex-soldier and woman
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First Posted: January 28, 2012

FORT BENNING, Ga. — Two Fort Benning soldiers have been acquitted of assault charges in the beatings of a former soldier and a woman in Columbus.

A military jury in the court-martial of Army Pvt. Nathan Smajda found him not guilty Friday of assault with intent to commit grievous bodily injury in the downtown attacks last April. A second soldier, Pvt. Dillon Fisher, was acquitted by a court-martial panel earlier this month.
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