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Guard prepares
for Iraq
More than 2,000 isle members
will report for active duty tomorrow
Spc. Norman Santiago is 43 and has been out of uniform for nearly 12 years. That was until his son, Spc. David Basques, was activated on July 2 for combat duty in Iraq along with more than 2,000 members of the Hawaii Army National Guard's 29th Infantry Brigade.
A few days later, the elder Santiago enlisted in the Hawaii Army National Guard. He is now a member of the same unit as his son, the 29th Support Battalion, stationed at Kalaeloa.
"A father lives to protect his sons," said Santiago. "That's my main reason in enlisting. I am the eagle looking after his little chick."
Throughout the state and in armories and reserve centers in California, Minnesota, Oregon, American Samoa, Guam, Saipan and the Marianas, citizen-soldiers of the 29th Brigade will be reporting for active duty by 7 a.m. tomorrow. They will begin at least four months of pre-deployment training before undertaking a year-long mission in Iraq, replacing the 81st Brigade from Washington. Six Washington Army National Guard soldiers have been killed since the unit arrived in March, the last on an Aug. 6 patrol in Baghdad.
Of the nearly 3,500 soldiers that will make up the brigade, commanded by Brig. Gen. Joseph Chaves, more than 2,000 are from Hawaii. This will make the largest call-up of Hawaii National Guard and reserve soldiers since World War II.
It will be only the second time since the Vietnam War that the 29th Brigade has been placed on active duty for combat. The last time was on May 13, 1968, when 214 officers, 23 warrant officers and 3,101 enlisted soldiers reported to active duty at Schofield Barracks.
But the entire brigade never went to Vietnam. Only 1,500 of the citizen soldiers mobilized in 1968 were sent into combat. Twenty-nine were killed.
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One of the 29th Brigade's three infantry battalions is the Army's most decorated unit and the Army Reserve's only infantry combat unit -- the 100th Battalion, 442nd Infantry. The 100th Battalion, the first all-Japanese American combat unit made up of mostly Hawaii Army National Guardsmen, draws its lineage from World War II's 442nd Regimental Combat Team.
In World War II, the 442nd not only acquired the motto "Go for Broke," but also received more than 18,000 individual decorations. Among the 18,000 are 20 Medals of Honor, 33 Distinguished Service Crosses, 559 Silver Stars, 28 Oak Leaf Clusters to the Silver Star, 4,000 Bronze Stars and 1,200 Oak Leaf Clusters to the Bronze Star and nearly 9,500 Purple Hearts.
Lt. Col. Alan Ostermiller, who assumed command of the 100th Battalion Aug. 2, described it as "an honor. It's a privilege. I see myself as being a good steward. It's my job to take care of what so many men have laid down their lives for. It's a legacy, and I am humbled by it."
Sharleen Acierto's husband, Sgt. 1st Class Glenn Acierto, has been a member of the 100th Battalion for the past 16 years.
On Friday night the Aciertos threw a farewell party in Waianae not only for Glenn, who has been a Honolulu police officer for seven years, but also for her nephews, Spcs. Walter Keamo, Lopaka Eguchi and William Kahoonei IV, who are members of the 29th Infantry Brigade.
Sharleen Acierto said she just plans to keep her family around her this weekend "to spend as much time together as possible."
Earlier in the week, she attended a family readiness group meeting for the 100th Battalion's Delta Company. "A lot of people are still in shock," she said. "They are still numb ... like myself."
She is still keeping her fingers crossed that her husband will be allowed to come each night after a day of pre-deployment classes at Schofield Barracks until he leaves in October for further training at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.
Eguchi, a security screener at the Honolulu Airport for the past two years, said he always expected to get the call after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
"It was always a matter of when, not if," said Eguchi, who graduated from Waianae High School in 1998.
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By the end of this week, all of the brigade soldiers from American Samoa, Saipan, Guam, Marianas and the Neighbor Islands will be billeted at Schofield Barracks until October, when they will join their colleagues from Oregon, California and Minnesota in Texas. The brigade's final training tests will be held at the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk in central Louisiana before it leaves for Iraq.
For Norman Santiago, who will stand in formation tomorrow morning with the 29th Support Battalion's Alpha Company, his first test will begin Aug. 20, when he must face 20 weeks of training in Alabama to qualify as a supply specialist before he can join his son at Fort Bliss.
As he puts it, "I am working this old body to get it back into shape."
Basques, 19, said he never expected to go to war, let alone to serve in the same unit with his dad.
"It's awkward," acknowledged Basques, a 2002 Waipahu High School graduate, "but you get used to it."
But his mother, Penny Basques, who has been with Santiago for the past 28 years, is having problems adjusting.
"She's quiet," said David, who joined the Hawaii National Guard two years ago after graduating from high school. "She doesn't say anything, but, knowing her all these years, I know there is an emptiness. It must be hard when there is one loved one going away ... now there are two of us. I try to reassure her that we'll be home."
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