Schofield prays
for fallen soldier
As the U.S. military yesterday reached the morbid milestone of 1,000 soldiers killed in Iraq, friends and comrades honored the latest Schofield Barracks casualty and families of deployed isle reservists continued their worried vigil.
Archie Wung, whose son, Lt. Col. Jonathan Wung, commands the 300 Hawaii Army Reserve citizen soldiers of the 411th Engineer Combat Battalion in Iraq, said the fear of the worst is always with family members left at home.
"They're worried," said the elder Wung, 72. "They're very worried. They want their soldiers to come home."
The reserve unit is halfway through its yearlong deployment and has suffered only two major injuries so far. Still, news of rising U.S. casualty rates in Iraq is on the minds of loved ones at home.
"We expected people to get hurt, but the numbers are getting bigger now," said Archie Wung. "The numbers of those being killed are climbing. Now we hear convoys are being hit by suicide bombers ... We pray all the time for him and his men."
Of the 1,000 soldiers killed in Iraq since March 2003, 12 have had Hawaii ties, including seven from the 25th Infantry Division.
Yesterday, Schofield Barracks held a private 45-minute prayer service for the seventh and latest 25th Infantry Division casualty, Spc. Joseph C. Thibodeaux III, who was shot in the head last Wednesday while on patrol in Hawija, east of Kirkuk. Thibodeaux was assigned to the Army's Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 2nd Brigade Combat Team.
Staff Sgt. Elias Cuellar, 30, spoke at the chapel service about his friend who was affectionately known as "Tippy Toes."
"No one know why he was called that," Cuellar said. "It was a nickname he picked up here."
Cuellar, who has been in Hawaii since 2001, met Thibodeaux when they were members of the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry, and were sent to Bosnia for seven months.
"He liked being in Bosnia," Cuellar said. "It's because people appreciated what he was doing. He said he felt good when a family would smile. He would say they were showing their appreciation.
"It would brighten his day."
Cuellar, who was in Iraq with Thibodeaux for four months, returned to Schofield to recuperate from shrapnel wounds received in an April 4 suicide car bomb attack.
Cuellar said the rising death toll of U.S. soldiers wasn't anything he and other Schofield Barracks concerned themselves with while in Iraq.
"In Kirkuk, there were attacks every single day," Cuellar added. "You didn't know when it's going to happen, so you took it one day at a time. You didn't know where the rounds were going, so you just lived day by day."
Thibodeaux, 24, of Lafayette, La., enlisted in 2000 and had been stationed in Hawaii for four years before being deployed to Iraq about seven months ago.
www.25idl.army.mil
Isle-related deaths
Twelve soldiers and one civilian with Hawaii ties have been killed in Iraq since the war started in March 2003. Of the 13 deaths, 12 were due to hostile action. Seven of them were from the 25th Infantry Division.
Three other 25th Division soldiers were killed in Afghanistan.
Iraq 2004
>> March 18: Pfc. Ernest Sutphin, 21, of Parkersburg, W.Va., was one of seven soldiers riding in a Humvee during a night patrol in Hawija, Iraq, on March 11 when the vehicle rolled into a canal. He was a member of the 2nd Battalion, 11th Field Artillery, of the 25th Infantry Division's 2nd Brigade Combat Team, stationed at Schofield Barracks. He was taken off life support on March 18.>> March 31: Wesley Batalona, 48, was one of four American contractors killed in Fallujah. Their bodies were burned and two hung from a bridge. Batalona was killed when a vehicle he was in was hit by rocket-propelled grenades. He and the three other American victims were working for Moycock, N.C.-based Blackwater Security.
>> April 4: Spc. John Amos II, 20, was killed after an explosive device hit his military vehicle in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk. Amos, of Valparaiso, Ind., was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment.
>> May 1: Staff Sgt. Oscar D. Medina, 32, of Chicago; and Spc. Ramon C. Ojeda, 22, of Ramona, Calif., were killed about 7 p.m. south of Al Amarah when their convoy was attacked. Both soldiers were assigned to the 25th Division's 84th Engineer Battalion.
>> May 2: Staff Sgt. Todd E. Nunes, 29, of Chapel Hills, Tenn., died in Kirkuk when his convoy encountered an improvised explosive device and small arms fire. He was assigned to 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment. Ten soldiers in his unit were wounded.
>> July 29: Spc. Joseph F. Herndon II, 21, of Derby, Kan., was shot while on patrol in Hawija. Herndon was assigned to the Army's 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry.
>> Sept. 1: Spc. Joseph C. Thibodeaux III, 24, of Lafayette, La., killed while on patrol in Hawija, east of Kirkuk. Thibodeaux, an infantry sharpshooter, was assigned to the Army's Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 2nd Brigade Combat Team.
Iraq 2003
>> March 30: Sgt. Eugene Williams, a former 25th Infantry Division soldier whose wife and two children live in Wahiawa, was killed by a suicide bomber at a roadblock north of Najaf. Williams was assigned to the 3rd Division when he was killed.>> Sept. 1: Staff Sgt. Cameron Sarno, 43, a member of the Army Reserve's 257th Transportation Company in Las Vegas, was sideswiped by a truck while changing a tire in Kuwait. Sarno formerly lived in Waipahu.
>> Nov. 7: Chief Warrant Officer Sharon T. Swartworth, 43, an official in the Army Judge Advocate General's Corps, was killed when the Black Hawk helicopter in which she had been a passenger was shot down. She was planning to retire in Mililani at the end of the year.
>> Nov. 15: Sgt. 1st Class Kelly Martin Liberato Bolor, a Maui resident, was killed in the collision of two Black Hawk helicopters. Bolor was one of 17 101st Airborne Division soldiers killed in the largest single loss of American life in Iraq since major combat ended May 1.
>> Nov. 15: 2nd Lt. Jeremy L. Wolfe, 27, of Menomonie, Wis., was a pilot of one of the Black Hawks that crashed. He graduated from Hawaii Pacific University in 2002 and was commissioned through the University of Hawaii Army ROTC program.
Afghanistan 2004
>> May 1: Spc. Phillip L. Witkowski, 24, of Fredonia, N.Y., died in Germany after being accidentally shot on April 30 by a member of his unit in Kandahar. Witkowski was assigned to the 7th Field Artillery.>> June 7: Cpl. David M. Fraise, 24, of New Orleans, La., died in Kandahar when an improvised explosive device hit his patrol. Fraise was assigned to Company A, 2nd Battalion, 35th Infantry Regiment.
>> Aug. 12: Sgt. Daniel Lee Galvan, 30 of Moore, Okla., died in Salerno. He was a crew member of a Black Hawk UH-60 that crashed. He was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 25th Aviation.
