We come tonight to honor three who paid the ultimate sacrifice for our country.
With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations. - Abraham Lincoln
With contributions by SpamNunn and blue jersey mom
Cpl. Jason A. Karella
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a Marine who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.
Cpl. Jason A. Karella, 20, of Anchorage, Alaska, died Oct. 9 while supporting combat operations in Farah province, Afghanistan. He was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Twentynine Palms, Calif.
Little is known of cpl. Karella, although this comes from the Fairbanks newspaper:
Cpl. Jason Karella, 20, was part of the 1,000-plus-troop battalion helping to train Afghan national security forces when he died Thursday in the country’s Farah province, military spokesman Lt. Curtis Williamson said.
Williamson declined to identify Karella’s death as the result of hostile fire, pointing to security concerns. But he noted that while Karella’s unit — the California-based 2nd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division — is conducting a mission aimed primarily to train Afghan forces, the U.S. battalion is regularly in the thick of combat.
"They are right in there, hooking and jabbing and really heavily involved in the fighting in Afghanistan," Williamson said.
Karella specialized in firing special anti-armor missiles, Williamson said.
Karella was born in Fairbanks, where much of his family lives. His battalion, the only free-standing Marine battalion currently serving in Afghanistan, was part of a task force Phoenix operating across a few of the country’s provinces at once, Williamson said.
rest in peace, cpl. Karella.
Col. Michael R. Stahlman
On Tuesday the Department of Defense made the following announcement:
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a Marine who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Col. Michael R. Stahlman, 45, of Chevy Chase, Md., died Oct. 5 from injuries
sustained in a July 31 non-hostile incident in Anbar province, Iraq. He was
assigned to Headquarters Battalion, Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, Twentynine Palms, Calif.
Colonel Stahlman is one of the highest ranking military members killed in the Iraq conflict to date. The circumstances surrounding his death are still under investigation. The Washington Post explains that:
"Non-hostile incident" is the military term for deaths unrelated to combat, such as from illness, accident, suicide or homicide. Defense officials said Stahlman's death is under investigation but is not believed to be a homicide; they did not elaborate.
Two friends said Stahlman suffered a gunshot wound and never regained consciousness. A family member who spoke on condition of anonymity said relatives have been told few details about how he was injured.
Stahlman died at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda after he
underwent brain surgery in August and battled a systemic infection recently,
friends said.
Colonel Stahlman grew up around the world, but he considered Chevy Chase, Maryland his home. His father was a member of the US foreign service. Sthalman attended a private military high school in Texas, and then entered
the US Naval academy. He graduated from the Naval Academy in 1985. His classmates remember him as an outstanding student.
"He excelled at everything -- academics, athletics -- and he
made it look easy. Whatever we did, he was number one, and he didn't even
break a sweat."
~source
Last year Col. Stahlman was the investigating officer in the trial of the Marine who was charged with killing two dozen civilians in Haditha. He returned to Iraq in February for what was supposed to have been a one-year tour of duty.
Colonel Stahlman is survived by his wife, Kim, and his two daughters, Piper, 7, and MacKenna, 11.
On learning of Col. Stahlman's death, The Governor of California issued the
following statement:
"Colonel Michael Stahlman served with courage, pride and an unrelenting commitment to democracy. Californians are forever indebted to
his sacrifice and we will never forget his dedication.
"Maria and I send our deepest condolences to Michael's family and friends during this difficult time."
Gov. Schwarzenegger said that the flags at the Capitol would be flown at half-mast in Col. Stahlman's honor.
Capt. Lorenza "Ren" Conner, USAF
According to the Defense Prisoner of War / Missing Personnel
Office in Washington, D.C., Capt. Conner and his copilot were "in a flight
of four on a combat air patrol mission over North Vietnam where the plane
was hit by anti-aircraft fire over Tuyen Quang Province. The copilot ejected
safely, was captured and later released by Vietnamese forces, but Conner
could not eject from the aircraft before it crashed."
On Wednesday, October 10th, The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing in action from the Vietnam War, have been identified and will be returned to his family for burial with full military honors.
He is Capt. Lorenza Conner, U.S. Air Force, of Cartersville, Ga. He will be
buried Oct. 25 in Cartersville.
On Oct. 27, 1967, "Ren" Conner and his copilot flew an F-4D Phantom II fighter jet in a flight of four on a combat air patrol mission over North Vietnam where the plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire over Tuyen Quang Province, North Vietnam. The copilot ejected safely, was captured and later released by Vietnamese forces, but Conner could not eject from the aircraft before it crashed.
Link
The McDonnell Douglas F-4D Phantom II was a two-seat,twin-engined, all-weather, long-range supersonic fighter-bomber which was used extensively by all three of these services during the Vietnam War, serving as the principal air superiority fighter for both the Navy and Air Force. It was used in both ground-attack and reconnaissance roles by the close of U.S. involvement in the war.
His family presumed he was dead, but never knew for sure until now. "We still had hope that maybe one day, you know, he would find his way back home," said one of Conner's cousins, Terri Durrah, in Cartersville on Thursday. "I've often said that we've had our time to mourn. It's time to celebrate his coming home. We're happy, now. We now know. So we don't have to wonder anymore. And now we can put him to rest next to his mother."
[snip]
"Growing up with him, it was like he was my big brother," she said. "He was the nicest person in the world that I knew." She was eleven years old in 1967. Conner was 24. He would have turned 65 this year.
Conner graduated in 1960 from the now-closed Summer Hill High School in Cartersville; he was the valedictorian. He graduated from Tuskegee University in 1965 and received his Air Force commission as a Second Lieutenant. "He was a smart young man," said a childhood friend and classmate, Mary Alice Johnson. "He was always neatly dressed. And just memorable." [snip]
"He was humble," Johnson said. "If he had made it back from Vietnam, he would have done something for this community. Definitely so." And she's sure Conner would have come back to Cartersville. "Yes he would have, because he loved Cartersville."
Link
On his last day alive, Lorenza Conner had a locket around his neck, a gun on his hip and his eyes on the sky. The prayers of folks back home followed him as surely as contrails stretched behind his fighter jet.
Those prayers are finally answered. The remains of the Cartersville quarterback are returning home, 41 years after he vanished in North Vietnam. "This is our closure," said Conner's cousin, Terri Durrah. "We know now that he's coming home." Everyone called Conner "Ren." A graduate of Tuskegee University in Alabama, he was an unusual sight in the early years of the Vietnam War: a black pilot. He flew the F-4D Phantom II fighter jet, a two-seater warbird. The jet was in a group of four that ran into anti-aircraft fire on Oct. 27, 1967, over the hills of Tuyen Quang Province in northeast Vietnam. Three jets got away; Conner's did not Durrah recalled a serious boy with a penchant for the printed word. Ren struck a deal with the school librarian to set aside weekly issues of Time and Saturday Evening Post magazines so he could read them first.
he played quarterback for Summerhill High School's football team. The
school, now a community center, was the home of the Blue Devils.
"He had a good arm," said his former coach, Matthew D. Hill. An ordained
minister, Hill will deliver the message at Conner's funeral service. "He was
real energetic, a real go-getter."Such a go-getter that his relatives were reluctant to say he might not be alive, even after the Department of Defense declared him dead. On Oct. 27, 1973, the six-year anniversary of the crash, the family gathered for a memorial service. Even then, "We always held out hope that he might come home alive," Durrah said. No one hoped more than his mother. A presser at a dry cleaners and an employee of Union Carbide Corp., Pauline Conner died in 1986. Mourners buried her at Oak Hill Cemetery, under a polished piece of granite. The headstone also bears the name of a boy who turned his eyes to the sky, wore a locket along with his ID tag, and traveled the clouds with prayers in his slipstream.
In late October, he'll be home for good.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"Ren" Conner, the way his mother remembered him
About "I Got the News Today" (IGTNT) I Got the News Today is a diary series intended to honor service members who have died as a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; its title is a reminder that almost every day a military family gets the terrible news about a loved one.
Click here to see the series, which was begun by i dunno, and which is maintained by Sandy on Signal, noweasels, MsWings, greenies, blue jersey mom, chacounne, twilight falling, moneysmith, labwitchy, joyful, roses, SisTwo, monkeybiz, and me, mediaprof.
Please bear in mind that these diaries are read by friends and family of the service members chronicled here. May all of our remembrances be full of compassion rather than politics.