At the Home Is Where The Heart Is Valentine's Soiree on Saturday February 2, 2008, honored guest Lt. R. Zach Alessi-Friedlander, Executive Officer of A Battery, 2-15 FAR, 2nd BCT, 10th Mountain Division (LI)addressed those assembled.
I would like to thank Mrs. Madaras, Maria Cuomo Cole, Nancy Pantoliano, and the other organizers of and participants in the Home Is Where the Heart Is initiative as well as everyone who has helped to make tonight's event possible for inviting me. It is an honor and a privilege to have the opportunity to lend my support to such an important endeavor; and I am also grateful for the opportunity to take a short break from the brutal wintry environs that distinguish Fort Drum from our other Army installations.
Nearly eight months ago, during our Memorial Day ceremonies, I had the opportunity to address the community. As I concluded those remarks, I attempted to articulate the value of service and the bond that unites our servicemen and women with the nation they serve: "Rare is this profession of arms for its whole essence is built upon a foundation of specifically conceptualized values that are intended to discipline individual Soldiers into a coherent and selfless team. The only constants that soldiers will ever have are the support of their fellow Soldiers, the value of their service, and the appreciation of the grateful nation whom they serve." I made those remarks as a soldier on leave from a 15-month rotation to the farmlands south of Baghdad at a time when my perspective was being shaped by the experiences of a unit grappling with the challenges of countering a constantly mutating and multi-faceted insurgency and with rebuilding communities torn asunder by more than four years of war and sectarian violence. Today, the context and purpose of my remarks have assumed a sharper focus: I wish to illuminate the debt we owe as a community and as a nation to these soldiers for the myriad sacrifices that they have made on our behalf. The military today is composed entirely of a volunteer force, of more than a million young men and women who have elected to serve their country knowing full well that they will deploy to Iraq and/or Afghanistan at least once, and, in many cases, multiple times. In most cases, these servicemen will separate from the military before having had the opportunity to formally retire, which means that they will not be entitled to the healthcare, pension, and housing benefits due to those who leave the military after 20 or more years in uniformed service. Today and in the years to come, we, as a nation, must confront a question that we failed to answer adequately after millions of servicemen returned from Vietnam a generation ago: How do we recognize and care for hundreds of thousands of servicemen, who now attempt to reintegrate themselves into the civilian world, after putting their lives on hold for years and exposing themselves to a host of physical risks and emotional stresses, most of which are unimaginable to the average American?
Most of my remarks last May focused on our extraordinary Non-Commissioned Officer Corps, a group correctly referred to as the Army's "backbone" for the direct role that they assume at company level and below in training, leading, and taking care of our Soldiers. Well, if our NCOs are the backbone, then our junior-enlisted Soldiers are the beating heart and well-calloused hands of this same metaphorical body and it is on this group that I would like to focus this evening's remarks because they represent the overwhelming majority of servicemen who will need the type of assistance for which groups like Home is Where the Heart Is are advocating. The average Army private makes about $1500 a month in basic pay (a little more during a deployment) despite the enormous responsibility they are asked to shoulder and risk they are required to assume in today's operating environment. Although some of these Soldiers will go on to become NCOs and some may even pursue commissions as Officers or Warrant Officers, most of them will separate from the service before gaining any significant rank and its accompanying privileges. The experience of war and of military service is a matter of perspective. Most of the nation is engaged in abstract discussions of operational and strategic decision making and geopolitical repercussions; but Soldiers talk with one another about their shared experiences...about the fear and exhilaration of combat; about the longing for family; about hopes for what lies beyond their service. I should preface all of which I am about to say by stating that I would have lived a less complete and less meaningful life if I had not had the opportunity to serve alongside such an exceptional group of young men.
When I was the Fire Support Officer for Charlie Troop / 1-89 CAV, the position in which I served for the entirety of our recent deployment to Iraq, I shared experiences with a special group of FISTers, an MOS minority among the infantrymen and scouts that constituted the main body of our Troop. One of these Soldiers in particular sticks out: SPC Perez, the child of Puerto Rican immigrants, a loving husband, and proud father to two young children. He spent most of the deployment as a dismount and M2 gunner for one of our scout platoons before coming over to our headquarters section, where SSG Phipps, my Fire Support NCO, and I were able to put his considerable motivation and professionalism to good use in processing the myriad civil-military projects that our troop executed in the final 3 months of the deployment. I still remember the first extended conversation we had. It was two Octobers ago immediately following a near-catastrophic IED strike on the humvee in which he had been patrolling. In the first real scare that we had as a troop, three 155mm artillery shells, daisy-chained together and connected to a command-wire initiator, had detonated under the engine block of his humvee, bunny-hopping it off the ground at a 90-degree angle, completely destroying the vehicle and all of the equipment contained within. Fortunately, none of the four soldiers riding in the humvee had been injured, but as we stood next to the charred wreckage of the vehicle in the motorpool later that same afternoon I could tell that he was visibly shaken. In his mind, he understood that if that IED had detonated a split second later under the main body of the vehicle, then all of the occupants would have either been killed or seriously injured. In the subsequent weeks and months, he regained his enthusiasm for the unit and our mission, but the close call still echoed in his thinking. His experiences are not unique. Thousands of Soldiers have shared similar experiences and their long-term responses to such trauma are impossible to predict. In all probability, SPC Perez will eventually get out of the Army and pursue a dynamic civilian life. But, if he struggles to re-adapt to the civilian world in the coming years, then we owe this man the support and compassion that his service merits.
The Army provides its Soldiers with experiences and opportunities for professional development that many use as a foundation on which to build productive and meaningful post-service civilian lives. Many of my Soldiers, who have recently or are in the process of separating from the Army, intend to attend college on the G.I. Bill or have secured jobs through recruitment events involving employers that give a hiring preference to veterans. Right now, I am the Executive Officer at Alpha Battery / 2-15 FAR, which provides half of the artillery support for our brigade. My armorer, SPC Church, is the just this type of Soldier. We were chatting the other week and he explained to me that he entered the Army with no intention of making it into a 20+-year career; rather, he wanted to serve his country and parlay his experiences into a future job with the Houston Police Department. I joked with him about getting a speeding-ticket pass if I ever encounter him on the roads in and around Houston in the coming years; but, in all seriousness, this type of professional vision one in which the skills, training, and experiences that one acquires while in the Army serve as stepping stones to lively civilian careers is just such the type of plan that one often encounters when talking to today's Soldiers. But, just as with SPC Perez, our country owes SPC Church the support and compassion that his service merits, if he encounters difficulties in re-adapting to the civilian world.
When Mrs. Madaras first approached me about this great and important initiative, I was struck by some of the more alarming statistics concerning our veterans. The facts that a third of all homeless men whom we encounter on the streets are veterans and that there are already nearly 400 homeless veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are truly national tragedies. I have been moved by the support that our nation has shown for our servicemen and women over the past six years; but we must not let this support wane over the coming decades. I am awed in particular by the energy and compassion that this community has shown for our servicemen. You are taking the proactive lead in dealing with a problem with which the entire nation must ultimately come to grips. Your efforts to build a foundation of support and money in a period during which the struggles of the individual service member are still prominently in the public eye will enable our communities to more effectively support these men and women once the conflict is over and their struggles have faded from national attention.
During my nearly three years in the Army, I have had the distinct privilege of learning from some extraordinary senior officers and NCOs. Into my own leadership vision, I have folded the maxim of "mission first, Soldiers always." Army leaders, especially at company level and below, must be motivated by a sense of urgency not seen since the Vietnam War era. All of our energies are devoted to leading men in combat or training them to deploy and fight in combat; everything we do is inspired by this imperative. The mission the first half of this maxim is the unique domain of the military; but, in the coming years, it will eventually end. Soldiers the second half of this maxim and the essential part to achieving the first half will never go away; and they are the responsibility of not only Army leaders but the nation whom they serve. We must unite in our efforts to support these young men and women now as they fight and prepare to fight and later as they attempt to re-integrate into the civilian world. Your presence here suggests that you understand and share in this sense of urgency; now, we must work to broaden the effort by bringing the message and the mission to the rest of the nation.
