Surviving the war on terror

Hundreds of Carson City's sons and daughters have gone overseas to join the war on terror.

On this, the one-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, the Nevada Appeal has compiled the thoughts a few have shared.

Kurt "Josh"

Zimmerman

Last April, Kurt "Josh" Zimmerman was riding in a line of amphibious, tracked vehicles along a north Baghdad highway. He and other members of Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Marines were lost in the smoky predawn, looking for the Al Azimiyah presidential palace. Pro-Saddam loyalists fired rocket-propelled grenades at them out of the darkness.

"We couldn't see them to fire back," said Zimmerman, who was born at Carson-Tahoe Hospital in 1980. "We were just shooting at the flashes (made by their rocket launchers)."

After his amtrack was hit, he was peering out the top hatch when Marines called to him from another vehicle ahead. It had been hit three times. He dodged bullets pinging off the pavement as Marines pulled the wounded from the vehicle. The squad's leader was seriously injured - which meant Zimmerman had to take over.

"I get in there, and there's blood all over the seats and fresh faces. I didn't really know most of these guys - I just became their leader."

One of them was his roommate. He had head injuries and a missing finger.

"My other friend - his lower jaw was blown off, and he had just had a baby while we were over there so it was kind of tough," Zimmerman said.

Zimmerman lived in Carson City for only two years, but his relatives in town - with a long Marine Corps history - followed his movements in Iraq anxiously.

Their concerns were intensified because the Marine's uncle, Richard Zimmerman, was killed 35 years earlier in Vietnam while serving in the same unit, the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines.

Joseph Madera

Carson High School graduate Joseph Madera, 20, was so keyed up during his unit's push toward Baghdad last year that he doesn't remember making the one call home he was allowed to make.

"He was just in survival mode," said his mother, Denise. His voice came and went, there was a one- or two-second delay, and it was over in less than two minutes.

A few weeks later her son and the rest of the 101st Airborne secured Saddam International Airport. They re-named it Baghdad International.

Denise and Jose Madera have a picture in their North Edmonds Drive home of Joseph and another soldier posing with Iraqi AK-47s at the airport.

During the push into Baghdad his unit took a lot of mortar and machine-gun fire.

"Those first couple battles really stand out in my mind," he said. "I was just thinking, 'I hope I don't get shot,' and I tried to keep everyone else alive with me."

John Green

When Marine Corps Capt. John Green came home in July 2003 from Kuwait and Iraq where he flew a Harrier AV8B, he was impressed by the greenery around Lake Tahoe.

"I can't even describe how good it is to be home," he said, relaxing on a porch in Marla Bay with his family, friends and neighbors.

"Things actually live here - other than goats and camels."

He described the heat in Kuwait as ridiculous.

"The thermometers only went up to 120 degrees and they were pegged by 8 o'clock every morning," he said.

His wife Meesha graduated from Carson High School in 1993.

"It was hard sending him off to war, but I'm so proud of him," she said, her dark hair flowing over a red dress. They celebrated his homecoming at the summer home of her parents, Carson City's Riley and Jane Beckett.

Green's squadron, the VMA 214 Blacksheep, was involved in the rescue of Private Jessica Lynch, he said.

"We were the ones flying overhead who got the aerial footage and we flew a diversionary tactic - blowing up a big Baath Party headquarters," he said. "We were very instrumental in her rescue."

Jeremy Chapman

Jo McDaniel thought the phone call during dinner last October was a telemarketer. Luckily the guy called back after she hung up.

"He said, 'Don't hang up, don't hang up - your son's coming home from Iraq,'" she recalled.

Meanwhile her boy, U.S. Marine Corps Capt. Jeremy Chapman, was having an epiphany as he drove past a golf course at Miramar Air Station in California.

"I realized that was the first time I'd smelled fresh-cut grass in almost a year," said the helicopter pilot. "The smell just hits you."

Chapman's unit, HMM Squadron 364, the Purple Foxes, landed at Kuwait City International Airport on Feb. 12. From there he and his CH46 "Sea Knight" helicopter moved to the Marine Corps' primary air station at Ali Al Salem.

"Our primary mission is medium lift, which is squad-sized elements (12 soldiers)," he said after his return. "But for the war we primarily did casualty evacuation."

During his 10-day leave he visited his father in Grass Valley, then came to Carson City to see his mother and triplet brothers, Eric, Matthew and Cody. The 13-year-olds play Pop Warner Football and attend Eagle Valley Middle School.

Capt. Chapman said Carson looked pretty nice compared to Iraq.

"Thirty miles south of Baghdad it's nothing but sand. It makes Nevada look downright lively."

Katherine Robinson

Spc. Katherine Robinson, who grew up in a two-story house on Goldfield Avenue and graduated from Carson High in 2000, was working as a photojournalist with the 50th Public Affairs Detachment at Fort Stewart, Ga. on Sept. 11, 2001.

Because many of the public relations soldiers were in Humvee driver training, she and one other soldier handled the news of the terrorist attacks alone.

Her division, the 3rd Infantry, XVIII Airborne, was deployed to Kuwait in January 2002. They later moved into Iraq, where she delivered aid supplies to local religious leaders and served as an escort for civilian media.

"We went with psychological operations soldiers and the 2nd Infantry Brigade out into town to deliver boxes of frozen chickens at the mosques," she said. "Some of the places we went, they kicked us out and one imam we talked to said he would rather eat rocks than our chicken."

At Carson High School, she worked on the Senator News. Before joining up, she worked at the Nevada Appeal as a classified paginator. She also mentored the high school newspaper students.

Caleb Haskins

Carson City's Caleb Haskins will have been in Iraq for a year when he is transferred back to Germany this spring.

Caleb's grandmother Joan Haskins said the 22-year-old Carson native is serving with the 1st Battalion, 4th Regiment, 1st Armored Division, Bravo Battery.

Caleb is driving a Bradley Linebacker tank, and the family expects him home shortly after he returns to Germany.

He is the son of Charles "Tony" and Loretta Haskins of Minden and brother to Joshua. His grandfathers are Ken Haskins Sr. and Richard Calvet, and he's the nephew of Carson City's Rockin' Rev Ken Haskins.

David Sieben

Carson City soldier David Sieben is back in Camp Junction City in Iraq after spending two weeks on leave.

The 24-year-old private first class is a1999 Carson High School graduate, who spent six months in Iraq with the 1st Engineer Battalion, 1st Infantry Division. He returns to Iraq Saturday. His father, John Sieben, owns the Inn Cognito in Genoa, Silver State Pools and General Builders.

"The Iraqi people are very grateful. They love the freedom we've given them," he said. "Children love us, they run out into the streets when we go by, women are starting to come out of the woodwork, smiling and waving. During the day, they love us, but they are still attacking us at night."

Bill Murwin

Sgt. Bill Murwin, 31, of Silver Springs was wounded June 15 after an Iraqi boy threw a grenade into his Humvee. The Lyon County deputy spent four weeks recovering in Maryland's Bethesda Naval Hospital. On June 26 he was awarded a Purple Heart. On his arrival home, he was handed a $210 bill for food while he was hospitalized.

"I think it's wrong. I really do. I don't think it's wrong for senior enlisted like myself or officers who have the income and can pay, but I think junior enlisted are already at a disadvantage, there's no way they can pay. It's like having to pay for getting blown up."

Thanks to Murwin, legislation was introduced in Congress that would change the law that makes soldiers pay for their own food.

Chris Scherbert

Capt. Chris Scherbert is a Nevada National Guard engineer with the 777th Engineer Utilities Team, who served with about 56 other Nevada soldiers in Iraq.

A Dayton resident, Scherbert described the summer in Iraq.

"Point a blowdryer on its highest setting at your face and then throw a handful of sand at yourself, and that's summer in Iraq," he said.

"These people don't like us because of what we represent," he said. "Freedom isn't free. Sometimes that's hard for people who have freedom to remember. But it's why we're over there."

Contact Karl Horeis at khoreis@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1219.