Names, Stories, and Pictures of the Fallen Heroes of Operation Iraqi Freedom

Specialist Mathew Boule

http://www.savannahnow.com/stories/040603/LOCKIAs.shtml

The care package addressed to their son is still in Leo and Sue Boule's Dracut, Mass., home. And even though Mathew will not be able to enjoy its contents, the package will still be sent to Iraq to bring a little happiness to U.S. soldiers in harm's way.

"That is my tribute to my son who, as far as I am concerned, is my hero," Sue Boule said. "Mathew always said to me 'Ma, send goodies, there are a lot of guys here who don't get mail. Whatever you send won't go to waste.' I always overloaded him because I knew he would share."

Mathew played soccer and hockey and wrestled in high school, his mother said. He and his friends would often get together in the Boules' back yard and play paintball.

He wasn't quite sure what to do with his life, but after talking it over with his father, a former Marine, he signed up for a five-year stint in the Army in March 2001.

"He loved his work and he loved his birds," Sue Boule said. "I went to visit him in Georgia last July and he showed me his bird -- that's what he called his Black Hawk. He was so proud of it. He was so proud he made crew chief. Some day he wanted to fly them."

Neighbor Gail Yates saw the difference that the Army made in Mathew. Yates remembered him as a tough, independent youth who found direction in the military.

"I was so proud of him when he told me he enlisted," Yates said. "I said to him 'You're finally doing something with your life.' He found a place and seemed to do well in the Army."

Boule is survived by his parents, two brothers and a sister.

"Mathew would give you the shirt off his back and walk out in the snow," his mother said. "He was very generous. He gave his life. That's how generous he was."

Spc. Ryan P. Long

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=7623822&BRD=2101&PAG=461&dept_id=417987&rfi=6

Seaford man dies in Iraq

By:RANDALL CHASE , Associated Press Writer

DOVER, Del. (AP) - The death of a Delaware man in a suicide car bombing in Iraq sent shockwaves through the tiny Sussex County community of Seaford on Friday.

Spc. Ryan P. Long, 21, was one of three soldiers killed when a car carrying two women exploded at a checkpoint northwest of Baghdad and about 80 miles east of the Syrian border.

All three soldiers were members of the 3rd Battalion of the 75th Ranger Regiment, based at Fort Benning, Ga.

Army representatives visited the home of Rudolf and Donna Long late Thursday to tell them that their son had died.

Donna Long said she last heard from her son on March 9, when he left a telephone message as he was preparing to ship out from Fort Benning.

"He just left a message on the answering machine ... that he wouldn't be able to get in touch with us for a while, ... and that he loves us."

Long, a fourth-generation soldier, knew early on that he wanted to join the Army, his mother said. He was very active in the Junior ROTC at Seaford High School, from which he graduated in 1999.

"We're pretty much in a little bit of shock right now," said Mellie Kinnamon, former principal of Seaford High School. "We all looked at the picture in the yearbook this afternoon."

"It's a very small town; we're very close," said Kinnamon, now an administrator for the Seaford School District, which includes the rural town of about 7,000 and outlying areas. "It's really brought the war real close to home. We have a young man from small-town America who has given his life for his country."

Long joined the Army in 1999 and had been stationed since then at Fort Benning. He was deployed twice to Afghanistan, but he tried to get home as often as he could, last visiting his parents in February.

"We got snowed in that weekend," said Donna Long, who said she never told her son that she was more fearful about his latest deployment than about his two tours in Afghanistan.

"A mother's intuition; I don't know," a distraught Long said.

Ryan Long was a competitive soccer player who also loved snowboarding and water sports, his mother said.

"The most remarkable thing about Ryan was that he lived life to the fullest," she said. "Everything that he did, he gave 110 percent. He was very good, very generous, very kind. ... We were proud of him no matter what he did."

Long is survived by his parents and an older brother.

Capt. Russell B. Rippetoe

http://www.bouldernews.com/bdc/city_news/article/0,1713,BDC_2422_1868460,00.html

Slain soldier Rippetoe lived in Boulder
By Amy Hebert, Camera Staff Writer
April 6, 2003

The fourth Colorado soldier killed in fighting in Iraq lived in Boulder for two years while training in the University of Colorado's Army ROTC program.

Capt. Russell B. Rippetoe, 27, was killed Thursday when a car exploded in a suicide attack at a special operations checkpoint in western Iraq, the U.S. Central Command said.

Those who knew Rippetoe said it was no surprise he would have approached the car after a pregnant woman stepped out of it screaming in fear. It's unknown if the woman voluntarily participated in the attack, which killed her, the driver of the

car and three American soldiers.

"He was trying to help the woman," said Capt. Steve Walter, who retired from CU's ROTC program last fall. "It frankly doesn't surprise me that this whole thing occurred. He was always up front."

Walter recruited Rippetoe into CU's program in the late 1990s, when the young man was a junior criminal justice major at Metropolitan State College in Denver.

He originally lived in Arvada, but Rippetoe enjoyed the ROTC program and his fellow cadets so much that he moved to Boulder and commuted to Denver in 1998 and 1999, said Army retired Lt. Col. Michael Nifong, who commanded the program at the time.

"He was very interested in being a leader, and he had the outstanding character where you could trust him with doing anything," Nifong said.

He said Rippetoe embodied the ROTC value of selfless service, working three jobs to support himself through school so his family wouldn't have to foot the bill.

Rippetoe's mother, father and sister were together Saturday in Gaithersburg, Md., where his parents had just moved last week, said Jim Mason, who lived next door to the Rippetoes in their old Arvada neighborhood.

Mason's wife, Palmer, said their children "idolized" the man they knew as Rusty and were worried when his parents, Joe and Rita Rippetoe, moved because they feared "they would never get to see him again."

Palmer Mason said Rippetoe would come over and play basketball with her kids whenever he visited his parents and he would mesmerize his neighbors with stories of his service in Afghanistan last year.

Rippetoe and the two other soldiers killed — Staff Sgt. Nino D. Livaudais, 23, of Utah and Spc. Ryan P. Long, 21, of Seaford, Del., — were in the 3rd Battalion of the 75th Ranger Regiment, based at Fort Benning, Ga.

Rippetoe is the fourth soldier with Colorado ties to be killed in the war.

First Sgt. Randy Rehn, 36, who grew up in Longmont, was killed Thursday in fighting near Saddam International Airport, his family said.

Marine Lance Cpl. Thomas J. Slocum, 22, of Thornton, and Marine Cpl. Randal Kent Rosacker, 21, who was born in Alamosa, both were killed March 23 at An Nasiriyah.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Staff Sgt. Nino D. Livaudais

http://www.al.com/newsflash/regional/index.ssf?/newsflash/get_story.ssf?/cgi-free/getstory_ssf.cgi?j8857_BC_AL--War-AlaFatality&&news&newsflash-al

Fort Mitchell resident Alabama's second war casualty

The Associated Press
4/7/03 6:35 AM

FORT MITCHELL, Ala. (AP) -- Army Staff Sgt. Nino D. Livaudais, 23, of Fort Mitchell, became Alabama's second fatality in the war against Iraq, Pentagon officials said.

Livaudais lived in the small community near the Georgia state line, not far from Fort Benning, Ga., where he was stationed. He had been assigned to Afghanistan twice and Iraq was his third combat tour in two years.

"He had a purpose. He was doing his part as an American. I knew I never was going to get him behind a desk," said his wife, Jackie Livaudais, who is pregnant with their third child.

"He wanted to make the world better and get the bad guys," she said.

On April 3, Livaudais was at a checkpoint northwest of Baghdad when a pregnant woman jumped from the car, screaming, and the vehicle exploded. He and two other Army Rangers from the 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, were killed.

Livaudais graduated in 1997 from Washington High School in Ogden, Utah, joined the Army a year later and became a ranger in 1999. He planned to make the military a career.

"He believed in his country very much," said high school classmate Chris Hatch. "He always was politically aware of what was going on in the world, and he very much supported and believed in what he was doing. He wanted to be in the action. He yearned for something, something dangerous."

Master Sgt. Robert J. Dowdy

http://www.thetowntalk.com/html/CEE27BA3-1959-47EB-A9EE-26E6B5E5157C.shtml

DeRidder mourns soldier's death
Eugene Sutherland / Staff Reporter
Posted on April 8, 2003

DERIDDER - Family members of a U.S. Army soldier are mourning his loss after he was killed in a recent ambush by Iraqi forces.

Master Sgt. Robert J. Dowdy, 38, was only two years from retirement at the time of his death.

Members of Dowdy's family living in DeRidder, including his wife, Kathy and their teenage daughter, declined comment on the matter.

In an unrelated incident, a soldier from Lake Charles was killed Friday when his vehicle fell into a ravine in Iraq. Pfc. Wilfred D. Bellard, 20, was a member of the 41st Field Artillery Regiment.

Dowdy was described in an Associated Press interview by his Kaneohe, Hawaii-stationed brother, Army Master Sgt. Jack Dowdy Jr., as "athletic, a dedicated family man and a dedicated military man."

Funeral services for the 18-year veteran will be held in his native Cleveland.

When contacted by The Town Talk, the Rev. Whit Holmes, pastor of First Baptist Church of DeRidder, of which the Dowdy family are members, asked that the public pray for the family.

"He was not a member of this church, and I did not have the pleasure of meeting him," Whit said. "He does have family here. ... They would just like some privacy until after the funeral and other arrangements are handled."

Robert J. Dowdy was a member of the 507th Maintenance Company, based at Fort Bliss, Texas. He was one of between 100 to 150 company members and 4,500 soldiers overall who have deployed from there to the Middle East.

The U.S. Department of Defense reported that at least two soldiers were killed in the ambush.

DeRidder Mayor Gerald Johnson met Monday with the Dowdy family.

"I know Kathy real well," Johnson said. "I did not know him. He may have been at Fort Polk for a little while. When we talked, she said she wanted to be left alone. She said, 'I just wish he would come back home.'"

While Kathy Dowdy appreciates the concern, Johnson also said, "She's not after dedications and congregational gatherings. I respect that."

Kathy Dowdy is active in youth summer sports and is an employee of a local flower shop, Johnson said.

He also is not certain if there has been a similar situation in DeRidder since the Korean War, "and certainly not since I became mayor" in 1986.

Jack Dowdy Jr. last heard from his brother, one of three siblings, through an e-mail.

"I can tell you that he was a very patriotic and very loyal man who loved his country," he said. "To my knowledge, he just wanted to serve his country to the best of his ability before he retired."

Pvt. Brandon Sloan

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/07/international/worldspecial/07CLEV.html?ex=1050292800&en=3964b4c252dd7b64&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE

For One Pastor, the War Hits Home
By JAYSON BLAIR

CLEVELAND, April 6 — The Rev. Tandy Sloan has presided over many a funeral and memorial service in his decades as a pastor in a section of the city that has seen its share of violence.

He has consoled weeping mothers, crestfallen fathers and widows searching for answers. He has held them gently and told them that for those who believe, a reunion will take place, someday soon.

But today it was Mr. Sloan, a preacher at the Historical Greater Friendship Baptist Church here in the Forest Hills section of Cleveland, who was looking for answers, discontented with consoling words. With his head slumped, he said the knots were growing tighter and larger in his stomach as he wondered, tried to find some understanding, of why his only child had to die 6,000 miles away in Iraq.

"I'm trying," Mr. Sloan said, pausing as congregants walked by and nodded to him, his eyes glassy and red from tears. "I am trying. I am trusting in the Lord. I know the Lord is still able."

As has happened for thousands whose children, parents or friends have died in the invasion of Iraq, life has been turned upside down for Mr. Sloan. His 19-year-old son, Pfc. Brandon U. Sloan, a supply clerk in the Army, was pronounced dead on Saturday.

Much attention has been focused on the rescue of Pfc. Jessica Lynch, who served with Private Sloan in the 507th Maintenance Company, based at Fort Bliss near El Paso. But many more families of members of the unit are not being lavished with attention by the Defense Department and politicians. They are not flying to Germany, like the Lynch family, to reunite with their loved one.

"Being a pastor does not insulate you from the hurt, the pain, the anger," Mr. Sloan, 44, said.

"The natural inclination is toward resentment, bitterness, even hatred," he added, noting that he had thought all along that President Bush should have given diplomacy more of a chance before invading Iraq.

The 507th Maintenance Company was attacked in southern Iraq on March 23, and at least six members, including Private Lynch, were captured by Iraqi forces. Five members of the company, who were shown being interrogated in images broadcast on Iraqi television, are listed as prisoners of war, and 12 have been declared dead.

Private Sloan is one of two dead soldiers from the 507th who lived in this area. The other, Master Sgt. Robert J. Dowdy, 38, of Cleveland, was also pronounced dead on Saturday. He was only 18 months away from retirement.

Two decades ago, Tandy Sloan moved to the suburbs of Cleveland with his wife, Kimberly, to work in Baptist churches here. As Mr. Sloan worked in the city, the family moved from suburb to suburb looking for the best place to rear their son, until about two years ago, when they divorced.

After the divorce, Brandon moved into an apartment with his father in Bedford Hills, a suburb about 14 miles southeast of downtown Cleveland. At Bedford High School, friends and relatives say, Brandon was a popular student and a defensive lineman on the football team.

In his senior year, in the fall of 2001, Brandon dropped out of school to join the Army. Mr. Sloan said his son had wanted to obtain computer skills he could parlay into a good job.

"His thinking to join the Army was altruistic in the sense that he was bettering his own self while serving his country," Mr. Sloan said.

After enlisting in 2001, Private Sloan became a supply clerk and was assigned to Fort Bliss. In January, he was sent to Kuwait with the 507th. The last time Mr. Sloan heard from his son was in late February, when Brandon sent him an e-mail message from a base in Kuwait.

The next news he heard about him, Mr. Sloan said, was on March 23, when he learned that the 507th had been ambushed. He turned off the television that day, and he says he has not turned it back on since.

For more than a week, Mr. Sloan said, his life was in a "holding pattern" — except for the nightly visits to Historic Greater Friendship, where he is the associate pastor.

Last Wednesday, a day after Jessica Lynch was rescued, the church held a service in support of Brandon Sloan.

The church was packed, something congregants say is unusual for any weekday night. Women in ornate hats were surrounded by police officers and soldiers, bikers and elegant men in suits and ties.

The news that five prisoners of war from the unit had appeared on television gave him hope that others had survived, Mr. Sloan said. And the rescue of Private Lynch gave him the feeling that any day now he would receive good news from the Army officials who had been in contact with him.

"It made me think that there was some chance that Brandon was still alive, out there somewhere," he said.

As the gospel choir brought worshipers to their feet, swaying and clapping, Mr. Sloan said, he felt in a world unto himself as he stared at his Bible. But he was not reading its verses; he was gazing at a photograph inside, of his son at graduation from basic training at Fort Jackson, S.C.

The senior pastor, the Rev. Larry Howard, opened the prayer service by reminding the several hundred people who had gathered that God was "bigger than Hussein." Mr. Sloan bowed his head and closed his eyes. He could hear the women, mostly family members, weeping behind him, and, as he recalls, he started to cry.

"We still have hope," Mr. Sloan said after taking the pulpit. "Hope hasn't gone anywhere."

He continued, smiling as the father waiting for his son was overtaken by the preacher ministering to his flock. "I'm all right," he said. "Brandon is all right. But the question is, are you all right?"

By morning services today, less than a day after the Defense Department had declared Private Sloan dead, that was the question many people were asking Mr. Sloan, who tried his best to assure them with soft-spoken words.

In his deep, rich baritone, Mr. Sloan, composed and stoic for the moment, replied to one well-wisher, "There is something about times like these, times of distress, that brings us all together."

Then Mr. Sloan walked into the church. The service that followed was the first one since his son disappeared at which he did not speak.

He stood in the front row with the other pastors, bowed his head, clapped with the gospel choir and tried to smile.

Pvt. Ruben Estrella-Soto

http://www.kfoxtv.com/weather/2096618/detail.html

Estrella-Soto Classmates Consider Him A Hero

Monica Balderrama, KFOX news at nine.

Students from Mountain View High started the week off with a heavy heart. They learned about their Ruben Estrella-Soto's death in Iraq. But a mist the sadness they feel, there's also a sense of pride.

Larry Zuniga played baseball with Soto in high school. He says, "He was always smiling he was a fun guy."
Alexis Reyes didnt know him personally but knows his girlfriend, "Everyone liked to hang around with him."

Eighteen year old Ruben Estrella-Soto was their friend and classmate. He graduated from Mountain View just last year.

Shawn Buckingham worked with Soto at Silver Streak, "It hurts. It hits close to home. I knew him, I worked with him."

Zuniga, "I felt bad. I had a lot of respect for him because he went over there and died for us."

As we've reported, Soto was killed in action after his unit, the 507th Maintenance Company was ambushed by Iraqi soldiers on March 23rd.

On Monday, students at Mountain View High are making yellow ribbons and collecting items for the troops overseas.

The items are marked with special messages. One reads: Stand tall, stand proud. The Mountain View Lobos from El Paso, Texas.

Reyes, "Some people write on it, just to show more support...show that it comes from our hearts."

Students at Mountain View High are going through a lot of emotions. There's a sense of support, there's sadness because their friend has passed on and there's a sense of pride.

Elva Chavez- Student Activities Coordinator, "He's our local hero. So many are so unreachable and to be able to know someone, they're very happy and very proud of him."

They are proud of him for the courage that he showed. His picture is up on the school's wall of heroes and his name displayed boldly so people will remember.

Buckingham, "He gave the ultimate sacrifice."

Soto grew up in the Montana Vista area, he joined the army after graduating from Mountain Vista High School.

Soto was also only two weeks away from completing his confirmation in the Catholic Church.

Spc. James M. Kiehl

http://www.sbcbaptistpress.org/bpnews.asp?ID=15582

MIA soldier baptized before battle; pastor's son KIA
Mar 27, 2003
By Staff

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--An American soldier listed as missing in action apparently accepted Christ and was baptized several days before being captured.

James M. Kiehl, 22, of Comfort, Texas, was the focus of a report on Dallas' KTVT-TV March 26, during which Kiehl was seen being immersed in the middle of the desert.

Kiehl is one of seven members of the 507th Maintenance Company -- part of the 111th Air Defense Artillery Brigade stationed in Fort Bliss, Texas -- listed as missing in action. Five other members of the 507th have been seen on Iraqi television and are listed as prisoners of war.

During the television report, KTVT's Robert Riggs said Kiehl "seemed to have a deeper awareness about the dangers of combat than any soldier we talked to."

"You've always got the threat of something new," Kiehl said during the report. "Every morning you wake up and it's happening on that morning."

Riggs reported that Kiehl "turned his life over to Christ shortly before the launch of the ground attack. ... His moment of decision had been prompted by a call from home -- a family member told him it was time to pick the right path for his life."

Kiehl's wife, Jill, is pregnant with the couple's first child and is due the last week of April, according to KFOX-TV in El Paso, Texas.

"You know, your mind wants to play tricks on you and you always wonder," she said in an ABC News report. "Missing in action is pretty general. You don't know whether he's alive or dead. You just know, they don't know where he's at."

Another member of Kiehl's company, prisoner of war Patrick Miller, 23, from Valley Center, Kan., accepted Christ during marriage counseling sessions at Olivet Baptist Church in Wichita last year, Baptist Press reported March 25.

Meanwhile, the son of a missionary Baptist church pastor in Prichard, Ala., has been killed. Howard Johnson II, 21, was killed in combat in Iraq March 23. His father is Howard Johnson, pastor of Truevine Baptist Church in Prichard.

"He was God's gift to us and the Lord has taken him away," Johnson said in an Associated Press story.

Before Johnson's son was deployed, the pastor told him to conduct himself in a Christian manner.

"No matter what anybody else did -- drinking, doing drugs, what have you -- remember that he was not to partake of that. Keep yourself clean, so the Lord will be on his side," Johnson said in the story.

Church members praised the younger Johnson's service.

"He served all over the church, was active in the Sunday School and active in the children's ministry," church member Andretta Thomas said, according to The Birmingham News. "He was a productive young man at the church. I think all of us are torn up about it."

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