Merry Christmas from Inside Iraq (A Marine tells of acts of kindness)

Editor's note: The following letter is from Staff Sgt. Brett Ledfors, a U.S. Marine currently stationed in Ramadi, Iraq. Ledfors was born in Wheeling (W.Va.) and is serving in Iraq with Moundsville (W.Va.) resident Sgt. Daniel Ealy.

As a Marine serving in Iraq and someone born at Wheeling Hospital, I'd like to take this opportunity to wish the citizens of West Virginia a Merry Christmas while sharing a true story.

News we get from home sometimes seems quite grim as far as the war. When I initially considered writing to a newspaper about the war, I wanted to show the progress being made here. I looked at the various positive signs from Iraq's growing economy, to the training of their security forces that's humming right along, to our growing success at combating the insurgent threat. Until a few days ago, nothing jumped out at me until Bravo Company Marines patrolled to an anonymous grid coordinate in a city called Ramadi.

The second platoon of B Company, a reserve unit based in Pittsburgh, regularly patrols a suburban area with one to two story buildings, few paved, and many dirt roads. Herds of sheep, palm trees and canals fed by the Euphrates River crisscross the landscape.

Throughout this area are two things that aren't native; U.S. troops and the bad guys (mostly non-Iraqi) they hunt. We refer to the bad guys as AIF (Anti Iraqi Forces), the Muj (short for Mujahadeen), or simply insurgents. The insurgents are rarely seen, but assert themselves by mortaring us regularly, with the occasional improvised explosive device and small arms fire to keep us on our toes.

With that kind of negative attention, the average Iraqi citizen often avoids contact with Marines so as not to be victimized by insurgents. This setting led to my revelation as to what positive thing I could share with the readers of The Intelligencer.

During our patrol led by Sgt. Dan Ealy, who lives near Wheeling, we had a beautiful experience. As Ealy guided our heavily armed column through narrow back alleys, we stopped for a short security halt to look and listen for anything unusual. Our column consisted of heavily armored HMMWVs (replacement for the jeep), with Marines walking amongst them for mutual support. As I looked around the area, I saw several children tentatively watching us from behind a fence. A quick scan of the area showed nothing suspicious, so I approached the kids who eyed me warily. The kids' demeanor changed to tentative smiles as one of my hands left my rifle and pulled candy out of a pocket. The first few children excitedly took the candy and ran around a corner, then the dam broke. A rush of children swirled into our patrol painting a picture of some stern Marines standing guard while others gave candy to kids. Shortly after this, the kids' fathers came out to meet us. They thanked us for the kindness to their children. Even more rare, we could see some of the women smiling at us from a respectable distance. That was something positive indeed. The women being out and interacting with us showed a great deal of progress in this part of the world. What followed could have been a visit among friends. Before I knew it, instead of a rifle in my hand, I had a cup of sweet tea that my new friend Mohammed brought for me and several other Marines.

As it turned out, Mohammed appreciated the simple kindness we showed his children and then the respect we showed him when he arrived. We stood there almost as neighbors sharing hot tea on a cold day making small talk as best we could with the language barrier. All good things must come to an end, so we eventually parted. As we continued on with our patrol though several very poor children had candy that they'd rarely had in their lives, while some very cold Marines had hot tea in their bellies. We shared those things not as Muslims and Christians or civilians and Marines, but as people, pure and simple.

After our patrol returned to base, I shed my ammunition and body armor to sit down to the more mundane side of operations that it seems no profession can escape: the paperwork. As I dated the after action report, it hit me; it's only a few days before Christmas. The symbolism of our encounter with those Iraqis a few days before a holiday symbolic of togetherness didn't escape me as I realized what a sign of hope that simple encounter brought. A cup of coffee tried to warm me from the cold local winter as I replayed that positive experience in my mind. That coffee, however, didn't warm me nearly as much as Mohammed's tea still did hours later.

UPDATE!!!Cadiz Native Survives Blast While on Patrol

Just one day after his letter of goodwill was published in the Christmas day edition of the Wheeling News-Register, U.S. Marine Staff Sgt. Brett Ledfors, a native of Cadiz, was injured by an explosion while on patrol in Iraq.

Ledfors, in an e-mail he sent after the incident, stated he was not seriously injured.

"Me and three of my marines volunteered to supplement another unit's patrol on (Dec. 22) into the more active part of Ramadi," he stated in the e-mail. "En route to the objective, an insurgent detonated an improvised explosive device right next to the vehicle (in which) I was riding. The only reason we're here today is because Uncle Sam has spared no expense in protecting us. The IED was a 155-mm artillery round that (the insurgents) mixed with other explosives and initiated by remote control.

"The resulting blast blew the vehicle up on two wheels as we drove through it. The concussion rocked all five marines in the vehicle and blew me completely out of the opposite side. The next vehicle in the patrol swerved to miss me, then the entire patrol set up defensive positions as (a fellow marine) picked me up," he continued.

"They assessed me for wounds, put me in another hummer, handed me my rifle, and we got the heck out of there. We went on to complete our mission and returned to our base. The armor of the hummer saved all of us, and my personal body armor saved me when I hit the road at 45 mph.

"We're very thankful for the gear we've been given to work with. I walked away with a large lump on the head, some blurred vision, a bloody knee and swollen elbow. Everyone had a pretty good headache and ringing ears. Our gear saved us. I was able to go on a mission the very next day," he added.

Ledfors' ordeal underscored the anxiety relatives face when their loved ones are injured while on active duty in the military. He described this in his e-mail when he stated, "Unfortunately, the Navy medical section had to notify my family about the injuries, which is how my mom found out. I didn't want to worry her more than was necessary."

In a separate letter, Ledfors' mother, Carole McCloy of New Philadelphia, described some of her emotions upon learning of her son's harrowing experience in Iraq. Noting that the incident occurred the day after he sent his first e-mail to the newspaper, she wrote, "However, the day after he wrote to (the newspapers) we received that dreaded phone call. The past three days have been spent trying to learn as much as possible about his condition and the attack. The result was learning exactly what happened and, the best news, that he's going to be OK."

In his description of his attack, Ledfors gave credit to the U.S. military for the protective equipment available to him and the vehicle in which he rode. This is contrary to some of the criticisms leveled by other military personnel, including during a recent news conference where one service man publicly criticized U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld about the lack of armor in military Humvees like the one Ledfors was riding in when his patrol was attacked. [Note: this is editorial comment on the part of the writer - since departed the News-Register - who is a rabid Bush hater and must have been really peeved to hear a soldier say he was well-equipped]

Ledfors' first letter also contradicted many news reports and commentary by news and foreign policy analysts that many of the Iraqi people are resentful of the U.S. military presence in their country. [Oops, more editorializing from the bitter lefty so-called reporter]

In Ledfors' letter, he stated that much good will is spread by U.S. military personnel toward the Iraqi people, which he said is appreciated. He pointed to one patrol by Bravo Company Marines in the city of Ramadi. On that patrol, Marines gave candy to Iraqi children, and he said the children responded with delight. He wrote, "Shortly after this, the kids' fathers came out to meet us. They thanked us for the kindness to their children. Even more rare, we could see some of the women smiling at us from a respectable distance. That was something positive indeed.

"The women being out and interacting with us showed a great deal of progress in this part of the world. What followed could have been a visit among friends. Before I knew it, instead of a rifle in my hand, I had a cup of sweet tea that my new friend Mohammed brought for me and several other Marines."

Ledfors' injury did not deter him from continuing to spread good will among the Iraqi people. In his second letter after his injury he wrote, "The day after that which was Christmas Eve, we went on a friendship patrol. We handed out pounds and pounds of candy plus soccer balls to the local children. We went back to Mohammed's neighborhood and met with his kids, but he wasn't home. I'd promised them a soccer ball the last time we were there, but we had none with us."

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