[W126 Coupe] IRAQ, they just keep shooting at us.

[JFlyer2 at aol.com]

Dand Gary,
I too hope that your boys return safe. 

My son is a Staff Sgt. in the Indiana Nat'l Guard and just returned two weeks 
ago from being in Afghanistan for over a year. He's a medic, and was awarded 
the Meritorius Service Medal while there as well as earned his combat medic 
badge. They sent him out with two Special Ops guys, three Rangers and an Afghan 
interpreter, all around the country doing what he called "drug and terrorist 
interdiction". They were in areas so rugged they couldn't take a Humvee. He 
used an armored 4WD Ford Ranger he said was made in Australia.

This has been his second deployment in three years. I can understand someone 
being regular Army doing this sort of thing. It's their job. But a National 
Guardsman has a civilian life outside of the military that has to be put in 
limbo during these deployments. (He works in a hospital and has a wife and kids.) 
Somehow this doesn't seem right. Given the fact the guardsmen don't have the 
same benefits as a regular army soldier. I was Nat'l Guard during Vietnam and 
never had to go out of country. 

Jay
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