Petraeus admits son served in A’stan
So aside from the fact that we both spent more than a day in uniform, General Petraeus and I were both fathers sweating our sons’ deployment to Afghanistan last year. Associated Press link;
Petraeus replied: “I may not be at this table, probably won’t be, in 2015, but I’ll tell you that my son is in uniform, and Lieutenant Petraeus just completed a tour in Afghanistan, which thankfully we were able to keep very quiet, and left in November after serving as an infantry platoon leader. We’re very proud of what he did. He thinks he was doing something very important.”
His son, 2nd Lt. Stephen Petraeus, served in Afghanistan as a member of Alpha Company, 3rd Platoon, 1st Battalion, 503rd Infantry, 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team.
OK, my son is an Air Force Sergeant who works in a hospital and his son is an infantry platoon leader, but ya know, just having a son or daughter so far away in a dangerous place is a life changing experience. I don’t have to tell a lot of you.
Category: Military issues
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Well, I’m grateful to you both.
Wow! A son and a grandson. Well, either you got married real young, or you look real good for your age judging from your pictures. I wish them both the best.
#3 Joe – You should of seen him in basic. Hear tell he was one ugly, sort of mean recruit (j/k). OTH – Lilyea, congrats bro. It really doesn’t matter what slot one serves in. The military can’t be all combat arms and stay afloat. Some go to battle, some work the rear and some simply do what they can, when and for the troops.
My dad (before he died) was really sensitive to war stuff. One time I was at my computer and he was dozing whill my brother was watching Black Hawk Down. I my brother to turn it down, and my dad freaked out, screaming for my brother to turn it off, then apologizing for watching it at all in my presence. Honestly I just wanted the volume turned down.
My youngest son just completed his tour in A’stan while I was in Iraq, and when I was in A’stan, he was in Iraq. We want him to get out, but he loves what he is doing. His next trip to A’stan in the fall, but I’m hanging at the home front for at least 18 months. My oldest got out on a PTSD discharge after his 2nd trip to Iraq and is living in Montana with his wife and new baby boy. I was a 1SG when my oldest went to basic and it sure was a surprise when I went to his graduation at Ft. Knox. Not much in the way of family tradition in the military any more though. I’m retired now, but still serve like they say.
I worked in a hospital that had a Vietnam veteran combat medic-turned-doctor who worked our ER. Kid was brought in with a contact shotgun wound to his head and neck. One nurse fainted and another bolted, and that left the doc and an aide to try and save this kid. He was able to save him because of his combat experience in ‘Nam.
You can be proud of your “Air Force Sergeant who works in a hospital” son — as I’m sure you are.
A good story, it makes a lie of the vacuous claims many of the anti-military types make regarding the lack of service amongst the ‘privileged’ classes.
My son was also an infantryman with the 173rd this last deployment to Afghanistan. He’s suffering some lingering effects from a concussion he got when his MRAP was hit by an IED. Fortunately, there’s an excellent TBI team in Germany, so he’s coming along well.
I tell you, it’s one thing to be serving, and an entirely other set of stressors when it’s your own son in harm’s way. I understand now how my own folks must have felt, and their folks, and so on.
God Bless them all.
Even though my daughter was “in the rear, with the beer and the gear” as a USAF F16 maintenance type, her service at Al Udeid AFB in Qatar is something I’m very proud of.
She volunteered to go on the deployment after her Maintenance Sqdn at Shaw AFB was tasked to provide personnel. She was single and didn’t want to see one of her married shop-mates take the hit and be away from home for 6 months.
Although she was not “in harms way”, as a Dad…and she my only child…I worried.
“Hank why do you…..just carrying on a family tradition.” My Dad, USN WWII, Me USAF and then Ga Army Nat Guard, Desert Shield, Bosnia, my Daughter USMC OIFx2,AND nephew US ARMY, Desert Storm, OIF. TRUE BELIEVERS all!