Vermonters Go To War

By Helen Simon-Franzak
Photos by Margaret Michniewicz

Although Iraq is thousands of miles from the Green Mountain State, for some Vermonters the war there is as close as an empty spot in the marriage bed or a grave in the local cemetery.

The Iraqi conflict has taken the lives of six men with ties to Vermont. Altogether, about 500 members of the American armed forces have been killed; more than 20 have taken their own lives. The war in Iraq has polarized the nation and become a major issue in the presidential campaign.

For one Vermont family, the conflict has meant the loss of an only son and the grandchildren who will never be born; in another, it has left a first-born child celebrating his first Christmas and first tooth with Daddy risking his life to promote democracy in a faraway land.

On the flip side, some members of the armed forces view assignments in Iraq as a chance to use skills they have worked hard to hone and an opportunity to contribute to a cause they consider much greater than themselves.

Friends, Cellphones, & Babies

Mindy Evnin of South Burlington says her life and daily routine haven’t changed much since her son, Marine Cpl. Mark Evnin, 21, was killed April 3, 2003, after a firefight near the Iraqi city of Kut. It’s how she feels that’s different.
"I have this huge hole in my life," she says. "How I feel is hugely changed."

One good thing that has come out of Mark’s death is the many wonderful people who have contacted her from around the country and the world. Some Jewish war veterans in Florida even named their chapter after Mark.

"It makes me feel comforted that people care and that a lot of people are not forgetting," she says. "… For a moment it feels better."

Still, her life continues to be an emotional rollercoaster. Sometimes she feels fine and is laughing; other times she’s so low she doesn’t know how she’s going to cope.

The hardest part of losing her son, she says, is not seeing what kind of person he would have grown to be and what kind of father he would have become.

"For anybody losing a kid, it’s the worst," she says.

Jessica Cross, 21, of Milton has her cell phone beside her day and night in case her husband, Army Sgt. Paul Cross, has a break in his busy Baghdad schedule to call her. She speaks to Paul once a week for about 20 minutes.
The war has kept the couple’s life in limbo. Paul, 25, a sniper guarding high-ranking officers, was supposed to leave Iraq this February but his assignment was extended. He won’t be home until September. Cross hesitated to buy a car, set up daycare for their 8-month-old son Brennan, and get a job in case Paul was sent home. In the meantime, she has spent the $12,000 nest egg the couple built up for her to stay home with the baby.

Cross says she misses sitting up with Paul at night talking, the intimacy, having him there to help her make decisions about their lives.

"It’s so hard," she says. "It’s awful."

Her husband’s morale and that of his colleagues is very low, she says. To hear Paul, "the leader of our family, say ‘I might die out here’" is very upsetting, she says, her voice cracking.

She worries how the couple’s marriage will be affected by the horrible things he has seen in the war and his long time away, about his mental and physical health, about opening the door to soldiers bringing news of his death.
She also worries about their son being without his father for the early part of his life — having Paul miss Brennan’s first Christmas, his first tooth, his first steps. She feels guilty about tickling the baby to make him laugh when he’s on the phone with Paul.

"I feel awful because Brennan is kind of looking like, ‘Who is that?’" she says. "But I think just for Paul to hear Brennan laugh is important."

Hard for Everyone

Major General Martha Rainville, head of the Vermont National Guard, says mobilization overseas interrupts members’ education, their jobs, and their normal lives with their families.

"It has been difficult for some," she says.

Some families end up with a cut in income if the wage earner leaves a high-paying position for deployment in a lesser-paying one, she says. Deployment can also place a strain on employers — particularly small businesses — who must guarantee the same or equivalent jobs for returning armed-forces members. At least one couple liquidated a family business after deciding it would be too hard for the wife to run it alone when her husband went to Afghanistan.

Rainville says the days are gone when people joining the Guard don’t have to worry about ever going abroad. Now it’s almost a given.

While some Guard members near retirement are weighing whether to leave as soon as they are eligible, Rainville says morale in the National Guard is high overall.

"People are volunteering to be deployed," she says, "because they see it as something positive, something worthwhile."

Major Medical Woman
Trains Troops in Afghanistan

Major Anne Young of the Vermont Army National Guard says she learned a few lessons from her recent assignment training medical personnel for the Afghan National Army (ANA).

"One thing it definitely reinforces is cultural tolerance," she says of her almost seven months in Kabul. "Everybody has so much to learn from each other — us from them and them from us."

And, she adds, "It makes you appreciate what we have in this country — the freedoms, the way of life we just take for granted."

Young, 48, a resident of Barre, is a full-time occupational health nurse with the Guard. Her job is to ensure that the tasks her fellow Guard members do are safe.

She volunteered to go to Afghanistan when her husband Michael was called up to help establish a company of military police within the Afghan National Army. She arrived in Afghanistan June 7, 2003, and returned to Vermont December 31.

In Kabul, Young was the officer in charge of a group assigned to revamp a training program for ANA medics and to help the ANA take over the running of its medical clinic.

Young was one of about a dozen female armed-forces members working at the ANA’s Kabul Military Training Center. Going in, she says, her biggest concern was whether being female would present problems. The Afghan general in charge of the training center said it would not, and he was right.

"It never was an issue," she says.

At the training center she worked amid some 1,800 Afghan male soldiers without incident. The ANA medical personnel she collaborated with were very receptive and eager to learn, she says.

In Kabul, military security was tight. There were ID checks and mirror searches under the vehicles of everyone entering Camp Phoenix — where Young and her husband lived along with as many as 1,000 foreign troops — and the Kabul Military Training Center, about 10 minutes away.

On the street, Young always kept her wits about her and wore her uniform, protective vest, and 9mm pistol. She smiled a lot and said hello in the local language.

"There’s always the potential [for danger]," she says. "We were very, very lucky. There were no incidents with us."

The biggest threat turned out to be the Afghan roadways, where drivers have no age or licensing requirements, there are no rules, and cars jockey with tanks, donkey carts, trucks, and pedestrians for access to the travel lanes.
Young is proud of what she and the five medics assigned to her were able to accomplish. When they got there, there were only six well-trained medics at the Kabul Military Training Center. Her group trained about 180. And when they left, the first 36 medics had just graduated from training run entirely by the ANA.

Young says both she and her husband are glad they had the chance to go to Afghanistan.

"We would do it again," she says.

Demands on Military Reignite Draft Discussions

Discussion about reviving a military draft continues in the wake of the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and commitments of American troops to multiple conflicts abroad.

At present, there does not appear to be much support for such a measure in Congress or among the U.S. armed forces, observers say. Still, the possibility of having the draft reinstated is on the minds of at least some Vermont parents and members of the military.

Jane Kanfer of Williston, a teacher and mother of a 21-year-old son and a 19-year-old daughter, remembers the draft and young men’s fears of being called up during the Vietnam war.

"Kids were scared," she says. "I knew kids that died in my town and we thought it was horrifying."

Kanfer strongly opposes a draft. "To me drafting always felt kind of like slavery," she says.

Instead, she favors improving conditions for members of the voluntary armed forces and resolving conflicts with diplomacy instead of with force.

Kanfer would support her son’s decision to avoid military service if involuntary recruitment were reinstated, she says. "I would help him pack his bags for Canada."

Better Support for Volunteer Army

Major General Martha Rainville, head of the Vermont National Guard, does not support reviving the draft, but says, "It’s not a bad discussion to have."

Rainville says the voluntary system has worked "very well." The quality and motivation of volunteers has been high and many are committed to continuing their education.

With a draft, she says, many resources would be spent on disciplinary measures for those who didn’t want to be there, taking away from efforts to improve the overall force.

"I think there are a lot of negatives with having to rely on a draft," Rainville says.

An alternative, she says, is to improve conditions for the voluntary recruits — with modern equipment, better health benefits for themselves and their families, up-to-date technology; and by keeping promises to take care of them when unexpected hazards arise, such as Agent Orange and Gulf War Syndrome.

Also, efforts should be made to reach out to populations traditionally ignored by recruiting campaigns — particularly women, she says.

Rainville says National Guard recruitments have been up since the end of the war in Iraq last spring and she doesn’t expect a change in the trend.

"They feel the mission is important," she says of new applicants.

Army recruitments at the Armed Forces Career Center in Burlington have been stable in the past several years, says Sargent First Class Lange, who does not use his first name in his job.

"It’s business as usual for us as recruiters," he says, adding that he has no opinion on selective service.

Not Business as Usual

During most of its history, the United States has not had a military draft, opting instead for a small professional army and volunteers in cases of war, says University of Vermont history professor Mark Stoller. A draft was most recently in effect from 1940 to 1946 and from 1948 to 1973.

Stoller, who does not voice a position for or against the draft, says the selective service system the United States had during the Vietnam War did not treat everyone equally since it allowed deferments for certain professionals and college students.

"The most egalitarian system is that everybody is drafted or that everyone gets military training and that they can be called up as needed," he says.

Legislators Speak Out

Members of Vermont’s congressional delegation do not support a return to a draft.

Laurie Schultz Heim, defense adviser to Senator Jim Jeffords says the senator "sees no reason to depart from a system that works pretty well."

However, she says the senator believes the armed forces can do more to broaden the racial and economic background of their recruits, too many of whom, some observers say, come from poor and minority groups with few other options to increase their income and education.

Senator Patrick Leahy says the important thing is to support those in the military.

"The only people making sacrifices are our men and women in uniform overseas, their families, their friends, and the Iraqi people," Leahy said in a written statement. "Reinstating the draft might spread the burden to others, but it wouldn’t necessarily strengthen the military. It would have broad social consequences."

According to Sanders’ spokesman Joel Barkin, Representative Bernie Sanders believes the United States should focus on working with the international community, .

"We’re overextended at this point," Barkin says. "We think that it’s a global issue to have Iraq be a safe and democratic country, and the U.S. can’t do it by itself."

A Matter of Choice

Bonnie Benson of Essex Town has three sons, ages 17, 15, and 13. She says her husband Mark spent 20 years in the Vermont National Guard, so the boys grew up in a military household. The three are considering military college.

"I would support them if they went," she says. "I would be scared, but I would definitely support them."

But Benson says the military is not for everyone. For some, she says, mandatory service would violate their beliefs and take away some of their freedom.

"I don’t know that I’d like to see the draft," she says. "I think there should be a choice."box:

Selective Service Defined

For information on the draft, see the Selective Service System Web site at www.sss.gov

A report for the Congressional Research Service published in December 2002 in anticipation of the war in Iraq said the following:

"A review of military manpower levels and potential war scenarios suggests that only a prolonged war, with major military reverses for U.S. forces, or new international developments creating the need for substantially larger armed forces, would result in a military requirement to reinstitute the draft. …However, there are possible scenarios that might tax the ability of the armed forces to recruit a sufficient number of volunteers. One such scenario could combine an Iraqi conflict with other confrontations (e.g., North Korea). Other scenarios could involve the need for very large peacetime deployments of U.S. forces (e.g., the possible occupation of a defeated Iraq) or major demands for domestic deployments based on threatened or actual terrorist activity."