Thanks everyone,
Chaplain TIG

Our YouTube Channel: ChildOfFallenSoldier

This has proven to us that YouTube is a fantastic platform for you to express your support for the Children of Fallen Soldiers. Your support and excitement is surpassing all of our expectations.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, head over to our YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/childoffallensoldier) – Those channel comments are so encouraging and supportive.

Thanks again everyone,
Chaplain TIG

A bridge on Highway 96, going over the Harpeth River was renamed Sunday in memory of Staff Sergeant Timothy Walker, 38.

NASHVILLE, Tenn.- A local bridge will forever be a reminder of another soldier who gave his life fighting for our freedom.

A bridge on Highway 96, going over the Harpeth River was renamed Sunday in memory of Staff Sergeant Timothy Walker, 38. He died in Iraq back in 2008 serving as a military medic.

“Timmy always said he was not the hero… He was doing his job because that’s what he chose to do as a career. This was his job. The real heroes are the wives, the mothers, the fathers, the husbands who were home taking care of their loved ones,” said Barbara Shearer, Timothy Walker’s Mother.

His mom also said Timothy drove over this bridge a lot, and he often even got in trouble on it.

A new website design at www.tricare.mil gives beneficiaries a faster, more personalized way to get the TRICARE information they need.

FALLS CHURCH, Va. – A new website design at www.tricare.mil gives beneficiaries a faster, more personalized way to get the TRICARE information they need. The redesign includes improvements to the profile entry field, as well as new sections such as “New to TRICARE,” “Crisis Center” and “Quick Links.”

The improved profile entry feature makes it easier and faster for beneficiaries to answer three simple questions about status, location and health care plan to bring up information specifically tailored to them.

Beneficiaries who are not sure which category they fall under can visit the “New to TRICARE” section to learn about eligibility, TRICARE plans and get enrollment information…

The “Quick Links” section provides easy access to the most popular topics beneficiaries use the TRICARE website to find – including what’s covered, contact information and locating a provider.

The global navigation bars, found at the top and bottom of each page on the redesigned website provides access to other TRICARE portals. Providers, TRICARE staff, media and others can access these portals to find information about the TRICARE Management Activity and how to become a TRICARE provider.

Beneficiaries can click on the “e-mail updates” link on the top bar to subscribe to e-alerts about changes to benefits and to get newsletters and news releases electronically direct from TRICARE.

Visit www.tricare.mil now to view TRICARE’s new design and offer feedback through the link on the bottom navigation bar.

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Sign up for TRICARE e-mail updates at www.tricare.mil/subscriptions.

Connect with TRICARE on Facebook and Twitter at www.facebook.com/tricare andwww.twitter.com/tricare.

The TRICARE Management Activity administers the worldwide health care plan for 9.6 million eligible beneficiaries of the uniformed services, retirees and their families.

Sgt. Christopher Duke reunites with Rufus at PetAirways on Thursday, July 29, 2010. Rufus was one of the dogs that saved his and other soldiers' lives in Afghanistan.

Article By Chelsea Cook
for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

An injured Army Guardsman home from Afghanistan was reunited Thursday with two of the heroes that saved his life in February, but there were no handshakes or salutes. There was, however, a lot of tail wagging.

Sgt. Christopher Duke, originally from Franklin, Ga., submitted a “wish” to non-profit organization Hope for the Warriors to adopt the dogs he had befriended at his forward operating base in Paktia, Afghanistan. After hearing the story of how Rufus, Sasha and Target saved his life, the organization couldn’t say no.

“That night was just like any other night,” Duke told the AJC on Thursday. “I was using the Internet. My roommates were in our room … playing cards, and they heard the dogs going crazy, barking and growling, which was abnormal. They yelled, ‘Be quiet! Stop barking!”…

The dogs were barking at a suicide bomber strapped with 25 pounds of C-4 explosives. Had he made it any closer to the entrance of the camp, the soldiers may have lost their lives.

“Almost instantaneously, the guy blew up,” Duke said. “In my belief, after looking around and doing research, the dogs were trying to keep harm from coming to us.”

Duke suffered serious shrapnel wounds but walked away from the explosion. Sasha, one of the strays, lost her life.

“The U.S. Army spends unlimited amounts of money to make sure we have the best equipment, the best weapons, the best armored vehicles,” Duke said.  “And the one thing that saves your life is a free-of-charge mutt that you really don’t do much but pay him attention and give him a piece of jerky every now and then. It’s kind of strange. It was surreal.”

Duke and his wife, Lauren, both dog lovers, recently learned they are expecting a child. Duke said this only compounded the meaning behind that night on Feb. 10.

“I owe them so much, not just for my life, but since returning, we now have a child on the way, which wouldn’t be possible without that happening,” Duke said. “He’s not only saved my life, but helped create life for somebody else.”

Duke and his wife will take Rufus and Target back to Franklin before Target is adopted by a medic who also was at the camp the night of the explosion.

“He sent me pictures of Rufus when he was over there, so I feel like I know him,” Lauren Duke said. “We have three other dogs. He’ll be right at home with us.”

Hope for the Warriors will cover the estimated $3,000 to get the dogs to their new owners, a news release said. The dogs were flown an estimated total 25 hours — from the base in Paktia, to Kabul, to Pakistan, to New York, and finally to Atlanta. The flight was made possible by a pet airline service called Pet Airways.

Robin Kelleher, spokeswoman for Hope for the Warriors, said Duke’s “wish” was  different than others she has received from injured soldiers.

“We’ve built multiple pools in the homes of injured soldiers for rehabilitation purposes. We recently granted a fairytale wedding in Hawaii for a soldier,” Kelleher told the AJC. “This is the most unique wish we’ve ever granted.”

How were the stray dogs tracked down once Duke and the other soldiers came home?

“Another group replaced the injured men, and the fiancee of one of those soldiers, she put Hope for Warriors into contact,” Kelleher said.

As Rufus and Target get acclimated to life in the United States, Duke said all he really wants to do is get them home.

“I want to take them everywhere and show them to everybody,” he said, “but I’ll probably just take them home and let them relax from all of this attention they’re getting.”

In May the DCoE posted a poem by a now deceased World War II veteran named Sgt. James Lenihan, in which he expressed his torment about killing a German solider during the war.

That DCoE post was picked up by CNN, and Lenihan’s son Rob was asked to share the poem with viewers and soon became a part of a national dialogue surrounding Memorial Day. Hearing from readers across the world, it was the DCoE’s mission to help people reflect, share and connect with others who have been affected by similar issues and provide resources to help them.

Army veteran Nick Stamatis, almost 70, was one reader who wanted to help. He posted a poem in the “comments” section of the DCoE blog, in response to Lenihan’s poem. Stamatis later told that when he heard Rob Lenihan read his father’s poem on the news:

“I nearly broke down…. I had the feeling that I needed to give voice to the dying soldier… and give Sgt. Lenihan some comfort…. I felt like this guy was carrying this wound with him his whole life…. I thought, I gotta give Sgt. Lenihan some help here.”

The DCoE reposted Lenihan’s poem, along with Stamatis’ poem as a response – we all hope this sharing brings comfort to the Lenihan family and the many other warriors and families dealing with or experiencing war’s spiritual wounds. You are not alone.

A Warrior’s Poem: “Murder — So Foul”

By: Sgt. James Lenihan, World War II veteran (1921- 2007)

I shot a man yesterday
And much to my surprise,
The strangest thing happened to me
I began to cry.

He was so young, so very young
And Fear was in his eyes,
He had left his home in Germany
And came to Holland to die.

And what about his Family
were they not praying for him?
Thank God they couldn’t see their son
And the man that had murdered him.

I knelt beside him
And held his hand–
I begged his forgiveness
Did he understand?

It was the War
And he was the enemy
If I hadn’t shot him
He would have shot me.

I saw he was dying
And I called him “Brother”
But he gasped out one word
And that word was “Mother.”

I shot a man yesterday
And much to surprise
A part of me died with Him
When Death came to close
His eyes.

*Written in the voice of the dying soldier

Grieve No More

By: Nick F. Stamatis, Army veteran

Soldier I see you coming,
Scared and cautious down by me.
I see the sadness in your face
As you knell upon your knee.

On this tortured battlefield,
Trading bullets we did meet.
By only fate did yours reach first,
And now I’m at your feet.

I fear my life is fleeting
I feel it draining out.
It looks you came to comfort
and to quell my primal shout.

Are those my tears upon your face?
Are they for me or you?
What majesty they bring to me,
It seems you feel it too.

You seem to be about my age,
Maybe friends if I’d but wait.
But my time is going on,
Plummeting towards my fate.

And now you put my hand in yours,
And erase what you have done.
I see the shocking truth so clear.
To stop before war’s begun!

You’ve changed the fear upon my brow,
To a need to express my heart.
And the wish to change things,
Before these battles start.

I have so much to tell you,
So much of you I want to know.
Do you feel my forgiveness,
Tell me quickly before I go.

And as my strength is failing,
My mind is not so clear.
How can I convey my thoughts
To one who’s come to calm my fear.

What one word could I summon,
What one name could I call.
What could I do for you,
That would express it all.

I think that I have it now,
In these moments how I’ve grown.
Trust the meaning of this word.
In tomorrows when you’re home.

Your grace helped and gave me,
A wonderful and loving clue.
So in your thoughtful future,
Know it really came from you.

That clue was monumental,
It’s from you my strength was found
I give your hand an answering squeeze,
And my world it’s final sound.

You closed my life with joy,
When you chose to call me “Brother.”
Now back to you that universal word.
The antithesis to war . . . it’s “Mother.”

Wash that anguish from your face
And know that this is true.
If the roles had been reversed,
Would I be half the man as you?

I feel myself floating upward now,
A strangers agony my path did pave.
For you my friend have given all.
A comforting journey to my grave.

- NFS, 6/26/10

*Have a poem that you want to share with the DCoE? All poems should be e-mailed to Corina.Notyce.ctr@tma.osd.mil, in the body of the e-mail, not as an attachment.

*Check out the section on the DCoE website where all of the reader poems that we’ve published so far are kept.

Cemetery officials had previously estimated just 211 were mislabeled.

A Senate subcommittee is holding a hearing to examine… the mismanagement of Arlington Cemetery, one of the nation’s most hallowed burial places for its war dead.

The hearing was spurred by Army Secretary John McHugh’s reports in June that revealed 211 graves were misidentified or mislocated in the historic cemetery.

A months-long investigation found “a lack of expertise in contracting processes within the cemetery, coupled with a lack of focused external oversight.”

The probe exposed a dysfunctional management team with no oversight, missing documents, poor record keeping and failure to notify next-of-kin about the problems, according to the Inspector General’s report.

McHugh said that “by placing everyone in charge, no one was in charge,” and vowed to do “everything necessary and possible to right these unimaginable, unacceptable wrongs.”

However, the cleanup launched in June did not include clearing out personnel.

After the investigation, the cemetery’s former superintendent, John Metzler, who was scheduled to retire next month, was reprimanded. Metzler’s former deputy superintendent, Thurman Higginbotham, was placed on administrative leave pending further review. The pair are invited witnesses at the hearing.

Army Inspector-General Steven Whitcomb said his review found no evidence of deliberate wrongdoing.

But Gina Gray, an Iraq veteran who is suing on grounds that she was fired for bringing the problems to light, wants to see someone held accountable for the blunders. She alleges the cemetery used outdated technology despite receiving millions of dollars to update its record-keeping systems.

“I don’t know what it is going to take to get them fired over there,” Gray said. “We have evidence of unmarked, mismarked graves, mismanagement going decades back.”

McHugh said in June that a number of solutions are currently being considered for correctly identifying the remains in question, including exhuming graves for family members to identify their loved ones by the unique caskets containing them, opening the caskets to pick through articles and mementos, or, as a last resort, conducting DNA tests.

McHugh, sworn in as Army secretary in September, said the circumstances were allowed to continue due in part to fuzzy lines of oversight.

“I’ve restructured the administrative processes, and the lines of authority are pretty clear through the executive director, right down to my desk,” McHugh said.

He said the solutions include pumping money into modern computer technology.

McHugh created a position to oversee operations at Arlington, and will personally supervise the superintendent position, he said.

(CBS)

According to a Bloomberg Markets Magazine investigation,insurance companies have been profiting off of the death-benefits of fallen heroes…

“Ryan was a neat kid,” said Cindy Lohman – Ryan’s mother. “He really wanted to join the Army after 9/11 because he saw that, you know, there were things he could do.”

CBS Evening News Anchor Katie Couric reports Sgt. Ryan Baumann was as proud of his mission in Afghanistan as his mother is of him. A soldier with the 101st Airborne, he was stationed in eastern Afghanistan – protecting villagers from the Taliban and providing critical services – like repairing pumps supplying water.

“One of the things that he said to me,” Lohman said, “he said ‘if anything happens to me, just let the world know we’re making a difference over here.’”

But on August 1, 2008, Ryan was riding in a Humvee when he spotted an improvised explosive device, an IED.

“He told his driver, ‘go left,’ and that placed the IED directly under him,” Lohman said.

Baumann was killed instantly. The driver, gunner and medic with him all survived.

It was hard to accept life without her son, until a casualty assistance officer asked her to choose how she would like to receive his death benefits.

Lohman said, “I handed the paperwork back to the poor CAO and said ‘I don’t want it.’ And he was very patient and explained that it wasn’t an option and that really I had to accept it and had to decide what to do.”

She eventually filed, electing to receive a lump sum of $400,000. But the check never came. Instead, she received a check book and a packet from Prudential saying the money had been placed in its “alliance account” where it was “available immediately” and would “begin earning interest” right away.

Everything seemed fine, until she tried using the checks.

“I was told that the check could not be verified,” she said.

When did you realize this was some different kind of checking account?

“Sad to say, it wasn’t until the journalist contacted me,” she replied.

The journalist was David Evans, award-winning senior writer with Bloomberg Markets Magazine.

“The life insurance company is holding onto their money. And that bothers some people, once they find out,” Evans said.

Evans’ six-month investigative report, appearing today in the magazine’s September issue, reveals that Cindy Lohman’s money was being held in Prudential’s general corporate account — accruing interest –most of it going to the insurance giant.

Joanna Maselko of Duke University in Durham, N.C., and colleagues followed up on data collected in the early 1960s in Rhode Island that tracked interactions between pairs of 8-month-old infants and their mothers… observed by professional psychologists, who evaluated the mothers along a scale ranging from “negative” to “caressing” to “extravagant.”

The researchers assessed mental health of the children when they reached age 34 using a validated symptom checklist, which captures anxiety, hostility and general levels of distress.

When the children were 8 months, one in 10 interactions were characterized by a low level of maternal affection, 85 percent were characterized by normal levels of affection and 6 percent were characterized by very high levels of maternal affection.

The study, published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, finds those whose mothers had been observed to be the most affectionate at 8 months had the lowest levels of anxiety, hostility and general distress at age 34.

High levels of maternal affection are likely to facilitate secure attachments and bonding, which not only lowers distress, but enables a child to develop effective life, social and coping skills, the authors say.

(Reuters) – A 15-year-old New Zealand boy has survived with minor injuries after falling 16-storeys from the balcony of his family’s apartment onto a concrete floor, New Zealand media reported Monday.

The New Zealand Herald said the teen-ager fell about 50 meters off the balcony, dropping through… a carpark roof that may have broken his fall before he hit the concrete. Another tenant raised the alarm after seeing the boy fall past his window.

The newspaper said medical experts were amazed that the boy survived as few people managed to live if they plunged from more than five storeys.

The teen-ager was described as in a stable condition in an Auckland hospital with a broken wrist, broken rib, gashed leg and internal injuries, the New Zealand Herald reported.

“God must have been with him. He’s got an angel looking after him, that’s for sure,” housekeeper Kaa Wehi, who was working in the building at the time, told the newspaper.

(Writing by Belinda Goldsmith, Editing by Gyles Beckford)