Army Ranger Died on His 14th War Deployment

[n2doc]

—By Adam Weinstein|

As right-wing pundits decry the end of one US war and the conduct of another, they'd do well to consider the case of Sgt. 1st Class Kristoffer Bryan Domeij. The 10-year veteran of the elite Army Rangers was killed, along with two of his comrades, in an IED attack in Afghanistan on October 22. But Domeij's situation was special: He perished on his 14th war deployment since 2002.

Domeij's commanding officer, Col. Mark Odom, called him "the prototypical special operations" leader whose special skills—he was one of the first soldiers qualified to coordinate Air Force and Navy air attacks from his ground position—made him a hot commodity in the war zones. Domeij, he said, was a "veteran of a decade of deployments to both Iraq and Afghanistan and hundreds of combat missions."

Besides being loved by his colleagues, the San Diego-born Domeij was also (PDF) the married father of two daughters. Assuming an average deployment length of seven months—Army deployments are seldom shorter than that, and usually much longer—he probably spent at least 8 of his 29 years overseas, waging America's wars.

It's easy to make too much of a case like this; Domeij, after all, was a voluntary soldier, and a member of an elite special operations community whose motto is "Rangers lead the way." But a fit young person's willingness to serve his country is not the point; the point is whether this country is abusing its fit young peoples' sense of commitment. It's amazing (and encouraging) that, for all its shortcomings and divisions, the United States still has a supply of dedicated public servants. It's also amazing that we could exhaust our supply so dramatically that we could ask a man to spend nearly one-third of his brief life at war.

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http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/10/army-ranger-dies-14th-war-deployment

[Rhiannon12866]

1. K&R. This is so very sad...

But this man is a real hero, nonetheless. ;( :patriot:

[TwilightGardener]

2. His wife and children essentially did not have him, except as a paycheck

and benefits, for the last 10 years--and then he got unlucky. Very sad. I wonder if he was really willing to do this, with his family's blessing and understanding, or if he just hadn't found a way out of this situation yet by the time he died. It's hard to know what motivates a person to spend this much time away from family, and in danger. Edit to add: Even as the wife of a military member, I don't think I could have put up with the extreme sacrifices this family endured.

[Rex]

3. The look on his face...to me...is one of 'get me the hell out of here'.

Rangers lead the way.

RIP soldier.

[myrna minx]

4. .

:cry: It's as if the military treated his life like it was a dare. RIP.

[cliffordu]

5. .......

:patriot:

:cry:

[Arctic Dave]

6. If you play the game long enough the house will always win. RIP

[riderinthestorm]

8. So sad. RIP indeed. nt

[hack89]

7. Ranger and Special Forces deployments are relatively short

more like 2 to 3 months so 14 deployments does not equal 8 years - the flip side is they also have shorter periods at home. They also spend a lot of time at home training.

The reason is that many of their skills are perishable without refresher training and they don't use them all on deployment. The Army has very specific re-certification requirements because a lot of what they do is very dangerous and requires constant and frequent practice.

[Scuba]

9. This is an indictment of what America has become...

... when I served during the Viet Nam war, doing a second one-year tour was not uncommon, but not the norm. Three or more tours was uncommon, even rare.

The idea that some of our finest have been at war for a decade - in a war based on lies - is simply without redemption. America should be ashamed. Very ashamed.

[City Lights]

10. Heartbreaking.

:cry:

My condolences to his loved ones.