Marine Becomes Face Above Crowd

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
San Diego Union-Tribune
January 12, 2008 Iraq war veteran received Silver Star for actions in Fallujah in 2004
By Liz Neely, Staff Writer
EL CAJON – Marine Sgt. Kristopher Kane didn't expect accolades.
He was just doing his job that November day in 2004, when one of his fellow Marines was killed and several wounded during an intense, five-hour battle with insurgents in Fallujah, Iraq.
Kane was decorated for his actions with a Silver Star, the U.S. military's third-highest honor for valor. And his picture is on a downtown El Cajon billboard – part of the year-old Hometown Marines program, which honors military heroes in the towns they are from.
The billboard, unveiled last month, is one of fewer than a dozen nationwide and the first in San Diego County. It can be seen on eastbound East Main Street near the Prescott Promenade.
Kane, a 1998 Valhalla High School graduate, is humbled by the public display. He said it is an honor he shares with all the Marines who didn't make it back from Iraq, particularly those in his platoon.
“Everyone wants to honor me for that award, but I also see it as honoring every Marine that serves,” Kane said.
Kane, 27, who lives in Murrieta, is a marksmanship instructor at Camp Pendleton. His father lives in El Cajon. Some people have called him or his father about the billboard, but Kane hasn't made a big deal of it himself.
“If people from my hometown see me as some kind of hero, that's great, but there are a lot more heroes out there that deserve a lot more recognition,” he said.
The 12th Marine Corps Recruiting District in San Diego arranged for the billboard, which is paid for by Clear Channel. A brief dedication ceremony was held last month. Kane told friends about it hours beforehand.
“He's a very modest young man. He doesn't like to blow his own horn,” said Joanne Antoine, a Jamul resident and the grandmother of Kane's best friend. She was among those who attended the ceremony.
Kane's path to the military was almost preordained.
“Everyone has served one way or another,” Kane said of his family.
His father was a Marine. His brother is a sergeant in the Army. Kane, who worked some odd jobs after graduating from high school, joined the Marine Corps in 2001.
Kane initially was stationed in Hawaii and spent years training and working in several Asian countries before being sent to Iraq in September 2004.
On the morning of Nov. 10 that year, Kane and his platoon, C Company, 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines, were in Fallujah to retake the city from insurgents. While his platoon was resting overnight in a guarded building, the building next door was attacked.
Soon his platoon was in a fierce battle, according to military documents and an account in a Marine Corps newsletter.
Kane protected his fellow Marines from gunfire, including some already wounded. When the grenades Kane threw failed to stop the insurgents, his lieutenant, Dustin Shumney, sent in a bulldozer to take down a portion of the house.
The house fell down around Kane, the rubble crushing his right leg. He continued to fight despite the injury. He was sent to hospitals in Germany and then San Diego before spending a month recuperating at his father's house.
Two months after that battle, many of the Marines in Kane's unit died in a Jan. 26 helicopter crash in Iraq. Thirty Marines and a sailor were killed in the crash, 26 of them from Kane's unit.
Kane said he thinks about the November attack daily, but doesn't dwell on the January crash.
“I still like to think of them still living on through all of us who survived,” he said.
Kane heard he was up for the Silver Star about 1½ years after the fight in Fallujah. The letter and citation asking that he be recognized were written by Shumney, who died in the helicopter crash. The lieutenant's notes were found on a laptop recovered from the accident.
El Cajon Mayor Mark Lewis said the city is honored to be part of the Hometown Marines program.
“We're very proud he was chosen, and we think he is a fine example of the military,” Lewis said. “We're just thankful he was able to take the heroic action he took. It just shows the kind of people we have in East County.”
Tricia Kamolnick has a good view of the billboard from just outside her shop, the Lavender Rose Tea Room, on Prescott Promenade. It's important to recognize the contributions of those such as Kane, Kamolnick said.
“I think it's a wonderful idea,” she said of the billboard. “I think the community at large needs to appreciate our military.”
Kane is enlisted in the Marines until 2009 and expects to be redeployed in July, possibly to Iraq. In the meantime, he is looking forward to a personal milestone: He and his girlfriend, Tonya Riley, will welcome their first child later this year.
 
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