Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
New York Times
May 25, 2007
Pg. 6
By Randal C. Archibold
LOS ANGELES, May 24 — For the family and friends of Pfc. Joseph J. Anzack Jr., found dead Wednesday in Iraq nearly two weeks after being captured with two other soldiers in an ambush, the anguish came with a devastating twist: This was the second time in just four weeks that they had gotten word he was dead.
A month ago rumors surfaced in Torrance, the middle-class Los Angeles suburb where he grew up, that Private Anzack, 20, had been killed. Calls went out to the Army and the Red Cross before he himself finally brought relief by telephoning home.
Then came the ambush, on May 12, and the Army’s identifying him and the two other missing soldiers. As American forces’ vast search for them continued, a body was found Wednesday floating in the Euphrates River. It bore a tattoo on one arm.
His father, Joseph Sr., was at first certain that Private Anzack did not have a tattoo. But Army representatives arrived Wednesday evening at the family’s Torrance apartment to break the news, leaving a young soldier’s circle of friends and relatives with memories of a lover of football and wrestling who had enlisted in the Army with aspirations of someday joining the Special Forces.
On Thursday, the Anzacks draped an American flag and a banner with his picture over a railing outside the apartment and then receded inside, where they remained in seclusion for much of the day.
“It’s such a shame when God takes away good people,” said Lenore Storms, a family friend, sobbing as she delivered flowers there. “Sometimes I just don’t understand God and this war.”
As the Anzacks grieved, the waiting continued for the families of the two other missing soldiers: Specialist Alex R. Jimenez, 25, of Lawrence, Mass., and Pvt. Byron W. Fouty, 19, of Waterford, Mich., near Detroit.
Elizabeth Rexroat, a teacher at Private Fouty’s high school, said he called her from Iraq during class one day in March, prompting her to pass the phone around to delighted students.
“He said he just loved his unit,” Ms. Rexroat recalled, “that he was with the greatest guys.”
Specialist Jimenez, a native of the Dominican Republic, grew up in Lawrence, a former mill city north of Boston. Francisco Urena, the city’s veteran services director and a former marine who served a tour as a tank commander in Iraq, told The Associated Press that he anxiously awaited news about him.
“I just wish I could grab my pack and start searching for him myself,” Mr. Urena said.
Joseph Anzack did not take well to academics. He preferred the rough-and-tumble of the football field and the wrestling mat, and when he graduated in 2005 he told people of his dream of joining the Special Forces.
By then the war had been under way for two years, but Private Anzack was not known for introspection and in any event did not share with many people whatever anxiety he might have had.
“Joe could take it,” said Josh Waybright, his football coach at South High. “He had the attitude that he had to go.”
He enjoyed the discipline and camaraderie of being part of a team, friends said. He played nose guard on the football team, a physically demanding position, and spent long hours in the weight room. The team went 2-8 in his senior year, but Mr. Waybright has a photograph on the wall of his office in which Joe exults with teammates after they have beaten their crosstown rivals.
“He was the scrapper in the middle of every play, and I think that is where he wanted to be, in the middle of everything,” said the school’s principal, Scott McDowell. “I think that translated into his desire to be in the military as well.”
The athletic director, Robert Kutsch, who was Joe’s English teacher, said the first scare that he had been killed, and the confirmation of his death now, had resonated in the hallways.
“Then, and even more so now, it brought the war home to Torrance,” Mr. Kutsch said. “Most of my students have not been touched by it, and neither have I. It is like now this is real.”
Ana Facio Contreras contributed reporting from Torrance, Calif., and Ellen Piligian from Waterford, Mich.
May 25, 2007
Pg. 6
By Randal C. Archibold
LOS ANGELES, May 24 — For the family and friends of Pfc. Joseph J. Anzack Jr., found dead Wednesday in Iraq nearly two weeks after being captured with two other soldiers in an ambush, the anguish came with a devastating twist: This was the second time in just four weeks that they had gotten word he was dead.
A month ago rumors surfaced in Torrance, the middle-class Los Angeles suburb where he grew up, that Private Anzack, 20, had been killed. Calls went out to the Army and the Red Cross before he himself finally brought relief by telephoning home.
Then came the ambush, on May 12, and the Army’s identifying him and the two other missing soldiers. As American forces’ vast search for them continued, a body was found Wednesday floating in the Euphrates River. It bore a tattoo on one arm.
His father, Joseph Sr., was at first certain that Private Anzack did not have a tattoo. But Army representatives arrived Wednesday evening at the family’s Torrance apartment to break the news, leaving a young soldier’s circle of friends and relatives with memories of a lover of football and wrestling who had enlisted in the Army with aspirations of someday joining the Special Forces.
On Thursday, the Anzacks draped an American flag and a banner with his picture over a railing outside the apartment and then receded inside, where they remained in seclusion for much of the day.
“It’s such a shame when God takes away good people,” said Lenore Storms, a family friend, sobbing as she delivered flowers there. “Sometimes I just don’t understand God and this war.”
As the Anzacks grieved, the waiting continued for the families of the two other missing soldiers: Specialist Alex R. Jimenez, 25, of Lawrence, Mass., and Pvt. Byron W. Fouty, 19, of Waterford, Mich., near Detroit.
Elizabeth Rexroat, a teacher at Private Fouty’s high school, said he called her from Iraq during class one day in March, prompting her to pass the phone around to delighted students.
“He said he just loved his unit,” Ms. Rexroat recalled, “that he was with the greatest guys.”
Specialist Jimenez, a native of the Dominican Republic, grew up in Lawrence, a former mill city north of Boston. Francisco Urena, the city’s veteran services director and a former marine who served a tour as a tank commander in Iraq, told The Associated Press that he anxiously awaited news about him.
“I just wish I could grab my pack and start searching for him myself,” Mr. Urena said.
Joseph Anzack did not take well to academics. He preferred the rough-and-tumble of the football field and the wrestling mat, and when he graduated in 2005 he told people of his dream of joining the Special Forces.
By then the war had been under way for two years, but Private Anzack was not known for introspection and in any event did not share with many people whatever anxiety he might have had.
“Joe could take it,” said Josh Waybright, his football coach at South High. “He had the attitude that he had to go.”
He enjoyed the discipline and camaraderie of being part of a team, friends said. He played nose guard on the football team, a physically demanding position, and spent long hours in the weight room. The team went 2-8 in his senior year, but Mr. Waybright has a photograph on the wall of his office in which Joe exults with teammates after they have beaten their crosstown rivals.
“He was the scrapper in the middle of every play, and I think that is where he wanted to be, in the middle of everything,” said the school’s principal, Scott McDowell. “I think that translated into his desire to be in the military as well.”
The athletic director, Robert Kutsch, who was Joe’s English teacher, said the first scare that he had been killed, and the confirmation of his death now, had resonated in the hallways.
“Then, and even more so now, it brought the war home to Torrance,” Mr. Kutsch said. “Most of my students have not been touched by it, and neither have I. It is like now this is real.”
Ana Facio Contreras contributed reporting from Torrance, Calif., and Ellen Piligian from Waterford, Mich.