The hometown Baltimore Sun had a follow up today on the death of Staff Sgt. Joseph Curreri, the communications sergeant with an OD-A team out of 2nd Battalion, 1st Special Forces Group who died Friday in the Philippines.

According his biography released by the U.S. Army Special Operations Command, Curreri was an impressive young man – a graduate of the University of Southern California and an accomplished competitive swimmer who enlisted in the Army and went straight into the Special Forces. Unanswered was how he could he have drowned.

The Sun quoted his father:

The elder Mr. Curreri struggled with his composure as he recounted what he understood to be the circumstances of his son's death, which occurred at the conclusion of an arduous, 11-hour scuba training mission. His son, who he said swam "like a dolphin," had "grabbed a snorkel" and jumped back into the water to retrieve some items he had accidentally dropped.

"Somehow he misjudged where they were, and as he was trying to resurface he blacked out," Mr. Curreri said. "He faded back down, and he drowned."

Purely speculation on my part, but here's more about underwater blackouts.

A couple hundred soldiers from the 502nd Military Intelligence Battalion are due back from 15 months in Baghdad.

A Fort Lewis press release said "they collected human and signal intelligence and provided intelligence analysis for Multi-National Corps - Iraq."

There's one return ceremony scheduled for Monday afternoon and another on Tuesday.

From the 'I Did Not Know This' File: Washington state law requires public schools to spend at least 60 minutes in the week before Nov. 11 on "educational activities suitable to the observance of Veterans' Day."

RCW 28A.230.160 says, in part:

The responsibility for the preparation and presentation of the activities approximating at least sixty minutes total throughout the week shall be with the principal or head teacher of each school building and such program shall embrace topics tending to instill a loyalty and devotion to the institutions and laws of this state and nation.

So there you go.

The Washington Post, the New York Times and The Associated Press all had stories today about Adm. Mike Mullen's visit Tuesday with artillery officers at Fort Sill, Okla. The new chairman of the joint chiefs of staff was on a quick tour of a couple Army posts to get the soldiers' view of how the service is holding up under the strain of the wars.

Mullen met mostly with captains, most of them combat veterans.

From the Post:

Mullen acknowledged that troops in Iraq are tired and "ready to come home." He said his goal is to shift "as rapidly as possible" from the current Army standard -- 15 months in combat, followed by 12 months back home -- to equal time deployed and at home.

Some officers were not satisfied. "That's not good enough," one captain said, saying he'd like to be home three years for every year away.

"I've got it that it's not good enough," Mullen replied. Still, he said, even lengthening home stays to 15 months would take time. "We can't wave a wand and get there overnight," he said.

From the Times:

One Iraq veteran said he had witnessed increased disciplinary problems among troops, which he attributed to the enlistment of recruits with lower academic credentials as well as some who have been granted “moral waivers,” a step that allows those with minor criminal records to join up.

This captain, whose name was withheld under ground rules for reporters observing the session, spoke of training all day and then having to spend much of the night on disciplinary action. Of the roughly 100 soldiers in his unit, about a dozen had been caught selling drugs or going absent without leave.

“Making sure we do not break our military is a huge priority for me,” said Admiral Mullen, who vowed to review statistics on discipline so he could gauge any impact of the current recruiting standards.

And from the AP:

"When it becomes a burden to my family, it becomes repulsive," said one captain, who told Mullen that he wants a stable assignment so his wife can go to school, but he was told "family considerations don't play a role" in such planning decisions.

Mullen grimaced as the officer said he was preparing to leave the Army because of the problems.

"We can't not take family considerations into account," Mullen said. "That is just not the case in 2007. It can't be the case if we're going to have a healthy force."

Mullen's Army tour was to include Fort Sill, Fort Riley and Fort Leavenworth, and Army recruiters in Denver. No indication that he'll be coming to Fort Lewis anytime soon.

But if he did, and you got to tell him what's on your mind, what would you say?

The Los Angeles Times has a good story today about Darrell Griffin, Sr., father of a Fort Lewis Stryker soldier killed in Iraq last March.

The elder Griffin went to Iraq himself to research a book he is writing about his son, Staff Sgt. Darrell Griffin, Jr., who died March 21 in Baghdad.

The Cramer family pictured at home in Okinawa on the day -- Oct. 21, 1957 -- that Capt. Harry G. Cramer would become the first the first U.S. service man killed in Vietnam. Young Hank, age 4, clutches a hat between his sisters, Kainan, left, and Anne, right, mom Anne, and their nanny, Imiko.

Sunday marks the 50th anniversary of the death of U.S. Army Capt. Harry G. Cramer, who depending how you look at it, can be seen as the first U.S. combat death of the war in Vietnam. Cramer was leading a team of advisers from the 1st Special Forces Group -- the Green Beret unit his son, Hank, would later serve with during his active-duty and reserve Army career. He retired in 2004 as a reserve lieutenant colonel.

Hank Cramer and his wife, Kit, who are from Winthrop, and other family members will lay a wreath Saturday at the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C. Then on Sunday, they'll attend a formal memorial ceremony at Capt. Cramer's burial place at West Point.

Cramer, a wounded combat veteran of Korea, was killed Oct. 21, 1957 near Nha Trang in what was either a training accident or a Viet Cong mortar attack.

Cramer's name was at first left off the wall when it opened in 1982. Maybe it's because the Special Forces missions

Capt. Harry G. Cramer

in Vietnam were secret then, or maybe it was just bureaucratic bungling. But Harry Cramer had to fight with the government to get his dad's name on the wall. He succeeded, and it was added for Veterans Day 1983.

"This really helps to heal that scar, as far as most of the family is concerned," Cramer said. "To think that at one point he was almost completely forgotten."

But no longer. Cramer's name is also listed on the 1st Special Forces Group memorial at Fort Lewis. The Seattle Times took note in 2002, observing the parallels with his story and that of Sgt. 1st Class Nathan Chapman, the 1st Group operator who was the first U.S. hostile fire casualty in Aghanistan.

Cramer was three when his father left home for the last time, to take his A Team into Thailand and later Vietnam. Still, he has a few memories of him. One is of the rough-housing, of riding around on his back and singing cowboy songs. (This may have something to do with Cramer's retirement past-time as a folk singer).

Another was the time, just before leaving, that his dad sat him down.

The Cramers in 2003 at the 1st Special Forces Group monument at Fort Lewis: Kai, Mrs. Cramer, Hank and Anne.

"Right before he left he got real serious," Cramer said. "He sat me on his knee and said, 'Until I get home, you're the man of the house.' It was a big thing to put on a 3-year-old but I really took it to heart. It really stayed with me."

The Department of Defense today confirmed the news about pending callups and deployments for eight National Guard brigades -- including Washington's 81st Brigade Combat Team.

These units are currently scheduled to begin deployment in the summer of 2008. They are receiving alert orders now in order to provide them the maximum time to complete their preparations. It also provides a greater measure of predictability for family members and flexibility for employers to plan for military service of their employees.

That said, the alert order the Washington Guard received last night still is only an alert, and not a mobilization order. Guard officials today said they don't know yet when, or if, that follow on order will come.

But reading the Pentagon's announcement it sure looks like it's a when, not an if.

The DOD says the 81st will be one of four "security force brigades" that "will be assigned tasks which will assure freedom of movement and continuity of operations in the country. Those tasks will include base defense and route security in Iraq and Kuwait."

Sounds very much like the brigade's mission in 2003-04.

UPDATE: Trolling for reaction to the order, here's a take by one veteran of the last deployment.

Here's that message that went out Thursday afternoon that put the 81st Brigade Combat Team on alert.

G3 18 October 2007
S: 0800(L), 19 October 2007

MEMORANDUM FOR Commander, 81st HBCT WQYQFF

SUBJECT: ROARING BULL message for NGB Mobilization Alert Order number XXX-XX

1. Reference. NGB Mobilization Alert Order number XXX-XX “Operation NOBLE EAGLE/ENDURING FREEDOM/IRAQI FREEDOM” for Partial Mobilization dated 19 xxxxZ OCT 07.

2. This is a ROARING BULL message effective 18 1600(L) OCT 07. This message is applicable to all units associated with WQYQFF (WQYQAA HQ 81st BCT, WQYTAA 181st BSB, WPRJAA 1-161 IN BN, WPRVAA 1-303 ARS, WPRGAA 2-146 FA BN, WP7JAA 81st BSTB, WP7NAA 1-185 AR BN) on NGB Mobilization Alert Order number XXX-XX.

3. F-hour is 18 1600(L) OCT 07.

4. This is an alert message only. The 81st HBCT has been alerted for potential mobilization and deployment in support of the Global War on Terrorism. Upon final determination of the need for the 81st HBCT, HQDA may publish a mobilization order, which will contain the mobilization date and the designated mobilization station. Other mobilization information will be provided by the WAARNG G3 as higher headquarters releases the information. The duration of any mobilization and deployment will be directed in the DA mobilization order. If a DA mobilization order is published, 81st HBCT will be issued a separate ROARING BULL message. Soldiers will not terminate rental contracts, employment, schooling or any other event currently on-going in their personal life during this alert phase. This alert may or may not transpire into a mobilization. All subordinate units will ensure assigned personnel are advised to review their family care and personal deployment plans.

5. Commander, 81st HBCT will contact all Washington State assigned personnel and inform them of the potential for mobilization of all or a portion of assigned units. Commander, 81st HBCT will contact Commander, 1-185 AR BN to ensure proper notification of all CAARNG personnel is being affected.

6. Report in the hour sequence stated in this message until all members of the alerted units are contacted. The hour sequence is: as of F+2, F+4, F+6, F+14, F+16 to the G3-Mobilization Branch at mrowa-all@ng.army.mil. Reporting format: Number of assigned personnel against number of confirmed notifications at that time. NGB has directed a suspense for 100 percent notification of all affected personal to ensure our Soldiers and their families are notified through proper command channels as opposed to local/national media. In order to meet this suspense, the 81st HBCT must report 100 percent notification no later than 19 0800(L) OCT 07.

7. This message is NOT TO BE RELEASED to the news media. Refer all media queries to PAO at 253-512-8989 or pao@wa.ngb.army.mil.

8. POC this action is MAJ Jeff Sabatine at (253) 512-xxxx. (Phone number removed to protect the innocent. MG)

FOR THE ADJUTANT GENERAL:

S
DANIEL R. KERN
COL, FA, WAARNG
G3

After Mosul and Baghdad, Fort Lewis troops have shed more blood in and around Baqouba than any other area in Iraq. So it is with some interest that they likely read the news that come December, when the 3rd Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division pulls out of Diyala Province and returns to Fort Hood, U.S. military planners don't intend to send in another brigade to replace it.

Instead, the plan at the moment appears to be that Fort Lewis' 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division will cover down on Diyala – in addition to the area southwest of Baqouba that it is already covering. The new turf will be as large as the state of Maryland, says the Raider brigade commander, Col. Jon Lehr.

Lehr on Wednesday talked to the Pentagon's "blogger's roundtable," a regular gaggle with military bloggers who talk with newsmakers by conference call.

A transcript of Lehr's remarks is here.

All in all Lehr was very upbeat about his brigade's progress in the area along the Tigris River Valley north of Baghdad, in the areas of Khan Bani Sa'd, Husseiniyah, Tarmiyah and elsewhere in the convergence of Baghdad, Diyala and Salahuddin provinces.

IED attacks are way down, Lehr said, and the market rate that insurgents have to pay to get "the average goomba," as he put it, to emplace a bomb has skyrocketed from $100 to $500.

"The average goomba that's laying an IED realizes, 'Hey, this is serious business. They're killing people out here and they're eliminating the leadership. I'm not going to do this for $100 anymore. It's going to cost you this amount of money to do it.' So that is a huge metric for us to determine how successful we're being."

As for his soon-to-be-expanded AO, Lehr said:

"We are moving over there to take the larger portion of the mission set, which is the remainder of Diyala province, which is absolutely huge. ... I believe it is a success story. I feel, based on my battle space and what we've accomplished, that the tactical purpose behind the surge is working and now we're able to expand further out concentric circles away from Baghdad."

The Pentagon's going to call up eight National Guard brigades later this week – seven for duty in Iraq, one in Afghanistan –  over the next couple years, according to Associated Press defense correspondent Lolita Baldor.

Will Washington's 81st Brigade Combat Team be among them? The brigade spent a year in Iraq and Kuwait in 2004-05.

A Guard spokesman at Camp Murray said he didn't know, and that officials there were waiting to see the pending announcement.

Baldor, citing unnamed "defense officials," reported:

Specific brigades were not identified, but they will include units from North Carolina, Oklahoma, Illinois and Hawaii, according to officials. Some of those being alerted this week have done tours in the war zone already, and others would be going for the first time.

It's not clear how this jibes with a previous AP report, in April, that announced the deployments in 2008 of National Guard combat brigades from Arkansas, Oklahoma, Indiana and Ohio.

A retired Army friend passed this along, clearly sent to him from a friend in blue, with the subject line: "And you wonder why us Air Force guys are so confused about Army units!"

It's a Stars & Stripes bright about reflagging moves that will be made with various units on their way in or out of Iraq. The story includes mention of the 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division at Fort Lewis, which will eventually be rechristened the 2nd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division – just as soon as the current 2nd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division comes home from Iraq to Fort Carson, Colo., and becomes the 4th Brigade, 4th Infantry Division.

But that's nothing.

At Fort Lewis in just the past couple years, we had the 2nd Cavalry Regiment move in from Louisiana and hang around long enough for the 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division to "steal" its name and hightail it off to Germany.

The "old" 2nd CR became the 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, while the Army slapped the 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division tag on what had happily existed as the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team up in Alaska.

As all this played out at Lewis, you always had to be sure you were talking about the old 1st Brigade, or the old 2nd CR, or the new 2nd CR. ...

And inside the 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, we've got the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment – the 2-3 in the 3/2.

And before all that, there was the whole business of referring to the Army's first Stryker brigade – 3rd Bde, 2nd ID – and the Army's second Stryker brigade – the 1st Bde, 25th ID. That is, the first brigade was actually the 3rd Brigade, and the second brigade was in truth the 1st Brigade.

There'll be a quiz later.

Not all the soldiers who deploy from Fort Lewis are trigger-pulling infantry types. The 673rd Medical Company, in fact, is more the tooth-pulling type – they do dental services – and they're heading out soon for a year in the box.

Also deploying is the 551st Medical Logistics Company, and the 153rd Medical Detachment.

The 153rd runs a blood bank and will be making its first deployment of the war.

The 551st is going for the third time – the unit was in Qatar at the start of the war, then returned to Kuwait in December 2004 for a yearlong deployment providing medical logistical support. (They came home on Christmas morning 2005.)

The 673rd also went at the beginning of the war but returned home after just a couple months.

Fort Lewis is holding a deployment ceremony 10 a.m. Friday at the Sheridan Gym on post.

3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division commander Col. Steve Townsend, left, and Brig. Gen. Donald M. Campbell, the DCG at Fort Lewis and I Corps, award Silver Star medals Thursday to soldiers from Townsend's Stryker brigade. Photo: Dean J. Koepfler/The News Tribune

The soldiers who were decorated Thursday with the Silver Star, the nation's third-highest award for combat valor, were, in left to right order in the picture above, Staff Sgt. Mark Grover; Staff Sgt. Shawn McGuire; Staff Sgt. David Plush; Sgt. Tyrese Faulkner, who received it on behalf of Sgt. Jason Harkins, who was decorated posthumously; Sgt. Steven Peters; Spc. Gildardo Cebreros; and Spc. Curtis Lundgren.

Two things: Can you help with the ID of the soldier who received the medal on behalf of Harkins? (Done! Thanks SG 10-30-07) And look for my colleague Christian Hill's story, scheduled to run Saturday, on the actions for which these brave men were honored.

From a brief interview with Townsend:

He and his wife Melissa said they are grateful for the big turnout at Thursday's ceremony and can't help but think how different it was for their fathers, both Army men who came home by themselves from Vietnam.

"There was there was no ceremony, there was no fanfare, there was none of that," the colonel said. "He never really complained about that ... but we all know that our nation didn't do a good job recognizing the service and sacrifice of our Vietnam-era veterans. That's why we do that now."

=> Read more!

A familiar name to lots of folks at Fort Lewis, Col. John RisCassi commands the 2nd Stryker Cav Regiment in Iraq now – the ones who've fallen in on what was the 3rd Brigade's strike force job.

RisCassi spoke for a few minutes with the Pentagon's "bloggers roundtable" group on Thursday. For a transcript, click here.

The Hill newspaper reports out of the AUSA convention this week that Army Secretary Pete Geren says they can't do away with the stop-loss policy just yet, despite SecDef Robert Gates' order to do so earlier this year.

“With the demand on the force that we have today, we are unable to not use stop-loss, in order to make sure that we are able to deploy fully manned and trained and properly prepared brigades to the theater,” Geren said Monday during a press conference at the annual meeting of the Association of the United States Army. “With the increase in the length of deployments, it increases the number of soldiers on stop-loss.”

Gates in January had directed the Army to figure out a way to live without the unpopular policy, which has required several thousand soldiers -- including hundreds from Fort Lewis -- to stay on beyond the term of their enlistment. But the change has turned out to be easier said than done.

ADD GATES: We'll post a transcript of his speech to the AUSA convention today just as soon as we can find one.

AS PROMISED: Here's a transcript of Gates' speech Wednesday.

Lance Cpl. Jeremy W. Burris

The Beaumont, Texas, Enterprise has more this morning about the Marine lance corporal who was killed earlier this week in Iraq.

The Enterprise includes a link to his myspace page.

He spent a couple years here in Tacoma with a Christian discipleship group called The Core before joining the Marine Corps in late 2005.

About 80 soldiers from the 520th Medical Company from Fort Lewis are scheduled to come home tonight after a 15-month deployment to Iraq. They'll be in late, so the post will hold a welcome home ceremony at 1 a.m. at the Soldiers Field House.

The company, part of the 62nd Medical Brigade, ran a medical treatment facility at COB Speicher in Tikrit.

According to a Fort Lewis press release, the unit "provided critical medical treatment to more than 9,075 patients, 1,912 mental health patients, 2,743 dental patients, 567 radiology visits, 9,000 vaccinations, averaged 2,000 pharmaceutical dispenses, treated over 180 trauma casualties, performed 68 emergency evacuations, and treated 750 detainees."

Welcome home.

Strykernews posted this one as well -- Alexandra Zavis' excellent story looking back on the 5th Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment's difficult year in Iraq.

It's told from the perspective of the Joes in A Company, 3rd Platoon, and well worth the read.

Looks like we're going to run at least a portion of the story in Tuesday's TNT. It ran at more than 90 inches in the Times, so follow the link above if you want to read all.

Package includes a link to photos and a video tribute to the six soldiers from the platoon who were killed in a single IED strike May 6 in Baqouba.

There's been a change in the leadership of the hard-hit 2nd Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment in Iraq. Lt. Col. Alfredo Mycue is out as commander, succeeded by Lt. Col. Mark Landes. A 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division spokesman said Mycue asked to retire for personal reasons.

The battalion is currently six months into a 15-month Iraq deployment. It recently moved up from the Doura district of Baghdad to a new area of operations northeast of Baqouba.

The battalion has lost 10 soldiers during the deployment, the most of any battalion in the 4th Brigade.

Brigade spokesman Maj. Mike Garcia said Mycue asked to leave command. Garcia said:

"LTC Mycue was not relieved. For personal reasons, LTC Mycue felt he could no longer give 100 percent to his unit, 2-23 IN. After consulting with COL Lehr and considering the needs of his deployed battalion, LTC Mycue requested to retire. His request was accepted and approved by 1st Cavalry Division on or about 6 SEP 07."

Landes was waiting to take command of the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment at Fort Lewis until he was called up in September to take the job in Iraq, according to a story in Landes' hometown Kingsport, Tenn., Times-News.

Reservists from McChord's 446th Airlift Wing will deliver more than the usual shipment of stuff on a mission that leaves Friday from the local base.

They're going to fly a fire truck from Klamath Falls, Ore., to a village in Nicaragua, where currently the closest fire service is 45 minutes away.

And they'll take 100 pediatric wheelchairs to northern Iraq, where U.S. troops (including many from Fort Lewis) have been working for several years now to provide chairs to kids in need there. The chairs are donated by the Hope Haven International Ministries out of South Dakota.

The flights are possible under the Denton Program, which allows U.S. citizens and groups to ship humanitarian supplies on a space-available basis aboard U.S. military aircraft, the wing said in a press release.

With Lt. Ehren Watada's court-martial, round II, apparently set to go on Tuesday, there's a useful backgrounder on freedom of speech in the military in the new issue of Parameters, the quarterly academic journal published by the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pa.

MEANTIME ... It falls to the newest member of the federal bench in Western Washington, U.S. District Judge Benjamin H. Settle, to decide whether to intervene in the Army's case against Watada. The lieutenant's lawyers want to stop the court-martial while they pursue their case that a second trial would amount to double-jeopardy.

Settle, confirmed in the Senate on a 99-0 vote back in June, has a little bit of experience in the Army's court system. He was a lawyer in the JAG Corps back in 1973-76.

At a hasty hearing Thursday Settle indicated that he might not rule on a stay until Tuesday morning.

U.S. Army Reserve Col. Jonathan Ives, pictured here at a ribbon-cutting last June in Panjshir Province, normally works as the executive director of the Northwest Yacht Brokers Association in Seattle. Since February he's been commanding a U.S. military task force covering five northeastern Afghan provinces. Photo: Pfc. Chris Shin/U.S. Army

In civilian life Jonathan Ives of Seattle is the executive director of the Northwest Yacht Brokers Association. But these days the U.S. Army Reserve colonel is commanding Task Force Cincinnatus in northeast Afghanistan.

He told reporters in a Pentagon briefing Tuesday that Afghan and NATO forces are making progress, particularly in a recent Afghan-led operation in his area. But he said they still are being out-recruited by the Taliban in the more remote valleys.

Ives said he is seeing criminal and Taliban activity in his area and an increasing number of sophisticated attacks that he thinks are led by foreign fighters.

"The Taliban at this time have an established rapport with the community, and sometimes they're seen as being the right answer or a secure answer over the unrest that may exist between the criminal element and/or the power struggles that exist from one to the other or other type of criminal killings, where maybe -- we call them criminal killings -- they're cultural killings, and they can go and answer that revenge because they have weapons and they're in the populace.

"And then the young, impressionable boys see that they're strong and arrogant leaders -- I would say I'd throw in arrogant, but they're definitely strong leaders, and so that it's easy for these impressionable, young youth and young men to migrate towards the Taliban. We have to have that same presence, and the presence needs to be the Afghan National Army and the Afghan National Police as we develop them a little bit further. We've been focusing on the Afghan National Army, and it shows, it really shows, and so does the populace, sits there and comes back and acknowledges that.

"If we can get the police into the same situation, move them down into the valleys and disrupt the Taliban ability, and they can start to see -- the young youth can start to see the police as somebody that they want to emulate, they want to be a part of, they want to do what they're doing in helping the community and helping Afghanistan and not fight against it, then we'll have that good relationship in recruiting. But presently, in some of these areas that have been isolated, we do not have that."

Saw this one on Mike Francis' blog at The Oregonian, Oregon at War. Figuring it could be described as "big." (Also figuring you'll pardon the expletives.)

UPDATE: Commenter observes that this might be a mortar round instead. There is a longer version of the same blast that shows the convoy slowing down and stopping about 200 m or so later. Everybody's OK. No additional rounds or blasts can be seen or heard, which makes me think a mortar less likely.

I was always under the impression that a mortar generally would have a fuze set to burst on impact to send shrapnel flying in all directions, and not to penetrate so deep as to churn up such a huge section of the ground and road.

But I am no expert at this stuff, so I would welcome the input of someone who is.

And as it turns out, the folks at Wired's Danger Room had this same debate some days back. I guess this is why they call it viral video.

Bad news, youngsters: They've got plenty of child doses of flu vaccine on hand at Madigan Army Medical Center. So if mom or dad is running you by the clinic anytime soon, expect to get jabbed.

It'll be another 4-6 weeks before they've got doses on hand for adults, a MAMC spokesman said.

The hospital at Fort Lewis serves some 90,000 military, retirees and family members.

They say you should call 253-968-4744 for more information.

Fort Lewis will hold a memorial ceremony 2 p.m. Wednesday for six soldiers from the 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division who died in Iraq. The ceremony will be held in the Main Post Chapel.

The soldiers to be remembered: Cpl. Joseph N. Landry III, Cpl. Nicholas P. Olson, Cpl. Donald E. Valentine III, Cpl. Graham M. McMahon, Cpl. Luigi Marciante, Jr., and Cpl. David L. Watson.

Members of the public who want to attend can get on post without a Department of Defense ID card. Go to the visitor center at the main gate, exit 120 off Interstate 5, and present your driver's license, registration and proof of insurance to get a visitor pass. Give yourself plenty of time.

The 2nd SCR lost two soldiers in Iraq, the Department of Defense announced today. Sgt. 1st Class Randy L. Johnson, 34, whose home state is listed as Washington, was killed in a bombing Saturday in Baghdad, while Sgt. Robert T. Ayres III, 23, of Los Angeles, was killed by small-arms fire, also in Baghdad, according to Pentagon press releases.

I don't know anything more about where in Washington Sgt. 1st Class Johnson was from, or whether he or Ayres served with the old 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division from Fort Lewis -- before it was reflagged as the 2nd SCR and moved to Vilseck, Germany, in 2006.

I have been trying to reach U.S. Army Europe public affairs folks to set up a link so that they can tell me about 2nd SCR soldiers who are killed in Iraq. My assumption is there are many with the regiment with significant ties to Fort Lewis, and I figure that's something that folks around here would want to know.

If you knew Sgt. 1st Class Johnson or Sgt. Ayres, please share a reflection here.

Here's a link to recent news stories and Army press releases about the regiment, as posted on Strykernews.com.

Readers who have been around a while will well know the story of the 1-25's year in Iraq. Johnson was assigned to the 2nd Squadron -- formerly the 3rd Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment -- and Ayres was assigned to 3rd Squadron, formerly the famed Deuce Four, 1st Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment.

Click here to see a Northwest Guardian story that includes a rundown of the rest of the new, 2nd SCR names of the old 1-25 units.

One of Adm. Mike Mullen's first moves as new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff apparently is to banish the use of the phrase "global war on terrorism."

Here's the e-mail that went out Thursday to all hands (we're learning to speak Navy) in the Joint Staff's J-5 section - the strategic plans and policy shop.

From: Pitman, William B LtCol JCS J5
Sent: Thursday, September 27, 2007 6:10 PM
To: J-5 All (w/o GO/FO)
Cc: J-5 All GO/FO
Subject: *REMOVE ANY REFERENCE TO GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR" OR "WAR ON TERROR" FROM ALL CORRESPONDENCE*

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED

J-5,

Today, we have received clear direction from Adm Mullen (incoming CJCS) regarding the phrase "Global War on Terror". He does not like this reference and we are not to use this in any future correspondence. Review your letters, orders, JSAPs, and presentations to ensure this reference is removed.

Ensure strict compliance.

If you have any questions, please let me know.

R/S,
LtCol Pitman

This raises a whole host of questions. For instance, now what do we call the Air Force one-star on the J-5 staff whose job title is "deputy director for the war on terrorism?"

And what about all the guys who have been decorated with that GWOT expeditionary medal?

Join in the fun at Castle Argghhh!, where they're having a contest to come up with a suitable new name.

New Department of Defense regulations that cap interest rates on payday loans, vehicle title loans and tax refund anticipation loans to service members went into effect today.

The Pentagon also announced a variety of financial advice resources for service members.