Courtesy Photo | Cpl. Teganya shows Sgt. Sadaghiani how to operate the Mobile Electronic Power 805...... read more read more
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By Maj. Greg Lewis
Excutive officer
Combat Logistics Battalion 7
CAMP DWYER, REGIONAL COMMAND (SOUTHWEST), HELMAND PROVINCE, Afghanistan – It’s atypical for a Monday to ever start off with good news. However, on Monday, May 2, American forces serving in Afghanistan awoke to the announcement that U.S. forces had killed public enemy number one, Osama bin Laden, in the neighboring country of Pakistan. Back in the United States, the news spread quickly, and people rallied from Ground Zero in New York City to Washington, D.C., to every city and town all the way to the west coast and beyond to the global American Diaspora. It was the antithesis of the collective pain felt 10 years earlier on Sept. 11, 2001. The present and former commanders-in-chief eloquently noted how once again a singular unifying event caused demographics to be forgotten as Americans stood together, “one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.”
For America’s service members serving abroad, the past 10 years of conflict have forged a steadfast unity that is often lacking at home. It’s almost cliché to say how we find “strength through diversity;” however, our shared focus of effort truly enables us to ignore the gratuitous socio-economic lines that so often divide our nation and choose instead to capitalize on the varied talents and backgrounds of our service members.
On this first Monday of May, a Marine corporal sits in the Combat Logistics Battalion 7 medical clinic having his arm sutured by a trio of hospital corpsmen eager to demonstrate their skills: Petty Officer 3rd Class Paul McCoy, born in Pusan, Korea; Petty Officer 3rd Class Christopher Bermudez from Laguna Island in the Philippines; and Seaman Richard Lasky from Dallas, Texas. The junior hospital corpsmen are supervised by Petty Officer 2nd Class Volker Schweyer, a naturalized citizen from Munich, Germany. Nearby, the clinic leadership, Senior Chief Petty Officer Renato Tolosa, a native of Luzon in the Philippines, and Navy Lt. Victoria Divis, a Japanese-American from Hawaii, work to ensure the battalion’s Marines and sailors receive the best possible medical care.
The corporal undergoing the field expedient operation is Clement Teganya, originally from Ruhengeri, Rwanda. His father, a member of the Tutsi tribe, was lost in the April 1994 genocide, and his mother fled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo with her family and eventually to America. They now reside in Buffalo, N.Y., where his mother serves in the Rwandan Consulate. Ironically, the night prior, Teganya had a dream that he had personally terminated bin Laden while providing security for a convoy on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
A few days earlier, Teganya, a combat electrician, set up a generator at a patrol base in order to provide air conditioning for a group of Marines reservists from the 1st Battalion, 23rd Marine Regiment based out of Texas and Louisiana. As he set up the power system, the company commander for the 1/23 Marines, Maj. James Korth, a 6-foot 9-inch “tiny” Texan, walked the lines checking on his Marines and identifying areas where he wanted CLB-7’s engineers to emplace Hesco barriers, guard posts and concertina wire for their new patrol base.
After setting up the generator, Sgt. Kamram Sadaghiani, one of the 1/23 Marines, received a “hip-pocket” class on how to operate and maintain the system from Teganya. An Orange County, Calif., native, Sadaghiani is a fluent Farsi speaker and has quickly picked up on the similar Dari language as he liaises with the Afghanistan National Army unit they serve with. His parents fled Iran in 1978 ahead of the toppling of the Shah’s Pahlavi Dynasty by the Islamic Revolution of Ayatollah Khomeini. Satisfied that the Marines knew how to maintain the generator and will have some respite from the upcoming 120-degree temperatures of the Helmand province, we mount up for our ride back to base in our Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles. On the trip back, the radio operator, Cpl. Gary Levron, a native of New Orleans, La., talks about his wife’s college classes, their plans for a restaurant and most importantly, the pending birth of their first son due in a month’s time.
The day has been a reminder of how the stereotypically monolithic Marine Corps is actually a juxtaposition of genuinely talented individuals. It further reinforced how the strength of our national treasure is derived from the amalgamation of these unique men and women whose honor, courage and commitment is a living testament to the universally self-evident truths of great Americans serving their country and making a difference halfway around the world.
| Date Taken: | 05.02.2011 |
| Date Posted: | 05.06.2011 16:45 |
| Story ID: | 69997 |
| Location: | CAMP DWYER, AF |
| Web Views: | 419 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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