A Soldier's Story part 6

Editors Note: This is the last of a six-part series of first-hand accounts written by Sgt. Raymond Murray, a Norwich student on leave to serve as a medic in the U.S. Army in Kosovo. He will serve as a medic treating army personnel and Kosovo citizens for several months. Ray Murray is a Norwich communications major who also served last semester as the The Norwich Guidon sports editor.

By Ray Murray
Norwich Guidon Correspondent

The 399th CSH has been in Kosovo for four weeks and every day brings new patients and new heartaches.

Camp Bondsteel, where we are stationed as members of the KFOR (Kosovo Force), is as comfortable as the U.S. can make it for us. The MWR (Moral Welfare and Recreation) personnel do their best to keep the gyms clean and open 24 hours a day, and they sponsor events and activities every day at every hour to accommodate the varying schedules people work.

Everyone on the base lives in buildings called seahuts, which contain five six-man rooms and one latrine with three showers and a row of sinks and toilets. The seahuts and buildings of importance, except for the hospital, which is a tent structure, are all made of wood. Every other building, including the gyms and the PX (Post Exchange) are huge tents.

The United States owns the land where the base is located for 49 years, and permanent structures are being started now, including a permanent hospital structure.

Armies from all over the world are stationed here, including Italy, Russia, UAE, Jordan, Ireland and the UK. There are others, too many to list here.

Our hospital and our Task Force (Task Force Med Falcon IV) is the biggest and best equipped medical facility in the region so all injuries of major significance come to us via ground ambulance or MEDAVAC helicopter. A few days ago we received a call that six wounded soldiers would be arriving by helicopter to the hospital. The soldiers turned out to be Russians who were attacked on the border by a group of Serbs.

As we were unloading the patients from the chopper, we discovered that two were dead on arrival, having died during the 20-minute flight. Three others had multiple gunshot wounds to the legs and back. And one, which fellow NU Cadet Rob Murray and I carried off the chopper, had two gunshot wounds to the head. Rob and I were carrying the front of the litter (stretcher) and the 21-year-old soldier, who was still alive, gripped our arms. Within 40 seconds of his arriving and just 10 feet from the emergency room, he died while we were carrying him into the hospital. We couldn't revive him.

The next day we got an early-morning call that three British soldiers were enroute by chopper. We were told that all of them were alive but in bad shape. On the way to the hospital, however, their vehicle ran off the road and drove over a mine. All of the vehicles used here are hardened with sand bags and Kevlar blankets, but some of the mines here are as big as trash cans and can do incredible damage.

The patient Rob and I took off the chopper was dead. The mine had opened him up everywhere, and there was not much left for us to put in a body bag. The other two survived the mine explosion, but both will be in traction for a long time.

We received a 35-year-old Albanian man who had been beaten almost beyond repair. Every bone in his face was shattered and his neck was slit open. He had been approached by a group of men as he walked down the street. They spoke to him in Serbian and he answered them in Serbian, as well. But the men were Albanian and had tricked him, using Serbian language to find Serbs. They proceeded to beat him, trying to kill him. Two of the men were later caught by the MPs and Civil Affairs. The irony, however, is that the man they nearly beat to death was one of their own; he wasn't Serbian, after all. Only after learning this did they feel any remorse.

Every day, it seems the patient flow and cases are getting worse. The good weather is bringing the fighters out of their holes. Even though Kosovo is a beautiful country, exploring it would be disastrous, since it is so mined. We can only travel on NATO-marked roads. Farmers and civilians trying to work in the fields, as well as others who simply walk the countryside, are finding and being injured or killed by the mines almost too fast for us to treat them all.

All this takes a huge toll on the solders serving here, no matter what job they do. Seeing people having to live like this, in fear of one another and of venturing outside, is heartbreaking. Seeing children growing up to hate and hurt is not only sad, but disgusting as well. As we have visited little towns to treat people with disease and to teach them proper health, we have discovered that almost without exception the only English sentences the children know is accusing us for helping the "Serbian or Albanian scum."

We are doing a great thing here. What we fear most is that the people are not learning anything from it. But I guess only time will tell.

Additional Note: Ray requested that this postscript be included with this last part of the series as a personal message to members of the corps at the university.

As I type this, the juniors were probably in the middle of the Ring Ceremony. Congratulations! Missing it will always be a regret, but as hard as it is to say, I guess some things are more important. To my friends who are graduating and getting commissioned: good luck. Paul Mieir, Johnny Heaton, Christine Harker, Whilden, John McManus, Mike Cormier, and Brendan Conway, good luck and thanks for teaching me just what being a cadet is supposed to mean. And Paul, you turned out to be an awesome friend. And the rest (you know who you are). Thanks for keeping me sane while I'm here; it means a lot. I owe you big in October.

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