Army Command Sgt. Maj. Marilyn L. Gabbard

Iowa soldier killed in helicopter crash in Iraq
By Henry C. Jackson, The Associated Press



JOHNSTON, Iowa — The first woman promoted to the rank of command sergeant major in the Iowa Army National Guard was among those killed when a Black Hawk helicopter crashed in Iraq, guard officials said Jan. 24.

Command Sgt. Maj. Marilyn L. Gabbard, 46, of Polk City, was a passenger on the UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter when it crashed Jan. 20 northeast of Baghdad, officials said. She was the first woman in the history of the Iowa National Guard to be killed in combat, Iowa National Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Greg Hapgood said.

Military officials said Gabbard’s helicopter might have been shot down, but the investigation was continuing. Twelve National Guard soldiers from seven states and the U.S. Virgin Islands died in the crash.

Gabbard was 19th Iowa National Guard member and the 50th service member with Iowa ties to be killed in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Gabbard was born in 1960 in Boone and graduated from Boone High School in 1979. She served in the National Guard for 27 years, starting in 1979, ascending to the rank of sergeant major. In her most recent post, Gabbard served as state operations sergeant major at the Iowa National Guard’s Joint Forces Headquarters in Johnston.
Gabbard’s long tenure with the Iowa National Guard made the pain from her loss acute, Hapgood said.

“She touched so many people in so many different areas of our organization,” he said.
As the first woman promoted to her rank, Gabbard was in a position to serve as a role model to other woman soldiers in particular, Hapgood said, but Gabbard never saw herself as a trail blazer, just a soldier and a leader.

“She didn’t take it as a burden,” Hapgood said. “She embraced the fact that she had gone places other people hadn’t gone before. I think she relished having soldiers look up to her.”

Gabbard deployed from Iowa on Dec. 16. She served as the noncommissioned officer in charge of the National Guard Affairs Team in Baghdad. It was her first deployment to the region, Hapgood said.

Gabbard leaves behind her husband, Edward Gabbard; daughter, Melissa Danielson; mother, Mary Van Cannon; brothers, Mark and Mike Van Cannon; sister, Marla Noren; two grandchildren, five stepdaughters and a stepson.

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When I read this article I just knew I had to post this on my blog. Because CSM. Gabbard touched so many people in so many different ways I felt it was my duty to pass along her achivements to all my visitors. She has brought great honor upon herself and the United States National Guard and will be forever missed.

Compensation and the VA ... Is enough being done?

Compensation and the VA ... Is enough being done?
January 14, 2007
By Tony Bucaro

January, a month that all disabled veterans look forward to. Why you ask, because every January the government gives disabled veterans an increase in their disability payments.

This year the government passed a 3.3% raise to take effect starting on January 1, 2007. That’s a great start but the VA needs to step up and start taking better care of our veterans. What I mean by this is the time it takes to process claims for compensation.

For example, I put in a claim back in August 2006 for an existing disability which is both my knees. Now, this is not a new claim because I have been receiving compensation for my knee’s since 1998. But because my VA doctor said that I could no long work in nursing because of my condition, I submitted a claim to have my compensation increased. It has been almost 6 months now and they are still sitting on it. What is the reason for this? I have been told that the rating specialists have up to 60 days to hold a claim and then a decision has to be made on it. I have also been told that that’s a lie. So what is one to think? I can say this to you that my claim has been sitting with the rating specialist for well over 60 days now and as of today....nothing.

I was watching the evening news a couple of nights ago and they were interviewing a soldier who just came back from Iraq. He had spent many months in and out of hospitals and rehab centers because he lost one of his legs by an IED. He stated that from the time he was hit in Iraq to his last day in the hospital before going home everyone was just great with him. He didn’t have a bad word to say about the treatment he received by the Army or by the VA. What he did say was that he couldn’t believe that he has been waiting over 6 months to receive word on his claim for compensation from the VA. He stated that he needed that money to help support himself and his family because he is still in physical therapy (PT) and can’t work just yet.

What’s the deal with this? Why is it taking so long to review a claim and decide if a person will receive compensation or not? I understand that it takes time to review each claim but, that sounds like a personal problem and not one that I or any other veteran can help with. But yet, we are the ones suffering for it.

In my opinion the VA needs to step it up on processing claims.

What is your opinion on this? Tell me all about it ………

3 U.S. airmen among 17 deaths in Iraq

Iraqis carry a coffin with the body of their dead relative in front of Baghdad's Yarmouk hospital morgue, Iraq, Sunday, Jan. 7, 2007.

By SINAN SALAHEDDIN, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Three U.S. airmen died Sunday in a car bombing in Baghdad — among at least 17 people killed in violence across Iraq as Iraqi troops launched a fresh battle to oust militias and pacify the capital.

The sectarian attacks continued despite the major drive to tame Baghdad. The Iraqi army reported killing 30 militants late Saturday in a Sunni insurgent stronghold in the center of the city, just to the north of the heavily fortified Green Zone.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, speaking only hours earlier at a ceremony marking the 85th anniversary of the Iraqi army, announced his intention for the relentless and open-ended bid to crush militant fighters bedeviling Baghdad.

Hassan al-Suneid, a key aid and member of al-Maliki's Dawa Party, said the Iraqi leader had committed 20,000 soldiers to the operation that would call upon American troops and airpower only when needed.

A car bomb in Baghdad on Sunday killed the three airmen assigned to the 447th Expeditionary Civil Engineer Squadron's Explosive Ordnance Division, the U.S. military said. A soldier died Saturday after coming under fire in the capital, and another soldier died Friday from combat wounds sustained in Iraq's volatile western Anbar province.

With the deaths, at least 3,011 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

Among Sunday's attacks:

• A barrage of mortars killed four civilians and wounded five others in central Baghdad after a roadside bomb missed an Iraqi police patrol and killed two pedestrians, police said.

• Gunmen drove through a marketplace in southwestern Baghdad, spraying bullets into food and clothing stalls and killing three Sunni Muslim shopkeepers, a police officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Another drive-by shooting targeted four guards for the Iraqi Finance Ministry, killing one of them.

• In Mahaweel, about 35 miles south of Baghdad, gunmen killed a Shiite cleric and his son as they were heading to a nearby Shiite shrine, police said.

• Attackers shot dead a Defense Ministry employee on his way to work south of Baghdad, and a provincial councilman was injured in an assassination attempt in Hillah. Police said a parked car bomb killed a woman and wounded 13 people in an outdoor market in the same city, about 60 miles south of Baghdad.

On Saturday, a stern al-Maliki told the nation the Iraqi army operation in Baghdad would continue "until all goals are achieved and security is ensured for all citizens."

"We are fully aware that implementing the plan will lead to some harassment for all beloved Baghdad residents, but we are confident they fully understand the brutal terrorist assault we all face."

State television said eight militants, including five Sudanese fighters, were captured Saturday in the battle near Haifa Street, a Sunni insurgent stronghold on the west bank of the Tigris, where police reported finding the bodies of 27 torture victims dumped earlier in the day.

Al-Suneid, who is also a member of parliament, said the new drive to free Baghdad from the grip of sectarian violence would focus initially on Sunni insurgent strongholds in western Baghdad.

Sunnis were likely to cry foul, given that a large measure of today's violence in Baghdad is the work of Shiite militias, loyal to al-Maliki's key political backer, Muqtada al-Sadr.

Also Sunday, the U.S. military announced that 88 suspects were captured in American and Iraqi raids last week, and a weapons cache used for assembling improvised explosive devices was destroyed. Sixty-nine of those suspects were released after questioning, the military said in a statement.

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As I read this today all I could think about were their families. This war has taken a toll on all Americans and I hope and pray that the Iraqi people will step up and take control of their own country soon.

This is just my 2 cents!!