Soldiers Return After Year in Iraq
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
FORT DRUM – More soldiers from the First Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment of the 10th Mountain Division were returning yesterday and today from a year’s deployment in Iraq.
About 50 returned Saturday to Fort Drum in northern New York. At a welcome home ceremony, Major General Lloyd Austin III said the battalion performed its combat operations flawlessly regardless of where they were or who they served.
They were stationed west of Fallujah and also south of Baghdad. The battalion was under the command at different times of the 82nd Airborne Division, the 1st Infantry Division and the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force.
Four battalion members died in Iraq, Lieutenant Richard Torres and Private First Class Kerry Scott from a roadside bomb last October, and Sergeant Dale Lloyd and Private First Class Charles Persing in a mortar attack in July.
The mortar attack destroyed the personal items and tents of more than 260 soldiers. Several individuals and groups sent them packages and money.
