Memoria Day

[TheBigDogg]

It has been 20 yrs, but I can remember it like it was yesterday, the ground war was over, 2d ACR was done fighting the Iraqi Republican Guard in Iraq and we were heading to Kuwait . On the way to Kuwait we had made a couple of stops, the first stop was to eat, drink water, rest, and we also got some mail. I remember SPC James Miller showing me a picture he recieved in the mail from his wife, it was a picture of his brand new baby boy, talk about someone excited and happy as can be,I remember telling Miller congratulations and that his baby was beautiful, I was really happy for him and his new family. The next morning we continued our journey to Kuwait, not reaching our destination, we stopped for the night, it was still day light outside, and as always our unit formed a 360 degree circle with our vehicles, we did not let our guard down, we were not sure if all the Iraqi Soldiers had recieved the notice of the cease fire, my vehicle wasn't part of the circle, we drove out a little ways, kinda like an observation post, as we were driving out we here an explosion, it came from inside the units circle, first thing that came to my mind was we were being attacked, but I was wrong, what had happened was Miller was doing what he was trained to do, he got his vehicle in the circle and positioned where it needed to be, he then jumped out of his truck he was driving and started digging a hasty fighting position( a hasty fighting position is kinda like a fox hole, but shallow and quick to make, and for one person) while digging Miller hit a land mine with his shovel( yup some idiot put our unit in a unmarked mine field). The mine went off, it also caused one of the 40mm granades to go off, well I am sure you can figure out what the rest of the story is. I use to tell people I thought of Miller when anyone brought up Desert Storm, but the truth is, anytime I seen or hear anything military related I think of Miller, I didn't know Miller very long, but we did become friends. I miss you Miller, RIP brother!!