Mothers cried and children squealed with delight as a company of US troops arrived back from Iraq on Saturday, after a year-long tour marked by desert heat and monotony.
A crowd of families roared as 124 soldiers from Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment, arrived marching in formation, part of a wave of homecomings as US President Barack Obama scales back the US role in Iraq.
The welcoming ceremony at Fort Myer, outside Washington, was a joyous event for the soldiers and their loved ones after 12 months of separation, even if the legacy of the US invasion of Iraq remains a subject of bitter debate at home and abroad.
“It has been a very long year,” said a tearful Charlotte Thompson, whose 25-year-old son had volunteered for the Iraq assignment.
The unit spent most of its time guarding a prison with about 300 Iraqi detainees in Taji, and carried out combat patrols as well, officers said.
The troops’ work in Iraq was a long way from their customary job as part a regiment known as “the Old Guard” in the US capital, where they perform ceremonial duties at funerals, visits by foreign dignitaries and other official events.
Specialist Charles Thompson said he was braced for a culture shock as he would soon be marching in honor cordons at the Pentagon and the White House.
“It’s really a big change,” he said. “I could do without the ceremonial stuff.”
The company returned without any casualties, in a war that has claimed the lives of more than 4,000 US troops and with roughly 50,000 forces still on the ground facing lethal threats.
Thompson said he got used to the intense heat in Iraq, but the work was “kind of boring at some points,” with troops playing basketball or video games to ease the monotony.
After spending the weekend with his family, Thompson will be returning to duty at Fort Myer, but said he was looking forward to a 30-day leave coming up soon.
He said he would head back home to northeastern Kentucky and “go fishing.”
“I’ve been thinking about it for about 365 days,” he said.
DISPUTED WATERS: The Philippines accused China of building an artificial island on Sabina Shoal, while Beijing said Manila was trying to mislead the global community The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) is committed to sustaining a presence in a disputed area of the South China Sea to ensure Beijing does not carry out reclamation activities at Sabina Shoal (Xianbin Reef), its spokesperson said yesterday. The PCG on Saturday said it had deployed a ship to Sabina Shoal, where it accused China of building an artificial island, amid an escalating maritime row, adding two other vessels were in rotational deployment in the area. Since the ship’s deployment in the middle of last month, the PCG said it had discovered piles of dead and crushed coral that had been dumped
Experts have long warned about the threat posed by artificial intelligence (AI) going rogue, but a new research paper suggests it is already happening. AI systems, designed to be honest, have developed a troubling skill for deception, from tricking human players in online games of world conquest to hiring humans to solve “prove-you’re-not-a-robot” tests, a team of researchers said in the journal Patterns on Friday. While such examples might appear trivial, the underlying issues they expose could soon carry serious real-world consequences, said first author Peter Park, a postdoctoral fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology specializing in AI existential safety. “These
The most powerful solar storm in more than two decades struck Earth on Friday, triggering spectacular celestial light shows from Tasmania to the UK — and threatening possible disruptions to satellites and power grids as it persists into the weekend. The first of several coronal mass ejections (CMEs) — expulsions of plasma and magnetic fields from the sun — came just after 4pm GMT, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center. It was later upgraded to an “extreme” geomagnetic storm — the first since the “Halloween Storms” of October 2003 caused blackouts in Sweden and damaged
A Philippine boat convoy bearing supplies for Filipino fishers yesterday said that it was headed back to port, ditching plans to sail to a reef off the Southeast Asian country after one of their boats was “constantly shadowed” by a Chinese vessel. The Atin Ito (“This Is Ours”) coalition convoy on Wednesday set sail to distribute fuel and food to fishers and assert Philippine rights in the disputed South China Sea. “They will now proceed to the Subic fish port to mark the end of their successful mission,” the group said in a statement. A Philippine Coast Guard vessel escorting the convoy was