Maryland National Guard

Kayden Hoskins can say "Daddy" now, but she could not when her father, Spc. Tom Hoskins of the Maryland National Guard, left for Iraq in February. The 15-month-old from Havre de Grace has known Daddy mostly as a voice on the phone, a man reading her a book on a DVD sent from far away, a face in a framed photograph that on occasion she kisses. Dressed in a pink winter jacket, brown knitted hat and pink wool gloves, Kayden turned up Saturday morning with her mother, Nicole, and her paternal grandparents to join the crowd of several hundred family members and friends welcoming home troops of the 1729th Forward Support Maintenance Company.

Maj. Robert J. Marchanti II, 48, was buried Tuesday at Arlington National Cemetery. Marchanti, a 25-year member of the Maryland National Guard, was one of two officers killed last month in Afghanistan. Violence erupted in Kabul, where Marchanti was stationed, when it was revealed that copies of the Quran had been burned at a NATO base in Bagram. The Taliban claimed responsibility, saying the deaths were punishment for burning the Muslim holy book. Gov. Martin O'Malley ordered U.S. and Maryland flags flown at half-staff Tuesday in Marchanti's memory.

CHECKPOINT 3-C, Sinai Desert -- Spc. Alexander Epps is jealous. Just around the bend, Italian tourists sunbathe and snorkel at a Red Sea resort.Specialist Epps, in jungle boots and green fatigues, must stare through binoculars at empty sand."

For months, the men and women of the 135th Airlift Group have been training on their new C27J Spartan turboprops for their deployment this spring to Afghanistan. Their job: carrying soldiers, equipment and supplies around the war zone as the fighting season resumes. It's a mission for which the Maryland Air National Guard unit has deep experience. In the last decade alone, members have deployed several times to Iraq and Afghanistan, while also responding to the Haiti earthquake, California wildfires and Hurricane Katrina.

While American military bases are being cut and eliminated, business is booming at the Maryland National Guard's Camp Fretterd -- once the site of a reform school for girls."

Maj. Robert J. Marchanti II, 48, was buried Tuesday at Arlington National Cemetery. Marchanti, a 25-year member of the Maryland National Guard, was one of two officers killed last month in Afghanistan. Violence erupted in Kabul, where Marchanti was stationed, when it was revealed that copies of the Quran had been burned at a NATO base in Bagram. The Taliban claimed responsibility, saying the deaths were punishment for burning the Muslim holy book. Gov. Martin O'Malley ordered U.S. and Maryland flags flown at half-staff Tuesday in Marchanti's memory.

The collection and preservation of war relics from the 18th century to the Persian Gulf war -- specifically conflicts that engaged the Maryland National Guard -- was the lifelong passion of retired Brig. Gen. Bernard Feingold of the Guard.General Feingold, who created the Maryland National Guard Museum at Baltimore's 5th Regiment Armory and later was its director and curator, died Thursday of cancer at Sinai Hospital. The Northwest Baltimore resident was 76.A former soldier with an insatiable curiosity and appreciation for the minutiae as well as the grand sweep of war, General Feingold possessed vast knowledge of military history, tactics, battles and personalities.

Col. William C. Bilo, who has been with the Maryland National Guard for almost 20 years, has been appointed deputy director of the Army National Guard Bureau in the Pentagon."

The Maryland National Guard wants to spread its anti-drug and -alcohol efforts in Carroll County, implementing a prevention program at the high schools and beginning an after-school program for at-risk middle school children, officials say.The effort, which could begin in September, is contingent on receiving a federal grant and the approval of Carroll County school officials, said Lt. Col. Robert L. Finn, who works for the National Guard's director of...

Anthony A. Wajer, an electrician and veteran of the Army and Maryland National Guard, died of mesothelioma, a form of lung cancer, Monday at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. The longtime Baltimore County resident was 83. Born and raised in Fells Point, Mr. Wajer attended City College and later earned his high school equivalency diploma. At age 18, he was drafted into the Army, spending three years as an infantryman. His unit was shipped to France after D-Day, said his son, Stephen D. Wajer of Towson.

I found the recent headline regarding to Maryland National Guard ("Maryland Guard fights on in hope of Afghan peace," Jan. 29) to be Orwellian. It is a simple dictum that you can't wage war for peace. There are no winners in a war, only losers. One side may kill more than the other or capture more territory, but a cessation of warfare is not peace. I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Botswana helping to set up small business. It would have been ludicrous for me to use force on the entrepreneurs to get them to do what I wanted.

Kayden Hoskins can say "Daddy" now, but she could not when her father, Spc. Tom Hoskins of the Maryland National Guard, left for Iraq in February. The 15-month-old from Havre de Grace has known Daddy mostly as a voice on the phone, a man reading her a book on a DVD sent from far away, a face in a framed photograph that on occasion she kisses. Dressed in a pink winter jacket, brown knitted hat and pink wool gloves, Kayden turned up Saturday morning with her mother, Nicole, and her paternal grandparents to join the crowd of several hundred family members and friends welcoming home troops of the 1729th Forward Support Maintenance Company.

Maj. Mark Zinno Citarella was scheduled to spend Thanksgiving in Baghdad. The commander of a public affairs unit in the Maryland National Guard, he figures he would have joined fellow officers on a chow line, serving the holiday meal to enlisted troops. But with the announcement in October that the United States would pull all troops out of Iraq by the end of the year, his unit returned to Baltimore earlier this month. Now he is looking forward to spending the day with loved ones.

At long last, Osama bin Laden is gone. I'll never forget the horror of September 11th, and I am relieved this monster of terrorism has been dispatched. It was about time. Now that our mission has been accomplished, it's time to bring our troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan, and get the Maryland National Guard out of Egypt. America's Middle East adventures should be scaled back and ended. After nearly a decade of war, the loss of thousands of lives and trillions of American tax dollars, I say enough.

Ellen Ingram Fretterd, who was known as the "first lady" of the Maryland National Guard, died of cancer Dec. 3 at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia. The Federalsburg resident was 75. Born Ellen Ingram in Pike, W.Va., and raised in Seaford, Del., she was a graduate of Seaford High School. She earned an associate's degree from Chesapeake College and a bachelor of arts from what was then Salisbury State College. In 1988 then-Gov. William Donald Schaefer appointed her to the school's board of visitors.

At the end of World War II in Europe, a young American soldier was reassigned from the infantry to the military police. He was issued a new uniform, told to practice saluting and ordered to guard the former German SS headquarters in Bavaria, where the U.S. Army had set up a base of operations. As he stood at his post, proudly sporting the black-and-gray patch of the 94th Division on his sleeve, Pfc. Roland "Ron" Sluder spotted a tall, broad-shouldered man in a trench coat making his way down the corridor.

I found the recent headline regarding to Maryland National Guard ("Maryland Guard fights on in hope of Afghan peace," Jan. 29) to be Orwellian. It is a simple dictum that you can't wage war for peace. There are no winners in a war, only losers. One side may kill more than the other or capture more territory, but a cessation of warfare is not peace. I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Botswana helping to set up small business. It would have been ludicrous for me to use force on the entrepreneurs to get them to do what I wanted.

More than 40 soldiers from a Maryland National Guard unit in Annapolis are scheduled to leave today for New Jersey to prepare for a peacekeeping mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Guard officials said. The six-month deployment marks the first time the entire Troop A 1-115th Calvary Forward unit has been called into service. Individual members served in Operation Desert Storm and Bosnia with other units, officials said. The unit will leave for Europe from Fort Dix, N.J., in about two weeks.

Gov. Martin O'Malley called a news conference from an unexpected location Friday: Baghdad, where he had arrived on an early-morning flight as part of a Pentagon-sponsored tour. In a conference call with reporters, the governor said he spent the day meeting and dining with troops and gaining insight into the war-zone lifestyle that should be useful in his role as official leader of 6,300 troops of the Maryland National Guard. "The reason I'm here is because it's important to the Department of Defense and it's important to our country that our governors stay engaged, given the number of National Guard troops" who are deployed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, O'Malley said.