The People (And Animals) of Second Section, 3rd Platoon, B Troop, 4/4th Cav... just who are these guys, anyway?<br/><br/>I'm glad you asked.  Here's some brief bio stuff on them- what you've been able to put together by talking to them or other people.  This stuff may or may not be true, or the whole story, it's just what you hear around.<br/><br/><div class="floatright">(http://i43.tinypic.com/aa7tpi.jpg)<br/> <em>The Platoon Sergeant, recalled to the colors in 1996</em></div><strong>SFC Allen Hart </strong><br/>Allen Hart came into the world in Irontown, Ohio, to parents married right after the war.  His father had fought in the European theater, then moved to Irontown to work in the the steel plants there.  Given good economic times that followed the war in the US, Hart had a fairly idyllic childhood.  In 1967, his draft board informed him that he would be entering the US Army- which actually suited him, given that he'd mostly floated his way through school, and wasn't too sure that he wanted jump into the mills that ran the town.  He ended up in the Cav, and by the end of 1967, he was with the 1st Air Cav in Vietnam, which meant that his tour would be one of the most active in the war.  He fought through the Tet Offfensive, the relief of Khe Sahn, the A Shau Valley, and a number of other engagements as 1968 wound down on account of heavy communist casualties.  He managed to escape the year with only minor energy, and a promotion to corporal.  His bit done, he could have sat out the rest of his term in a cav unit in the US, but he ended up disliking garrison duty so much that, by 1970, he was back in country, serving  second tour after reenlisting.  That was, by comparison, a much slower year, even though his tour was cut short by an AK-47 round through his thigh.<br/><br/>After he recovered, with the war in 'Nam winding down, he considered heading out of the Army.  But, he'd invested a lot of time, by a 23 year old's reckoning, into the service, and figured he might as well stick it out for a bit.  He served in Cav units in Korea and Germany, trying to stay out of the long garrison periods in the US.  He suffered through the low points before the transition to a volunteer force, and was part of the effort to train up new Cav troopers in the '80s.  He enjoyed mentoring younger soldiers, and helping those that wanted to improve themselves.  He helped a lot get into college after the Army- though, he never bothered getting a degree himself.  When the Berlin Wall fell in '89, it looked like his watch was over, and, with enough time in, he retired to start on a second career.<br/><br/>That turned out to be a job as at State Police officer in Kentucky.  He got married to a woman he could get along with, adopting her two kids.  He worked the day shift, came home at night, and didn't worry overly much about his actual rank or politics in department.  It kept him busy in his 'retirement,' and let him protect the safety of highway drivers.  Still, as the world turned ugly again in the 90s, he wondered if he'd made the right decision by leaving the Army.  And, once the war came again, he kissed his wife and kids goodbye, used his status as a member of the Inactive Reserves to get out of his job with the police, and joined up for refresher training with the first round of draftees that made it through basic training.  They shipped out as replacements for losses in the front line, and Hart ended up as a replacement PSG in a platoon in the 3rd Mech.  He fought through to Poland, survived a nuclear strike in the Ukraine, and, during the retreat back to Germany, ended up back in the Cav.  He commanded a platoon for a while, given the lack of lieutenants in his area, and provided valuable leadership in getting the unit back to Bremerhaven.  Back in the US, he plans to stick with the Army, at least until things sort themselves out.<br/><br/><div class="floatleft">(http://[url=http://i41.tinypic.com/105ps9h.jpg]http://i41.tinypic.com/105ps9h.jpg[/url]) <br/><em>Huerta, fourth from right, with his scout team, outside Nemiece, Poland</em></div><strong>Sgt. Carlos Huerta</strong><br/><br/>Carlos Huerta was born down in El Paso, Texas, in in 1974.  He spent most of his teen years running the streets, rather than worrying too much about schooling.  He had a knack for coming up with halfway intelligent plans for pranking rival high schools and getting the help he needed.  Never a serious criminal- unless driving very fast and mostly harmless vandalism count- he was challenged by the one teacher he respected to do something with his life other than be a slacker.  He decided to Be All That He Could Be, and joined the Army.  Surprisingly, he took well to the discipline of Boot Camp, though the more independent operations of a cav scout suited him more than life in an infantry squad, and far, far more than the promise of some other job that didn't involve walking around outside in all sorts of weather conditions- including ones they never got in El Paso.<br/><br/>He was tapped fairly early in his career as a possible NCO, and was given more leadership responsibility even before his promotions came through.  He made corporal as he reupped in time to be deployed to the 11th ACR in 1996. As a result, he was one of the first US soldiers into combat in Europe.  He was wounded three times- outside Berlin, again besieging Warsaw, and then finally last year, fighting marauders near the German-Polish border.  Each time, he was shuffled through the replacement depots and ended up in a new unit, landing finally in the Cav Troop assigned to Team Perrin in the 3rd Mech.  With the reshuffle, he's a fairly senior fire team leader, and has made it known that he thinks he's ready for a move up the line.<br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><div class="floatright">(http://i43.tinypic.com/6t0ili.jpg)<br/><em>Klaus Piper somewhere in Poland, third day of the war</em></div><strong> <em>Stabsgefreiter</em> Klaus Piper, SAW Gunner</strong><br/><br/>If you ever got a flat tire on the side of the road, Klaus would be a good guy to have around.  Not that he would know how to replace it, that's not his thing.  No, he could just pick up the end of the car and hold it while you swapped the tires, no problem.  This means that he doesn't mind carrying the big MG-3, a full size GMPG, over the lighter M249 SAW that he easily could use, given his position in the platoon.  However, he always insists on the bigger weapon, saying he's carried one the entire war and doesn't see any reason to give it up.  Despite being a senior corporal, Klaus is a quiet, lead by example sort of guy- and the fact that he's not an American does limit his career opportunities in a US unit.  Still, he's taken Private Commenia under his wing a bit, as she'll be his assistant gunner when the team is dismounted- though, when she's driving, he seems to have little trouble running the machine gun himself.<br/><br/>Klaus doesn't talk much about the war himself.  He doesn't wear any unit patches from the German Army- rumor has it he was picked up by the 3rd Mech alone outside Krakow in a sanitized uniform, but Klaus just laughed that off the one time someone asked him about it on the trip back to the US.  He's been with the 3rd since the Great Nuclear Retreat, and has a reputation for being a very good machinegunner, a quiet teammate, and willing to lend a hand when needed.  He decided to come along to America because he figures that his hometown, Bonn, may well have gotten more kilotons per square kilometer than anywhere else in the world, and so there was no home to go back to- and it's generally accepted that the division is his home now.<br/><br/><div class="floatleft">(http://i44.tinypic.com/2zdvhj5.jpg)<br/><em>Spec. Stover assists an orphaned child in southern Poland</em> </div><strong>Spec. Terri Stover</strong><br/><br/>They say war makes people hard- though, no one passed that memo to Terri Stover.  A junior at Missouri University when the war broke out, she dropped out of school to enlist and do her bit.  Well known and liked in college- she probably would have been president of her sorority in more normal times- she kept a positive attitude and generally cheerful disposition despite the best efforts of her drill sergeant to hammer it out of her in preparations for the hardships coming to her once she got to the Central Front.  It was still early in the war, so she was assigned to a rear area transport and supply unit, though she was not overly interested in getting stuck driving a truck or swapping tires for the war.  After getting slightly wounded in an airstrike, she volunteered for a quick, in theater training course to be a convoy guard, where she developed a special affinity for the M203 grenade launcher.  Back in the saddle for the offensive of '97, her unit came apart quickly under the pressure of Soviet nuclear strikes during the counterattack out of the Ukraine, and she got swept up by the 3rd Mech as it retreated and her logistical command effectively disbanded itself.<br/><br/>Not very interested in going back into the rear area, she finagled a spot in an infantry team- the 3rd always needed more infantrymen, or, in this case, infantrywomen- and served on the front lines in 98, 99 and most of 2000, and survived mostly intact, other than a pinkie finger she never really needed, and a few extra scars that she wouldn't have gotten back on campus.  She still hasn't gotten the memo about getting hard, scary and the thousand yard stare, as if infantry combat is either just how normal life should be for her, or she's in total denial of her current situation.  It's hard to know talking to her, to be honest, but as long as she can keep putting 40mm rounds into machine gun nests, will anyone really care?<br/><br/><div class="floatright">(http://i40.tinypic.com/345zgxy.jpg)<br/><em>PFC Commenia's induction photo</em></div><strong>PFC Anna Commenia</strong><br/><br/>The US didn't get the chance to draft too many women in the war, but Anna was one of them.  She graduated high school in 1997, the last class North Atlanta High will graduate for a long, long time.  Given the fact there was a war on, she figured someone would sort out what she would do pretty quickly.  She got her notice in the first wave of women draftees, a few months before the strategic exchange, when things were looking quite bad.  She was at sea when the bombs finally fell in the US, and ended up in a very fluid situation once she landed in Bremerhaven.  Barely trained, she was assigned to the logistics command of VII Corps, driving trucks around wrecked transportation exchanges to bring supplies from the ports to forward supply dumps in lieu of the trains that no longer worked.  After driving through a particularly hellish bit of the rear area, she lost most of her hair and puked her guts out for several days.<br/><br/>After recovering from acute radiation sickness, she found that the front had stabilized and didn't quite need as many long haul truckers.  She was reassigned as the driver for a forward observer team, which had lost their FIST-V a long time ago, and now road around in a Humvee.  This worked out well for her, even though it meant being closer to the front lines.  As the years went on, there was less and less artillery to call for, so, the team was effectively a long range scout team with a big radio.  Unfortunately, the Humvee carrying the team ate a mine on the movement to Bremerhaven, and was broken up in the big reorg.  Needing drivers to fill out their TO&E, the div arty team gave her up to the 4/4Cav.  Now she has a new ride, in a totally unfamiliar group.  Still, it beats the alternatives- she's sure Atlanta's the same smoking ruin all those German cities were when she got to them.<br/><br/><div class="floatleft">(http://i40.tinypic.com/2nbwmcp.jpg)<br/><em><em>Woof!</em></em></div><strong>Private Afridi</strong><br/><br/>Private Afridi is a German Shepard SFC Hart picked up on a patrol a year ago.  She appears to have some sort of training, perhaps as a police or military dog.  She's friendly, until someone decides to put Hart in danger.  In garrison, she sleeps in the Humvee, so good luck stealing the stuff from this section's truck.<br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/>