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Re: MIA-KIA Parents Want Answers

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: July 13, 2003

"Parents get lonely picture of son's death in Iraq

PAIGE PARKER

SALEM -- Her oldest son, alone in the desert.

That's the image that lingers with Arlene Walters, who on Tuesday read for the first time the Army's account of what happened to her son, Sgt. Donald Walters. The 33-year-old Salem father of three was killed during the March 23 ambush of the 507th Maintenance Company.

"That's what I see," Arlene Walters said Tuesday. "All this sand and him there in those fatigues with that gun."

Army officials will release Thursday their account of what happened March 23, the deadliest day of the war. But Donald Walters' parents said their early look at the report left them wondering whether their son had been mistaken for Pfc. Jessica Lynch.

The POW made international headlines when The Washington Post erroneously reported that she had suffered gunshot wounds while battling the Iraqis in a fierce firefight. Military officials later reported that Lynch had not been shot.

"There is some information to suggest that a U.S. soldier, (who) could have been Walters, fought his way south of Highway 16 toward a canal and was killed in action," the report reads. "Sgt. Walters was in fact killed at some point during this portion of the attack. The circumstances of his death cannot be conclusively determined by available information."

Walters suffered gunshot wounds to his torso, according to a casualty report obtained by his family.

"I guess he was standing out there trying to fight," Arlene Walters said. "I can't imagine what it was like being out there, trying to fight off all those people."

Donald Walters' vehicle was the first of the 18-vehicle convoy disabled during the 60- to 90-minute attack, the report indicates.

Walters rode in the passenger seat of a 5-ton tractor-trailer rig driven by 19-year-old Pvt. Brandon Sloan. Theirs was the 11th vehicle in a convoy of supply trucks that fell behind in a 600-vehicle column during the U.S. Army's march toward Baghdad.

During a three-day journey slowed by wrong turns and stalled vehicles, the crew of cooks, mechanics and supply clerks slogged along with little sleep.

About 65 hours into their trip, Walters and the rest of the convoy came under fire on the outskirts of An Nasiriyah.

As the convoy fled through the city, Walters' truck became disabled, although the report does not specify whether it stalled, wrecked or took a hit from enemy fire.

While moving and under fire, Pfc. Patrick Miller and Sgt. James Riley "executed a combat pick-up" of Sloan, the report indicates. The wrecker carrying the three soldiers later was disabled by Iraqi fire, which killed Sloan. Miller and Riley were captured.

Army investigators found no witness who could describe how or where Walters died. Nor is it known whether others in the convoy rescued Walters or whether he defended himself alone, according to the report.

The Walterses, who live in a tidy pink house in Salem, speculate that initial military intelligence reports might have confused their son with Lynch. Those early reports, which have since been corrected, depicted the blond-haired Lynch bravely fighting off Iraqis and sustaining gunshot and knife wounds.

Donald Walters also had blond hair.

"I know Don," Arlene Walters said. "And that sounds like something Don would do."

Donald Walters' widow, Stacie Walters of Kansas City, Kan., declined to comment on the report until the Army's official release.

The Army's report concludes that fatigue and stress contributed to navigational errors that put Walters and his comrades in the line of fire.

Norman Walters, Donald's father, said he's reserving judgment as to whether the military did all it could to protect his son.

Arlene Walters wonders whether anyone else in the convoy attempted to rescue her son.

"I want to know," she said, "why he was just out there."

©2003 OregonLive.com"