Re: Ex-POW's Mom... Don't Forget the War

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: March 14, 2004

"Former POW's mom: Don't forget the war

By JASON LAUGHLIN Courier-Post Staff

PENNSAUKEN
A year after the war in Iraq, the mother of a former prisoner of war thinks the country may be missing the point.

"You have all these people coming back whose lives have changed," Jane Riley said. "I don't know if we, the general public, really realize how their lives have changed."

Her son, Sgt. James Riley, was captured by Iraqis on March 23 near Nasiriyah. He spent three weeks in Iraqi hands before being rescued and returned to his home base of Fort Bliss, Texas.

Riley, a subdued personality who never welcomed the attention his ordeal brought him, has changed, his mother said.

"He gave us his phone number for a change," she said. "He's a little more tolerant. . . . Sometimes the way he words something you think, OK, you've changed."

Riley now teaches machining at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland.

"He seems to be enjoying that," she said. "He just wishes everyone would forget about this and have it all go away."

Jane Riley declined to say how she felt about America's policy in Iraq, and declined to say for whom she would vote in the next election.

The anniversary of the war's beginning has a different meaning for the Rileys. Their daughter Mary died days after James Riley was captured.

Jane Riley just hopes Americans don't forget this is still a nation at war.

"You guys (Courier-Post) used to give how many days the war had gone and now you don't," she said.

Reach Jason Laughlin at (856) 486-2476
Copyright 2004 Courier-Post"