- KENT (AP) -- As a boy, Benjamin
Colgan marched with his parents in peace protests.
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- Joseph and Pat Colgan, 62 and 60, respectively, whose
activism dates from the Vietnam War, were surprised when their son enlisted
in the Army. But they continued to support him, even as they opposed the
war in Iraq.
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- On Monday, their worst fears came true. Colgan, 30, a
second lieutenant, the father of two young daughters with a third child
due next month, died Saturday when a roadside bomb exploded as he responded
to a rocket-propelled grenade attack in Baghdad, the Defense Department
said.
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- A U.S. flag hung outside the family's home Monday. Funeral
arrangements were pending.
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- Word came with a knock on the door at the Colgans' home.
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- "I saw the cross on his lapel pin and I said, 'No,
not my son! Not my son!' " his mother said.
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- "There will be many people experiencing the same
thing," she added. "This war, it shouldn't be."
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- Benjamin Colgan was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 3rd
Field Artillery Regiment, 1st Armored Division.
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- His parents were concerned when he gave a dim appraisal
of Baghdad in an e-mail Friday.
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- "What raised a red flag was when he said, 'It's
getting real old and getting real crazy,' " his father said.
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- As a young child, he had joined his parents on marches
to protest nuclear weapons at Naval Submarine Base Bangor. Then, to pay
for college, he enlisted in the Army after graduation from Mount Rainier
High School in Des Moines in 1991.
-
- "That was hard, but you support your children,"
his mother said.
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- She and her husband joined protest marches again against
the war in Iraq this year.
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- They tied a yellow ribbon around the maple in their front
yard, a tree they had planted when Benjamin Colgan was born. On Monday,
they replaced it with a black ribbon.
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- Benjamin Colgan initially planned to become a medic,
but joined the Special Forces and then Delta Force, the military's most
elite and secretive unit.
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- He left to attend officer candidate school, was assigned
to the 1st Armored Division in Germany after graduation, and hoped to return
to Delta Force after earning his captain's bars, his father said.
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- His mother says his death has only strengthened her position
against the war.
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- "People keep asking, 'Are the Iraqis better off?'"
she said. "What we have to start asking is, 'Are we better off?' And
we're not. We're losing our children."
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This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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