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| Mooney said this week that the Defense Department was continuing an investigation into the events that morning when a convoy of cooks, mechanics and supply clerks made a wrong turn into Nasiriyah. A report is expected soon, said Mooney. The Army released a 15-page narrative of the battle in July, but many families said the report didn't answer their questions. Walters, for example, mysteriously vanished from the convoy after the tractor-trailer carrying him got stuck |
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Killed soldier's family seeks recognition
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) -- The family of a Missouri soldier killed in the same Nasiriyah, Iraq battle that made Jessica Lynch a household hero wants the Army to set the record straight.
Sgt. Donald R. Walters' family contends that he -- not Lynch -- was the blond soldier who was reported to have fought fiercely and did not want to be taken alive in the March 23 battle.
"It was Don," said Walters' widow, Stacie, of northern Kansas City. "I want the military to face me and to tell me it was Don."
The Department of Defense has said a "fog of war" still obscures details of what happened in Nasiriyah.
Lynch in her new book, I Am a Soldier, Too: The Jessica Lynch Story, by Rick Bragg, has said she was too injured to have fought off Iraqis who attacked and killed 11 soldiers from a wayward convoy of the 507th Maintenance Company.
Monitored communications of Iraqi forces during and after the attack reportedly led U.S. officials to believe that a blond woman battled gallantly before being shot and stabbed.
Walters, 33, suffered two gunshots to the back, another to the leg and stab wounds in the abdomen.
Col. Heidi Brown at Fort Bliss, when interviewed by "60 Minutes," said Walters could be the blond soldier thought to have fought so hard before being stabbed.
"When (the military and the media) thought the blond soldier was Jessica, they just ran with it," said his mother, Arlene Walters of Salem, Ore. "But Don was the one who stayed out there alone and fought for his fellow soldiers. I wish they'd come out and admit it."
Rep. Darlene Hooley, a Democrat whose Oregon district includes the home of Walters' parents, is pressing defense officials "to do an accounting in what actually happened," said a Hooley spokeswoman, Joan Mooney.
Mooney said this week that the Defense Department was continuing an investigation into the events that morning when a convoy of cooks, mechanics and supply clerks made a wrong turn into Nasiriyah.
A report is expected soon, said Mooney.
The Army released a 15-page narrative of the battle in July, but many families said the report didn't answer their questions. Walters, for example, mysteriously vanished from the convoy after the tractor-trailer carrying him got stuck.
"There is some information," the July report states, "that a U.S. soldier, (who) could have been Walters, fought his way south of Highway 16 towards a canal and was killed in action."
Walters, who also left behind three daughters, was posthumously awarded a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star. His family has not voiced any hard feelings toward Lynch, who has stressed that she didn't shoot anyone.
Walters' mother had eagerly awaited the TV movie about Lynch, which was broadcast earlier this month on NBC. Although defense officials assisted the scriptwriters, "Don wasn't mentioned at all. Period. Nothing," Arlene Walters said. "I taped it to save. But I'm going to tape over it."
Stacie Walters has reached her own conclusion.
"I guess the military likes the fact of having Jessica Lynch their hero," she
