Buena grad helps troops by looking for patterns (Sierra Vista AZ H.S. Grad)

Sierra Vista Herald/Bisbee Review ^ | Bill Hess

[SandRat]

FORWARD OPERATING BASE HAMMER, Iraq — Soldiers see their missions differently.

An infantryman has close contact with an enemy.

But ensuring the infantryman is as safe as can be falls to other soldiers, whose MOSes — military occupational specialties — provide additional help.

Having knowledge of what may face an infantryman outside the wire is something Pfc. Craig Obeso does.

An intelligence analyst, the 20-year-old Obeso has yet to go outside the wire that separates Forward Operating Base Hammer from potential insurgents, but he knows his job is important.

Analyzing intelligence is designed to help “patrols find what they are looking for as well as informing them of known dangers,” said the 2005 Buena High School graduate.

“I look for anything that might have a pattern,” he said.

And analyzing what patrols bring back provides more information for future forays, Obeso said.

To him, protecting those who have the mission to patrol outside the forward operating base, which is 20 miles east of Baghdad, has a personal meaning.

His best friend, Sgt. Courtney Johnson, was killed in action.

“He remains in my heart and my mind forever,” the former Sierra Vista resident said.

Obeso’s family has a military background. His father, Daniel, is a retired Army first sergeant.

Enlisting in January 2006, the soldier returned to the area from April through August of last year when he attended the intelligence analyst course on Fort Huachuca.

He is currently assigned to the 3rd Brigade Special Troops Battalion, 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team of the 3rd Infantry Division out of Fort Benning, Ga., and is a little more than halfway through his 15-month deployment.

Forward Operating Base Hammer isn’t too bad, even though most of the troops live in tents, he said.

There are coffee shops, video games and other amenities, and he has time to work out in a gym at the facility.

But it’s still not home to Obeso.

Besides his father, his 26-year-old brother, Christopher, who works for Lawley, lives in Sierra Vista.

And so does his mom, Joanna Wolfe.

During a telephone interview before Thanksgiving, the soldier said he misses his mother’s cooking.

She cooks turkey well, “and I miss her mashed potatoes,” Obeso said.

Then, stopping for a short time, he remembered when he came home on his mid-tour break a couple of months ago and his mom didn’t make his mashed potatoes.

Well, he said, that will be on his order list when he returns from deployment.

HERALD/REVIEW senior reporter Bill Hess can be reached at 515-4615 or by e-mail at bill.hess@svherald.com.

[SandRat]

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