For one year, Middle Village native U.S. Army Specialist Asheley Wicklow, 23, spent her days at the U.S. Strategic Operations Center, in Baghdad, Iraq, surveying battlefields, gathering intelligence about the enemy and briefing U.S. military commanders. One of her main responsibilities included being a targeting intelligence specialist providing information to commanders in order to get clearance for strikes against specialized targets like the one that recently killed Iraq's number-one terrorist Abu Msuab al-Zarqawi.
Earlier this month, U.S. intelligence officials received information that enabled them to track Sheikh Abdul Rahman, a spiritual adviser to al-Zarqawi. That intelligence culminated in a U.S. F-16 strike in which two 500-pound bombs were dropped on the target site, killing al-Zarqawi.
“That was my job,” Asheley said. “I waited for that kill for one year, and six months after I left, we got the bastard.”
Editor's note: Asheley returned to the U.S. on January 6, 2006, and the strike that killed al-Zarqawi occurred on Wednesday, June 7, 2006.
However, this is only a part of Asheley's story.
FAMILY TIES
Being involved in the military is not out of the ordinary for the Wicklow family - some may even call it the “Wicklow Way.” Asheley's older brother Martin, 26, enlisted in the military in July of 2001, prompting Asheley to join one month later.
“I always followed in his footsteps,” Asheley said.
However, her brother was not the only member of the Wicklow family involved in the military.
Asheley and Martin's grandparents, George and Rita Martin, who helped raise the pair while they grew up in Middle Village, served in World War II in a tanker battalion and as a secretary, respectively.
“It's pretty much instilled in our family to be patriotic,” Asheley said.
Therefore, it is not surprising that Asheley's younger brother John James Martin, 16, a junior at Forest Hills High School, is considering joining the military following his high school graduation.
“He will probably want to go into the Navy, if he can stand the abuse from his brother and sister,” his mother Deirdre Martin joked.
TRAINING
When Asheley enlisted in the New York National Guard in August of 2001, she did not go in alone. Her childhood friend, Roseanne Addeo, who lived around the corner from Asheley, enlisted at the same time.
“We went on the buddy system,” Asheley said. “They have to spot you together through the whole training process.”
In April of 2002, Asheley and Addeo left for basic training - a nine-week stint in Jackson, South Carolina - not knowing what to expect.
“Initially, when you are thinking about going, it is terrifying,” Asheley said. “Your mind automatically goes to movies. It's pretty scary at first, but you start to form relationships with people, and you make it through together.”
After spending 17 weeks in Arizona doing military intelligence analysis training, Asheley and Addeo traveled back to New York for more training at the Lexington Armory in Manhattan.
Finally, after two months of training in Kuwait, Asheley and Addeo returned to the United States one more time before leaving for their mission in Iraq.
A DAY OF MIXED EMOTIONS
New Year's Day 2005 was supposed to be a joyous day for the Wicklow family. This was the day the family welcomed Martin back to the United States after he served 11 months as part of the 2-108th Infantry in Samarra, Iraq, a city about 124 kilometers north of Baghdad.
However, as fate had it, this turned out to be the same day Asheley and Addeo's orders had them leaving from Fort Benning, GA, for their mission in Iraq.
The long-anticipated Wicklow family reunion would have to be delayed.
“When Martin came home you were waiting to exhale, and then you have to inhale again real quickly as you are putting another one [Asheley] on the plane,” their mother Deirdre Martin said, her voice cracking as she recalled the day.
Deirdre Martin was not the only one experiencing mixed emotions that day.
“The side that I was showing my mom, I wouldn't want to let on that I was worried,” Martin Wicklow said. However, his big brother instincts quickly kicked in and he admitted to being nervous and concerned for his sister's safety.
ASHELEY'S TIME IN IRAQ
Nearly three years after Asheley and Addeo started training, they finally arrived in Baghdad, Iraq as part of the 53rd Army Liaison Unit on January 8, 2005. Asheley vividly recalled her first impressions of the country.
“It's the kind of thing that you will never understand unless you are there,” she said. “You see a country that people live in such poverty that it literally hurts you inside.”
Asheley and Addeo worked out of the Strategic Operation Center in the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, the location where U.S. Generals, including Gen. George Casey Jr., the senior American commander in Iraq, met every morning to receive battle assessment updates.
“It was one of the most heavily armed areas in all of the country, but it's scary; you are in a war zone,” Asheley said. “If you are a smart person, and you want to do harm to the U.S. military, you try to attack the headquarters.”
It only took one month for that statement to come to fruition. Right before Asheley prepared to leave for work on the morning of January 29, 2005, insurgents launched a rocket attack on the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. Immediately after the rockets hit a building connected to the Embassy Annex, the signal went off ordering the soldiers into lockdown, and Asheley returned to her trailer.
Two Americans died in the rocket attack that day, and Asheley saw firsthand the dangers of the country - no matter how much security the area she worked in had.
Asheley and Addeo worked in different parts of the Strategic Operation Center, and developed close relationships within their unit, which they referred to as a team, because it consisted of only 23 members.
“When you get deployed, especially with a unit like the one I was with, you become like a family,” Asheley said. “People are getting on each other's nerves and fighting all the time, but you have a bond that can never be broken. You have gone to war together, faced imminent danger together; it's unbreakable.”
Asheley's duties included surveying battlefields and strategic locations as well as acting as a ‘go-between' for the Iraqis and their government officials and the U.S. commanders.
Editor's Note: Asheley could not go into details about many of the missions she participated in while she was in Iraq because that information is classified.
BACK, BUT FOR HOW LONG?
Asheley's tour of duty ended in Iraq almost a year to the day after it began when they returned to the United States on January 6, 2006. She has moved to Yonkers, NY, continuing to work for the New York State Army National Guard as part of the 53rd Troop Command, headquartered in Valhalla, NY.
Her brother Martin, who currently lives with their aunt in Forest Hills and hopes to join the NYPD's next class at the academy, is currently working full-time for the army with the Fighting 69th doing security at the Indian Point Power Plant.
Everyday, Asheley and her brother hear about U.S. soldiers dying in Iraq, but that does not affect their desire to return to the country.
“Me and my brother talk about it all the time, there is a certain part of you that misses it,” Asheley said.
“I know it sounds a little hard to believe,” her brother Martin said. “There is an element of structure and kinship that it is hard to acclimate to civilian life.”
Although alleged inappropriate actions by U.S. military personnel in Iraq have headlined newspaper and television reports during the last few weeks, Asheley said she saw a different side - soldiers committed to rebuilding a country that needs their help.
“There are so many people in this country that are looking to put the military down, and I understand we are not perfect,” she said. “But, nobody has been through that with bullets flying over their heads every day.”
She went even further, saying how the shared experiences, some joyous and others tragic, have brought the soldiers closer together.
“You ask a soldier why they join the military and the politically correct response is for the country, but most of the time you are doing it for the people in uniform with you,” she said.
Asheley and her brother Martin both plan on remaining active in the military, although they are not sure where future orders may take them. In addition to service to their country and fellow soldiers, a sibling rivalry continues to drive the brother and sister towards a future goal.
“My brother and I have a challenge [about] who is going to make Sergeant first, and I am determined to win,” Asheley joked.
