The Press Enterprise (Riverside, CA) November 7, 2001
Troops from the 10th Mountain Division are protecting a key air base near Afghanistan
By Richard Brooks
World War II ski soldier Bob Roddick had barely completed his first major battle when an artillery shell ended his combat career with the U. S. Army's 10th Mountain Division. "A German 88 round came in and got me and two other guys," Roddick said over the dining room table of his San Bernardino home.
Medics patched up his buddies. Roddick went home with a shattered left leg. And the division eventually got out of the ski-soldier business, though some of its troops now are in Uzbekistan -- near the border with Afghanistan. Roddick and his fellow vets are waiting to see whether their old outfit will remain on the sidelines, apparently protecting an important staging base, or cross the border and fight.
Though seldom in the news in recent years, the 10th Division is among the Army's most unusual divisions. Finland provided the inspiration for its creation. In 1939, the Soviets invaded Finland -- and Finnish ski troops annihilated two Soviet tank divisions.
Ski unit created in 1941
Charles "Minnie" Dole, then-president of the U. S. National Ski Patrol, saw the Finnish exploits as an example of why the Army needed ski troops. He lobbied the War Department, now called the Department of Defense, and the Army's first mountain ski unit was created in December 1941.
Dole's National Ski Patrol recruited the volunteers for what was to become the 10th Mountain Division. As a result, most of the recruits were accomplished skiers or rock climbers. They trained at altitudes above 9,000 feet near Camp Hale, Colo. But they didn't reach Italy until January 1945, becoming the last Army division sent overseas. The following month, they fought their first major battles, assaulting Riva Ridge and Mount Belvedere in the Apennine Mountains, dislodging German gunners.
It was on the slopes of Mount Belvedere that Roddick was wounded by a German cannon shell. Tenth Division troopers had captured the peak four days earlier, and Roddick's unit was preparing to hike to another ridge. "We had just gotten out of our (fox)holes, and we were moving out -- and bang!" he said. "There were patches of snow there. And the ground was frozen. But no, we didn't even have skis with us."
These days, the division's "mountain" designation is largely honorific.
Any weather, any terrain
"We're a light infantry division," said Maj. Kenneth McDorman, division spokesman at the 10th Division's home at Fort Drum, N.Y. "We're very proud of that (mountain) lineage, but we're trained to fight in any kind of weather and any kind of terrain."
McDorman wouldn't say how many of the division's troops are in Uzbekistan or what they're doing. But roughly 2,000 10th Division troops are there protecting an air base that serves as a key staging point for U. S. efforts in Afghanistan, said Dan Smith, a retired Army intelligence colonel and chief of research for the Center for Defense Information in Washington, D. C.
Even if the entire division is sent to the region and assigned a direct combat role, it's unlikely they'd be sent into action alone, Smith said. "I don't think we would use a single division, because there would be literally no backup," he said. "You sure couldn't do it with 2,000 troops."
The 10th Division contingent is believed to be the largest U. S. conventional combat force in the region, said military analyst John Pike, director of globalsecurity.org. But sending a large conventional combat force into Afghanistan could be a grave mistake, he said.
"At this point, I can't figure out what large numbers of ground troops would do over there, except get shot at," Pike said. "I think that's what (Osama) bin Laden's hoping for." Instead, Pike figures the 10th Division will operate and protect facilities that are being used by special forces such as Army Rangers.
Living at another's camp
"Special operations units have to eat at somebody else's mess hall. They have to clean up at somebody else's showers," Pike said. "They basically have to live at somebody else's camp until they're out flying around (on combat operations) at night."
Pike said he doesn't expect any major changes in the war -- or the 10th Division's assignment -- until at least spring. "I think the bombing is going to fade out over the next several weeks as they gradually run out of stuff to blow up on a regular basis. For the next six months or so, you'll have Rangers going out at night doing ambushes," he said. "Comes the spring thaw, people (at the Pentagon) will draw some conclusions on how it's going."
In the meantime, the aging vets of the 10th Division are remembering the hardships and dangers of winter warfare in rugged terrain. "I was scared to death," said Eric Cromie of Fawnskin, another veteran of the fight for Mount Belvedere. "We were being shelled. And when you got shelled, the shrapnel would be (flying) over your head. You could hear it. The things sounded as big as a car."
Today's 10th Division has at least one advantage Roddick and Cromie didn't have: helicopters for medical evacuation. "If we'd have had helicopters, we'd have saved a lot more lives," Cromie said. "We lost 1,000 men and 5,000 were wounded . . . (during) three months of combat."
Copyright 2001 The Press Enterprise Co.
