The Toll of War

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The toll of war

By David L. Harris/ Staff Writer
Thursday, December 1, 2005

Carlos Arredondo looked with despair at a photo of his two sons.
     There they were: Alexander and Brian posing in front of an American flag not too long ago.
     "That’s my American dream," said Arredondo, a 45-year-old native of Costa Rica who now lives in Roslindale. "My boys."
     But just over a year ago - on Aug. 25, 2004 - he found out Alexander, barely 20 years old, had been killed while fighting in Iraq. Arredondo’s dream had been changed. The young man who once attended the Charles Sumner Elementary School in Roslindale and went on to Blue Hills Regional Technical School in Canton was gone, the 968th American casualty in Iraq.
     The photo, mounted on a 10-foot board with other snapshots, Alexander’s resume and one of his letters home, was displayed recently for pedestrians walking through Boston Common as part of an antiwar exhibit.
     With more than 2,000 deaths recorded thus far in the war in Iraq, Arredondo has taken his anger, frustration and sadness and channeled it into being one of this war’s most visible critics, a New England version of Cindy Sheehan, the Texas mother who has become the national symbol of the antiwar movement.
     "Now he’s working to stop these tragedies," said Jamaica Plain resident Charley Richardson, co-founder of the anti-war group Military Families Speak Out. "He’s saying ’I’m giving meaning to this.’"
     Grief displayed
     Just over a year ago, Arredondo’s grief was displayed for the world to see.
     Arredondo, who was living in Hollywood, Fla., at the time, was holding his cell phone, waiting for his son to call home to wish him a happy 44th birthday.
     He remembers the uniformed officers coming out of their van.
     "I was fixing a fence in my house when I saw them coming over," said Arredondo, in an interview at his home, where the Marine Corps and U.S. flags fly in his backyard on Seymour Street in Roslindale. "It was my birthday ... I thought he was back home, like a surprise. But instead, it was my worst nightmare."
     Three Marines approached him.
     "I’m sorry to tell you that Lance Cpl. Alexander Arredondo was killed in combat," said one of the Marines.
     Arredondo couldn’t breathe.
     "I was in shock," he said. "It wasn’t supposed to be happening. I ran to the back of my house to find my mother.
     "I asked God to tell me what’s going on," he recalled. Carlos asked the Marines to leave his home, but they did not.
     For the second time, Carlos asked the Marines to leave. They said they couldn’t.
     Arredondo grabbed a hammer out of his garage, intending to smash the Marines’ van windows.
     He pounded the hammer hard into the ground, went back into the house and again prayed to God, asking to wake up from this nightmare. And for the third and last time, Arredondo asked the Marines to leave. But they didn’t.
     Arredondo went back to his garage, grabbed five gallons of gasoline and a propane gas torch he had stocked for a job that morning. He took his hammer out with him and began to hit the windows of the van so hard it flew inside the vehicle.
     His mother, Luz Marina Redondo Piedra, tried to get the gasoline away. But Carlos went to the driver’s side door, placed the gas can on the driver’s seat and sat inside.
     "I was calling for my son, screaming for my son," he said. He picked up the hammer and again smashed the equipment inside the van. The dashboard, the computer, the rear windows. He cut his wrist, a mark he still bears.
     Then he poured the gas all over the van.
     "I grabbed the torch and the fumes were already so much ... I couldn’t breathe," he said. "My mother grabbed my hand."
     And then a spark ignited and sent flames pouring all over.
     "I landed in the middle of the street," he said.
     Carlos was in flames and the Marines rushed to put out the fire. About 26 percent of his body had been burned.
     "My feet are burning, my feet are burning," he recalled saying.
     Another nightmare
     Two days later, Carlos woke up in the hospital.
     "I thought I was in another nightmare," he said.
     One year later, his burns are almost all healed, except for the lower parts of his legs, which are reddish in color from the flames. He applies a special ointment every day to help heal. He now attributes the incident to post traumatic stress disorder and goes twice a week for psychological counseling.
     "We still don’t believe it," said Melida Arredondo, Alexander’s stepmother. "We still expect him to come home."
     About three years earlier, Alexander had signed up with the Marines, who promised him a sign-on bonus. He quit his job at D’Angelo and had his sights set on seeing new places and meeting new people. Carlos and Melida found out later Alexander was offered a $10,000 bonus to sign up with the Marines. He was 17.
     Alexander was nicknamed "Dondo" by his Marine buddies and was known for his humor.
     "He really liked complaining about a lot of things," said Lance Cpl. Peter P. Brogdon in an article published in a Marines newsletter after Alexander’s death. "But if he didn’t complain, he used sarcasm. It had to be a joke."
     But Alexander was serious about his experience overseas.
     "I’ve never seen water this blue before," Alexander wrote his parents on Jan. 19, 2003, as he was shipped to Kuwait. "I’ve never looked 360 degrees around me and seen nothing but water, clouds, the sun and a fleet of battleships surrounding me."
     Later on in the letter, Alexander wrote, "I am not afraid of dying. I am more afraid of what will happen to all the ones that I love if something happens to me."
     As part of his work with the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, Alexander was dispatched on his second tour of duty to Najaf, a restive city at the time that was filled with rebel Shi’ite cleric Moqtada Al-Sadr’s followers, men who wore black and were urged to fight Americans at any cost.
     On Aug. 25, Alexander was clearing out a four-story hotel and was fatally shot in his left temple, most likely by a sniper, according to an e-mail sent 10 months later to Carlos by the Marines. He fell into the arms of a fellow Marine, whose identity is still unknown to the Arredondos.
     "My son made the ultimate sacrifice," Carlos Arredondo said. "He did a wonderful job by helping the Iraqi people. But it’s time to let them walk on their own two feet."
     Carlos Arredondo visits his son’s grave in Walpole no less than twice per week.
     "Sometimes we bring lunch there for about an hour," he said. "We cut the grass and change the flowers."
     Activism
     Arredondo, a handyman by trade, is struggling to get back to work and he is consumed by sharing his story to whomever will listen.
     By his own estimates, he has spread out 7,000 copies of the letter his son wrote to his parents on Jan. 19, 2003. He has already ordered 2,000 more. In his home, he has 20 binders filled with news clippings, letters and other materials related to Alexander.
     The sudden public appearances - he’s quoted in almost every article about anti-war protests - have taken their toll.
     "It’s affecting me economically because I’m not working full time," Arredondo said. "We barely make it with the bills. We have a purpose which we think is important ... whatever it takes. If they look at my son’s pictures, it makes it worth it."
     He’s already met with Gov. Mitt Romney and has even been kicked out of a rally for Sen. John Kerry when he displayed that photo of Alexander and Brian in front of the crowd. And he’s become close to Sheehan, the anti-war activist who also lost a son in battle, often marching with her in protests around the country.
     Any way he can, Arredondo continues to share his story. At one event earlier last month, he talked to about 30 people at the Paulist Center near the State House as part of the American Friends Service Committee’s "Eyes Wide Open" exhibit.
     "What you are doing is fantastic," said one anti-war activist, Ivonna Lee of Arlington.
     Currently, Arredondo plans to form a group called People United for Peace, a nonprofit that he hopes will educate high school students about military recruiting techniques and giving students alternatives to the military.
     "We don’t want our 17-year-old sons signing up," he said. "We want them [recruiters] to be out from the high schools."
     But he will never forget his son, his pride and joy.
     On the day the number of war dead in Iraq surpassed 2,000, Arredondo woke up early and constructed a small casket and draped an American flag on it. He attached a photo of Alex on the back and walked from the Common down Newbury Street to Roslindale.
     "It’s a catharsis. It’s just part of the healing," he said. "I’m not going to stay inside the closet."
      David Harris can be reached at dharris@cnc.com.
     Send donations to:
     People United for Peace
     c/o Boston Mobilization
     30 Bow St.
     Cambridge, Ma 02138