Flag that flew in Iraq now flying over NGEMC

Published 11:50 pm Friday, November 10, 2006

Ken Bain says it’s important to continue to honor the men and women who have served this country in the military.

Bain should know. A sergeant first class with Charlie Company, the Georgia Army National Guard unit based in Dalton, he was among the members of that unit who spent a year in Iraq, returning earlier this year.

On Friday, Bain presented North Georgia Electric Membership Corp., where he has worked for 10 years, a U.S. flag that flew at the convoy support center in Scania in Iraq, about an hour south of Baghdad.

Today, the Murray County High School graduate will participate in the Veterans Day Parade in Dalton.

“Some of the people don’t realize some of the stuff American soldiers have to go through,” Bain said, “even though when you sign up you know the sacrifices are there.”

“Most of them leave their wives and their kids,” he said. “By the time you come back, your kids are grown up.”

Bain, 40, said the “active” military “stay gone all the time.”

“Most of the Guard, you’re gone (to Iraq) for 18 months, then you come back and you might have to go to the (Mexican) border, you don’t know where they might send you.”

Bain said the soldiers who served in World War II and Korea, “pretty soon they’re going to be gone. They had a pretty rough time.” And his father John, a Marine who now lives in Aberdeen, Md., where he works for the Department of Defense as a civilian, served in the Vietnam War during a time when the soldiers’ sacrifices weren’t always appreciated.

But Bain believes since the second Iraq war, “the American people are coming around” in support of the soldiers.

That’s important, he says.

“They (soldiers) put up with a lot of sacrifices. Now it’s all volunteer. What’s going to happen if nobody volunteers for it?” he said.

Bain doesn’t like to talk about his most recent time in Iraq — he was there during the first Gulf war after Iraq invaded Kuwait — where he and other soldiers patrolled the streets in M1A1 tanks.

He saw his share of IEDs — improvised explosive devices — and his tank was hit a couple of times, but he says he was just “banged up a little bit.”

He said the reaction by the Iraqi citizens to the American soldiers in the Sunni “triangle” where he was stationed was mixed.

“Some were all right, and some I got the impression they didn’t want anybody there. They were real particular, they didn’t like Americans.”

Of the deposed Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, Bain said, “I hate to see what he did to all those people because that isn’t right. They didn’t have any rights. After you keep people down all the time they don’t know anything else but to live that way. That’s pretty bad that they had to be like that.”

He said of the U.S. mission, “I believe it takes time. It’s going to take time to solve the problem. That’s real complicated over there.”

NGEMC president/CEO Ron Hutchins on Friday presented Bain a plaque on behalf of the co-op’s board of directors and his fellow employees thanking him for his bravery and service.



The Veterans Day Parade in Dalton organized by the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 4985 and American Legion Post 112 will begin today at 10:30 a.m. on Waugh Street. The parade will travel right onto Thornton Avenue, left onto Morris Street, left onto Pentz Street and left back to Waugh.

The parade will be followed by a ceremony at the Whitfield County Courthouse. Retired Navy Rear Adm. Mack Gaston, a Dalton native, will be the guest speaker.

American Legion Post 167 in Chatsworth is hosting a Veterans Day service today at 11 a.m. on the Murray County Courthouse lawn. Alan Price, pastor of Chatsworth First Baptist Church, is the guest speaker. A lunch at the senior center will follow for veterans and their families.