Sergeant Jose Munoz, Sgt. Mark DeCorte and Cpl. Sean Henry filtered through the auditorium before their panel discussion began, greeting students with enthusiastic and disarming smiles.

The soldiers wanted to know where the students were from, if they were there by choice or with a class, and, of course, if there were any questions they could answer.

Their personal approach established an interactive atmosphere at Friday’s ‘Why We Serve’ panel, where Munoz of the U.S. Army, Henry of the U.S. Marine Corps and DeCorte of the U.S. Air Force, shared some of their personal experiences and fielded a wide array of questions.

After Mark Rupert, chair of the political science department, turned down the panel, professor Bill Coplin’s HNR 260 class decided to host the panel in conjunction with the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs in order to present a unique perspective about serving in war.

The three men opened the discussion by describing their personal reasons for serving in war.

Henry, a 22 year old from Queens, N.Y., joined the U.S. Marine Corps the summer after graduating high school. He lost a cousin on Sept. 11 and felt a desire to move away from home and serve his country.

DeCorte comes from a military family. He has spent 13 years in the U.S. Air Force as a medic. Last year in Afghanistan, DeCorte’s work on an improved medi-vac increased the casualty survival rate to above 90 percent – an accomplishment to which DeCorte takes great pride.

Munoz was born in Mexico and moved to Texas when he was 9 years old. He joined the U.S. Army because he wanted to give back to a country that he felt gave him so much. ‘I’ve lived here for the past 13 years. I am from here. And it feels great,’ he said.

The audience responded to his statement with roaring applause.

During the panel discussion, Henry described a typical good and bad day when fighting in a war.

He said, simply, ‘a good day, you all come back; a bad day, you’re putting a friend in a medi-vac chopper.’

The men reflected on how they deal with negative media and public feedback, a prevalent issue given to the high-profile status of fighting overseas.

‘It doesn’t really affect me because we love the American people, we love this country. That’s why we joined, and we do our job 100 percent regardless,’ Henry said.

‘He stole my answer,’ Munoz joked.

Despite the patriotic and heroic sentiment present for most of the program, some people in the audience felt their questions were left unanswered.

Peter Wirth, a resident of Fayetteville, asked about the high number of civilian casualties in the Iraq War as compared to other wars. Henry responded to him by saying he had never killed a civilian, nor seen a civilian killed.

Wirth thought this response and the entire session cast an excessively positive light on the war.

‘They talked about handing out candy (to children), and it sounds exciting and very positive, but I spoke with a mother whose son served in Iraq and who came back so troubled, he hung himself in the basement,’ he said. ‘I wanted to talk about the reality of killing civilians, and they danced around the question.’

Wirth was disappointed with the soldiers’ answers and thought it may skew the view of potential young students who consider enlistment.

Other audience members brought up the Blackwater controversy, experiences with Iraqi native hostility toward the troops, post traumatic stress disorder and the purpose of staying in Iraq.

The questions created tension in the auditorium, and most went largely unanswered.

Panel moderator Bill Smullen had the difficult job of keeping questions on track with the purpose of the program.

‘Our students stood tall and expressed themselves in very articulate, passionate, powerful ways, and I liked that,’ he said, ‘I also liked the fact that we had a diversity of opinion in the audience today. If we all agreed with things in life, it wouldn’t be much of a reason to come to forums like this.’

Smullen also expressed pride in SU for being one of the first universities to host the program. He said it might have had a lot to do with the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications’ reputation and the program’s aim toward better communication. ‘We ought to be talking to each other. Dialogue is one of the most important things you can do in life,’ he said.

Student reaction to the panel was mostly positive.

Freshman Chris Collins, who fought in Iraq prior to enrolling at SU, found many parallels with Cpl. Henry’s experiences in the Marines to his own.

‘His views were pretty much the same as mine. He wanted to get out of his town, he wanted to serve his country. The flag meant a lot to him, and he wanted to make a difference,’ Collins said.

Published on December 2, 2007 at 12:00 pm