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California soldier's story from the war on terror

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Leroy Harris Kelly III enlisted in the U.S. Army at age 17. He was married at 18. A father at 19. Dead at 20. His parents, Guiselle Harris and Leroy Harris Jr., buried their son in the suit he wore to his senior prom at Azusa High School. His father had helped him pick it out — a bright white number with a long jacket, gold buttons and a black turtleneck.

Leroy was killed in Iraq on April 20, 2004, three years into the war on terror, three years after hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and a field in rural Pennsylvania, leaving behind a scar on this nation that has yet to fade and for families like the Harrises remains as fresh as ever. As the 20th anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001, nears and the United States withdraws troops from Afghanistan and Iraq, the toll to the U.S. military has reached a terrible peak. With at least 13 troops killed in the August suicide bombing at Kabul airport, about 7,050 men and women in uniform have died in the “forever war.”

No state has lost as much as California; 776 men and women who called the Golden State home have died, 11% of the nation’s casualties. Nearly 20% of California’s war dead were old enough to die for their country but too young to buy a drink. They left behind 453 children.

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