The following article first appeared in Rolling Stone in May of 2004. It is written by Osha Gray Davidson. I received permission from Mr. Davidson to reprint the article here to include in my series of "Native Americans in the U.S. Armed Forces". Due to the length of the article, it will be divided up into seven parts. To read the article in its entirety, please click on the link provided at the end of the article. Thank you. Phyllis Doyle Burns


A Wrong Turn in the Desert - Part Four
By Osha Gray Davidson
Rolling Stone, 27 May 2004

For Native Americans, patriotism and military service are complex, often contentious issues. Some Indians call those who join the military "apples" – red on the outside, white on the inside. (One T-shirt popular on reservations bears an old-time photograph of four Indians, rifles at the ready, with the words, HOMELAND SECURITY: FIGHTING TERRORISM SINCE 1492.) But many American Indians still consider this their homeland and have fought to defend it; during World War II, one in eight Indians joined the military.

For Lori, the military was just another way to help others – starting with her kids and her family. "She wanted to fend for her children," says her mother, Percy. "She was going to build us a house and take care of us. I think she weighed the options that she had. We’re not rich enough to send her to college. When you have obstacles in your way, you take what life offers."

If there was one thing Lori knew, it was how to deal with obstacles. In April 2001, with just two weeks to go in basic training, she broke her foot during a training exercise. She kept the injury quiet. "She didn’t want to get held back," her dad recalls. Lori simply bandaged her foot and continued the punishing training as if nothing were wrong. After her graduation ceremony, Lori couldn’t wait to remove her shoe. Even her parents, long accustomed to her injuries, winced when they saw her grotesquely swollen and bruised foot.

Outskirts of Nasiriyah. 23 March: 0600 hours
Dawn has special significance for the Hopis, who consider the sun the creator. Piestewa saw it rising out of the desert as she followed the convoy off Route Blue and onto a smaller road. King – now without sleep for fifty hours – had missed a left turn that took Route Blue just west of the city. The smaller road, flanked by partially drained marshes, plunged into the eastern section of Nasiriyah. The town was just waking up. Men with AKs slung over their shoulder gawked at the Americans; pickups mounted with large-caliber machine guns drove slowly by. The potential for violence crackled in the morning air. With its narrow streets hemmed in by low buildings of mud and concrete, Nasiriyah would be a hellish place to come under fire.

The Americans felt a surge of relief as they crossed a canal marking the other side of Nasiriyah. A mile later, King checked his global-positioning system and realized for the first time that he was in the wrong place. They were too far east. There was only one way to get back on route – they had to retrace their path through Nasiriyah. King gave the order to "lock and load."

The convoy made the first turn around seven o’clock. King was in the lead; Piestewa brought up the rear. Suddenly, King’s driver, Pvt. Dale Nace, heard the popping of small-arms fire. "Trucks were hitting the gas and coming around the turn fast," he recalls. "They were trying to get away from something." Several rounds slammed into the Humvee that Piestewa was driving. At least two bullets punched through her plastic side window, missing her head by inches.

In the confusion, King missed the turn that led back into the city. Dowdy yelled over his radio, alerting King to his mistake. Now they had to find someplace wide enough to turn the big trucks around. But the road was too narrow, and they kept driving, headed in the wrong direction. Under the strain, a five-ton truck broke down and had to be abandoned.

It was a harrowing two miles before the convoy managed to turn around and head back toward the city. King had completed the turn and was racing back west when he saw the Humvee driven by Piestewa bringing up the rear, still heading east. The two vehicles stopped. They weren’t taking fire at the moment, so King jumped out to confer with Dowdy, leaving Piestewa and Nace a couple of feet from each other in their Humvees.

"Pi, are you all right?" Nace asked. The two were friends and had worked in the same office back at Fort Bliss. In response, Piestewa lifted the plastic window that she had zipped down and showed him the bullet holes.

Nace didn’t think he could lead the convoy out of what he knew would be a withering attack once they headed back into Nasiriyah. Piestewa was the more experienced driver, so Nace asked whether she would switch places. She shook her head. She knew her responsibility was to stay with her commander, even if it meant remaining in the last vehicle in the convoy – the most dangerous position in an attack. "I’m not getting out of this Humvee," she told Nace. The officers climbed back in. "Take care, Pi," said Nace, slipping his vehicle into gear but terrified of what lay ahead. "You, too," she told him. Nace was struck by how serene she sounded, as if she were just saying goodnight after another day of work back at Fort Bliss.

"She had this look on her face that was like: ‘Something is about to happen, but we’re going to be OK,’ " Nace recalls. "It made me feel at ease with myself. She gave me this calmness. If it wasn’t for her, I probably would have freaked out." Piestewa turned her Humvee around, took up position at the rear of the convoy and headed back toward the city.


Part five of this story will be printed May 10, 2008