Completing the record...this post was first sent as an email on March 31st, 2003.

Hello All -

Just wanted to bring you up to date as to whats going on with Patti and the 1st Armored Division.

Updates one and two went only to family members - for this one I've included some of our closest friends.

If you have listened to the news about the war lately one of the themes you have heard is the media questioning whether we have sufficient ground troops in Iraq to handle the mission.

(Now just a word about that if you will indulge me a moment for my personal opinion - I get a little irritated because I guess I believe if you are going to ask a question then you ought to be inclined to listen to and believe the answer - otherwise, why ask it? In my view the media mouths run incessantly but their ears are highly selective.)

The Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the Central Command Commander GEN Franks have all been asked a hundred times each if we have "too few troops" on the ground for this mission. And each one of them has said look - we've been flowing forces for some time and that continues - just as we planned. But still the breathless, vapid so-called reporters can't get off the question.)

Well, as if to try to shut these guys up once and for all the Pentagon made it clear late last week that over 100,000 more troops are on their way. (Just to be clear, all these troops have been under deployment orders since well before the first bomb fell on Baghdad.) You may have heard how the 4th Infantry Division from Fort Hood is now deploying its soldiers right now.

Anyway, the point you need to take from all this is that Patti and her company will be among those 100,000.

There is no doubt about that. The 1st Armored Division will deploy.

When? Well, we don't have an exact date...but it may be instructive to think of a deployment as a process instead of an event. And the process has begun, in that everyone is working long hours trying to make sure everything is as good as it can get before they step on that airplane. Me - I'm guessing the troops in our neighborhood are gone in a month to 6 weeks, tops.

Previously we believed that the 1st Armored Division would be deploying somewhat after the fact to perform peacekeeping duties. That no longer appears to be the case. Hostilities continue...and so we must at this point assume that to be the environment into which the 1st Armored Division deploys.

Patti is feeling the full weight of the responsibility of command right now. She could truly benefit from your prayers, and those of any prayer groups you are plugged into.

Matter of fact, so could I.