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<text id=91TT0375>
<title>
Feb. 18, 1991: War's Real Cost
</title>
<history>
TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1991
Feb. 18, 1991 The War Comes Home
</history>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
THE GULF WAR, Page 14
THE HOME FRONT
War's Real Cost
</hdr><body>
<p>A small California mining town mourns a native son killed in a
desert battle in Saudi Arabia
</p>
<p>By Michael Riley/Coulterville
</p>
<p> Last Saturday they buried Thom Jenkins beneath the soaring
pines of California's Sierra Nevada. As silence again envelops
Dudley Cemetery, echoes of a U.S. Navy chaplain's words linger:
"Thomas Allen Jenkins, your sacrifice will not be forgotten.
Your courage stands as a beacon of liberty. You exemplify the
U.S. Marine Corps motto, `Semper Fidelis.'"
</p>
<p> Lance Corporal Jenkins was one of the first ground soldiers
to be killed in action in Operation Desert Storm. He turned 21
last August, just two days before leaving for Saudi Arabia. He
was killed, perhaps by friendly fire, in a clash near the
Kuwait border. On Feb. 9 he returned home to Coulterville in
a flag-draped casket, both a hero and a haunting reminder of
war's real cost. His handsome freckled face reflects the human
toll of a conflict sanitized by high-tech smart bombs and
camouflaged by antiseptic acronyms like KIA (killed in action).
</p>
<p> Big cities may be able to absorb the death of one young man
with indifference, but in places like Coulterville (pop. 115)
the loss strikes home with intense personal force. "If I could
trade for Thom, I'd do it," says the distraught Marine who
helped recruit him. "Poor kid."
</p>
<p> Shortly after the Marine messengers appeared on Tom and
Joyce Jenkins' front porch with the horrible news about their
only son, the word blazed across these drought-stricken
mountains like a runaway forest fire. The close-knit community
of this historic gold-mining town, one of simple values and
sturdy folk, circled its wagons around the family, including
Thom's sister Jamie, 19, in a show of patriotism and support.
But the Jenkins' selfless stoicism is even more telling. "Our
boy came home, and we know exactly where he's at," says Joyce,
39, who drives a school bus. "But there's lots of other men
and women over there who need our love and support." She wears
a sweatshirt with a yellow ribbon and a simple message: 'TIL
THEY ALL COME HOME.
</p>
<p> American flags and yellow ribbons adorn almost every house,
pole, tree and car antenna in Coulterville, for here patriotism
is a solemn duty. These people despise antiwar protesters, and
they consider few acts more heinous than flag burning. So if
anyone here believes Thom died in vain, he is keeping it to
himself. "People do view him as a hero," says Tom, 42, who
works for the state transportation department. "To me, he's my
son." Tom has only simple requests. "Please be kind," he asks.
"Please be honest. Don't be too big, because it's not real."
</p>
<p> After arriving in Saudi Arabia with the 1st Combat Engineers
Battalion, Thom fought boredom by keeping pet scorpions--the
first one, named Maurice, died; the other was called Mel Torme--in a camouflaged desert shelter. In one letter home, he
pleaded for Tabasco to spice up his rations, and in another he
told a fire-fighting friend to keep the boisterous Magnolia
Saloon on Main Street from burning down so they could enjoy his
first legal beers there upon his return. At home, a Queensland
heeler puppy named B.B. and a cat named P.J. are still waiting
for him.
</p>
<p> Protected by a web of friends, the Jenkins family spoke to
no outsiders during the week following Thom's death. When they
finally did, it was to reminisce for several hours as the warm
winter sun sank behind the mountains. They shed no tears, but
rather smiled and even laughed as the memories poured forth.
Though pain seemed to burn in their eyes, the healing had
begun.
</p>
<p> Just five days after hearing of Thom's death, his parents
received a letter written a few days before he died. He wrote
that he had never seen so many planes in his life, and that he
expected to head into Kuwait after the bombing had softened up
the Iraqis. He had latched onto an infantry corporal who knew
his business. "He's teaching me a lot," Thom wrote. "It's
weird, but I'm not scared. Nervous, I guess, but not scared.
I've been preparing for this for a year now, and [Aunt] Jean
would probably say I'm brainwashed, but I've joined the Marines
to do something for the U.S., and why not the best?" The letter
ends, "Take care. I love you."
</p>
<p> Last Christmas his parents sent Thom a 35-mm camera, and the
photos from the roll he mailed home in January are among his
family's greatest treasures. One shows Thom clowning around in
a red-checked kaffiyeh under a camouflage net. Another portrays
him standing in his tent, an M-16 on his arm and a cigarette
hanging jauntily from his mouth. Several others show his light
armored vehicle, hauntingly dubbed "Blaze of Glory." Painted
on one side is a cartoon of an armed Saddam Hussein atop a
camel, his body framed within the cross hairs. Says Dan Bartok,
Thom's boss back when he spent a summer fighting fires for the
U.S. Forest Service: "We figure he'd have pulled the mustache
off of Saddam Hussein."
</p>
<p> Thom's roots are deep in the rocky mountain soil, stretching
back seven generations to Coulterville's first settlers. His
forefathers arrived in the 1850s, shortly after the California
gold rush began. This proud heritage infused every bit of his
6-ft. 1-in., 180-lb. frame. In some of Thom's desert pictures,
his greenish-brown eyes, often hidden behind mirrored
sunglasses, are filled with the glint of a growing confidence
as he began to make his way in the world. His bearing betrayed
a lifelong fascination with the military. Thom often wore
camouflage pants and shirts, and he spent weekends playing
survivalist in the mountains around his family's 160-acre ranch
up toward Yosemite. His high school classmates picked him as
the best companion on a desert island.
</p>
<p> Though Thom took a lot of teasing about his paramilitary
pursuits, he fascinated some kids at Mariposa County High
School with tales about a secret cave called Havoc, where he
claimed to have stored a cache of weapons. Thom could identify
knives and guns with uncanny precision, and his military
obsession gave rise to a nickname, "G.I. Jenkins." Another was
"Indiana Jenkins," since Thom often sported a hat like Indiana
Jones' in Raiders of the Lost Ark, his favorite movie. Says his
cousin Ed Jenkins: "He was always a dreamer, dreaming of
exciting places." His high school yearbook announced, "Expect
the best from your future."
</p>
<p> Friends recall that if Thom dove into something, from
emergency medical training to playing basketball in high
school, he gave it his best. "He never made the first string,
but he was always close," says Jon Turner, his English teacher
and a Vietnam vet. "If he got in, he'd win the game for you."
That was true whether he was square dancing as a kid or out on
a county search-and-rescue mission. His steady marksmanship
enabled him to bag a four-point buck, whose weathered rack sits
on a fence beside his house. Around town, folks knew Thom was
coming when they saw "Baby Huey," a battered green-and-rust 1972
GMC pickup. He would zoom through mud puddles in it, yelling
at friends, "Just like a Jeep commercial!"
</p>
<p> Though Thom had long wanted to join the Marines, the first
time he talked with his dad about it the answer was no. Tom
wanted his son to go to college. So he studied criminal justice
for a year, planning to become a peace officer. But he got
restless and asked again. This time the answer was yes.
Explains Jenkins: "I have a saying--save the boy, destroy the
man."
</p>
<p> At least 15 other local men and women are in the gulf, a
consequence of the convergence of patriotism and economics in
rural America. Their parents are proud but also worried that
their child could be next. At home, TVs blare incessantly.
Parents stay awake at night hoping for reassuring phone calls
from the front. They get headaches. They cry, they hug, they
pray.
</p>
<p> There was some talk around Coulterville about building a
permanent memorial for Thom, but it has been silenced. "We're
postponing that decision because he may not be the only one,"
explains Sharon Tucker, a close family friend. Thom's cousin
Ed Jenkins and his friend Jason Turpin are signed up to join
the Navy this summer, after they graduate from high school. Ed
is the last male in the Jenkins line. "I don't know whether to
serve my family or my country," he says. But in his heart he
knows he will join the Navy.
</p>
<p> The last time Tom Jenkins saw his son alive was after
drinking several cups of coffee with him at the breakfast table
three weeks before he left for Saudi Arabia. Two days before
the funeral, Tom paid a solitary visit to the funeral home in
nearby Sonora. He propped Thom's wooden-framed portrait in
front of the gunmetal-gray steel casket, then stood quietly to
one side, his eyes misting up. It was the first time he'd been
alone with his son since Thom returned from the Persian Gulf.
"Good memories flow," said Jenkins. "They just keep flowing."
</p>
<p> Shortly after Thom's death, this poem "for Tommy J." from
"Kathy B." appeared on local bulletin boards:
</p>
<list>
<item> When Old Folks Die
<item> I Don't Cry
<item> It's Time
<item>
<item> But
<item> When The Young Ones Go
<item> It Grieves Me So
<item>
<item> Who Can Count The Cost
<item> Of A
<item> Young Life
<item> Lost?
<item>
<item> The Sharpest Sorrow
<item> Is For What Might Have Been
</list>
</body>
</article>
</text>