Stepping off the plane, 1st Lt. Daniel Banter beheld his wife for the first time in nine months, and she looked even more beautiful than he remembered. Relief poured through him as he realized that he was finally home.
Banter, a Ball State University graduate, was part of the 76th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, and with 3,400 soldiers, it was the largest deployment of soldiers from Indiana since World War II. Units of the brigade returned this week after nine months in Iraq.
"Coming home was a great relief," Banter said. "You look forward to it, yet you're so occupied with what's going on with day-to-day business that you don't have time to worry about going home, especially if you're a leader. Now my guys, I'm sure that they were counting down the days until they could come home."
Tim Cummins, Enrollment Officer for the Department of Military Science and ROTC, said he worked with all the Ball State graduates sent to Iraq with the brigade.
"I'm very proud of them," Cummins said. "They indicated they wanted to be an army officer, and when asked to go to war, they went to war. None of them said I'm hurt or whatever and begged off. They all deployed. And so they showed great maturity and courage in doing that, so I'm very proud of all of them."
First Lt. Travis Kazmirzak, a Ball State graduate, was a platoon leader in Iraq and enjoyed his time spent overseas.
"Everything that we've learned throughout school and life and military training is actually coming to some sort of perspective," Kazmirzak said. "And you actually get to utilize everything you've learned. It's definitely a boost of confidence."
Ball State graduate First Lieutenant Dean Yoder was also a platoon leader. His position as a leader made him responsible for the mind-set of his men.
"Whenever people will realize that it's almost over it's easy for complacency to set in." Yoder said. "[I had to keep my men with] the mind-set of going outside the wire everyday -- the possibility of taking fire, any kind of assortment of attacks from the enemy."
Though he is now safely home, Yoder still looks back on the lessons the Iraqi culture taught him.
"Whenever you get over there and you see the differences in the lifestyles," he said, "what they have and what we have - it makes you really appreciate what you have and what our forefathers have worked so hard to give us."
Yoder reflected on the differences in the United States since he left nine months ago. He laughed about the changing gas prices, saying when he left, gas was $3.00, but now it's $1.50.
"Other than that," Yoder said, "it's kind of a weird transition when everyone else has continued on with their lives and then you start all over again. I'd like to say it's easy to step back in, but you just can't do that."
Yoder is glad to be back home, but sees the past nine months as a good experience.
"For our mission, we did very well. Any sort of mission we were given on top of convoy security we were also successful with. I believe that we did definitely accomplish the mission, but there's definitely a lot more to be done over there."
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