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Stay course, grieving mom says

John C. Ensslin, Rocky Mountain News

Published July 11, 2007 at midnight

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Debra L. Bascom, of Colorado Springs, doesn't want one more mother to have to go through what she endured - the death of a son in combat in Iraq.

"But if we don't stay the course," she quickly said, "what was the point of going over there in the first place?"

Bascom's son Doug, a 25-year- old Marine sergeant, was killed while leading his squad in a firefight in Anbar province, northwest of Baghdad.

Bascom had served a full four- year active duty enlistment in 2003 but returned to the Marines after a brief stint in civilian life. He volunteered for service in Iraq.

Just three days before his death, he had been wounded in a skirmish and won a Purple Heart. He returned to his squad the next day. He was fatally wounded by an improvised bomb.

When asked about the latest round of debate over the war in Congress, Debra Bascom said, "That's a really hard thing to answer."

She thinks back to the Vietnam War, when she felt that the U.S. pulled out too early and abandoned its original objective. She worries that the country might be repeating that mistake.

"If our objective was to fight terrorism, then obviously we are not done because we still have tons of terrorism over there," Bascom said.

"I don't know when our objective changed from stopping terrorism to rebuilding a country. But my personal opinion is that you support the president and you do what you set out to do.

"Who's going to respect us if we go in and then pull out because somebody doesn't like it?

"We're not expendable. And with the way Congress is doing things, it seems like we are expendable.

"I sent in a 25-year-old son with great potential and a great heart to believe what he was told needed to be done."

She remembered how her son would call her from Iraq. "Mom, this is really scary over here," he would tell her.

"But he stuck it out," she said. "He didn't leave. He didn't let his buddies down. (Congress is) letting him down by not following through on what needs to be done."