15th Kane'ohe Marine is killed
By William Cole
Advertiser Military Writer
A few weeks ago, three of Lance Cpl. Jeffery S. Blanton's toes were shot off in Fallujah, Iraq.
Family photo via Associated Press
All he wanted to do was get back with fellow Marines, and get back in the fight.
Jeffery Blanton, a Marine based in Kane'ohe, was killed Sunday in Iraq. He and his wife were married in the Islands six months ago.
"That kid, I believe that if they'd told you that he had to go jump out of an airplane to stay (in Fallujah), he'd do it," said his aunt, Cheryl Blanton, in a telephone interview yesterday. "He wanted to stay with his men. He didn't want to come home. He felt that it was his duty to be there with them."
On Sunday, the 23-year-old Fayetteville, Ga., man with the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment out of Kane'ohe Bay was one of eight Marines killed in Anbar province, which includes Fallujah.
"I could be no more prouder of him than if I had a dozen grandbabies sitting around here that he had given me, because he loved the Marines," said Blanton's father, Stephen Blanton, from his home in Seonia, Ga.
Stephen Blanton didn't find out his only son was headed to Fallujah until he was already there.
"Like I told him, 'Since you're there, just be careful. Do what you gotta do.' "
The eight deaths equaled the number lost when a car bomb exploded on Oct. 30, killing eight 1/3 Marines in the deadliest single-day attack against the U.S. military in six months.
Fifteen Hawai'i-based Marines and one sailor have been killed in Iraq since Oct. 24. Twelve Schofield Barracks soldiers have died while serving in northern Iraq in 11 months, and 13 have been killed in Afghanistan since March.
Two more Marines died Monday in Anbar province.
Blanton's family was told the Weapons Company Marine was killed by small-arms fire in house-to-house searches for weapons and insurgents.
Marine Corps Lt. Gen. John Sattler on Nov. 18 said a U.S. assault on Fallujah had "broken the back of the insurgency." More than 71 U.S. troops and 1,200 insurgents have been killed in some of the fiercest fighting of the Iraq war.
Lance Cpl. Blake A. Magaoay, 20, of Pearl City, a California-based Marine, was killed Nov. 29 in Fallujah and buried Monday at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.
The Blanton family will meet the Marine's new wife for the first time at his burial, rather than at the renewal of wedding vows Jeffery Blanton had wanted to take place during his leave in March.
Amber Blanton, a paralegal in the Army, is heading back from Afghanistan. The couple met and married in Hawai'i about six months ago.
Blanton enlisted in the Marine Corps in March 2002, trained to be an anti-tank assaultman at Camp Lejeune, N.C., and after November of that year was assigned to the 1/3 Marines at Kane'ohe Bay.
The outgoing young man — who loved the outdoors, sports and coaching Little League — joined the Marines to give direction to his life, his aunt said.
"His dad told him, 'Look, you've been sitting around here too long.' He said you're not ever going to have a career to where you can do the things that you could do if you were in the armed services. So he suggested that he join the Marines," said Cheryl Blanton, who lives in Fayetteville.
He loved the Marines and the far-flung places he would get to visit. Several weeks ago, Blanton lost three toes, but on Friday, called his grandmother and told her he was being released from a base hospital and was going back out.
"Sunday morning, there were seven men, seven Marines, and they were split up into two different platoons and they were sent out to a certain part of Fallujah," Cheryl Blanton said. "And all of them wound up dead by Sunday night."
Stephen Blanton has no issues with his son having been sent to Fallujah, only pride in his service in the Marines.
"No matter where he'd be at, I'd support him," he said. "He didn't make the agenda. That was set for him."
Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-5459.
