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Ron Griffin
Emerson, New Jersey
Ron Griffin, father of Specialist Kyle Griffin, 20, said, “Kyle always wanted to be in the military. He just always knew he wanted to be a soldier. He knew the Rangers creed and had memorized it two years before he entered service. He was born to be a soldier.” Kyle was set to enter Ranger school after his deployment in Iraq ended, but he died just short of realizing that dream on May 30, 2003. Ron said, “When Kyle left to enter into the service, his mother said to him, ‘Aren’t you afraid?’ Kyle said to her, ‘Mom, I’m a soldier. This is what I do. This is what I’m trained for. If I die, I die. I don’t have any problem with that. There’s a war going on. And I am going to go fight that war.’”
A member of the LRS unit that went behind enemy lines to capture human intelligence, Kyle was a fearless and passionate young man who at 19, had already received a Bronze Star, a nearly impossible accomplishment for one so young. “The thing my son said he wanted the most was the Combat Infantry Badge” said Ron. “Kyle never did want to fly a copter or ride in a tank. He wanted to be on the ground. When 9/11 happened, he said to me, ‘It looks like I’m going to get a chance to earn my CIB.’” And he did earn the CIB, along with several other awards. “Kyle considered the Army his home. When he had to go back to an assignment from leave, he’d say, ‘I have to go home now’. He loved everything about being an Infantryman and a soldier.”
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News
- Ron Griffin stepped to the microphone, gazed out at more than 200 people who had come to honor his fallen soldier son, and tried to make sense of his feelings.
"This is going to be tough," he said, his voice breaking. "I never want to lose the sadness for Kyle, but I never want to give up the love" that's come from his death, Griffin said Saturday morning at the dedication of the Kyle Griffin Memorial at Ackerman Avenue Park. "It's bad, but it's good. I don't know why."
Since Army Spec. Kyle Griffin, 20, died in a truck accident outside Mosul, Iraq, on May 30, 2003, this quiet town of 7,000 has mobilized to support Ron Griffin, his wife, Robin, and their two children, Ryan, 17, and Blair, 16. Bergen County (N.J.) Record, 6/13/04
- The Griffins have always have been "110 percent for the war," Robin [Griffin, Kyle's mom] says. "We started it, so let's finish it. It'll bite us if we don't. And it's awful. It's unfortunate to have to lose lives. No one knows this better than us."
"Ninety five percent of the soldiers in Iraq want to do the best they can do," says Ron. "They love what they do. And that doesn't come through in the media ... I was in Vietnam. I know what it's like when you walk by and a little kid looks up at you in your uniform, carrying your weapon and smiles. American soldiers -- when they do their job, they do it well and they love it. Kyle loved it out there. He wanted to be there and he wanted to do his job." Salon.com 8/21/03
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