San Diego Servicemen Killed Overseas

Shortly before he was sent to Iraq in early June, Andrew Chris and his brother visited their father’s grave in Alabama. After five years living in San Diego, Chris had realized his dream of joining the elite Army Rangers unit, and he had one thing to do before he left for the war.

“Dad, I did this for you,” Chris said as he laid his Ranger patch at the tombstone of the man who had died when Chris was 3.

Days later, Chris, 25, was deployed to Iraq as a Ranger team leader. Last week, he was working with a commando unit searching for Saddam Hussein when the vehicle he was traveling in was ambushed near the Baghdad airport, according to news reports. Chris was killed, and eight U.S. soldiers reportedly were injured.

Another serviceman from San Diego died in the Middle East last week.

Thomas Retzer, 30, was killed when his convoy came under fire outside of Gardez, Afghanistan. The Navy did not release details of the incident.

Retzer had grown up swimming in San Diego’s surf and jogging in its hills.

The son of a Navy sailor, he was 8 years old when he attended a reunion for retired members of the Navy’s elite SEAL unit and a few veterans took him out on the ocean in a Zodiac raft. It was then, he would tell his wife years later, that he decided, “that’s the type of guy I want to be.”

An athletic kid, he thrived at sports, wrestling as an All-American his last year in high school. After two years at San Diego State University, he joined the Navy and became a member of a Virginia Beach, Va.-based SEAL team.

“He was an easygoing guy, but he thrived in the rough conditions the SEALs put him in,” said his wife, Courtney, from their home in Virginia Beach. “When he was called to duty, he did not just do it because it was his job, but because he really believed it was the right thing to do.”

The order to ship out was unexpected, she said, especially because it came after a year in which Retzer had already spent many months overseas.

In his 10 years in the Navy, there had been many goodbyes and countless hours waiting on docks to greet him upon his returns, Courtney Retzer said. But the final farewell remains sharp in her mind. Each time before, Retzer had quickly kissed his wife and their two young sons and walked toward his ship. This time, he inexplicably waited until his family drove off.

“He stood there watching until I was out of sight,” Courtney Retzer said. “That was the last time I saw him.”

Respecting his wishes, Retzer’s family will bury him at the Ft. Rosecrans National Cemetery at Point Loma in San Diego. He had told his wife that he not only wanted to be buried beside fellow soldiers, but overlooking the ocean of his childhood.

Like Retzer, Andrew Chris was the son of a military man. In fact, he came from a long line of soldiers. His grandfather fought in World War II, his uncle was a special operations soldier in the Army, his father belonged to an Army airborne division and his brother Derek served in the Navy.

And although the men in his life died when Chris was young, he still felt a fierce determination to continue their legacy, Derek Chris said.

“He had a deep sense of duty and sacrifice,” Derek said. Andrew, he said, devoured history books about wars and talked about one day becoming a history professor.

But Chris did not enlist in the Army after graduating from high school. He instead jumped at the opportunity to join his brother in California. And in San Diego Chris found a group of friends that would become like a second family to him.

The group often spent weekends camping in the desert. His former boss, Dennis Kaping, said Chris often hiked in the local hills during his lunch break.

Far from his family, Chris’ friends took him to their homes for holidays. And having grown up without a father, Chris looked to the father of a San Diego friend, Jon Bailleul.

“He called my dad from Iraq, and my dad told Andrew how proud he was of him,” Bailleul said.

When he did enlist in the Army, Chris was determined to become a Ranger, his brother said, not only for the personal challenge, but because of the bond Rangers have.

In fact, Derek looks back on the graduation ceremonies when he pinned the Ranger “tab” on his brother’s uniform and the visit to their father’s grave shortly after as a turning point in Chris’ life.

“He really found a lot of peace in himself that day,” Derek said of the visit to the cemetery. “He validated himself in the eyes of his family.”