Marine Corps PR Officer Takes Her Job Personally

Shortly after the first Marines were killed in Iraq, a reporter called the military base in Twentynine Palms and asked Sgt. Jennie Haskamp of the public affairs office if she would issue an e-mail each time a Marine from there is killed in combat.

As the public face of the Marine Corps, Haskamp’s job is to handle such queries tactfully. But the request that death notices be sent out like stock quotes touched a nerve, and she tore into the reporter.

“You see it as a news story!” she recalled saying. “You know these are people’s lives! These are our friends and neighbors! It’s more than just a news story to us.”

What Haskamp didn’t say was that one of the Marines at risk is her husband of five years, 2nd Lt. Adrian Haskamp, a platoon commander who was in the thick of the battle for Baghdad and remains in that still-unstable city.

The job of conveying the values of the Marine Corps to often-jaded members of the media is tough enough.

For Haskamp, it holds dueling demands: to present the best face of the Marines and to be the loving wife who can’t help but worry that her own office could one day draft a sad press release about her husband.

Fewer than 4% of active-duty Marines are married to other Marines, according to military officials. Haskamp’s bosses say her unusual situation makes her invaluable to the Corps. Her perspective has also made her popular with Marine wives, who have turned to her for support and guidance when reporters come looking for interviews.

A frank-talking Orange County native with a quick wit, Haskamp, 28, takes pride in being the first line of defense for nervous families facing a barrage of questions from reporters.

And she shows no qualms about chiding those who fail to accord Marine families the proper respect.

She recalled sitting in on a reporter’s interview with a female Marine who has two small children. Though the Marine made it clear that her chances of being deployed were slim, Haskamp said, the reporter repeatedly asked what the mother would do with her children if she were shipped to Iraq. Infuriated, Haskamp halted the interview briefly and reprimanded the reporter.

“If I’m rude to the media, it’s because I’m protecting the families of Marines,” she said from her desk in the public affairs office of the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, a tiny military town about 150 miles northeast of Los Angeles.

Above her desk, which is adorned with photos of Haskamp and her husband, is a bumper sticker that reads: “Freedom of the press does not mean the right to lie.” Her father-in-law bought it for her after hearing her complain that television reporters were sensationalizing the war to increase ratings.

“If I don’t make friends with the media, I don’t care,” Haskamp said.

Her moxie may be a byproduct of her childhood. She grew up in a foster home in Anaheim after her father died of a drug overdose when she was 2. Her mother also struggled with drug addiction, spending many of Haskamp’s early years in and out of jail.

Haskamp joined the Marines straight out of high school, with a dream of seeing the world. To her dismay, the Marines assigned her to Camp Pendleton -- only a few miles from Anaheim -- and trained her to be a cook. After four years of cooking for hundreds of hungry grunts, she grew frustrated and left the military.

She left California to enroll in Southern Illinois University, where she studied human resources. By then, friends had introduced her to Adrian, who shared her love of rock climbing and vintage Jeeps. She decided she wanted to marry that Marine and become a mother. The college education, she said, would be insurance in case her plan didn’t work out.

The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks changed everything. “I knew we were going to war, and in good conscience I couldn’t stay in college while other Marines ... were fighting to support my freedom,” she said.

One semester shy of her degree, Haskamp reenlisted. The Marines do not send women into combat, so Haskamp chose to be a combat correspondent, a position she thought would allow her to be near the front lines, writing and taking photographs for Marine publications. Instead, the job landed her at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, where she works on the weekly base newspaper, fields questions and escorts reporters who come to the base to interview Marines or their families.

Haskamp is part of a six-member public affairs office, headed by Capt. Robert Crum. Before the war began, the Marines in the unit spent much of their time putting out the weekly newspaper, giving tours of the base and arranging for the color guard to attend community events. Now the same staff members spend most of their time fielding calls from the BBC, the New York Times, Time Magazine, PBS and CBS.

Because Haskamp is married to a deployed Marine, Crum said, other Marine wives often ask for her to be at their side when reporters come calling.

Last month, newspaper reporters and television crews swarmed Loma Linda University Medical Center, where Betsy Sellers, whose husband had gone to the Middle East in February, was waiting for her ailing infant son to undergo a heart transplant

Sellers called for Haskamp, who kept vigil with her throughout the four-hour operation. In the end, hospital officials handled the media requests and Haskamp spent most of her time simply sitting at Sellers’ side.

“She really went above and beyond the call of duty,” Sellers said.

Sometimes, Haskamp’s job overlaps with her role as a wife. During a recent “Care Package Day” event on the base, Haskamp scurried about, helping reporters get interviews with wives and others who were packing boxes of toiletries, candy and clothes to ship to spouses and other Marines overseas.

Once her work duties were met, Haskamp packed a care package for her husband, stuffing it with socks, shirts, moist wipes, M&Ms; and outdoor magazines with pictures of places she wants to see with him.

In February, Haskamp said, she got a letter from the Marine Corps telling her to be prepared for possible deployment to the Middle East. Finally, Haskamp thought, she would work near the front lines and fulfill her dream of seeing the world. But she has not been called up.

Though disappointed at first, Haskamp said, she now feels she is doing more for the Marine Corps by doing her job with zeal and supporting her husband by writing him letters, assuring him that she is safe and waiting for him to return.

“I don’t regret coming back to the Marines,” she said, sitting at her desk while phones around her rang repeatedly. “I absolutely love my job.”