Canadian On His Way to Iraq With 48th
Came to U.S. Army to Jump and Serve

Staff Sgt. Keith Hunter (left) and Staff Sgt. Gordon Spears, both with 1st Battalion, 121st Infantry, train on an Army radio (Photo by Sgt. Jeff Lowry, 124th MPAD)

FORT STEWART, Ga. – There are many reasons people join the Army. Some do it for college money, others feel it’s their patriotic duty, and yet others feel the need to jump from perfectly good airplanes.

That’s the way it was for one Canadian lad.

“I tried two years in a row to join the Canadian Army, but there was a list a mile long,” said Staff Sgt. Keith Hunter, a training sergeant from Headquarters Company, 1st Battalion, 121st Infantry.

“I just wanted to be in the army and be a paratrooper,” he said. He got that opportunity when he traveled from his hometown in Windsor, Ontario north to Detroit and joined the U.S. Army.

He earned his jump wings and master paratrooper badges years ago on active duty with the 82nd Airborne Division, now he teaches Soldiers at Macon’s Regional Training Institute.

Hunter, who currently calls Blue Ridge home, is one of more than 4,000 Soldiers representing the 48th Brigade Combat Team, which is scheduled to deploy to Iraq in May.

Hunter, 57, is probably just one of a few of those seeking U.S. citizenship. Immigration and Naturalization Service has his paperwork. Hunter is just waiting for the signature.

“As soon as INS signs it, I’ll be a U.S. citizen,” Hunter said as he smiled.

He’s looking forward to the day he takes the oath, and hopes it will be before the 48th deploys to the Middle East.

“I’ll be in my dress greens with all my service ribbons,” said Hunter who has served nearly 30 years and has nine service ribbons.

When standing in line for Soldier Readiness Processing a Soldier asked if there was anything she could do for him.

“‘A will, a power of attorney,’ she said,” said Hunter.

“I said I got those all I want is to be a U.S. citizen. All I got in return is the deer in the headlights look,” said Hunter.

Hunter is forthright in why he wants to forsake his Canadian citizenship and become a U. S. citizen.

“I’ve been here longer than I’ve been there,” said Hunter as he pointed to the ground on which he was sitting.

As a goalie growing up in Canada, the only thing he really misses about his home country is hockey.

“I sure as heck don’t miss the snow and the cold,” he said. “I recently returned from seeing my sister and they had 18” of snow.”

Snow is something he probably won’t see in Iraq. To get ready for that 48th BCT soldiers are participating in “emersion training” where they face as realistic as possible scenarios.

The 48th tasked Hunter, and about 12 other Citizen-Soldiers, to help train the Iraqi army. According to Hunter what they teach has yet to be determined.

“It’ll be basically the same as teaching our Soldiers, but with a language barrier,” he said.

Although he has served nearly 30 years he missed the call-up to Vietnam and other hot spots, but he does not have any regrets about his upcoming deployment to the Middle East, especially if goes as an U. S. citizen.

“I figure if I’m going, I might as well be one,” said Hunter.

“I can truly be U.S.”