1st Battalion 22nd Infantry - SGT Brian Taylor

1st Battalion 22nd Infantry

SGT Brian Taylor - Doing a job

Next stop: Kuwait

Posted on: Friday, March 07, 2008, 1:51 AM By Amanda Kim Stairrett
Killeen Daily Herald

FORT HOOD – If Sgt. Brian Taylor was going to be part of something big, he wanted to be part of the backbone.
If Sgt. Brian Taylor was going to join the Army, he wanted to go infantry.

Taylor left Fort Hood on Thursday with about 500 other Soldiers from the 4th Infantry Division's 1st Brigade Combat Team.
The two flights that day also carried about 120 of the 13th Sustainment Command's 4th Sustainment Brigade headquarters. More are set to leave today.

The Soldiers will land in Kuwait, where the sustainment brigade will spend the next 15 months.
The brigade combat team Soldiers will continue on to Iraq, where the division's Headquarters, Special Troops Battalion
and Fort Carson-based 3rd Brigade Combat Team have been since late 2007.

Taylor is a 25-year-old Houston native on the way to his second Iraq deployment.
He enlisted in the Army three years and six months ago to do something different and get out of trouble.
At the time, he worked in a steel factory. Now he's an infantryman leading six other infantrymen in the 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry Regiment.

Taylor is not a career Soldier. He was set to get out of the Army in January, but was stop-lossed.
He planned on working at a sheriff's department in Houston – his dream job.
He still plans on doing that when he returns from Iraq and gets out of the Army.

He's not mad or bitter. He's going to do his job no matter what, even if it means putting his dream on hold for a little longer.
And his wife of nearly a year doesn't mind either – just as long as he doesn't re-enlist, he said.

Part of what Taylor likes about being an infantryman is doing a job that others can't or don't have the guts to do, he said on Thursday.
It's that trait that makes it special for him. That and "my guys" – the six other Soldiers who rely on his leadership.

Taylor is the oldest in a tightknit group who have been through some "hellified times" together, he said.
They've survived hard personal times, hard professional times, and they are there for each other.
Taylor spends more time with these guys than his own family and wouldn't change his team for the world.

The group has a bond that he'll "definitely" miss when he gets out of the Army.
That closeness fades away once a Soldier leaves his unit, Taylor said, with a little sadness in his voice.

But, for the next 15 months, it's just the sergeant and his guys – all combat veterans.
They'll spend day in and day out with each other, forming an even tighter bond that those not in the military couldn't comprehend.
For now, before all the goodbyes, take cares and stay in touches, he'll tell his guys to keep their eyes open,
keep their heads up and stay sharp. It'll be tough. Don't let the hard times bring you down, he'll say.
It's not like they can leave their jobs and go home at the end of a long day.

"Try your best to come back alive," Taylor says. "That's about it."

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