[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 170 (Friday, November 21, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S15394-S15396]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                TRIBUTE TO CPL RODNEY ``JIMMY'' ESTES II

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I rise today to pay tribute to a brave 
young man who just returned from a tour of duty in Iraq. Rodney 
``Jimmy'' Estes II is from my hometown of Louisville, KY. A few months 
ago, Jimmy was dressed in fatigues fighting the war on terror in the 
Iraqi desert. But today, you can find him wearing red and white and 
playing football for the University of Louisville Cardinals--my 
favorite team.
  Jimmy Estes, a 1998 graduate of St. Xavier High School, turned down a 
football scholarship to Georgetown College to follow in his 
grandfather's footsteps--to serve in the U.S. Marine Corps. The day 
after graduation, he left Kentucky for boot camp at Parris Island. And 
on January 7, 2003, Jimmy was called to active duty.
  As a member of the Alpha Company, 8th Tank Battalion, Jimmy was on 
the front lines in An Nasiriyah, Iraq. During his time in the country, 
he experienced some of the war's most intense fighting. In his tank, he 
worked as the loader and operated the 240-millimeter gun on top of the 
vehicle. Jimmy and his comrades are unsung heroes in one of our troops' 
finest hours. They were the lead tank in the rescue mission of PVT 
Jessica Lynch.
  To pass the hours in Iraq, Jimmy played football with his fellow 
soldiers, reminding him of his lifelong dream--to play football for the 
University of Louisville Cardinals. Following his tour of duty, which 
ended this past May, Jimmy returned home and enrolled at U of L. 
Determined to play football, Jimmy spent his summer preparing to try 
out for one of four walk-on positions. And just like on the 
battlefield, Jimmy succeeded. Not only is he a wide receiver on his 
university's football team, he also continues to serve his Nation as a 
Marine reservist.
  Jimmy's bravery, humility, and determination should be commended. On 
behalf of this grateful Nation, I ask my colleagues to join me in 
thanking Corporal Estes for his dedicated service. As a proud U of L 
alum and most importantly, a football fan, I wish Jimmy and his 
teammates a winning season. Go Cards!
  I ask unanimous consent that the article, ``For Jimmy Estes, that was 
war; this is football'' from my hometown paper, The Courier-Journal, be 
printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

          [From the Louisville Courier-Journal, Oct. 10, 2003]

            For Jimmy Estes, That Was War; This Is Football

                             (By Pat Forde)

       The war wasn't so bad until bedtime.
       Jimmy Estes spent the dusty desert days in the company of 
     his M1A1 Abrams tank crew or with the other members of Alpha 
     Company, 8th Tank Battalion. On the dull days the Marines 
     opened care packages or talked about family, sports and what 
     they'd give for cold water and hot showers. On the deadly 
     days they went out and killed Iraqis because it was their 
     job, and when the battles around An Nasiriyah were done, the 
     soldiers rehashed them in detached terms.
       But at the end of the day, when Cpl. Rodney J. Estes II 
     would lie down and stare up at the inky Arabian night, he was 
     alone with the whole thing. It was just him and the horror: 
     the dead women and children, the dogs tugging at corpses, the 
     Iraqis he personally shot in combat, the bullets they shot at 
     him that pinged off the tank's armor.
       It was just him and the heroism: Estes and his mates rode 
     the lead tank on the famous Jessica Lynch rescue mission, 
     laying down fire and securing the perimeter before Army 
     Rangers and Navy SEALs went into Saddam Hussein General 
     Hospital to retrieve America's most famous POW.
       He took all of it to bed with him.
       ``Those were some lonely nights,'' Estes said.
       It was during those lonely nights that he made a vow: ``If 
     I get out of here and make it home alive, I'm going to do it. 
     ``
       Go to college. And play football. For his hometown team, 
     the University of Louisville.
       Today Jimmy Estes is alive and well and a 23-year-old walk-
     on wide receiver for the Cardinals.
       He saw enough death in the desert to learn that dreams can 
     come with an expiration date--probably not one of your 
     choosing. A young man who had drifted along without plan or 
     purpose since graduating from St.Xavier High School in 1998 
     had an epiphany in Iraq.
       ``Absolutely, it changed me,'' said Estes, who hadn't 
     played organized football in six years. ``I kind of piddled 
     around at jobs here and there, not anything I'd call a 
     career. If I hadn't gotten deployed, to be honest, I don't 
     know where I'd be right now.
       ``I don't take things for granted like I used to. I realize 
     how lucky I am. I realize life can end.''
       Now his life is just restarting. He is a justice 
     administration major in the classroom, with designs on 
     becoming a football coach. On the field he is a humble 
     freshman who hasn't even dressed out for a game.
       Yet there is no bigger hero in the U of L football program.
       Said offensive lineman Will Rabatin, Estes' friend since 
     grade school: ``I'm proud to know him.''
       No more proud than Estes is to have this long-shot college 
     football experience. Think of all the coddled athletes out 
     there, complaining that a full ride isn't enough. Then listen 
     to Estes, who's been through more than those guys can ever 
     imagine and now cherishes the chance to pay his way 
     through college and play on the scout team.
       ``He's just a great kid to have around,'' said offensive 
     coordinator and wide receivers coach Paul Petrino. ``Every 
     day when we start out doing ball drills, he has a lot of 
     enthusiasm, a lot of fire. You can tell he loves being 
     here.''
       ``I look forward to going out there every day,'' Estes 
     said. ``I really appreciate the opportunity. It's just so 
     great to be a part of it.''
       In the weeks before the invasion of Iraq, the Marines 
     played touch football in Kuwait all the time. Tankers against 
     tank maintenance. In combat boots. In the desert.
       Talk about your sandlot games.
       For Estes, this was a continuation of his life long love of 
     sports. When he played flag football in grade school, all the 
     kids on the sidelines were squirting each other with water 
     bottles, oblivious to the game. Jimmy was running the 
     sidelines, keeping pace with the action and imploring his 
     coaches to put him in.
       When he was 6 he persuaded his father, Rodney, a retired 
     Louisville police officer, to get him out of school early for 
     the first two days of the NCAA basketball tournament. Jimmy 
     sat in front of the television from noon until midnight each 
     day, transfixed.
       At age 7 he was reading Sports Illustrated cover to cover.
       Later on he played at St. Martha for Rabatin's father, once 
     catching the winning

[[Page S15395]]

     touchdown pass in the Toy Bowl. Then it was on to St. X, 
     where he played little his final year after a disagreement 
     with the coaches.
       ``He just didn't have a positive experience,'' his father 
     said. ``Part of that was his fault.''
       Estes' only football option was a partial scholarship to 
     Georgetown College. He turned it down to follow in his 
     grandfather's footsteps--into the Marine Corps and into a 
     tank.
       ``That broke my heart when he didn't take that scholarship 
     to Georgetown,'' Rodney Estes said. ``You know how you 
     envision going down there on Saturdays to watch your son and 
     walk around campus?''
       Instead, a day after graduation from St. X, Estes was off 
     to Parris Island for boot camp as a Marine reservist. Higher 
     education--and football--flickered out of sight.
       In 1999 he had talked to UofL assistant Greg Nord and then-
     coach John L. Smith about walking on, but he never followed 
     through. He worked a job here and a job there and performed 
     his duties with the reserves. Life was standing still.
       ``He kind of had his head up his--in other words,'' said 
     Lance Cpl. Nick Rassano, a 2000 Trinity graduate who was in 
     the same tank in the Middle East with Estes.
       Then last Jan. 7, the phone rang at Ruby Tuesday, where 
     Estes was bartending. The order was expected but still 
     jarring: Report for active duty.
       He told his family the news at dinner that night. Two days 
     later he was gone--but not without some prescient final words 
     from his father.
       ``Remember,'' Rodney Estes told his oldest son, ``the way 
     you handle yourself out there probably says a lot about how 
     you'll handle the rest of your life.''
       First stop was Camp Lejeune, N.C. Then he was on a ship 30 
     days to Kuwait, for a month of preparation, some touch 
     football and the last decent meals for a long time.
       Finally, after a month in Kuwait, Estes and the rest of the 
     American military force invaded Iraq.
       ``I was a policeman 25 years, and I'm not the kind of guy 
     who gets overly worried,'' Rodney Estes said. ``But I tell 
     you, that night he left I thought, `This could be the last 
     night I ever see him.' When your own kid goes off, that puts 
     you through some changes.
       ``I'd wake up in the middle of the night and watch CNN. I 
     watched so much TV I was about to drive myself crazy.''
       Over in Iraq, the A-8 Marines were pushing hard toward An 
     Nasiriyah and what ultimately would be some of the most 
     intense fighting of the war. The first day of combat was the 
     worst, as Estes watched a rocket-propelled grenade blow up an 
     American vehicle and kill several soldiers.
       He said they arrived in the area to find the streets 
     flooded with sewage that stalled half of Alpha Company's 14 
     tanks--including his, christened the ``Think Tank'' because 
     of the crew's propensity for making maintenance errors.
       When the tanks bogged down, the Iraqis lit up. They were 
     firing on foot, from orange-and-white taxis and from SUVs.
       Estes was the loader in his tank but also was charged with 
     manning the 240-millimeter gun on top of the vehicle. With 
     the upper half of his body in view, he exchanged fire with 
     the enemy.
       Welcome to the terror and exhilaration of warfare, Cpl. 
     Estes.
       ``It was a heck of an adrenaline rush,'' he said. ``I was 
     scared, excited, all those things. I think of it like going 
     into a big game, only times 100. Obviously, the stakes are 
     much higher.
       ``You get a sick feeling in the pit of your stomach. I 
     didn't freeze or tense up, but I definitely had 
     butterflies.''
       Asked if he personally shot anyone, Estes looked down 
     briefly and answered yes. There was no bravado in his voice.
       ``The first time you see somebody get hit with a round is a 
     crazy feeling,'' he said. ``It's a sick feeling. But when you 
     sign up to be a Marine, that's something you obviously know 
     can be part of the job.
       ``I can't sit here and describe the feelings you get. I can 
     tell you what I saw, but in no way does it simulate what it 
     was like.''
       There is no simulation. Just late-night assimilation--
     alone, lying on your back and staring at the sky in a strange 
     and dangerous land.
       One day the Think Tank crewmen got the call to be part of a 
     hush-hush mission. They were to be the lead among three tanks 
     escorting a group of Special Ops forces into town. It had the 
     potential to be dangerous. Estes' tank commander had him 
     clear out space inside the tank, in case they needed it to 
     transport bodies.
       They originally were told that the target was a Saddam 
     look-alike. They had no idea that they were going to play a 
     part in the most dramatic--and later controversial--event in 
     the war.
       In the early hours of April 1, their tank led a group of 
     other vehicles carrying Special Operation Unit Task Force 20 
     into Nasiriyah, storming into position around the hospital. 
     Night-vision goggles on, Estes laid down suppression fire 
     with the 240-mm gun for a few minutes and set up a perimeter 
     before the Rangers and SEALs went in.
       Lynch was rushed out and loaded onto a helicopter, though 
     most involved in the rescue still didn't know the particulars 
     of what happened. Estes' tank remained in position for hours 
     afterward.
       At one point he was told to hand some Special Ops soldiers 
     a tank shovel. They used it to dig up a shallow grave outside 
     the hospital, locating the bodies of several Americans from 
     Lynch's 507th Maintenance Company.
       It wasn't until days later that the Think Tank crew was 
     able to piece together the story and realize that their 
     mission was the rescue dominating news coverage at home.
       ``We didn't realize how big a deal it was until we saw it 
     on the cover of Newsweek,'' Rassano said.
       To Estes the mission was important for one other reason: He 
     never again discharged his weapon. A series of moves to other 
     cities resulted in nothing more noteworthy than a couple of 
     utterly uneventful weeks guarding a bridge.
       With the action centralizing on Baghdad, there wasn't much 
     to do other than reading the Sports Illustrateds and eating 
     the beef jerky sent from home. Finally, Alpha Company pulled 
     out and returned to Kuwait on May 5.
       The war was over for Cpl. Estes. It was time to act on his 
     vow.
       During the interminable 38-day voyage back to America, 
     Estes e-mailed his father and told him his plans: He was 
     going to enroll at U of L and walk on to the football team. 
     Rodney Estes was thrilled.
       Jimmy returned to Kentucky on July 2, and he and the rest 
     of his battalion were feted at Fort Knox. He obviously was 
     thrilled to see his family--his father, mother, stepmother, 
     stepsister and two half-siblings.
       Especially his 11-year-old half-sister, Jennifer Estes. He 
     thought of her often when he saw children her age caught in 
     the calamity of war.
       ``He's crazy about her,'' Jimmy's dad said. ``He's not 
     exactly a sensitive kid by any stretch of the imagination, 
     but I think some of the things he saw over there affected 
     him.''
       To help put the war behind, Estes plunged into his future 
     plans. After about a week of acclimation, he began working 
     out six days a week toward his goal of becoming a Cardinal.
       A depressing and debilitating diet of MREs--the scarcely 
     edible Meals Ready to Eat--had killed his appetite. By the 
     end of the war Estes could eat barely half an MRE a day, and 
     he lost a significant amount of weight and muscle mass.
       But that could be overcome with work, and he was driven. 
     His first couple of calls to U of L graduate assistant Sam 
     Adams, in charge of the walk-on program, went unreturned. 
     Finally, Adams called back.
       He said that Estes couldn't walk on until classes started, 
     but in the meantime the coaches wanted to look at some 
     videotape of him. He had nothing significant to show since 
     his days on the St. X junior varsity. Nevertheless, Adams 
     told him to report for a one-day group tryout.
       Estes arrived in excellent physical condition, performed 
     well in the fitness tests and was one of four walk-ons chosen 
     for the team. After U of L upset Kentucky to open the season 
     Aug. 31, he reported for his first practice as a Louisville 
     Cardinal.
       ``It was awesome that first day, just putting on the 
     equipment again,'' he said. ``I was looking around saying, 
     `I'm playing with a Division I football program. Four months 
     ago I was shooting at Iraqis running around with AK-47s.' ''
       Today life is easy. The 18-hour days don't pile up for 
     weeks on end. The food is edible. There are no tank repairs, 
     no missions, no imminent danger.
       The load so many student-athletes find so difficult is like 
     vacation to Jimmy Estes.
       ``All you've got to do is go to class and play football,'' 
     Rassano said. ``That's got to be the easiest thing he's done 
     all year. After going through there, everything's easier.
       ``The whole experience kind of straightened him out. I'm 
     real proud of Jimmy.''
       A good many Cardinals have no idea what Estes was going 
     through while they were in spring practice. But a few have 
     seen the USMC tattoo on the 5-foot-11, 200-pound 
     receiver's left shoulder and inquired, and a few others 
     have heard a story or two about the walk-on soldier.
       He doesn't hide his history, but he doesn't broadcast it, 
     either. He's not looking for hero status in the locker room.
       ``The coaches can't give me any special treatment, and I 
     don't want it,'' he said. ``I'd always heard stories of 
     people coming back (from a war) and thinking the world owed 
     them something, or they were messed up mentally. I didn't 
     want that. I just wanted to make that experience a 
     positive.''
       U of L will play Army tomorrow. Estes has been where none 
     of the celebrated West Pointers has gone yet: into combat for 
     his country.
       He is a Cardinal worthy of a salute from the Cadets.
       Yet he wasn't even supposed to be at the stadium. Instead, 
     he was scheduled for real military work: a reunion with Alpha 
     Company at Fort Knox for their first weekend of reservist 
     training since the war.
       But at practice yesterday head coach Bobby Petrino informed 
     Estes that he will be dressing out and joining the squad if 
     he can get a furlough from Marine drills.
       Estes plans to wear two uniforms tomorrow; he'll be in Papa 
     John's Cardinal Stadium in the afternoon after meeting up 
     with his mates in the morning. He's looking forward to seeing 
     the men with whom he shared a life-altering experience--and 
     telling them about his college football career.
       ``I don't think a whole lot of them really believed me,'' 
     he said with a smile.
       But it's true. A desert dream that materialized on lonely 
     nights under an inky Arabian sky has come true.

[[Page S15396]]



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