[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 6 (Tuesday, January 18, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E63]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




RECOGNIZING MAJOR MARK O'NEILL, UNITED STATES ARMY, ON THE OCCASION OF 
           HIS DEPARTURE FROM THE ARMY'S HOUSE LIAISON OFFICE

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. GEOFF DAVIS

                              of kentucky

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, January 18, 2011

  Mr. DAVIS of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, today I recognize and pay tribute 
to Major Mark O'Neill, United States Army, on the occasion of his 
departure from the Army's House Liaison Office and his new assignment 
as a student at the Army's Command and General Staff College. My staff 
and I have had the great pleasure of working with Mark over the past 
year he has served with the Congress. It has been an honor to work with 
this combat veteran and citizen-soldier.
  Major O'Neill has had a varied and distinguished military career. 
Upon graduation from Villanova University in May of 1998, he was 
commissioned as a second lieutenant in the United States Army. After 
completing the Infantry Officer Basic Course and Ranger School at Ft. 
Benning, Georgia, he was assigned to the elite 82nd Airborne Division 
as an airborne infantry platoon leader. In March of 2000, he led his 
thirty-nine-man platoon in a joint exercise in Oman with the Omani 
army. During his time with the 82nd, Mark, a paratrooper to the core, 
participated in fifteen airborne operations.
  In December of 2000, he transferred to the 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment 
(The Old Guard) where he served as a platoon leader and regimental 
personnel officer. With the Old Guard, then First Lieutenant O'Neill 
conducted dozens of military funerals and state ceremonies. The same 
dedication with which he accorded respect to grieving families and 
friends during funerals at Arlington National Cemetery was in evidence 
on September 11, 2001, when Mark led his platoon in the initial 
response to the attack on the Pentagon.
  Major O'Neill left active duty in May of 2003, joining the Cintas 
Corporation as a Service/Sales Manager, but in February of 2006 he was 
recalled from the Ready Reserve to serve as an embedded trainer with 
the fledgling Afghan National Army. As an advisor to an Afghan National 
Army (ANA) infantry company, Mark trained the company leadership on 
both tactical and logistical tasks and accompanied them on over twenty 
combat patrols. On more than one occasion, he experienced combat 
firsthand. He was cited for bravery in October of 2006 for organizing 
the defense of his ANA company and repelling a Taliban ambush.
  In June of 2007, Mark joined the Army National Guard and was assigned 
to the National Guard Bureau's Directorate of Domestic Operations. From 
February 2010 to present, he served as the National Guard's legislative 
liaison with the Department of the Army's House Liaison Division. 
During his assignment to the Army House Liaison Office, Major O'Neill 
developed outstanding rapport with Members of Congress and their 
staffs--both personal and committee. Whether escorting congressional 
delegations to visit soldiers and families at Army installations, 
soldiers in the theater of operations or Wounded Warriors at Walter 
Reed, Mark has been a strong advocate for soldiers and a superb 
representative of Army values.
  I ask that my colleagues please join me in recognizing the 
outstanding accomplishments of Major Mark O'Neill in serving the United 
States Army and the Nation.

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