Death of Teen Soldier Brings Grief to Iowans

05/11/2007

By Peter Slevin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 11, 2007


DAVENPORT, Iowa. May 10 -- The long black hearse did not belong in the picture, parked outside Davenport North High School on a day more suited to a picnic than a wake. As students spilled into the afternoon sunshine and did a double take, a family gathered to mourn an effervescent teenager taken too soon.

Pfc. Katie M. Soenksen, a 19-year-old soldier serving with the 410th Military Police Company, died last week in a Baghdad explosion not two years after she graduated from North High. She enlisted and wrote recently that being in Iraq "makes me realize how good we have it in America."

She was the 71st woman killed in Iraq -- 45 by hostile action -- and the 246th teenage soldier killed in Iraq or Afghanistan. With women serving in combat in unprecedented numbers, the number killed in action is higher than in previous wars, roughly triple the number of female casualties in Vietnam and the Gulf War combined.

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