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04/15/2006:

"War Without End"

The war in Iraq arrives on America's shores by gurney. More than 16,000 U.S. soldiers have been wounded -- almost 400 have lost arms, legs, hands or feet. Each injury ripples through lives with its own pattern and force. And as two soldiers and their families are discovering, the war will be with them forever.

The ball was an Army tradition, celebrating a battalion's homecoming from war. The men of the 1st Battalion, 5th Infantry Regiment out of Fort Lewis — a few miles from Tacoma — had returned 10 days earlier from their yearlong tour of duty in Iraq.

Two soldiers had been looking forward to the gathering with heightened anticipation. Thirty-year-old Michael Buyas and 23-year-old Brent Bretz were sergeants in the 1-5's Charlie Company. In December 2004, within four days of each other, bombs blew off their legs. As the company fought together in Iraq for another 10 months, Michael and Brent — like so many of the more than 17,000 American soldiers wounded in Iraq — slipped off alone to their own private wars, inside hospital rooms and physical therapy clinics, inside the intricate circles of their families, inside their own heads.
sfgate.com