Chaffee native receives Bronze Star

Maj. Doug Welter, by his own admission, is low-key.

The Chaffee, Mo., native says he's not one for the spotlight.

During his latest tour in Iraq, Welter was ultimately responsible for securing a busy air operations base. Despite periodic rocket attacks and the constant threat of ground assaults and suicide bombers, the mission was accomplished.

The Air Force Space Command officer will tell you, no big deal. He was just doing his job.

That's not how his superiors see it.

On Wednesday, Welter was recognized with the Bronze Star for meritorious service against an armed enemy.

"A lot of folks owe their security and their safety to that man right here standing in front of us today," said Col. Joseph Schwarz, deputy director of AFSPC Directorate of Logistics, Installations and Mission Support, during the medal presentation ceremony.

Welter, in a phone interview from Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo., said he found going through Wednesday's ceremony tougher than making it through his two tours in Iraq.

"I'm not much for the spotlight or the center of attention," he said.

The 1989 graduate of Notre Dame Regional High School was deployed to Joint Base Balad, Iraq, about 40 miles north of Baghdad, as the operations officer for the 532nd Expeditionary Security Forces Squadron from late August 2009 to Feb. 19. It was his second tour of duty in Iraq, following a stint as an adviser with Iraqi forces in 2007 and 2008.

The squadron, including contract security and local forces, numbered as many as 1,000 people and was responsible for securing the base's entry control points and all patrols around the base.

"We had to search and clear all of the shipments of all of the trucks coming in," Welter said, noting hundreds of vehicles moved in and out of the installation on a daily basis.

The picture he paints is of a quiet agrarian region, much like the farm country where he grew up in Southeast Missouri in the 1970s and '80s. Villages filled with big families tended grapes, corn, squash and melons.

"When I'd write letters home to my dad and tell him what crops they were growing and what was in season, he got a kick out of that," Welter said.

But the pastoral life was constantly interrupted by the roar of war.

"It was generally quiet, but that could change in a second," Welter said. "On any given day we could see a couple of rocket attacks, especially if the weather turns bad and the visibility goes down; those come without much warning."

Welter led daily combat operations as part of the largest security forces group deployed to defend an air base since the Vietnam War. According to the medal citation, "He personally led more than 30 (combat operations) and operationally planned over 950 combat patrols to counter indirect fire attacks and to prevent the emplacement of improvised explosive devices throughout the security zone."

Everyone in one piece

Welter likened his leadership role to that of a parent, in this case a parent responsible for the safety and well-being of hundreds of servicemen and women. He said he's most proud of one important fact:

"I didn't lose anybody," Welter said. "Not only were we successfully able to accomplish the mission, we were able to bring everybody home in one piece."

Welter, who also received the Army Commendation Medal for his service in Iraq, said he was surprised in first hearing that he had earned the Bronze Star, pointing to those who have earned the medal in a lot harder ways.

"I am talking about men who fought in Normandy, who crossed the Waal River under fire to take a bridge at Nijmegen, who held the line at Bastogne, who fought through Viet Cong ambushes that took out half of their platoon; and I think I will always wonder how I could measure up to what they did," he said in an Air Force Space Command news release.

Welter's wife, Becky, his two sons and his parents attended the reception. Becky Welter, in the news release, said her husband takes his duty to his country seriously.

"I am proud that he genuinely puts his country and his family before himself," she said.

Welter's military service and training extends back to the early 1990s, when he was a member of the Southeast Missouri State University Air Force ROTC. He comes from a long line of military men. His father, retired Army Master Sgt. Franklin Welter, spent nearly 40 years in the National Guard, serving out of Cape Girardeau. A great-uncle served in World War I, another great-uncle was killed in the Korean War, and a cousin was killed in action in World War II.

Now his sons, one in high school, the other in junior high, are planning to follow in their father's footsteps.

"I'm proud and honored they would want to be like me," Welter said, "but it's also scary to know they want to do things I've done."

mkittle@semissourian.com

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