news-record.com

The deaths in Afghanistan of two soldiers assigned to an Army Reserve civil affairs unit based in Greensboro bring the distant fighting painfully closer to home.

They come as the president faces agonizing decisions on whether to ramp up the nation’s military commitment in an increasingly unpopular war.

Pfc. Alan H. Newton Jr., 26, of Asheboro, and Capt. Benjamin A. Sklaver, 32, of Medford, Mass., were killed in an Oct. 2 ambush near the Pakistan border.

As part of a civil affairs unit, they were working as liaisons between civilian authorities and military commanders in an ill-defined war zone.

As was borne out in Iraq, winning the hearts and minds of a wary, often-hostile populace is the foundation of restoring order in a war-torn nation.

And the civil affairs program based at Fort Bragg is critical in achieving that elusive goal. Most unit members are civilian reservists with skills needed to communicate in and later rebuild war-ravaged areas.

Both Newton and Sklaver fit that bill.

Newton joined the National Guard after graduating in 2002 from Southwestern Randolph High School and later transferred to the 422nd Civil Affairs Battalion here. In Afghanistan since August, he was planning to come home on leave at Thanksgiving.

Humanitarian causes were nothing new to Sklaver. He’d worked for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and FEMA before starting an organization providing clean drinking water in Uganda.

Fighting an unconventional war in rugged, dangerous terrain presents unique challenges and requires a different strategy. And civil affairs units often are placed in the middle of the fray, walking a tightrope between warrior and combatant for peace.

The noble mission, however, doesn’t make the losses any easier to accept.