Where Things Stand: Indiana Knows Sacrifice of War After Five Years

March 18, 2008— -- After five years in town squares around Indiana, those yellow ribbons are fading. But traverse the state on its winding two-lane roads and you will see there are still many places where Iraq and Indiana intersect.

Like in the small town of Decatur, just outside of Fort Wayne, is the home of the Stoppenhagens. In the window hangs a banner with three blue stars. One for each son now deployed to Iraq.

"I would be lying if I said I wasn't concerned," said Stan, father to the young men.

"Concerned for sure. All three of them going into the battlefield together. There's real risks, there's real dangers," added mother Tami.

The Stoppenhagen brothers all joined the National Guard and will serve in the same brigade in Iraq. The middle son, Zach, signed up four months after 9/11. He was only 17. His unit had not seen combat since Vietnam.

"I would have never guessed that we'd be going to Iraq." Zach told us recently at Ft. Stewart, Georgia. "That he would be going to Iraq," he gestured to his brother, Josh.

Older brother Josh, now 24, enlisted a month after Zach. He's already been to Iraq.

"I'm kind of a little bit more at ease that all three of us are going because I've already been there once."

The youngest Stoppenhagen brother, Jake, was only 14 years old when the war began five years ago. He joined the guard just over a year ago and will be a medic in the 76th Infantry brigade.

"We're doing a good thing helping to keep the country safe so other people don't have to do what we're doing."

The brothers are among 3,400 Guardsmen called up now, the biggest deployment of the Indiana National Guard since World War II, and their mission is a dangerous one. We visited the 76th Infantry Brigade training at Ft. Stewart before they shipped out to the Middle East.

Col. Corey Carr will command the 76th. In civilian life he works in a two-person office in Columbus, Indiana. Here he will lead the 3,400 men and women of the National Guard as they protect supply convoys. Carr says the role of the guard has changed over time