{"id":191279,"date":"2024-05-31T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-31T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=191279"},"modified":"2024-06-02T01:52:32","modified_gmt":"2024-06-02T01:52:32","slug":"retiring-illinois-guard-artillery-gun-chief-fires-final-rounds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=191279","title":{"rendered":"Retiring Illinois Guard Artillery Gun Chief Fires Final Rounds"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n
\n
\n <\/p>\n

<\/a>
\n <\/span>
\n <\/span>

\n
\n
\n U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Terry Rutherford, a gun chief with B Battery, 2nd Battalion, 123rd Field Artillery Regiment, Illinois Army National Guard, watches as his gun crew prepares their M777 howitzer to execute a fire mission during exercise Immediate Response in Ustka, Poland, May 11, 2024. The exercise is Rutherford\u2019s last \u2013 he retires later this year. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. 1st Class Jon Soucy)
\n (Photo Credit: Sgt. 1st Class Jon Soucy)<\/span>
\n <\/span>
\n VIEW ORIGINAL<\/a>
\n <\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

USTKA, Poland \u2013 When U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Terry Rutherford enlisted in 1982, the idea of taking part in a training exercise in Poland was a seemingly ludicrous one \u2013 something that would never happen. After all, the Cold War was in full swing, and Poland was an Eastern Bloc nation aligned with the Soviet Union.<\/p>\n

At the time, he was stationed in what was then West Germany, his unit continually training to defeat a possible Soviet foe.<\/p>\n

And yet, 40-plus years later, Poland is exactly where he is.<\/p>\n

Now a gun chief with B Battery, 2nd Battalion, 123rd Field Artillery Regiment, Illinois Army National Guard, Rutherford and the rest of his battalion are training alongside Polish army units in Ustka, providing artillery support during Immediate Response, a multinational training exercise that includes more than 22,000 participants from the United States, Poland, the Czech Republic and the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n

The exercise is also Rutherford\u2019s last, as he\u2019s retiring this year, and it marks a bookend of sorts \u2014 he\u2019s only a few hundred miles from his first training exercise 40-plus years ago while he was stationed in Freiburg, Germany.<\/p>\n

\u201cI fired my first rounds in Europe and I\u2019m going to fire my last rounds in Europe,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s sort of bittersweet,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not sure how to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said his current gun crew is perhaps the best he\u2019s ever worked with.<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess the hardest part is knowing it would be the last time I\u2019m firing with this group of gentlemen,\u201d Rutherford said.<\/p>\n

He said the time between that first round and the final round was filled with memorable moments, such as the time his crew fired nine rounds during an eight-round fire mission. Higher unit leadership pulled him aside to answer for the extra round, which was fired based on a miscommunication.<\/p>\n

Added measures were put in place to ensure clearer communication, but he said he noted to the leadership team that they should really be upset with the other crews.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, we fired nine rounds in the same time it took them to fire eight,\u201d he said, adding the other crews were running noticeably slower.<\/p>\n

But the most impactful and significant parts of his career, Rutherford said, were serving along the Southwest border as part of Operation Jumpstart, the 2006-2008 National Guard mission to support U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, and deploying to Iraq.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt means a lot,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s a group of guys that I got to be friends with, and they\u2019re my brothers. Those are the kind of relationships and camaraderie and brotherhood that people who have never been in the military, they don\u2019t understand it. They\u2019ll never understand it. But it\u2019s what means the most.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rutherford\u2019s path to the artillery began with the father of a high school friend who was the first sergeant of a Tennessee Army National Guard artillery battery.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a 109 (M109 Paladin, self-propelled howitzer) artillery unit,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s what I wanted to do, and we (he and his friend) joined together.\u201d<\/p>\n

After serving four years, he chose to leave the Army when his enlistment contract was up in 1986. Though, something nagged at him in the ensuing years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just felt like I hadn\u2019t finished what I started,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

In 2000, then in his late 30s, he enlisted in the Army National Guard.<\/p>\n

And now, with retirement nearing, he said he feels like he\u2019s finished what he began in 1982.<\/p>\n

\u201cWatching these young guys step up shows me that maybe I\u2019ve done something right from time to time,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve watched some of these young guys since we\u2019ve been here, how they\u2019ve elevated what they do, and it makes you feel pretty good.\u201d<\/p>\n

The gun crew and unit wouldn\u2019t be what it is today without Rutherford\u2019s guidance and mentorship, said Spc. Austin Rodriguez, a member of Rutherford\u2019s gun crew.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s honestly been the rock and guidestone for a lot of our guys,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

For Rodriquez, Rutherford\u2019s upcoming retirement has been the most daunting part of the exercise.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe most challenging part for me is knowing that my chief is retiring,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve been with him since I got into the unit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rodriguez added that Rutherford\u2019s retirement gives him mixed emotions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s bittersweet,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m happy for him to finally get some time to relax and enjoy life and just have a good time, but the amount of knowledge going out with him from our battery is going to be sorely missed.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Rutherford said he feels the gun crew will be just fine.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere, the only challenge for me is walking up that motor pool hill in the morning,\u201d he said. \u201cI mean, I got these guys here. My section is just, they\u2019re just badass. Period.\u201d<\/p>\n

And as his retirement nears, Rutherford has one last piece of advice for his crew.<\/p>\n

\u201cI suggest anybody stay 20 years,\u201d he said. \u201cJust don\u2019t break it up over 40 years like I did. Just do it straight through.\u201d<\/p>\n

But had he not done it that way, he may not have ended up back in Europe for his final training exercise.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo finish where you started, that\u2019s pretty cool,\u201d said Rutherford.<\/p>\n

For more National Guard news<\/a><\/p>\n

National Guard Facebook<\/a><\/p>\n

National Guard X<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Terry Rutherford, a gun chief with B Battery, 2nd Battalion, 123rd Field Artillery Regiment, Illinois Army National Guard, watches as his gun crew prepares their M777 howitzer to execute a fire mission during exercise Immediate Response in Ustka, Poland, May 11, 2024. The exercise is Rutherford\u2019s last \u2013 he retires later […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191281,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-191279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=191279"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":191282,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191279\/revisions\/191282"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/191281"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=191279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=191279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=191279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}