Two-tour vet finds solace as volunteer

BONNERS FERRY — Sept. 11 is Patriot Day and National Day of Service and Remembrance.

Veteran James Knott, a former Bonners Ferry resident, knows what it means to serve.

Knott was 20 when al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four planes in the largest coordinated terrorist attack ever on U.S. soil, flying them into the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon and attempting to reach the White House Sept. 11, 2001.

Like many Americans, Knott remembers the day.

He was putting mufflers on his truck at John’s Shop on the South Hill in Bonners Ferry when someone came out and told the mechanics what was happening. They watched in horror on a tiny office TV as the day’s events unfolded.

By March 2003 when the U.S. invaded Iraq, Knott was tired of his job and ready to join the fight.

“I wished I was there,” he said, after reading about what Saddam, Uday and Qusay Hussein were doing to their own people.

Knott married his high school sweetheart, LeAnn, in October and shipped out for the U.S. Army in November 2003.

Knott became a combat engineer for the Army, known as a 12B or “12 Bravo.” According to the Army, duties for a 12 Bravo include constructing fighting positions, fixed/floating bridges, obstacles and defensive positions, placing and detonating explosives, conducting operations that include route clearance of obstacles and rivers, preparing and installing firing systems for demolition and explosives and detecting mines visually or with mine detectors.

When Knott arrived in first the Iraq and later the

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Afghanistan theater, this mainly meant clearing roads of improvised explosive devices (IED’s) and disposal of explosive ordinance.

“Iraq and Afghanistan were two totally different wars,” Knott said. “In Iraq, there was a lot of ordinance left over from the Iraqi army. (Insurgents) would take that and rig up a detonating device from a cell phone, a washing machine timer or a pressure plate.”

By Knott’s second tour in Afghanistan, in 2010, ammunition was harder to find. Insurgents were using Russian mines or silver nitrate and a five gallon jug of diesel as improvised explosives. The 12B crews would track individual bomb makers in a cloud-based computer system to ID and eliminate each target.

“They’re adaptive, productive and smart,” Knott says.

Knott spent most of his time as a turret gunner for a Route Clearing Patrol or RCP, riding atop massive armored vehicles like the MRAP and Buffalo to protect his comrades as they worked to clear roads.

His weapon of choice was the M240B, a 7.62 mm belt-fed machine gun capable of firing 800 rounds per minute. It was Knott’s job to take care of “ticks,” enemy combatants using small arms fire.

He was also armed with a .50 caliber machine gun, MK19 40 mm grenade launcher and a 30 mm mini gun at times. By the end of his time in the Army, Knott was using the common remotely operated weapon station, or CROWS, a computer operated turret capable of mounting a multitude of weapon systems operated from within the cab of an armored vehicle by joystick and computer screen. The CROWS keeps the gunner out of harm’s way.

“I was comfortable being the gunner,” Knott said, “It’s a big responsibility. We would get in a fire fight a couple times a week, from a few rounds exchanged and over in five minutes to a few hours.”

The RCP crews aren’t designed to be the aggressors and infantry is called up to take over a long-term fight.

“You can’t go anywhere without the RCP in front of you,” Knott said. “We would have to clear the roads every time.”

In Afghanistan, the crews were responsible for an area the size of Boundary County in rugged, mountainous territory. 12 to 25 trucks could take as much as 18 hours to clear a 10-mile stretch. Ground penetrating radar on the vehicles search out buried ordinance, and a boom with a ‘spork’ on the end is used by the Buffalo to clear explosives. Even still, crews didn’t find every bomb.

“I took several blasts over there (Afghanistan) in vehicles,” Knott says. “A couple in Iraq as well.”

Knott was called up for his Afghanistan tour in 2010 after an honorable discharge from the National Guard in 2008.

He was still on individual ready reserve, though, so when the U.S. Army needed someone with Knott’s training immediately, they called up him and 300 other 12B reservists. Knott’s wife was pregnant with their first child, so they induced her so Knott could meet his son before he shipped out on Valentine’s Day 2010.

He spent a lot of his time on the Afghanistan/Pakistan border, patrolling the route Osama Bin Laden used to flee the country.

Now out of the service and living with his family in Coeur d’Alene, Knott just started working for Transport Equipment, Inc. selling big rigs.

Like many veterans, het had a hard time transitioning back to civilian life after his service. He has no regrets from his time overseas, though.

“I had zero control over the reasoning for the war,” he said, “As an individual, I wanted to fight. Iraq was a more direct war. We wanted to help the people; there were hundreds of thousands of people killed by their own president.”

The Iraq war was more politically and monetarily driven, Knott says, but Afghanistan has an imbedded ideology that is harder to break.

“They’re brutally ideological, I would call them orthodox Muslim,” he says. “What we can do there is done. We can’t win their hearts and minds.”

By the time he left, rules of engagement in Afghanistan had changed. Troops were ordered to detain insurgents rather than fighting.

“That’s not how to win a war,” Knott says.

After coming home, Knott suffered PTSD but refused to acknowledge it or get help.

“Service men and women don’t want to be weak,” Knott said. “Weakness gets you killed.”

Knott had a bad shoulder and foot from repeated bomb blasts, and was later diagnosed with traumatic brain injury that causes severe migraines, anxiety and depression.

He can’t turn off his defense mechanism and always feels on guard. He can’t have his back to open spaces and often feels a sense of threat around him.

“The world is a bad place,” Knott says “I think the worst of everyone. Over there, there could be 500 people in a marketplace, and all have the potential to kill you. It took me a long time to feel safe driving on roads. In Iraq, a piece of trash along the highway raises a red flag.”

Knott says he doesn’t suffer flashbacks or nightmares, but will wake up with night terrors, feeling a sense of danger. He takes medication to help him sleep.

Eventually, the stress took a toll on his marriage and family life, and his family told him he had to seek help. He got help through the VA, and went to the top of the list since he is a dual-war veteran.

The civilian psychologist was helpful, he said, but he just couldn’t relate. They didn’t understand what he was going through, Knott said.

Knott took some time off work to de-stress, and that’s when he started working with two veterans organizations that really helped.

He joined the Combat Vet Riders, a motorcycle club devoted to helping veterans and started volunteering with Newby-ginnings, a 501-c3 organization started by the mother of a Coeur d’Alene soldier killed by an IED in 2011. Newby-ginnings helps active military, vets and families of those killed in combat with essential items, resources and referrals. Knott knows he’s helping people that have gone through the same as him or worse.

“Helping in the community is the best therapy I’ve had,” Knott says. “There are 70-plus members of the Combat Vet Riders and I can sit down with any one and talk, with no explanation needed. My attitude, everything has changed.”

PTSD is not a disease or disorder and nothing to be ashamed of, Knott said. Often, people just want someone to listen. Vets will let another vent for two hours without saying anything, Knott says.

“Twenty two vets die every day from suicide,” Knott said. “This is an epidemic that needs to be curbed. It’s not new, just being counted for the first time.”

Knott doesn’t fight the ghosts that many veterans do. He says that for him, it was a case of saving his life or someone else’s. Others are different.

“We’re not just a bunch of trigger-happy guys in camo,” Knott says. “There were a lot of jobs over there and all of them dirty. Often, you have to make a quick decision to pull the trigger, or react to an IED explosion. It’s hard losing a friend or a fellow comrade, even coming upon another unit pulling parts of their friends out of a vehicle. That “why” question will ruin your life.”

Knott says vets asking “why not me?” often becomes a reason for suicide. Some vets will try to suppress it with medication or drinking.

“You don’t have to talk about it, but you can’t ignore it,” he says.

Even with all he’s been through, Knott would go back to the Middle East if required. The ideology behind terrorists like al-Qaeda is like no evil anyone has ever seen, he said. He would rather take the fight there than on our soil.

“Maybe my son won’t have to go to war,” he says, “and I won’t have to worry about someone blowing up a car next to him.”

Knott is proud of his time in the military and teaches his son to always thank veterans.

“I live in a great country, my family was in the service and I wanted to do my part,” he said. “I wanted to be there to say, ‘I didn’t sit still while this was happening.’”

The Combat Vet Riders can be found at www.combatvetriders.org and Newby-ginnings can be found at www.newby-ginnings.org