Las Vegas mom recalls soldier ‘who wanted to serve his whole life’

“He was one of those kids,” the Las Vegas woman said Thursday, reflecting on Army Spc. Douglas J. Green, the last U.S. soldier killed in Afghanistan in August, the deadliest month for U.S. troops in the 10-year war.

“Everybody loved him. He was quick to laugh, quick to smile. He was a comedian,” she said. “When everybody was scared, he’d make a joke. He made everybody feel good.”

Green was killed Sunday in Afghanistan’s Kandahar province when he stepped on an homemade bomb after his patrol had been ambushed by insurgents who had unleashed a hail of small arms fire. Two other soldiers were severely wounded. He took the full brunt of the explosion, his mother said.

His father, Douglas Green, said his son lived by the motto: “The other fellow first.”

His parents and oldest sister spoke about him during a telephone interview from his father’s house in Sterling, Va., where the family and friends had gathered to celebrate the life of the 23-year-old infantryman.

“He was my best friend,” said his sister, Krissy Green, 24. “He never talked to me about Afghanistan. He always tried to put the story on me. He always wanted to make it about us and not about him.”

Douglas J. Green spent much of the last five years at his mother’s Summerlin home when he wasn’t with his unit in Iraq or Afghanistan or in Fairbanks, Alaska, where the 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team is based at Fort Wainwright.

Dakota Taylor, who was Green’s team leader in Iraq, said Green was an amazing soldier. “He didn’t care about himself. He always wanted to help somebody out.”

They often went on patrols together to clear houses and provide security escorts during a tour from September 2008 to September 2009.

“He had a dog in Iraq named Jake that he took care of,” said Taylor, of Tuttle, Okla.

“If you were having a bad day, he’d cheer you up.”

Douglas Jay Green was born May 30, 1988, in Alexandria, Va. He grew up in Sterling and graduated from Potomac Falls High School.

He played lacrosse and football and was picked for the role of “the mean guy” in the musical “Footloose,” Erlanger said. Green was a homecoming prince his senior year.

During high school, he volunteered with the local fire department.

“Doug wanted to serve his whole life,” his mother said. “He was a hero before he went in the Army, and then he became another hero.”

While stationed in Alaska between his two combat deployments “he chose to be a big brother to a little boy in Fairbanks. That’s the kind of person he was,” she said.

With only two months left on his Afghanistan tour, firefights had intensified around his outpost, and he had told his mother he wanted to serve the rest of his enlistment in the United States.

“He called me every time he could on his cellphone,” she said. “He was scared. I could hear it in his voice.”

His father said Green had intended to use the GI Bill to go to college and pursue a career in criminal justice.

He was planning to ask his girlfriend, Alicia Swanstrom, to marry him, his mother said. He had written Swanstrom a letter two weeks ago with instructions to play certain songs at his wake “in case anything happens,” Erlanger said, reading from the letter.

The letter offers some “words of wisdom” to “always put yourself in a position to have contact” with others and to “never judge or put anger on somebody too quickly. That person is fighting a battle you know nothing about.”

His long list of tunes includes the Beatles’ “Let It Be,” the Beach Boys’ “Don’t Worry Baby,” Bob Dylan’s “Times They Are A-Changin’,” the Rolling Stones’ “Ruby Tuesday,” Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’ ” and Frank Sinatra’s “Summer Wind.”

“Just listen and interpret what you will,” he wrote, adding that he wanted his wake to be about celebration, not mourning. “Have fun, get drunk and keep your heads up.”

Green will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia on Sept. 14.

He is the 75th U.S. military personnel with ties to Nevada to die in the nation’s wars overseas since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. His awards include the Bronze Star Medal for valor, the Purple Heart Medal, the Army Commendation Medal and the Combat Infantryman Badge.

In addition to his parents and sister, he is survived by his stepfather, Don Erlanger; stepsister, Paige Erlanger; and stepbrother, Seth Erlanger; all of Las Vegas; grandparents June and Douglas Rusta of Henderson; and grandfather Jay Chabrow of Las Vegas.

In lieu of flowers, the family prefers donations in the name of Douglas J. Green to defendingfreedom.org, a nonprofit organization founded in 2003 by Las Vegan Phil Randazzo “to support these honorable service men and women who are willing to sacrifice everything for the ultimate prize of freedom.”

Contact reporter Keith Rogers at krogers@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0308.