OLD TOWN – The boots. The helmet. The rifle. The dog tags.

A tribute to a fallen soldier. A faceless memorial, unless it belongs to a friend.

“It’s not a good story,” Spc. Brian Clement began.

“As the armorer, I had to take care of his weapon, which he had been carrying when he was killed,” Clement continued, his speech slowed as he sought the words to describe his friend’s death.

“It was pretty filthy, and I had to make it like new for his funeral. I didn’t see him, thankfully; that was all I needed to see – his rifle. It was just … it was, it was gory …,” Clement’s narration trailed off, but as his eyes glazed over and he swallowed hard to fight back tears, it was evident the images were playing in his head.

Spc. Beau Beaulieu of Lisbon was walking back from lunch when he was killed on May 24, 2004, by a mortar attack in Taji, Iraq. Beaulieu and Clement, both Maine natives, had just completed a three-week mission together. Beaulieu’s death spurred Clement to re-examine his views about the war.

“That was a big turning point for me because since that day I’ve tried in my head to find that noble cause that everyone is talking about,” Clement said. “To find a reason that would satisfy me for the loss – the why Beau had to die – and I can’t find one.”

Clement, 24, originally of Pittston, enlisted in the Army’s delayed entry program his junior year in high school. Three days after graduation, he reported to basic training and was stationed at Fort Hood, Texas, with the 1st Cavalry Division, Bravo Company, 27th Main Support Battalion.

Clement completed his four-year active duty commitment in June 2005, after rounding out his service in Iraq. For a year the University of Maine student has been protesting as a member of Iraq Veterans Against the War.

“Even when I went to Iraq I went over thinking I was going to make a difference. I was going to do something positive. Right or wrong, we could fix what was going on in Iraq,” Clement said in the living room of his Old Town apartment.

“As the year went on, I saw less and less positive things going on for the Iraqi people. We [the United States] were spending so much time and money fixing up our little plot on this U.S. base, while Baghdad and surrounding cities and towns were struggling to survive,” he said.

Then, Clement’s faith in the system completely evaporated after a hot August day.

His unit was transporting bottled water to another military base when a truck went off a soft shoulder and flipped. Some bottles rolled onto the sand, while others burst, showering the area and leaving behind patches of chocolate-brown mud. Rather than distributing the bottles, soiled only on the outside, to the begging Iraqi civilians, the soldiers were commanded to repack the unblemished bottles and pour out the rest.

“My notion of doing something good or being a positive asset to the country just went out the window,” Clement said. “After that it was just do what you have to do to survive. I stopped thinking about how to help, and started thinking about how do I get through every day to get out of here.”

A new direction

In December 2006, the Army called Clement up from inactive reserve. Clement would have been back at Fort Hood in January, had he not filed for a medical exemption.

After four years of truck noise and the constant clamor of generators and explosions in Iraq, Clement has lost about 10 percent of his hearing. His repeated use of night vision goggles and artificial lighting has troubled his eyesight. He travels to Togus VA Medical Center in Augusta for treatment, and expects to hear by March 18 the Army’s ruling on whether his “hearing problems would make me more of a liability than an asset.”

Clement said he knows of only two others who have sought exemptions, one on medical grounds, the other citing higher education, and both were denied. He did not follow the cases of his comrades and did not know whether they were forced to redeploy.

“At this point, the appeals process will become my priority if [the exemption] is denied because with my political values and medical issues, I can’t see myself going back into the military,” Clement said, growing more passionate with every word.

“The Army was something I really, really enjoyed. I don’t regret joining. But I have reached a point in my life where I just can’t participate anymore.”