Call Of Duty In San Diego, Texas

Vicki Mabrey Visits Small Town That Has Sent 30 Soldiers Off To War

(CBS)  The cost of war hit home in San Diego early on: more than 1,000 people
lined the streets when they brought home the body of Jose Amancio Perez III, 22, an Army medic who was killed in Iraq.

People started lining up at 7 at night. Amancio’s uncle shot home video while they waited. Even though it was after midnight when the body finally arrived, the procession was 100 cars long.

San Diego was in mourning, but life went on. Then, 11 months later, there was another hearse, another casket, another outpouring of grief in San Diego.

Ruben Valdez, who survived his first tour of duty in Iraq, came home to San Diego and married his girlfriend, Amy, in the park. They had a plan: his soldier’s benefits would pay for her to go to college. Then, she’d join up so he could study. But Valdez’s unit was called back to Iraq and he was killed in an ambush near the Syrian border. He was buried a few yards from his childhood playmate, Amancio Perez, and it seemed that something in San Diego changed.

"We experienced all the same things -- the grief, the pride, the relating to the stories, the knowing about his family and sharing in their grief," says Salinas. "But, there was also much more of a questioning on the part of the community. Because this was our second one."

What were the questions?

"Do our kids have to give more because of where we live or because of where we're from than kids who have more opportunities?" asks Salinas. "Or kids who come from more affluent families? Or kids who are from a part of the nation where there are more options?"

Statistically speaking, rural America is giving more. Fewer than a quarter of Americans live there, but Pentagon numbers showed that 40 percent of the soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan come from small towns.

San Diego honored Amancio Perez and Ruben Valdez in a memorial service in the town square. The deaths have taken a toll.

Alvarado used to steer bright students toward military careers, but says she doesn't do that anymore.

"I just feel like the boys are too young to go," says Alvarado. "They need to wait. And if at an older age, they decide they want to join the military, then that's something they can do."

She adds: "The reality of life is that if they join the military in a time of war, they're going to be sent over there."

After the town lost its second soldier, kids in San Diego said they weren't willing to take such risks any more.

"Recruiters will go to the school. And nobody wanted to talk to 'em," says Gonzalez. "Everyone would turn 'em down. Nobody wanted to -- like, after what happened, nobody wanted to talk to 'em."

It's a problem military recruiters are struggling with all over the country. Garza says he's had trouble meeting his quota.

"What do you think is going to happen in San Diego now?" asks Mabrey. "Do you think San Diego will continue to be patriotic? Continue to have its kids enlist?"

"Yes, I think they will," says Garza. "It's hard for them now. It's been hard. But they will continue."

Why?

"We're still talking to young men and women," says Garza. "There are some of them that are scared. And they may not wanna talk to us. But there are people that do. And so, of course, we're going to continue to go out there and show them the opportunities we can offer."

The kids at San Diego High School, though, are still just saying no. At graduation, for the second year in a row, not a single student joined the military.

But it's an option students like Robert Garcia said he's keeping in his back pocket. He wants to be a pharmacist, but says he may first become a soldier.

"I was in mourning when those two gentlemen did pass away. And it did affect me," says Garcia. "But if I have to go to the Army to get money for college, then I will."

Even if it means fighting in the war?

"Yes," he says.