11th ABN DIV vets pass unit legacy to newly minted ‘Arctic Angels’

Photo By Derrick Crawford | Sgt. Maj. of the Army Michael A. Grinston, left, laughs with U.S. Army veteran, Joe Doshier, right, president of the 11th Airborne Division Association, following a ceremony, June 6, 2022, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, to mark the activation of the 11th Airborne Division. Doshier and Wayne Porter, not shown, Association secretary and treasurer, served with the 11th in the 1950’s when the division was previously active and traveled from Arkansas and Kansas, respectively, with family to attend the ceremony.  

JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, AK, UNITED STATES

07.19.2022

Story by Derrick Crawford 

11th Airborne Division

When they learned the Army planned to activate their beloved 11th Airborne Division from the history books, Joe Doshier, 86, and Wayne Porter, 84, knew they had to be a part of it.
The two U.S. Army veterans, who wore the division’s winged “Angels” patch as young paratroopers in the 1950’s, made good on that hope. They and their family traveled from Kansas and Arkansas to witness the ceremony, June 6, 2022, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, in which the Army officially re-designated U.S. Army Alaska (USARAK) as the 11th Airborne Division and its two brigades as the 1st and 2nd Infantry Brigades,11th Airborne Division.
Following the ceremony, Doshier and Porter, decked out in their satin, royal blue 11th Airborne Division Association bomber jackets, stood on Pershing Parade Field among a sea of maroon berets and beamed proudly at these newly minted “Arctic Angels.”
“Makes me feel like we had a little something to do with that. For a farm boy from Kansas…this tops anything I’ve ever done,” explains Porter, a third-generation farmer from Fredonia, Kansas.
Besides having served in the 11th, both men have remained closely tied to the division through their work leading the 11th Airborne Division Association, which was established in 1965 and has several chapters nationwide with a total of roughly 900 members, according to Doshier, who is the Association’s national president, and Porter is its national secretary and treasurer.
Even so, they both expressed being a bit unsure of the reception they would receive during their visit.
“I would never in my life have expected this (outpouring of attention),” explained Doshier, of Rogers, Arkansas, referring to the groups of Soldiers, politicians and senior Army leaders who made an effort to meet and take photos with he and Porter at the ceremony. “The way we’ve been accepted, the way our unit has been accepted makes us proud.”
It was something of a full-circle moment for Porter, who said he actually operated the public address system during the division’s original deactivation ceremony, held June 30, 1958, in Germany, as a “spec-4” assigned to a communications platoon with the 187th Regimental Combat Team.
“It’s unbelievable what we’ve been through the last couple of days,” Porter added, incredulously. “Yesterday, senators coming up and wanting to take pictures with us, everybody sought us out, the Chief of Staff of the Army, four stars, came to meet us!”
In many ways, the two veteran paratroopers represent a connection between the past and the future.
“When I see the patch now, I’m thinking about the (11th Airborne Division Association) jackets they are wearing,” said U.S. Army 1st Sgt. Kyle G. Tripp, of Headquarters and Headquarters Detachment, 11th Airborne Division, who escorted the group during their two-day visit. “It just shows that (unit pride) was there before we adopted it, and now it’s just bloomed and multiplied on a high level. I’ll always think of these guys.”
That is exactly why Army leaders thought it was important to establish a common unit identity for the former disparate USARAK units, who previously only shared a moniker as “America’s Arctic Warriors.”
“This is really a reckoning, not just for the 11th Airborne Division, but it's a reckoning for our Soldiers here,” said U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Brian S. Eifler, 11th Airborne Division commander. “They’ve just become (part of) something bigger…They want to be part of something special, something bigger than themselves.”
The notion of identifying with a favored unit, something larger than self, is an experience familiar to many military veterans, including Doshier and Porter, whose time in the 11th framed their military service.
“When you can say you’re airborne that speaks more than anything else,” he said. “Those wings mean something. They don’t give them to everybody.”
Doshier enlisted in 1953 at the tail end of the Korean War, attended basic training at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and then underwent airborne training at Fort Benning, Georgia. He joined the 11th Airborne Division in March 1954 with the 187th Regimental Combat Team at Camp Wood, Japan, where he served as a corporal with a parachute maintenance company. He is unabashed in his belief that the 11th has been the best division in Army, bar none.
“There’s the 82nd and 101st, they’re there, but they never did what the 11th did. They can argue if they want to, but that’s facts,” he said with a wry smile and steady gaze.
Indeed, the 11th Airborne Division has a long, historic past with strong ties to the Pacific theater where its paratroopers first saw combat in the Philippines during World War II, earning the Presidential Unit Citation with two of its Soldiers being posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.
“I didn’t make the combat jump over Los Baños (Luzon, Philippines),” said Porter, who attended basic training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, in 1956 and completed airborne training at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, in 1957, “but my guys did, guys just like me…The 11th did that, and we’re part of that.”
Theirs is a legacy they now share with the nearly 15,000 Soldiers wearing the division patch today.

• Date Taken: 07.19.2022
• Date Posted: 07.20.2022 19:05
• Story ID: 425353
• Location: JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, AK, US
• Hometown: ANCHORAGE, AK, US
• Hometown: FAIRBANKS, AK, US
• Hometown: FORT WAINWRIGHT, AK, US
• Hometown: FREDONIA, KS, US
• Hometown: JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, AK, US
• Hometown: ROGERS, AR, US