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Saturday, October 14, 2000

'Tiny bit of hope' lingers

By Jeremy Schwartz
Caller-Times

Paul Iverson/Caller-Times

Ronchester ‘Ron’ Santiago (pictured in photograph) called his parents, Simeona (left) and Rogelio Santiago, from Spain, the USS Cole’s first port of call after leaving Norfolk, Va. It was the last time they spoke. Ron is now missing and presumed dead after a bomb attack on the USS Cole.

KINGSVILLE - Rogelio Santiago stood in his home holding a picture of his son and thinking about the trip to the Philippines they would never take.
   Ronchester "Ron" Santiago, 22, was getting ready to finish his four-year term with the Navy in December, and to celebrate, he was going to travel to his father's homeland, a place he had heard about but never seen.
   "I wanted to show him," Santiago said. "We had a lot of dreams for him, including that vacation in December."
   On Friday, Santiago and his wife, Simeona, learned their son was among 17 Navy sailors dead or presumed dead in a bomb attack on the USS Cole in a Yemeni harbor Thursday. Ron is among the 10 sailors listed as missing but presumed dead.
   "There's a little, tiny bit of hope," Santiago said. "But to be honest, I think I have to accept it."
   Four years ago, Santiago, himself a 21-year Navy veteran, reluctantly watched his son join the Navy and move from their Kingsville home to Boston.
   "I advised him not to go," Santiago said. "I was pushing him to start school."
   But Ron told his parents and two sisters and older brother that he wanted to see the world. He agreed with his father to serve one term before going to college.
   His plan was to attend the University of Texas at Austin and study engineering or computers when his Navy stint ended.
   Friends and former teachers in Kingsville remembered Ron as someone who didn't talk much, but liked to joke around.
   "He was quiet and attentive, he never had a bad word to say about anybody," said Jane Lyon, his art teacher at H.M. King High School. "I think when he got into Junior ROTC he found his niche."
   Arnold Sanchez, principal of Bernarda Jaime Junior High School in San Diego and former senior instructor for H.M. King's ROTC program, remembered Ron well.
   "He was the kind of individual who was respectful," said Sanchez, who served in the Navy during Operation Desert Storm. "He had a solid character. I just knew he would succeed. I look at him as a fellow veteran."
   Besides his ROTC activities, Ron's passion was anything mechanical. His parents remember him taking apart and re-assembling mechanical toys as a child.
   'A good friend'
   As he grew older he turned his attention to cars and fixing motors. Fred Aban, a high school friend, said Ron often worked on his 1978 Camaro and the two would have street races.
   "Those were some good times," said Aban, now a student at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi. "He was a good friend."
   Ron finished high school early so he could go to boot camp in early 1997, and graduated from Keys Academy, Kingsville's alternative high school.
   Keys Academy school secretary Dinah Ybarra remembered Ron as a hard worker who took accelerated classes so he could finish early.
   "His face stands out in my mind," she said. "He was smart. Very polite and an extra nice person."
   New orders
   His first assignment after boot camp was the USS Constitution, the historic, post-Revolutionary War ship anchored in Boston. But for Ron, who studied computers at boot camp, the 200-year-old "Old Ironsides" was a little dull.
   "It was an old ship and he was bored," his father said. "They had him shining brass and firing cannons."
   In search of more adventure, Ron put in for a transfer and earlier this year he was given his new orders: the USS Cole.
   Unanswered questions
   Ron called home from Spain, the USS Cole's first port of call after leaving Norfolk, Va. "He said he was going to send me a flower vase," his mother said. "Those were the last words he said to me."
   When he first heard his son was missing, Rogelio Santiago hoped that it was because his son, a mess management specialist, was off the boat gathering supplies.
   But as reports that his son is likely dead filtered in, Rogelio was left with questions. Could anybody have done anything differently? Why was the ship refueling at the Yemenese pier instead of out at sea where it's safer? Didn't anyone see the explosive-filled boat pull up next to the destroyer?
   "I'm going to miss him so much," his mother said. "He was the one close to me, always helping me out with little things."

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