Honor your hero with thoughts, memories, images and stories.
We miss you and love you! Today marks your eight year anniversary of your passing and it doesn't get any easier. Your son is a beautiful boy - you'd be so proud of him. Although I know you're watching down on us, I wish you never left but I know we'll see you again.
Marine Corp Gonzales was assigned to 1st Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade, Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. Gonzales was killed when the armored personnel carrier he was riding in was ambushed by Iraqi soldiers dressed as civilians pretending to surrender near An Nasiriyah. Jorge was an avid soccer player whose lean 6 foot 2 inch frame disguised surprising strength on the soccer fields. He briefly attended Temple City High School and later graduated from El Monte High School in El Monte, California. Immediately after graduation, he enlisted in the Marines. He hoped to finish his hitch in the Marines next year and become a policeman. It's not supposed to happen this way, but Jorge's family was informed of his death from television. They were watching clips from the Arab network Al-Jazerra on the Spanish language station, Telemundo, when film footage of four Marines killed in the fighting outside An Nasiriya was shown. An Iraqi soldier lifted one of the bodies for the camera and the parents recognized their son. Proud of her son for fighting for his country, his mother was angry at Telemundo for broadcasting the pictures of his body. Telemundo news executives said they regretted broadcasting the video of the dead American soldiers. In Jorge's last letter home, which came after his family learned officially of his death, he wrote to his infant son he had never seen, "If you can wait just a little, I'll see you in the summer if God wants it." Bio by: Brenda N