Lance Cpl. Tenzin Dengkhim, USMC
The Department of Defense announced on April 4 the death of a Marine who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Lance Cpl. Tenzin Dengkhim, 19, of Falls Church, Virginia,
died April 2 as a result of hostile action in Al Anbar
Province, Iraq. He was assigned to
2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, 2nd Marine
Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune,
N.C.
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WASHINGTON —- Radio Free Asia -- A 19-year-old Tibetan from Virginia has been killed in
combat in Iraq, less than one month after deploying there.
Cpl. Tenzin Choeku Dengkhim died as a result of “hostile action”
April 2, the Pentagon said. He appears to be the first
Tibetan-American killed in combat in Iraq.
“He was a very good boy, deeply religious, and [he] talked of serving
Tibet as a soldier after he completed his military career as U.S.
Marine,” his mother, Radio Free Asia (RFA) Tibetan service broadcaster
Rinzin Choedon, said.
“He was very devoted to his grandmother, who lives in Dharamsala
[northern India]. He made sure that his grandmother was present
at his Marine graduation ceremony.”
“He was very fond of playing basketball every Sunday with other
Tibetans,” Choedon said.
Dengkhim graduated from George Marshall High School in Fairfax,
Virginia, after moving with his mother and brother from Utah, where
the family first settled in the 1990s.
Dengkhim, born in India in 1985, enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps on
Sept. 14, 2003.
He had been on active duty in Iraq less than a month at the time of
his death. He enlisted in hope of saving money for college, according
to a family friend.
U.S. military officials said Dengkhim appeared to have been killed in
hostile action in the city of Hadithah, in Iraq’s Anbar Province.
No further details about the incident were immediately available.
Tibetan community leaders say he is the first Tibetan-American killed
on active military duty in Iraq.
Dengkhim is survived by his mother and older brother, Tenzin Fende
Dengkhim, of Massachusetts.
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