Hoboken American Legion Holds Second Annual 'Ruck the River' for Afghan Allies

HOBOKEN, NJ - The 2024 ‘Ruck the River’, organized by Hoboken Legion Post 107 drew crowds to the waterfront on Saturday.

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Last year’s inaugural ‘Ruck the River’ charity event saw more than 150 people, many of whom were military veterans, participate in a two-mile ruck up and down the Hoboken waterfront to raise funds and awareness for America’s Afghan allies.

In military terms, a ruck is a “hump or forced march,” where gear is loaded into a backpack or ‘ruck’ and is carried over long distances.

Many of the participants were dressed in military attire and carried large rucksacks, weighing, in some cases, between 35-80lbs.

Last week, at Hoboken's City council meeting, Josh Lees, Coordinator of Ruck the River, reflected on the days after 9/11 and the early days of the war when American troops were quietly entering Afghanistan and their Afghan allies were working in collaboration with the CIA and the Special Operations Community to secure a land bridge which would allow supply support to enter for American troops.

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“For the actions that were to take place for us to be successful in those early days in Afghanistan, we had to rely on partners,” Lees said.

This year, among those participating in the march were members of Seton Hall Prep’s Veteran Service Club.

“I don’t have family who served, but even if I don’t, I still feel like I should do something,” Tyler Szala told TAPinto Hoboken.

Another member of the Veteran Service Club, Thomas Gagliano, had a grandfather who served in the Vietnam War and a great-grandfather who served in the Italian Army in World War 2 and said that by participating, he “feels like it’s a way of giving back to them for their service,”

The beneficiary of the event is Badger Six, a charity that provides humanitarian assistance to the families of the Afghan Cavalry who fought alongside CIA’s Team Alpha and the US Army’s Green Berets of ODA 595.

Lees told TAPinto Hoboken that the funds raised would go towards “bringing Afghan war soldiers from the earliest parts of the war after 9/11 to America because they can’t be in Afghanistan because they’re wanted by the Taliban.”

He added that the turnout of support “means a lot, and shows that people haven’t forgotten 9/11 and what happened after, and that’s really the goal.”

Neil O’Sullivan, a Jersey City Firefighter and longtime friend of Lees, said that “in the beginning, it was just to support a friend, but now it’s 50/50,” and the more he learns about the cause, the more he wants to support it.

“All of these fundraisers for Veterans, we should be doing all the time for our people, this should be our focus,” Kerry Thompson, who sponsors the Pike County Tunnel to Towers, which is a foundation that provides mortgage-free homes to Gold Star and fallen first responder families with young children and builds specially-adapted smart homes for catastrophically injured veterans and first responders, told TAPinto Hoboken.

Just before the ruck began, Lees addressed the crowd, among whom was Commander Bakir, who played an instrumental role in Afghanistan and whose son had been brought over to the United States recently.

"He finally just arrived after all these years, he was waiting in Pakistan and we had to wait and wait but he's finally here and he's safe and this is a huge win and hopefully there'll be plenty more to come in the same way he did,” Lees said.

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