Doctor, 61, joins Navy to honor son - Bill Krissoff decides to enlist in the medical corps after his eldest child is killed in Iraq.
SAN DIEGO — When Marines came to his door a year ago to tell him that his eldest son had been killed in Iraq, Bill Krissoff reacted like any father: with confusion, devastation, then numbness.
Nathan Krissoff was so young, a lover of poetry, a champion athlete, a leader whose maturity and selflessness had impressed fellow Marines.
The father in Krissoff found no resolution to his grief. The physician in him did.
At an age when many people think about retirement, Krissoff decided earlier this year that he would enlist as a doctor. He was 60 years old, decades above the military's preferred demographic.
Still, with a medical degree from the University of Colorado and specialty training at San Francisco General Hospital and UC Davis, Krissoff seemed easily qualified for a reserve commission in the Navy medical corps, which tends to Marines.
Krissoff had a flourishing private practice in Truckee, Calif. After a lifetime of swimming, kayaking and skiing, he was lean and fit.
But his age was a sticking point. His application bogged down in the military bureaucracy. He thought things might be hopeless.
Then, in late August, Krissoff and his wife, Christine, were invited to meet with President Bush after his speech to the American Legion convention in Reno.
At the end of the hourlong meeting, Bush asked Krissoff and other relatives of service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan whether there was anything he could do for them. Krissoff mentioned his desire to enlist.
Karl Rove, then the president's top political advisor, took notes. Once back at the White House, he turned the matter over to Marine Gen. Peter Pace, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
A few days later, Krissoff got a call from Lt. Cmdr. Ken Hopkins, a Navy nurse now on medical recruiting duty. With a push from the top, Krissoff's enlistment application began to speed through the process of interviews and background checks.
"Suddenly, I got all the support I needed from the bureaucracy to get this done," Hopkins said.
On Nov. 17, Krissoff, now 61, was commissioned a lieutenant commander in the Navy reserves, assigned to the medical corps. Rove sent flowers and a note of congratulations.
Because of the need for doctors and other health professionals, the military offers reserve commissions to qualified applicants.
